Colloquium with Professor Charnvit Kasetsiri, Department of History, Thammasat University

Tuesday, November 6, 2012
1:00 PM - 2:30 PM
10383 Bunche Hall
UCLA Campus
Los Angeles, CA 90095

In this presentation Professor Charnvit Kasetsiri will briefly explore conflicts between Cambodia and Thailand, clashes of their brands of nationalism, and the question of war and peace. Citing the example of the July 2008 registration by UNESCO of the Preah Vihear temple as a World Heritage site belonging to Cambodia, Prof. Charnvit pointed out that history had been distorted for Thailand’s domestic politics. He will propose to set up an ASEAN Eco-Cultural Trans-Boundary World Heritage site was designed to foster close cooperation and collaboration at the Temple site.

Charnvit Kasetsiri is a prominent historian and Thai Studies scholar. He is Professor Emeritus at Thammasat University, Bangkok, Thailand. After obtaining his bachelor’s degree in Diplomacy with Honor from Thammasat, 1963, he pursued his 1967 M .A. in Diplomacy and World Affairs at Occidental College, Los Angeles, California, under a Rockefeller scholarship, and his 1972 Ph.D. in Southeast Asian History at Cornell University. His thesis, The Rise of Ayudhya and a History of Siam in the 14th and 15th Centuries, was published by Oxford in Asia, 1972. He served as Lecturer of History at Thammasat from 1973-2001 and founded, in 2000, the Southeast Asian Studies Program. He was the President of Thammasat University in 1995-96. He has written approximately 200 articles and a number of publications on Thai and Southeast Asian History. He has launched a ‘Siam not Thailand’ campaign to rename the country as to reflect the reality about its ethnics, languages and cultural identities. His latest works deal with questions of war and peace and good ASEAN neighbor relations, especially between Thailand and Cambodia.

Cost : Free and open to the public.

www.international.ucla.edu/cseas/

Sponsor(s): Center for Southeast Asian Studies