The FRACA will have the honor of welcoming a prestigious guest on March 18. Edyta Roszko, a researcher in social anthropology and professor at the Chr. Michelsen Institute in Norway, will be joining us. She will present the results of her research, which will be published in an upcoming book entitled When Water Binds the World: Global Hydroconnectivities and Making of Planetary Histories. Come and listen to a true enthusiast, for whom Vietnam is a laboratory for reflection on the world and the planet.

Presentation title:

When Water Binds the World: Global Hydroconnectivities and Making of Planetary Histories

Presentation abstract:

Taking Vietnam as a ‘theoretical laboratory for the World’ (Salemink 2019), the talk addresses pressing questions at the intersection of Indigenous histories, planetary thinking, and water politics—issues that resonate deeply in the context of accelerating climate change and global water scarcity. Coastal and island communities in Vietnam and beyond are among the most vulnerable to rising sea levels, saltwater intrusion, and shifting hydrological regimes. Yet, dominant narratives of connectivity and global history continue to privilege oceans as abstract highways of trade, overlooking the socio-material infrastructures – such as freshwater wells or water reservoirs – that made mobility and survival possible. As climate change intensifies, understanding these entangled temporalities and hydrological practices is not only an academic exercise but a critical intervention. It compels us to rethink planetary futures through the lens of Indigenous epistemologies and material infrastructures that have long sustained mobility, exchange, and resilience.

Short biography:

Edyta Roszko is a Research Professor and social anthropologist at the Chr. Michelsen Institute and a Guest Professor in Global History and Human Rights at Lund University (2026–2028). Her expertise is rooted in East and Southeast Asia, yet marked by a global perspective and a theoretical commitment to understanding how societies navigate economic and climate precarity in an era of intensifying global interdependence.

Her broader intellectual interests bridge the conceptual divide between land and sea, examining oceans, mobility, migration, and ecological transformations – including climate change and sea‑level rise – through their deep historical and contemporary entanglements. She is the author of Fishers, Monks and Cadres: Navigating State, Religion and the South China Sea in Central Vietnam, published by the University of Hawai‘i Press. She is currently working on her second book, When Water Binds the World: Global Hydroconnectivities and the Making of Planetary Histories, which investigates the interplay between Holocene sea‑level fluctuations, Austronesian island settlement, and the contemporary climate crisis from an anthropological perspective.

Conversation about the book Voix de Terrain

As part of FRACA's 2025-2026 discussion cycle, the Chair invites you to a conversation about Voix de terrain, a collective work edited by Alexandre Pelletier, Chair holder. The book takes a behind-the-scenes look at fieldwork in the social sciences: investigating, questioning, dealing with ethics, emotions, and the constraints of the field.

An open discussion on what the field does to research—and to those who practice it.

We look forward to hearing from you!

FRACA is kicking off 2026 with a bang! On January 28, Solène Ferreira will honor us with a presentation analyzing the new Uniform Civil Code (UCC, 2025) legislation in Uttarakhand in light of the sociopolitical context in northern India. Come one, come all!

Presentation summary:

The entry into force of the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) in the state of Uttarakhand on January 27, 2025, is a first in India's post-independence legislative history. The BJP's latest election promise since the 1990s, this reform, which aims to standardize civil law for all religious communities, raises the issue of religious pluralism in a society as diverse as India. To what extent does this reform reconcile the goal of civil equality with respect for religious freedom and minority rights in India? What concerns have been raised by the requirement to register cohabiting relationships in terms of individual freedom and privacy? Through a legal analysis of the text of the law, this presentation examines how this standardization of civil law fits into the nationalist political discourse of national unity and social cohesion. It also examines the potential effects on the rights of religious minorities, historically governed by separate personal law regimes. Finally, this paper places the case of Uttarakhand in the broader context of contemporary political and religious transformations in northern India. 

Short biography:

Solène Ferreira is a doctoral student in anthropology at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris and in religious studies at the University of Quebec in Montreal. Her thesis focuses on the agricultural rituals of peasant communities in the Indian Himalayas in light of climate change and Hindu nationalism. She is communications manager at the Center for Studies and Research on India, South Asia, and its Diaspora, and a member of the Indo-Pacific Chair at Laval University.

Research interests: anthropology of religion, Hinduism, religion and politics studies, rural worlds and peasant societies, environmental transformations, agricultural policies

Nationalism and speculation in globalized India: an ethnography of the Pan-African e-Network

UQAM professor Vincent Duclos will present his recent book entitled Life at a Distance: Medicine and Nationalism in India's Pan-African e-Network. Based on ethnographic research, this book tells the story of the Pan-African e-Network, a vast digital network funded and implemented by the Indian government. According to the author, this project has fueled speculation about the future of medical markets, the nation, South-South relations, and even a new world order. Presented as “India's gift to the world” and “a shining example of South-South cooperation,” the Pan-African e-Network was an exceptionally ambitious project. Between 2009 and 2017, the network used satellite technology to connect hospitals across Africa to hospitals in India, providing remote medical training and healthcare to patients.

In this exceptional work, the author shows us how, by accelerating the flow of expertise between continents, the network also created connected enclaves, both commercial and infrastructural as well as medical. 

Speaker presentation:

Vincent Duclos is an associate professor at the University of Quebec in Montreal. His ethnographic research focuses on global capitalism, digital technologies, and medicine, as well as the multiple links between them. His areas of expertise are anthropology, the anthropology of algorithms, big data, communication and health, information infrastructure, global health, science, technology and society, and social digital technologies. 

Tibetan Print Press and Exile Community in India in the Early 1960s

À cette occasion, Natalia Mikhailova, chercheuse postdoctorale à l'Université Laval, nous présentera ses récents travaux sur la production médiatique en langue tibétaine en Inde et sur les documents de presse écrite pour la communauté tibétaine en exil.

Natalia Mikhailova est chercheuse postdoctorale à l'Université Laval, spécialisée dans les médias en langue tibétaine et leur rôle dans la formation du nationalisme tibétain moderne. Elle est titulaire d'une licence en philologie mongole et tibétaine (2012) de l'université d'État de Saint-Pétersbourg, d'une maîtrise en études chinoises (2014) de l'université de Nanjing et d'une maîtrise en politique et relations internationales des pays asiatiques (2015) de l'université d'État de Saint-Pétersbourg. En 2023, elle a soutenu sa thèse de doctorat à l'université d'État de Saint-Pétersbourg sur le lien entre la presse tibétaine ancienne et le développement du nationalisme tibétain moderne, intitulée « Construire le métarécit de l'indépendance dans le journal The Tibet Mirror dans les années 1950 et 1960 ».

Searching for the Messiah: Secrets of the Origins of a Hmong Revolt in Colonial Vietnam

On this occasion, Professor Jean Michaud will discuss the origins of one of the most significant Hmong revolts in the history of Indochinese colonialism.

Jean Michaud is a professor of social anthropology at Laval University, Canada, and specializes in the adaptation of societies in the highlands of Southeast Asia. He is the co-author of Frontier Livelihoods: Hmong in the Sino-Vietnamese Borderlands (U. of Washington Press, 2015) and The Historical Dictionary of the Peoples of the Southeast Asian Massif (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), as well as co-editor of Chasing Traces. History and Ethnography in the Uplands of Socialist Asia (U. of Hawai'i Press, 2024).

Conflictual collaboration: citizen movements and the governance of radioactive contamination after Fukushima.

Maxime Polleri is an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology. His main research has focused on the Fukushima nuclear disaster that occurred in Japan in 2011. He examines how different groups clash and collaborate to govern such a controversial issue as radiological risks and post-disaster recovery.

Opening of the First Student Workshop: Resilience and Governance in Asia

During the first session of the FRACA 2024-2025 student workshop, Paul Lutard opened the presentations with his study on resilience in forest harvesting in Vietnam, highlighting adaptation strategies in response to environmental challenges.

Next, Alexandre Lord and Théoxane Marchand explored the negative externalities related to China, focusing on the limits of regional control. Their analysis underscored the tensions between centralization and local autonomy.

These presentations sparked discussions by providing rich and nuanced perspectives on economic and environmental dynamics in Asia.

Paul Lutard : Résilience par la cueillette forestière : Réarrangement des moyens de subsistance dans un contexte autoritaire.

Alexandre Lord : Chine et externalités négatives : Les limites du contrôle régional (Research conducted with Théoxane Marchand).

This talk explores the strategy of “pinkblocking” in Malaysia, where LGBTQ repression is used to mobilize a conservative electorate under the guise of “Asian values” and growing Islamism. After the democratic transition in 2018, hopes for liberalization quickly gave way to an intensification of attacks on queer people. Unlike “pinkwashing,” which aims to appeal to Western allies, pinkblocking instrumentalizes queer repression as a tool for political legitimation.

Date: February 26,  2025

Time : 15h30

Emplacement : DKN-5128

Invitation to the Conference by Vineet Rathee

Vineet Rathee, Course Lecturer, Department of Anthropology, McGill University

Location: DKN-5128
Time: 3:30 PM

Scholarship Applications (expired)
12 scholarships of $500 each available
Application Deadline: October 31, 2024

For more information and the list of recipients, please visit the scholarships section.

FRACA invites you to a 5 à 7 as part of the workshop "Protest under Duress: Democratic Decline and Human Rights Activism in Asia."

Registered members who have confirmed their attendance will receive a complimentary drink.

Location: Pub Universitaire

Meeting with Professor Jacques Bertrand: Nationalism and sub-state mobilization in Southeast Asia

Nationalism is deeply rooted in Southeast Asia, but attempts by states to create homogenous nations have produced resistance. This presentation examines the rise and decline of substate nationalist mobilization in the face of state nationalism. Two factors favored these movements: the lack of inclusiveness of state nationalism and the use of authoritarian tools. However, states have reduced this mobilization by adapting their policies, partially recognizing the specificity of groups and offering regional autonomy. The presentation focuses on Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Myanmar.

Location: DKN-3470  
Time: 3:30 PM  

Meeting report

The first FRACA meeting set the stage for defining the ambitions of this collaboration and the expectations of its members.

Location: DKN-3470  
Time: 3:30 PM