Pacific Science Association

Announcements

I. Call for Symposia for 22nd Pacific Science Congress

The call for sessions for the 22nd Pacific Science Congress continues.

If you would like to propose a session, please address the requested information below, and email to: Mr. Nasaruddin Rahman (nasa@akademisains.gov.my). The deadline for submitting session proposals will be posted on the official Congress website (www.22ndpsc.net) and on the PSA website (www.pacificscience.org).

Proposers should prepare a one-page summary of their proposed session that includes the following:

1. a. Specify symposia or workshop topic.

2. b. Provide a title of proposed session.

3. c. Provide the objectives of the proposed session.

4. d. Provide the names and contact information for committed conveners (symposia) or leaders (workshops). Note that it is highly recommended that at least 2 leaders (or a convener and co-convener) be committed for each symposia/workshop, and that they be from different countries. We also encourage cross-disciplinary session ideas, although this is not required.

5. e. Provide a proposed list of session speakers and potential paper titles.

6. f. A one paragraph justification and brief description of the symposia or workshop.

7. g. Time requested. Specify the amount of time needed for the symposia or workshop.

8. h. Name, affiliation, and tentative title for each invited speaker. Each presenting author must register and pay registration fees (by date in 2011 to be determined).

9. i. Anticipated outcomes of the symposia or workshop. Please provide a short description of anticipated outcomes from the proposed symposia or workshop. Note that symposia are expected to produce publishable proceedings, and workshops to produce publishable summaries or recommendations.

II. Philippines Rejoins PSA

PSA is very pleased to announce that the Philippines has announced their intention to rejoin the Pacific Science Association. There is a long history of association between the Philippines and PSA dating back seventy years, including very active Philippine involvement in several Pacific Science Congresses and Inter-Congresses, but budgetary issues and changes in the national institutional landscape in the early 1990s resulted in the National Research Council of the Philippines (NRCP)—the country’s Adhering Organization to PSA—to temporarily seek Observer Status.

In June 2010, PSA Vice President Dr. Nancy Lewis met with Dr. Alvin B. Culaba, President of NRCP, Dr. Zenaida G. Sadiwa, NRCP Governing Board’s Corporate Secretary, Dr. Napoleon P. Hernandez, NRCP Executive Director, and Mr. Salvador G. Tan, NRCP Chief of Research Management and Development Division. NRCP became the Philippines’ member organization to PSA in 1940. NRCP co-sponsored the 8th Pacific Science Congress on 16–28 November 1953 in Quezon City and hosted the 5th Pacific Science Inter-Congress on 3–7 February 1985 in Manila.

At the 11th Pacific Science Inter-Congress in Tahiti in March 2008, the Pacific Science Council expressed its strong desire to re-engage Philippines, both as a long-term partner as well as in the short to medium term in the session planning for the 2011 Congress in Kuala Lumpur in June 2011. The historical ties between PSA and NRCP are indeed long and illustrious, and so it is with great pleasure that we announce NRCP’s intention to renew its membership. We hope this re-engagement will serve as a catalyst for robust participation by Philippine scientists at the 2011 Congress.

III. New U.S. National Committee to PSA

The U.S. National Academy of Sciences has recruited new members to the U.S. National Committee to the Pacific Science Association (USNC-PSA).

The Chair of the USNC-PSA is Dr. Aihwa Ong, Professor of Social Cultural Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Ong grew up in Malaysia and received her Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1982. She joined UC Berkeley in 1984 and is currently Head of the Socio-cultural House in the Department of Anthropology at UC-Berkeley. Her professional focus deals with the particular entanglements of politics, technology, and culture in rapidly changing societies on the Asia Pacific rim. Her writings on Muslim factory women, diasporic Chinese, graduated sovereignty and Cambodian refugees helped configure an anthropology of globalization. Her works Spirits of Resistance and Capitalist Discipline (1987), Flexible Citizenship (1999), and Buddha is...