Camden Conference Season Kick-Off

It is in many ways the defining issue of our times: The Challenges of Asia. And it's the theme of the 2011 Camden Conference, featuring talks by opinion leaders from around the US and Asia itself on a range of economic, environmental, foreign policy and cultural topics dealing with China, India, Japan and other regional powers -- as well as the US response to those challenges and opportunities.

The Camden Conference isn't just about three days in February, however. It's a community supported by its members, and it's an entire season of community events on an even broader array of related issues. Most of those events are free of charge and take place in libraries and community centers across Midcoast Maine, from Ellsworth and MDI to Damariscotta.

This autumn and winter season of community events will kick off with a talk by University of Maine professor and Camden Conference board member Paul Holman on The Kremlin in Asia, on Sep. 14 at the Belfast Free Library and again on Oct. 12 at the Camden Public Library, both from 6:30-8 pm and both free of charge.

Before the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russians and Americans saw each other as bitter enemies in a global struggle for power. Now both are locked in protracted struggles against Muslim insurgents and have suffered terrorist attacks in their capital cities. Holman will argue that the US cannot achieve its own objectives in Afghanistan or the rest of Asia without understanding and taking account of Russia's national interests in the region.

Cultural anthropologist Steven Huyler, who settled in Camden after 39 years of field research on India, will follow up with a talk on Re-envisioning the Identity of Women in Contemporary India on Sep. 23 at 6:30 pm at the Camden Public Library. The 21st Century reality is often very different from the preconceived notions many Westerners have about the roles and identity of Indian women, as Huyler discovered in thousands of interviews with women throughout that rapidly changing country.

Rather than the victims of ancient, tradition-bound cultures that we often imagine, many women in today's India exhibit self-initiative and determination to better themselves and their families. Fresh back from a book tour of India in 2009 in which he met with many Indian feminists, Huyler will discuss some of his new insights. The talk is free.

On Nov. 11, the Camden Conference is co-hosting with the Farnsworth Museum what promises to be a highly popular talk on The Art of Asia and Africa by Farnsworth Director of Education Roger Dell. Bronze gods and goddesses of Gupta India, towering landscape paintings of Sung China, lopsided tea cups from Muromachi Japan, and 75 lb wooden masks from West Africa will all be discussed in the context of those cultures' own unique ideas about beauty.

Dell has been the director of education at the Honolulu Academy of Arts, Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art and Fitchburg Art Museum and has taught at Hofstra University, the University of Hawaii and the University of Vermont. He is currently an instructor in the Museum Studies Program at the Harvard Extension School and at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. His talk will be at 5:50 pm at the Strand Theatre in Rockland. For reservation call the Farnsworth, 596.0949.

This is just a taste of the many community events the conference will be sponsoring over the next six months, in the run-up to the annual conference: The Challenges of Asia, Feb. 18-20, 2011. That conference will be welcoming back last year's moderator, Nicholas Burns. The third-ranking official in the State Dept. from 2005-08 and now a professor of diplomacy and international politics at the Harvard Kennedy School, Burns' insights and repartee with the speakers made him a favorite with many in the audience at last year's conference.

For more information or to become a member visit our website or call 207.236.1034.