Hybrid Lecture: Tony Waters – “The Man from Bangkok: 'Rong Wongsavun describes the Americans"

7 July 2023, 2:00 pm, by AAI Webmaster

Photo: Wongdamloeng Wongsavun, cropped

We kindly invite you to this hybrid lecture on Friday, July 7, 2023, at 14:00–16:00 h (CEST/MESZ).

Topic: "The Man from Bangkok: 'Rong Wongsavun describes the Americans"

Lecturer: Prof. Dr. Tony Waters
Affiliation: Leuphana University, Lüneburg

Date/Time: 07.07.2023 (Friday), 14:00–16:00 h (CEST/MESZ).
Language: This hybrid lecture will be held in English.

Place: Universität Hamburg
             Asien-Afrika-Institut, room O-232
             Edmund-Siemers-Allee 1, Flügel Ost ("East Wing")
             20146 Hamburg

Zoom Link: https://uni-hamburg.zoom.us/j/64563521222?pwd=OEdSbENCOUV2Ynl5ZUdnNG5mM1pwQT09
Zoom Meeting-ID: 645 6352 1222
Zoom Passcode: hgtlecture

^{Photo: Wongdamloeng Wongsavun}

Topic:

'Rong Wongsavun was one of the most important Thai writers of the twentieth century. Between the 1950s and his passing in 2009 he wrote newspaper articles, published photographs, wrote novels and non-fiction books.

He had a particular talent for seeing Thailand and the world through the eyes of common people. He also took his journalistic eye to California in the 1960s to observe life in San Francisco, where he was a correspondent for the Siam Rath newspaper.

His observations of California were collected into a book On the Back of the Dog: The Golden Sunshine in 1978. The book was published in English last year as The Man from Bangkok: San Francisco Culture in the 60s. In this book he seeks to answer the question many Thai people of the 1970s were asking: “Why are the Americans the way they are?”

^{Photo: Tony Waters | White Lotus}

Lecturer:

^{Photo: Tony Waters}

Prof. Dr. Tony Waters is a Professor of Sociology. Currently he teaches at Leuphana University, Lüneburg, Germany. Previously he was at Payap University in Chiangmai (2016–2022), and California State University, Chico (1996–2021). Long before that he was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Phrae, Thailand (1980–1982), and worked in refugee camps in Nan and Phanat Nikhom (1982–1983). In order to work on his Thai language skills, he taught a Thai-English translation course at Payap University in 2016–2017. The translation from ‘Rong Wongsavun was initiated in the context of this course. His email is anthony.waters"AT"leuphana.de.

We thank the Hamburg Society for Thai Studies for the cooperation. 

All this information can also be found on our Instagram account and on our flyer.