KEYNOTE SPEAKERS FROM ABROAD

Ayu Utami is one of the most prominent representatives of a new generation of Indonesian writers, who, even before the end of the Suharto regime, were already openly addressing the social and cultural conflicts of the island state, and who today assist the transition to a robust democracy through their activism. Ayu began publishing reports and essays in various newspapers as a student and later, as co-founder of a union of freelance journalists declared illegal by the government, was banned from journalism. But she continued her journalistic work underground, which included the anonymous publication of a black book on corruption in the Suharto regime. With her debut novel “Saman” (1998) Ayu Utami achieved more than just her breakthrough as a writer. In 2000 Ayu Utami received the renowned Prins Claus Prijs from the Dutch government.

Poet and translator, Aazam was trained in philology and got master’s degree in business administration. He has more 10 poetry and translation books to his credit. These include translations from English, Indian and French poetry. Aazam has participated in the International Writing Program [USA] and has delivered papers in Leipzig. Aazam lives with his wife, journalist Nodira Abdullaeva and his three sons in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. 

 Regarded as an international authority on city futures and the use of culture in city, Charles Landry is the founder, Comedia, an organization based in UK that looks at how cities communicate their ambitions to their citizens and the wider world and how in turn citizens can more actively shape their urban future. A world-leading expert in urban renewal and development.

Dubbed Walt Whitman's sister-in-spirit, Fahmida Riaz is a noted Pakistani feminist and poet. She is the author of the highly acclaimed novella, Godaavari. Her most recent work is a volume of short stories, Khatt-e Marmuz. Ashe received Pakistan's Al-Muftah Award this year.

Novelist, short story writer, poet, literary critic and essayist Gunadasa Amarasekara is considered one of the founding fathers of modern Sinhalese literature. He is also considered one of its more controversial writers. Amarasekara revolutionized Sinhalese poetry with a new poetic form evolved from Sri Lanka's folk poetry. In the early fifties, his short story Soma was selected to represent Ceylon in a world short story competition organized by the New York Herald Tribune. By the mid 1950s he was a leader of the new Peradeniya School of Poets. Increasingly rejecting foreign literary influences, he developed a distinct Sinhalese short story form. In the mid-1970s, he ventured into a field of social, cultural and political criticism and continues in his role of social activist and commentator. He continues to practice as a dental surgeon.

Hassan Daoud worked in Beirut as a journalist during the civil war. He has worked as a correspondent for eleven years for the international Arab newspaper “Al-Hayat” which is published in London, writing on social themes, as well as on art and cultural. At present he is the chief editor of “Nawafez” the cultural supplement of the Beirut daily paper “Al-Mustaqbal Daily”. As writer, he has so far published two volumes of short stories and four novels. His first novel, “Binâyat Mathilde” brings to life the social microcosm of Muslim and Christian tenants who offer shelter to a nameless refugee. Hassan Daoud, who himself grew up in a house in which Muslims, Druzes and Christians, as well as immigrants from Russia and Armenia, all lived together, makes strikingly apparent the background for the disturbance in Lebanese society through the changes in the daily lives of the tenants. Hassan Daoud’s most recent novel, “Makiage khafif lihazihi Allailah” (t: A mild makeup for tonight), appeared in 2003. Daoud lives in Beirut.

Indira Viswanathan Peterson is David B. Truman Professor of Asian Studies in the Asian Studies Program at Mount Holyoke College, U.S.A., where she has taught since 1982.  Earlier she was Professor of Sanskrit and Indian Studies at Columbia University. She has been the recipient of numerous fellowships, including the German government’s Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship at Heidelberg University, the National Endowment of Humanities and the American Institute of Indian Studies Fellowships. Indira specializes in Indian literature in Sanskrit and Tamil, Hinduism, South Indian cultural history and the history of South Indian (Carnatic) classical music. Her publications include: Poems to Siva: The Hymns of the Tamil Saints (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989; Motilal Banarsidass, 1990); and Design and Rhetoric in a Sanskrit Court Epic: The Kiratarjuniya of Bharavi  (State University of New York Press, 2003). She is editor of Indian literature (500 B.C. to the present) in the Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces. Her recent research is related to cultural production in 18th & 19th century Tanjavur and Tamilnadu. 

Jabbar Yassin Hussin grew up in a politically left-wing environment. In 1968, after the Ba’ath Party took over power in 1968 (with Saddam Hussein as head of the ministry for state security), he joined the Communist Party. He was 14. He was arrested and tortured several times while still at school because of his political activities, which included holding the chair of the young communists of Baghdad. He withdrew his membership in 1973, when the Communist Party was taken over by the Ba’ath Party. From then on he was under constant observation by Saddam Hussein’s regime. He was a student at the University of Baghdad and worked as a journalist for a short period but was not allowed to continue either his studies or his journalistic work. Instead, he wrote novellas, short stories and fairy stories for children. In 1976 he was threatened with further arrest, and had to flee the country for France. There, together with others in exile he founded the magazine “Aswat” (t: The Voice), a publication which took a critical stance on Saddam Hussein. He lived near La Rochelle in France since 1992. After 27 years in French exile, Jabbar Yassin Hussin returned to Baghdad in May 2003.

 Joop de Wit has a PhD degree in Anthropology (Dr). Dissertation title: Poverty, Policy and Politics in Madras Slums; Dynamics of Survival, Gender and Leadership. Senior Lecturer Public Policy and Development Management with the department of Public Policy and Administration (PPA) at the ISS, The Hague, he has been involved in training and leadership enhancement programmes across Asia. His interests are good urban governance, urban poverty alleviation,  civil engagement and diversity issues.

KANAK MANI DIXIT is one of the most senior and respected journalists working in Southasia today. He is editor of the Nepal-based Himal, the Southasian magazine.

One of the best know poets of Pakistan, Kishwar Naheed has to her credit, more than 10 collections of poetry, two anthologies of English translations of poetry published in India, 16 collections of children's stories. A researcher in the social sector, she has been one of Pakistan’s finest writers of fiction over the last fifty years.  Honours she has received include the Adamjee Award for Literature, the UNESCO Prize for Children's Literature, Best Translation award of Columbia University, Women of Year nominated by America, and the Mandela Award by South Africa

Foremost writer of South Korea, for a half a century Lee Ho-Chul has devoted himself to Korean literature: he has written literature, and he has lived it. His achievement was honoured in 1992, when he received the highest award given to artists in South Korea, appointment to the National Academy of Arts. Lee Ho-Chul received both the Daesan Literature Prize and the National Academy of Arts Prize for his 1996 Southerners, Northerners. Translated into Polish, Japanese, German, French and Chinese, his works have been warmly received by a global readership.

Les Murray is Australia's leading poet and one of the greatest contemporary poets writing in English. His work has been published in ten languages. He has won many literary awards, including the Grace Leven Prize (1980 and 1990), the Petrarch Prize (1995), and the prestigious TS Eliot Award (1996). In 1999 he was awarded the Queens Gold Medal for Poetry on the recommendation of Ted Hughes. His life and childhood in a dairy farm on the North Coast of New South Wales and his homecoming has been the subject of several of his poems, though he also writes on a range of subjects including religion and politics.  

Ma Yuan is regarded as the most important pioneer of modern Chinese avantgarde literature. His stories about Tibetan culture, religion and mysticism, which he wrote during his residence there between 1984 and 1989, are among the most influential works of the new literary movement of the time. After Ma all the taboos on fiction writing disappeared, and the search for an idiosyncratic style became the writer’s legitimate pursuit. Since 2000 he has taught Classical Literature and Creative Writing at Tongji University in Shanghai. His two volumes of essays, “Xuguo Zhi Dao” (1997; t: The knife of fabrication) and “Yuedu Dashi” (t: Reading the masters), offer an overview of his appreciation of literature and his approach towards Creative Writing. Ma Yuan lives in Shanghai.

Professor Mona Baker has  been a professional translator for over 20 years, involved in training translators at major universities in UK. Her first book-length publication, In Other Words (1992, reprinted six times), was intended specifically to provide a model for training translators in a coherent and systematic way. It has since been adopted as a standard textbook in many parts of the world.  She has just finished the book she’s been writing for the past year, “Translation and Conflict: A Narrative Account.” It is to be published by Rutledge She serves as Professor of Translation Studies . Centre for Translation & Intercultural Studies School of Modern Languages. The University of Manchester . UK

A native Iranian and a German citizen, Kermani, a leading writer of fiction, he has made a name for himself as an author, essayist and literary critic, is considered one of Germany’s leading scholars on Islam. He is at once an expert on, and critic of, the Islamic world and one of its most important mediators. Also he has made a name for himself as an author, essayist and literary critic. His dissertation, an extensive analysis of the reception of the Koran, which he completed in 1997, was awarded the Ernst-Bloch-Förderpreis in 2000 and has already been reprinted in several editions. His book entitled “Iran. Die Revolution der Kinder” is the product of reports and essays which he published on the country as a writer for the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” from 1995 onwards. In 2001 Kermani wrote “Ein Leben mit dem Islam” (t: A life with Islam), which is acclaimed for its sensitive treatment of a delicate subject. In 2003, he returned to Cologne, where he lives as a freelance writer with his wife and daughter. His latest book, “40 Leben” (2004; t: 40 Lives), was published this year and explores the mysticism of everyday life in 40 narratives.

An eminent poet of contemporary Bangladesh, his first book of poems was published in 1970. Since then he has published forty-five collections of poetry and twenty collections of prose. Goon belongs to the generation of writers that emerged in the 1960s, a period marked by the sudden growth of a neo-rich class alongside stark poverty. The contradictions and conflicts of the period influenced Goon and fellow writers. His themes address an urge to overcome restrictions and break down the barriers dividing human beings. Love of freedom and faith in the human spirit underlie many of his poems. Among many other awards, Goon has won the prestigious Bangla Academy prize (1982) and Ekushey Padak (2001). He represented Bangladesh in the XI Afro-Asian Writers' Union Conference in Ho Chi Minh City in 1982, Bangladesh Festival in London in 1999, and the SAARC Writers Conference in Delhi in 2000.

One of the most important women writers of Bangladesh, Selina has published twenty-one novels, seven collections of short stories, four collections of prose writings and four collections of stories for children. Her works are a moving account of the contemporary social and political crises and conflicts as well as the recurrent cycles of the life of struggle and poverty. Quite a few of her novels have been translated into Indian regional languages and into French, Russian and English. Hossain is the winner of Bangla Academy award, 1980 and Alaol Purashkar, 1981 among many others. In 1994-95 she won a Ford Foundation Fellowship for her novel, Gayatri Sandhya. Selina Hossain is currently serving in the position of Director of the Bangla Academy in Dhaka.

Tibetan poet, writer and activist Tenzin is deeply involved in the freedom struggle of his country. "As a Tibetan and as a person born a refugee, I have always felt that my final destination is Tibet. I have been working for Tibet all my life and will keep on doing so." A restless young Tibetan, he braved snowstorms and treacherous mountains, broke all rules and restrictions, crossed the Himalayas on foot and went into forbidden Tibet! The purpose? To see the situation under Chinese occupation for himself and find out if he could lend a hand or two in the freedom struggle. He was arrested by the Chinese border police, and after cooling his feet in prison in Lhasa for three months, was finally pushed back to India. His volume of poems, “Crossing The Border” was published with the money begged and borrowed from his classmates while studying in Mumbai. His literary skills won him the first-ever 'Outlook-Picador Award for Non-Fiction' in 2001. His writings have been published in International PEN, The Indian PEN, The Indian Literary Panorama, The Little Magazine, Outlook, The Times of India, The Indian Express, Hindustan Times, Better Photography, The Sunday Observer, Mid-Day (Mumbai), Afternoon (Mumbai), Tibetan Review, Tibetan Bulletin, Freedom First and Gandhi Marg. Tenzin Tsundue joined Friends of Tibet (INDIA) in 1999 and serves as its General Secretary.

Jewish poet, filmmaker and short story writer. Tissa Abeysekara, is also a long established screenwriter, director and producer. He has a propensity to see narration in visual terms and often uses his story to map the changes in the suburban geography of Sri Lanka. In mid-life he wrote his first novella or memoir about a disappearing moment from his childhood of which Michael Ondaatje says, “When I first read Bringing Tony Home three years ago, it felt as if I had come across a book from my childhood, one I already knew well. The book had the delicious sad sense of being a solitary in the world, with a thousand intricacies between you and your closest neighbour or relative. Ondaatje goes on to say about the book, ““Funny and tender. Dangerous. Unfair. And, of course, it is one of the saddest stories. What is wonderful is the way Abeysekara can make a whole era hang on a single strand of memory.”

Writer, poet and a civil servant by profession, Tshering Dorji is currently working on the biography of a Bhutanese Lama as well as some contemporary short stories and poems. He has also conducted extensive research on the cultural and social life of Bhutan and co-authored a book on the same called Living the Bhutanese way.

 XU XI ranks as one of Hong Kong’s foremost contemporary English language novelists. The Far Eastern Economic Review hailed the appearance of her first novel, Chinese Walls, "a welcome new voice in the field of Asian fiction writers." "Not the typical Hong Kong writer," Asiaweek noted, "and speaks with more authority because of it." In 1996, Asiaweek named her fiction collection Daughters of Hui, one of the top ten "best books" of the year. A native of Hong Kong from a Chinese-Indonesian family, she has been a resident of that city, intermittently, for some thirty years. After some 18 years in international marketing and management, she quit the corporate world to write, and live, full time. She now inhabits the flight path connecting New York, Hong Kong and New Zealand.

 Zaheda Hina, a celebrated Karachi-based fiction writer and columnist. She has been felicitated with the Faiz Award , Sagar Siddique Award and the Satoor Award  for her writing.

Illustrator, Winner of the grand prize in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, co-Winner of the grand prize in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Runner-up in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Runner-up in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Runner-up in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Honorable Mention in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Honorable Mention in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Illustrator, Honorable Mention in the international search for excellence in illustrating and writing for children, the Katha Chitrakala contest

Research Associate and Cultural Advisor Kanoon, the Institute of the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults She is also an APPREB correspondent

A lawyer who represents the younger breed of politicians, his vision of India is that of a country rid of, poverty and illiteracy, and where the legal system, to which he owes special allegiance, is fast, fair and to the satisfaction of all. Besides a politician, Singhvi also briefly taught Constitutional Law at the Cambridge University in UK. 

Former Ambassador to the United States of America, Abid Hussain is the President of Katha and is involved with several important Indian institutions and NGO’s as well as international initiatives. 

A well-known writer of fiction, Ajeet Cour has more recently emerged as a crusader for women's issues in perceptive columns displaying a courage of conviction. Winner of many awards, she is chairperson, Academy of Fine Arts and Literature, New Delhi and has spearheaded an initiative to bring Southasian literature in a big way to India.

A young talent of the 7th generation in an unbroken chain of the Senia Bangash School, Amaan Ali Bangash is a youth icon and the elder son and disciple of the sarod maestro Amjad Ali Khan and grandson of the Haafiz Ali Khan. Awards and accolades came his way early in life.

One of the foremost sarod players in India, Ustad Amjad Ali Khan has carved a niche for himself in the Hall of Fame of Indian classical music. He offers his audience a rare aesthetic experience with his creative imagination, consummate artistry and an imposing stage presence. Ustad Amjad Ali Khan belongs to an illustrious family of musicians and is the recipient of several honours including Scrod Samrat, UNESCO Award, Padmashri, Kala Ratna, Sangeet Natak Academy Award, Tansen Award and Padma Bhushan.

A former Indian police service officer of Joint Commissioner rank with the Delhi Police, Amod Kanth is the founder of Prayas, an NGO that works amongst poor and neglected children. 

Poet and translator, Anamika also teaches at the University of Delhi. 

Legendry writer, UR Ananthamurthy is a distinguished teacher and scholar and recipient of the prestigious Jnanpith Award, India’s highest literary honour. 

Teaches at Delhi University.

Teaches at the department of Education, University of Delhi

Poet, author and playwright, Anju Makhija is a media trained expert who has worked in the fields of education, training and television. Her literary work includes poetry, plays and television scripts  She has also co-translated Freedom and Fissures – An anthology of poetry about partition. She has won many awards including the BBC world poetry competition.

Based in New Delhi, Anupama Srinivasan is a freelance filmmaker who specialized in Film Direction from the Film & Television Institute (FTII), Pune. She is also a keen photographer and has held two widely acclaimed solo shows of her photographs. 

Legal expert 

One of the foremost contemporary Indian painters, Arpana Caur is the recipient of numerous awards, her work has been widely exhibited in India and abroad and is in private and public collections in leading galleries and museums in Asia, Europe and the USA. In 2003 she held an exhibition of her paintings entirely devoted to Guru Nanak.

A teacher of long standing, she was principal of Janaki Devi Mahavidyalaya before she turned writer and translator. 

President & Founder editor of Cinemaya –The Asian Film Quarterly, Aruna Vasudev has had an eventful career ever since she began some 45 years ago. She has lived and breathed cinema since she edited her first film as a rookie filmmaker in a New York film school back in the ‘60s. Returning to India, she converted her passion into conceptualizing Cinemaya’s First Asian Film Festival that has now become an important annual feature not just in India but globally for film buffs.  

A poet, critic and translator, Asad Zaidi has received the Sanskriti Award for his contribution to Hindi literature.  Editor of about half-a-dozen anthologies of poetry, fiction and criticism, he has also translated the works of several European, Latin American and Classical Chinese poetry into Hindi and Urdu.   

Eminent political psychologist and sociologist, Ashis Nandy has worked on cultures of knowledge, visions, and dialogue of civilizations. At present he is Senior Fellow and Director of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies and Chairperson of the Committee for Cultural Choices and Global Futures, both located in Delhi. Nandy has co-authored a number of human rights reports and is active in movements for peace, alternative sciences and technologies, and cultural survival.