As many readers are no doubt aware, securing rigorous and professional peer reviews for scholarly submissions to journals such as Critical Asian Studies is becoming increasingly challenging, in part because of the increase in the number of academic journals but also because of the continued growth in the number of scholars seeking publication. Double-blind peer review is the foundation of scholarly enquiry, as this insures anonymity for both writer and reviewer. Yet this also places a significant burden on scholars to devote (unpaid) time and effort to reading and evaluating the work of their (nameless) peers. To address this issue, the editors of Critical Asian Studies have chosen to use a staggered submission process.
This means that we ask authors interested in submitting a manuscript to first email a short abstract to us at: [email protected]. In addition, we ask that potential authors explain how the proposed manuscript reflects the aims and scope of Critical Asian Studies, which was established by the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars in 1967.Footnote1 Initial proposals are evaluated by relevant co-editors, who may then choose to ask authors to send the complete manuscript. This is subsequently reviewed internally to determine if it merits full peer review. If a manuscript is selected for peer review, authors are invited to submit. We have chosen this approach cognizant of the time constraints of peer reviewers while also aware of the needs of potential authors.
What we publish
We encourage proposals for research articles, commentaries, notes from the field, book review essays, works of fiction, and translations. Full-length research articles should range between 7000 and 15,000 words, while commentaries are shorter pieces aimed at a current topic of importance in the Asian region. Notes from the field, like commentaries, are aimed at generating discussion by raising questions and offering contingent findings. Book review essay proposals should examine at least two books in a comparative manner. Works of fiction, including poetry and song lyrics, are welcome, particularly in translation. Finally, “translations” are aimed at addressing the continued hegemony of the English language in academic publishing, including on Asian matters. We seek to provide a platform for scholars and others writing in indigenous languages and who may not have access to an international audience. We therefore invite proposals for topical essays on books and essays published in indigenous languages in the broad Asian region. Please send proposals for essays of this type to [email protected].
Asia in Africa: a call for papers
In recent years policymakers, political scientists, and other scholars have noted the growing presence of state aid, private investment, and informal emigration from the People's Republic of China (PRC) into Sub-Saharan Africa. Meanwhile, at the conclusion of the recent Sixth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) in Nairobi, leaders from Japan and approximately fifty African states adopted the Nairobi Declaration, which among other objectives includes a pledge of US$ 30 billion in infrastructural and other capital investments by the Japanese government and private sector in Africa between 2016 and 2018. This recent Asian “pivot” towards Africa has led to questions about intentions, unintended consequences, and potential outcomes. Lost in this conversation has been the historical presence of Asian diaspora communities in Africa.
For example, the South Asia diaspora in Sub-Saharan Africa dates to 1834, when British colonial authorities began to allow agents to import indentured laborers to Mauritius from the Indian subcontinent after slavery had been abolished in the British Empire. For more than a century after this, South Asian petty entrepreneurs had a significant role in the economies of British colonies throughout Africa, sparking resentment among indigenous groups and leading to reprisals after independence, most notably in Uganda, where in 1972 Idi Amin expelled the entire South Asian population. Nevertheless, today more than three million citizens of various African states are members of the South Asian diaspora. The Chinese diaspora in Africa has its origins in Chinese prisoners from Batavia (present day Jakarta) forcibly resettled by Dutch authorities in the Colony of Cape Town in the seventeenth century. Tens of thousands of Chinese laborers were later recruited by British authorities to work in the Wiwatersrand mines in South Africa in the first decade of the twentieth century. Later, during the Cold War era, the South African apartheid regime welcomed investment and immigrants from Taiwan and South Korea. During this same period, the PRC funded thousands of African students to study in China and also undertook various development projects on the continent, most notably the 1800 kilometer TAZARA rail line linking Zambia and Tanzania, built between 1970 and 1975 with the assistance of more than 50,000 Chinese engineers and workers. Since the collapse of the South African apartheid government in 1994 and the shift to a state capitalist economy in China, significant numbers of Chinese immigrants have settled in South Africa and neighboring states, with some estimates placing the total at more than one million.
Despite the historical depth of an Asian presence in Africa, relatively little research has been devoted to examining this diaspora. We invite proposals for papers that examine the theme of “Asia in Africa” from historical, economic, political, demographic, sociological, cultural, and ethnographic perspectives, thereby linking the past with the present. We seek papers that focus on class, gender, ethnic, structural, material, and related questions, both historical and contemporary, and that reflect the aims and scope of Critical Asian Studies.
Selected papers will be published in a special issue of Critical Asian Studies in 2017. If interested, please send an abstract of no more than two hundred words to: [email protected]
Notes
1. For detailed information about the aims and scope of CAS, please see: http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?show=aimsScope&journalCode=rcra20.