Public Programming

Throughout the academic year, the Transnational Asia Initiative organizes conferences, talks, and panel discussions on topics of transnational and transregional importance through the following programming and series.

Transnational Asia Seminar Series
The Transnational Asia Seminar Series brings together scholars and students to explore the movements, connections, and shared challenges that shape Asia across borders. Highlighting transnational and transregional research, the series foregrounds questions of circulation, interconnectedness, and Asia’s evolving roles in global affairs, offering a space for rigorous and interdisciplinary dialogue.

Tsai Lecture Series
The Tsai Lecture Series is a flagship public program of the Harvard University Asia Center, established in 2000 through a generous endowment from Felix H. T. Tsai. It brings distinguished global figures from a wide range of fields—including academia, government, international organizations, business, architecture, journalism, law, humanitarian work, and the arts—to Harvard for public lectures that foster reflection and dialogue on Asia and its global presence. Together, these lectures create a platform for the exchange of ideas that shapes our understanding of Asia and its role in the global community.

Asia Beyond the Headlines Seminar Series
The Asia Beyond the Headlines Seminar Series, inagurated in the fall of 2017, focuses on contemporary issues that cut across Asia. The first seminar, titled "One Belt/One Road in Historical and Global Context," featured a discussion of China's Belt and Road Initiative in the context of similar programs that have changed human history worldwide. The series has covered important topics affecting the stability of not only Asian nations but the entire world from elections, and political protests to border conflicts, migration, and plight of refugees.

Asia Center Author Book Talk Series
The Asia Center Author Book Talk Series showcases authors of books recently published by the Asia Center Publications Program. Each talk may feature one single author or two or more authors who have written books on closely related topics. After presenting their research and discussing their books, authors will answer questions from the audience. The series was launched in Spring 2024. 

Science and Technology in Asia Seminar Series
This seminar series features talks on both historical and contemporary issues in science and technology in East, South, and Southeast Asia. The Science and Technology in Asia seminar series is convened by Victor Seow, John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences, Department of the History of Science, Harvard University, and is sponsored by the Harvard University Asia Center.

Asia Center Seminars
The Asia Center Seminar Series, previously called as the Modern Asia Seminar Series, is the longest-running series of the Asia Center. It was created to bring senior scholars, government officials, journalists, and other specialists to Harvard to speak on key issues from a regional perspective. Talks in the seminar series have covered topics such as community organizing in Japan and China, spatial planning in refugee camps in Southeast Asia, journalistic reporting on Asia, and on legacies of colonial rule and wartime memories in East Asia for UNESCO nominations.

Asia and Africa Programming
Over the past few years, the Asia Center has been dedicated to cultivating a robust platform to explore the historical, economic, and cultural synergies between Asia and Africa. From the geopolitical shifts of the Cold War to modern urban development in Nairobi, our programming highlights the complex "Third Way" pathways and collaborative futures emerging across the Global South.

Conferences
The Asia Center’s conferences bring together scholars, practitioners, and policymakers—from Harvard and around the world—to explore transregional themes related to Asia.