Cross-cultural Diplomacy Research Articles

CROSS-CULTURAL DIPLOMACY BETWEEN INDIA AND INDONESIA: ANALYZING INDIA’S ROLE IN SOUTH-EAST ASIA THROUGH SOFT-POWER POLITICS

The cross-cultural diplomacy is a new tandem in the arena of International Relation which has brought the nation-states all over the world to shift from traditional diplomatic negotiations to a naïve yet innovative approach of national interests. Softpower politics through cultural exchanges between India and Indonesia is historically a political statute. Both the states share a ‘Mosaic of Culture’, which indeed, facilitates India’s influence in South-East Asia. Present day, neo-liberalist agenda in International Relations has widened the scope for India, to be a socio-cultural influencer in Indonesia. However, India’s reach as a strategic partner in affairs related to South-East Asia is bleak compared to its immediate East Asian neighbors. India is struggling to be the first preference of the ASEAN nations, as a solid power of strategic influence. This paper shall explore, if soft-power politics can be gainful for India, in its visions towards South- East Asia, by understanding the dynamics of cross-cultural relations between India and Indonesia and its impact on India.

CURRENT TRENDS AND PERSPECTIVES IN TURKIC LANGUAGE EDUCATION IN SOUTH KOREA: FOCUSING ON THE KAZAKH LANGUAGE

This paper investigates the burgeoning field of Turkic language education in South Korea, highlighting its historical context, current landscape, and future prospects. As globalization and South Korea’s engagement with resource-rich Central Asia intensify, the significance of Turkic languages in fostering cultural understanding and promoting multiculturalism within Korea has become evident. This article explores the current landscape of Central Asian and Turkic language education in South Korea, focusing specifically on Kazakh language education. By analyzing existing programs, challenges faced by educators and learners, and potential areas for growth, this research aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of this developing field and its significance for Korea’s expanding soft power and cross-cultural diplomacy efforts. Despite the growing interest in Turkic language education, several obstacles hinder its expansion, including limited resources and the perceived difficulty of Turkic languages. To address these challenges, collaborations with Turkic-speaking countries are proposed, along with establishing a Central Asian cultural center in South Korea as a strategic move to promote Turkic language education, enhance cultural exchange, and strengthen Korea’s relationships with Central Asian nations. Such initiatives would foster reciprocity in cultural exchange, promote soft power for Kazakhstan, support Turkic language learning, and enhance Korea’s relations with Central Asian nations. While challenges exist, the prospects for Turkic language education in South Korea are promising.

An Interview with Joan-Pau Rubiés

Joan-Pau Rubiés is specialised in the study of cross-cultural encounters in the early modern world, from a perspective combining the contextual analysis of travel accounts and other ethnographic sources with the intellectual history of early modern Europe. Recent work has focused on the analysis of early modern ethnography and its intellectual impact in the period 1500-1800. This has involved developing various lines of research, including the history of travel, cross-cultural diplomacy, religious missions, early orientalism, race and racism, and the history of cosmopolitanism. In recent years, he has been working on the development a global comparative perspective on these various topics (encompassing both Asia and the New World) that might help interrogate critically the Eurocentric categories of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment.

New Diplomatic History and the Study of the Global Nineteenth Century

The cultural turn in diplomatic history and the rise of the field of new diplomatic history since the end of the twentieth century has not, to date, had a great impact on the study of the global nineteenth century. This article argues that bringing the methods and perspectives of new diplomatic history to bear on the study of the global nineteenth century is fruitful in at least five respects. First, it encourages multivocality by including informal diplomatic actors in the study of cross-cultural diplomacy and colonial encounters; second, it calls upon the historian to pay equal attention to the motives, perspectives, and worldviews of Europeans and non-Europeans; third, it pays attention to the conditions and circumstances, including violence, coercion, translation, place, ceremony, and gifts, of cross-cultural diplomacy and imperial expansion; fourth, it highlights the long-term character of imperial and diplomatic relations; and fifth, it broadens the range of available sources to include a wide range of textual and non-textual sources. In all of these respects, new diplomatic history can help historians of the global nineteenth century to overcome the traps of Eurocentrism and teleological and macrohistorical biases.

Making Sense of Central Asia in Pre-Petrine Russia

Abstract The existing historiography on liaisons between Russia and Central Asia in early modern period often tends to portray the cross-cultural diplomacy between the settings as an assemblage of sporadic, inefficient, clumsy encounters, full of diplomatic failures. Further to it, the dominant paradigm emphasizes cultural differences in the region, whereby any form of cross-cultural encounters was inevitably hampered by various confessional, religious and social borders. As a result, we tend to read every case of cross-cultural encounter between early modern Central Asia and Russia as a metaphor of cultural incommensurability. In the essay, I shall offer a close reading of two 17th-century Muscovite diplomatic missions to Central Asia as test cases with which to make sense of cultural encounters through the lens of individual actors. In doing so, I shall highlight the specific practices and strategies that allowed the diplomatic actors to play key roles as cultural mediators using their language skills, local knowledge and contact networks. In the broader sense, the essay set out to examine how can we problematize cross-cultural encounters between Central Asian principalities such as Khiva and Bukhara on the one hand, and Pre-Petrine Russia on the other: and to consider what we actually mean when we speak of early modern diplomacy in Central Eurasia.

Connecting Things: Trading Companies and Diplomatic Gift-Giving on the Gold and Slave Coasts in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries

Gift-giving was an important feature of cross-cultural diplomacy in the complex political landscape of the early modern Gold and Slave coasts. The article examines gift-giving practices that European trading companies used toward African rulers and elites, relating them to European courtly diplomacy. Tracing the repertoire of gift objects, it argues that the very function ascribed to gifts required learning about another’s rules, values, habits, or tastes. In consequence, a repertoire of gifts peculiar to the contact zone was established, consisting not least of objects adapted into local practices and production. These processes of adaptation were influenced by the materiality of the objects.

Alliances and Treaties between Frankish and Muslim Rulers in the Middle East: Cross-Cultural Diplomacy in the Period of the Crusades, by Michael A. Köhler, tr. Peter M. Holt (revised and edited by Konrad Hirschler)

Alliances and Treaties between Frankish and Muslim Rulers in the Middle East: Cross-Cultural Diplomacy in the Period of the Crusades, by Michael A. Köhler, tr. Peter M. Holt (revised and edited by Konrad Hirschler)

Material Mediators: Johan Maurits, Textiles, and the Art of Diplomatic Exchange

Although textiles were key facilitators in global diplomacy in the early modern period, there has been little scholarly consideration of the dynamic role they played in shaping diplomatic relationships during a time when textiles of all types from both east and west were circulating actively as wholesale commodities across world markets. This case study addresses this lacuna by examining the role that textiles, including linens, silks, and tapestries, played in mediating the inter- and intra-cultural diplomatic negotiations of Johan Maurits of Nassau-Siegen (1604-1679), the governor-general of Dutch Brazil from 1637 to 1644. As I argue, the production and dissemination of objects such as linens and especially the Old Indies tapestry series, based on designs made under Johan Maurits’s patronage, demonstrate how textiles, in their many forms and formats, were uniquely suited to negotiate the dynamic shifts that characterized cross-cultural diplomacy in the early modern period.

Muslim Missions to Early Modern France, c.1610-c.1780: Notes for a Social History of Cross-Cultural Diplomacy

This essay challenges traditional views on cross-cultural diplomacy by making the case for a social history of “Muslim” missions to early modern France. Calling for both a deeper understanding of the historical phenomenon and a broad reassessment of the research strategies at stake, it points to some hitherto unexplored issues, such as the lengthy duration of these missions, the many social interactions between Muslim envoys and French people, and the rather unspectacular nature of the “Oriental” presence even in inland regions of Europe distant from royal courts and capital cities. The essay stresses the necessity of taking a longer view of the presence and reception of foreign envoys, while also arguing against traditional court-centric perspectives in order to challenge the monolithic picture of cross-cultural exchanges as happening between two discrete cultural entities. Finally, advocating for a more fluid approach to these contacts and relations, it calls for a better understanding of the role of French royal interpreters in articulating figures and motifs of otherness.

Alliances and Treaties between Frankish and Muslim Rulers in the Middle East: Cross-Cultural Diplomacy in the Period of the Crusades (by Michael Köhler, transl. by Peter Holt)

<i>Alliances and Treaties between Frankish and Muslim Rulers in the Middle East: Cross-Cultural Diplomacy in the Period of the Crusades </i>(by Michael Köhler, transl. by Peter Holt)

Wayang Kulit Cirebon: Warisan Diplomasi Seni Budaya Nusantara

The wayang kulit (shadow puppet) theatre is a traditional art form that has thrived in Southeast Asia for a long time. In Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, apart from local stories, wayang kulit presents Indian epics, such as the Ramayana and Mahabharata, as a medium for Hindu-Buddhist teachings. When Islam spread in this region, the Javanese and Malay wayang kulit still kept developing, even when it was being repurposed for Islamic preaching. In its development in the Islamic era, the Javanese wayang kulit incorporated the role and influence of Sufi scholars and local rulers. The visual form, composition, and creation of the wayang kulit puppets along with the prose and musical arrangements were directly inspired by the Wali Sanga (Nine Apostles) and the following Javanese kings themselves. This paperng Kulit of Cirebonural Diplomacy of Nusantara ion in the pasteration, presents the historic wayang kulit of Cirebon and discusses its unique visual features, which reflect acculturation between ethnicities (Javanese, Chinese) as well as beliefs (local animism, Hindu-Buddhism, Islam). The historic wayang kulit of Cirebon proved that a peaceful, cross-cultural and religious diplomacy took place through the medium of art since the early stages of deployment of Islam in Java. This traditional art is a legacy for current and future younger generations, not only because of the aesthetical aspect, but also as a cross-cultural diplomacy strategy and philosophy that must be acknowledged, understood, and practiced. In accordance with the meaning of the word, ‘wayang’ (reflection) reflects a successful diplomacy of the past that can potentially be applied in the present, hoping harmonic relationships can emerge from cultural diversity in the midst of rapid globalization.

Trials of Nation Making: Liberalism, Race, and Ethnicity in the Andes, 1810-1910

Trials of Nation Making: Liberalism, Race, and Ethnicity in the Andes, 1810-1910