Conferences

Remembering Tiananmen
20th Anniversary Symposium
with keynote speech by Wang Dan, dissident and student leader

Monday, June 1, 1pm to 6pm
Hardin Hall, Rebecca Crown Center, 633 Clark St., Evanston

In 1989, the Chinese Communist regime mobilized over 300,000 troops to decisively crush hundreds of thousands of demonstrators who congregated in the center of the capital city Beijing, Tiananmen Square. Estimates of casualties range from a few hundred to a few thousand. In the official discourse in China, however, this traumatic event is rarely mentioned. Even when it is, it is obliquely referred to as the "Tiananmen event" or "disturbance in 1989." The massacre continues to be a symbol of a tragically missed democratic path. It also remains an important frame for the Sino-U.S. relationship and for discussions on human rights and institutional reform in China.

Wang Dan was a key student leader of the 1989 student movement in Tiananmen Square. He was one of the founders of and the leader of the United Conference of Beijing Area University Students, which coordinated much of the protest activities in Beijing. Toward the latter stage of the protest, he was a leader of the Headquarters of Defending the Tiananmen Square. After the crackdown on June 4th, Wang Dan did not leave China, but instead went into hiding. He was discovered by the authorities in 1990 and was in and out of jail until 1997, when he was released on medical parole to the United States. Since then, he has received a PhD in East Asian history from Harvard University and is currently a post-doctoral fellow at Oxford University. He continues to work toward political change in China by serving as the chairman of the Chinese Constitutional Reform Association and the editor of Beijing Spring magazine.

The Symposium is organized by Northwestern's Roberta Buffett Center for International and Comparative Studies and is co-sponsored by Northwestern's Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities, Program of Asian and Middle East Studies, Asian Studies Cluster, Center for Historical Studies, and University Library.

1pm - 2pm
Wang Dan Keynote Speech and Q&A

2:20pm - 3:40pm
Panel I:  Evolving Memories of the Tiananmen Protests
Peter Carroll, History
Wang Dan
Ed Friedman, Political Science, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Stefan Henning, Anthropology and Sociology
Melissa Macauley, History

4:00pm - 5:20pm
Panel II:  Tiananmen and Policies of Regime Survival
Wang Dan
Stephen Halsey, Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities
Stefan Henning
Victor Shih, Political Science
Dingxing Zhao, Sociology, University of Chicago

5:30pm   Reception

RELATED EVENTS

The Northwestern University Library will commemorate events through an exhibit of books and photographs as well as the showing of four films over two days.

EXHIBIT: Remembering Tiananmen Square 1989
June 1 - June 30, 2009
Main Library (1st floor)
1970 Campus Dr., Evanston, IL

FILMS
Films will be shown in the Forum Room, Main Library (2nd floor)
1970 Campus Dr., Evanston, IL

The Gate of Heavenly Peace
June 1, 8:45am - 12:00pm

The Tank Man
June 4, 1pm - 2:30pm

Tragedy at Tiananmen: the Untold Story
June 4, 2:45pm - 3:45pm

Summer Palace
June 4, 4pm - 6:30pm