Professor Kenneth George
Research interests
Visual and material culture; ethnography of lifeworlds and everyday life; anthropology of ethics; cultural politics; religion; violence; art; language; narrative; folklore.
Pragmatism; phenomenology; social theory; art history.
Island Southeast Asia; South Asia
Biography
Ken joined the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific in 2013 as Professor of Anthropology and Director of the School of Culture, History and Language, having served previously at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Harvard University and the University of Oregon. He is a specialist on Southeast Asia and a Past Editor of the Journal of Asian Studies (2005-2008). His ethnographic research in Indonesia has focused on the cultural politics of minority ancestral religions (1982-1992), and more recently (1994-2008), on a long-term collaboration with painter A. D. Pirous, exploring the aesthetic, ethical, and political ambitions shaping Islamic art and art publics in that country. Ken has been the recipient of major postdoctoral fieldwork fellowships from the Social Science Research Council, the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, and the Aga Khan Trust for Culture. His fellowships for writing and study include awards from the National Endowment of the Humanities, the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, and the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. His current research projects are two: The first looks at the production of “companionable objects and “companionable conscience” in an effort to link artworks to ethics, affect, language, and public culture. Another involves a comparative look at early postcolonial artists in Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, and India, and aims at theoretical and disciplinary issues surrounding public culture and the anthropology of art and visual culture.
Publications
- George, K 2016, 'No Ethics without Things', Journal of Religious Ethics, vol. 44, no. 1, pp. 51-67.
- George, K 2015, 'A. D. Pirous', in David Williams (ed.), Making Connections: Southeast Asian Art @ ANU, ANU Press, Canberra, pp. 28-30.
- George, K 2015, 'Companionable Art and a Companionable Conscience: Reflections on the Late Style of A. D. Pirous'.
- George, K & Zyskowski, K 2014, 'Interview about "Ethics, Iconoclasm, and Qur'anic Art in Indonesia"'.
- George, K 2014, 'Putting the quirks and murk to work: Disciplinary reflections on the state of Indonesian studies', in Eric Tagliacozzo (ed.), Producing Indonesia: The State of the Field of Indonesian Studies, Cornell Southeast Asia Program Publications, Ithaca, USA, pp. 33-45.
- George, K 2012, 'Life writing and the Making of Companionable Objects: Reflections on Sunaryo's Titik Nadir', in Maureen Perkins (ed.), Locating Life Stories: Beyond East-West binaries in (auto)biographical studies, University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, USA, pp. 35-54.
- George, K 2012, 'The Cultural Politics of Modern and Contemporary Islamic Art in Southeast Asia', in Nora A. Taylor and Boreth Ly (ed.), Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Art, Cornell Southeast Asia Program Publications, USA, pp. 53-68.
- Narayan, K & George, K 2012, 'Stories About Getting Stories: Interactional Dimensions in Folk and Personal Narrative Research', in Jaber F Gubrim, James A Holstein, Amir B. Marvasti, Karyn D. McKinney (ed.), The SAGE Handbook of Interview Research, SAGE Publications Inc., California, pp. 511-524.
- George, Kenneth. 2012. “The Cultural Politics of Modern and Contemporary Islamic Art in Southeast Asia.” In Modern and Contemporary Southeast Asian Art: An Anthology, edited by Nora A. Taylor and Boreth Ly, pp. 53-68. SEAP, Cornell.
- George, K 2010, 'Picturing Aceh: Violence, Religion, and a Painter's Tale', in ARNDT GRAF, SUSANNE SCHROTER, EDWIN WIERINGA (ed.), ACEH History, Politics and Culture, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), Singapore, pp. 243-264.
- George, K 2010, Picturing Islam: Art and Ethics in a Muslim Lifeworld, Wiley-Blackwell, Malden USA.
- George, Kenneth. 2010. Picturing Islam: Art and Ethics in a Muslim Lifeworld. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell.
- George, K 2009, 'Ethics, Iconoclasm, and Qur'anic Art in Indonesia', Cultural Anthropology, vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 589-621.
- George, K 2008, 'Ethical Pleasure, Visual Dzikir, and Artistic Subjectivity in Contemporary Indonesia', Material Religion: The Journal of Objects, Art and Belief, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 172-193.
- George, K 2007, 'Art and Identity Politics: Nation, Religion, Ethnicity, Elsewhere', in K Robinson (ed.), Asian and Pacific Cosmopolitans: Self and Subject in Motion, Palgrave Macmillan Ltd, Basingstoke UK, pp. 37-59.
- George, Kenneth. 2005. “Picturing Aceh: Violence, Religion, and a Painter’s Tale.” In Spirited Politics: Religion and Public Life in Contemporary Southeast Asia. pp. 185-208. Southeast Asian Publications Series, Cornell.
- George, Kenneth; Willford, Andrew. 2005. “Introduction: Religion, Modernity, and the Predicaments of Public Life in Southeast Asia.” In Spirited Politics: Religion and Public Life in Contemporary Southeast Asia. pp. 9-21. Southeast Asian Publications Series, Cornell.
- George, Kenneth; Willford, Andrew. 2005. Spirited Politics: Religion and Public Life in Contemporary Southeast Asia. Southeast Asian Publications Series, Cornell.
- George, Kenneth. 2004. "Violence, Culture, & the Indonesian Public Sphere: Reworking the Geertzian Legacy." In Violence: Culture, Performance and Expression, edited by Neil L. Whitehead. pp. 25-54. Santa Fe: SAR Press.
- George, K & Noor, M 2002, AD Pirous: Vision, Faith, and a Journey in Indonesian Art, 1955-2002, Porch Foundation Pirous, USA.
- George, Kenneth. 2002. A. D. Pirous: Vision, Faith, and a Journey in Indonesian Art, 1955-2002. Bandung: Yayasan Serambi Pirous. (co-authored with Mamannoor).
- George, K 1999, 'Objects on the Loose: Ethnographic Encounters with Unruly Artefacts A Foreword', Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology, vol. 64, no. 2, pp. 149-150.
- George, K 1999, 'Signature Work: Bandung, 1994', Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology, vol. 64, no. 2, pp. 212-231.
- George, Kenneth. 1999. Signature Work: Bandung, 1994. Ethnos 64(2):212-231.
- George, Kenneth. 1998. Designs on Indonesia's Muslim Communities. Journal of Asian Studies 57(3):693-713.
- George, Kenneth. 1997. Some Things That Have Happened to The Sun After September 1965: Politics and the Interpretation of an Indonesian Painting. In Comparative Studies in Society and History 39(4):599-634.
- George, Kenneth. 1996. Showing Signs of Violence: The Cultural Politics of a Twentieth-Century Headhunting Ritual. Berkeley: University of California Press.
- George, Kenneth. 1993. Lyric, History, and Allegory, or the End of Headhunting Ritual in Highland Sulawesi. American Ethnologist 20(4):697-717.
- George, Kenneth. 1993. Music-making, Ritual, and Gender in a Southeast Asian Hill Society. Ethnomusicology 37(1):1-27.
- George, Kenneth. 1990. Felling a Song with a New Axe: Writing and the Reshaping of Ritual Song Performance in Upland Sulawesi. Journal of American Folklore 103(407):1 23.
Projects and Grants
Grants are drawn from ARIES. To add Projects or Grants please contact your College Research Office.
- Building India: Religion, Craft and Infrastructure in Contemporary Asia (Secondary Investigator)
