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After the ceremony Yash Chopra joined us for a special alumni question and answer session. The evening was attended by over 200 people and held in the SOAS Brunei Lecture Hall. Images from the event can be seen here.

There was a great deal of public interest in the appearance of Bollywood director and producer Yash Chopra, who was awarded an honorary doctorate on Friday, 23 July.

"I am humbled by this honour and would like to thank SOAS for this recognition," said Chopra, 77, on receiving his honorary degree. "My filmmaking has always been from the heart and I would like to pass on this same message to students all over the world."

That evening, Chopra participated in a question-and-answer session at the School's Brunei Lecture Theatre. The event was chaired by Professor Rachel Dwyer, Professor of Indian Cultures and Cinema at SOAS and a biographer of Chopra.

The audience included SOAS students of Indian film, VIPs, media and Bollywood fans. SOAS was one of the first higher education institutions to offer a degree course on popular Hindi cinema.

It soon became clear just how strong an impression Chopra's work has made on Indian popular culture over a career that spans more than five decades. At one point, someone from the audience asked Chopra about the song Rang Barse, from Chopra's classic 1981 romance, Silsila. When Chopra had trouble recalling the song, a celebration of the Indian festival of Holi, the audience spontaneously broke into a group rendition. They remembered every word.

During his visit Yash Chopra, also recorded a podcast with SOAS’ Openair Radio. This interview will be printed in October’s edition of SOAS World Magazine. To make sure you receive the forthcoming edition, please ensure that we have your up-to-date postal address. Click here to update your details.

August

Graduation 2010, which was held on 21-23 July, was the largest in the history of the School.

A total of 852 undergraduate and graduate students were awarded degrees, cheered on by 1,441 friends and family members, over the course of the three days.

This year’s ceremonies included the usual mix of live music, inspirational speeches and a Champaign reception.

The alumni team were in attendance, welcoming the Class of 2010 to the network with free ice-cream and, for the first time, a free photo booth, to view all the fun images click here.

A particular highlight was the class of 2010 celebratory film, which was shown
during the ceremony.  The film, produced
by a former SOAS student, can be watched here.

SOAS also honoured the achievements of five leading figures in international diplomacy and the arts.

The Nigerian novelist Ben Okri OBE was awarded an honorary doctorate at a graduation ceremony for undergraduates, held on Wednesday, 21 July.

"The fame of SOAS has spread all over the world," he said upon receiving the award." There isn't one part of the world that hasn't heard of SOAS, perhaps because all of the world is here."

SOAS alumna HRH Princess Wijdan bint Fawaz Al-Hashemi, the Jordanian ambassador to Italy, was awarded an honorary fellowship on the same afternoon.

Jonathan Taylor CBE, chairman of the Booker Prize Foundation and a former chairman of the SOAS Governing Body, receive an honorary fellowship on Thursday, 22 July, along with Shiv Shankar Mukherjee, former Indian high commissioner to the United Kingdom.

There was a great deal of public interest in the appearance of Bollywood director and producer Yash Chopra, who was awarded an honorary doctorate on Friday, 23 July.

August

A third year Chinese and Law undergraduate at SOAS has won first prize at the ninth Chinese Bridge competition, a prestigious contest in Chinese language and culture proficiency for non-native speakers.

Stewart Johnson competed against 106 other university students selected from 59 countries. He survived numerous rounds over several months to make it to the final, held on 8 August in Changsha,  the capital city of Hunan province in the People's Republic of China. The final was shown live on Chinese state television, and watched by an audience estimated at 200 million people.

"It has been an extraordinary adventure, and I am still very much trying to process everything that has happened," said Johnson, reached in Beijing. "I had no concept of the scale of this competition before coming to China this summer, and even less expectation of getting so far."

Each year, more than 6,000 contestants enter the Chinese Bridge competition. During the early rounds, held in the spring, competitors must deliver a speech in Chinese, answer questions about Chinese culture and demonstrate a talent associated with China, such as storytelling, calligraphy, martial arts, singing, dancing or playing a musical instrument. In the final three rounds, contestants are given a theme and must build a performance around that theme through skits, plays and debates, with help from a 'celebrity supporting act'. In Johnson's case, he performed with Zhou Weixing, a famous comedian from Hunan province.

"As one of Stewart's teachers, I am really proud of him," said Zhaoxia Pang, lector in Chinese at SOAS. "The Chinese Bridge competition is recognised as the most challenging competition in the world for university students to demonstrate their Chinese language proficiency, their understanding of Chinese culture and their talent-based performance."

In winning the competition, Johnson was also awarded a full three-year scholarship to study at a Chinese university and received the title of 'cultural ambassador'.

"I have always very proudly told my peers in China and beyond that I study Chinese at SOAS, and feel privileged to have had the opportunity to develop under the tutelage of such a strong team of teachers as we enjoy here," said Johnson. "This year we had all three UK representatives in the last 30 of the competition, something that has never happened before, and something that shows good signs for the future of studying Chinese in the UK."

He said he not yet decided how to use his three-year scholarship, but he was considering many possibilities.

"I have actually been developing an interest in South Asia at SOAS and am keen to learn Hindi," he said. "I have considered enrolling in a Hindi degree at Peking University."

August 2010

The World Routes Academy, which was launched earlier this year, is a mentoring scheme with a special emphasis on musical traditions from around the world. Khyam’s first appearance on the programe was broadcast on 27 March 2010, further programmes were recorded in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and the UK. The culmination of this process witnessed Khyam Allami perform in a showcase concert as part of the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

The SOAS music department describe Khyam as an outstanding young player of the 'Ud (Middle Eastern Lute) and budding scholar of Middle Eastern music.

August 2010

The Alumni and Friends Fund Panel met at the end of July to disseminate the £46,000 raised so far in 2010. Alumni contributions have been exceptionally generous and we want you to know how your gifts will be put to good use. The beneficiaries are:

• SOAS Hardship Fund, which offers grants to EU and international students, both undergraduate and postgraduate.

• The Alumni & Friends Fund Library Acquisitions and Preservation Fund, which will support conservation work and provide funds for the purchase of early or rare books, manuscripts and archive materials.

• Local Excellence Awards. These will offer maintenance support  for 10 new undergraduates with financial need who evidence outstanding academic merit and personal achievement in their community in London.  Support lasts for up to three years. The Alumni and Friends Fund aims to support 10 more students in 2011.

• The Refugee Academic Grant, which will allow SOAS to host a refugee or at-risk academic.  This project will operate in conjunction with the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics (CARA).
  
  
• Student Projects. The AFF received 13 applications and made seven awards:
  

• SOAS Beyond Borders: West Africa.  In September, 16 SOAS students and alumni, most of them from the SOAS football team, will work on grassroots development projects in Ghana and Nigeria.  Activities will include helping to build a community school and volunteering at an orphanage. The group will also play football matches against local semi-professional sides.

• SOAS IV: Debating Tournament will be the largest debating tournament in Britain. This year's tournament will also include an English as a Second Language grand final. In 2009, the SOAS Debating tournament was attended by 100 teams representing nine countries.
  

• Common Ground is a community garden in Kings Cross established in 2009 by members of the Good Food Society at SOAS.

• Zipangu Fest will be London's first Japanese cinema festival. The screenings will be a mix of mainstream movies, independent cinema and retrospectives, supplemented by Q&A sessions,  talks and panel discussions. Films will be shown from 23 to 28 November 2010 at venues across London’s East End and at SOAS.
  

• SOAS Detainee Support Group training and awareness day aims to provide at least 30 SOAS students with the skills to visit and support women, children and families held in immigration removal centres in the UK. The group also hopes to raise awareness about the issues facing refugees and asylum seekers attempting to navigate the British immigration system.

• London and Bamako exhibition is a photography exhibition supported by narrations, film footage and PC webcams. Two identical site-specific exhibitions will be displayed simultaneously in March 2011 in museum galleries in London and in Bamako, Mali. 
  
  

•  Dance Jam seeks to bring together gifted inner city school students, SOAS volunteers and a trained dance teacher who all share a passion for dance. The project will culminate in innovative dance performances held at SOAS and Petchey Academy in Hackney.

Organisers of the student projects were ecstatic about the awards. The response of Becca Temple, project leader for Common Ground and an Anthropology student at SOAS, was typical.

"We are over the moon about this funding," she said. "It has arrived right on time, as we have finally finished building our shed to store the new tools we will buy. There’ll be no more fumbling to find someone a pair of gloves. The funding will allow us much better facilities for the seasonal workshops on everything from seed sowing and growing to pot-painting and jam making, which are open to SOAS students and local residents."

Without your gifts many of these projects would not have been made possible, so thank you again for your support! If you have any further questions about the Alumni & Friends Fund, please contact Anastasia Connor, Development Officer (Annual Fund and Legacies), email: a.connor@soas.ac.uk, tel: 020 7898 4062.

To make a contribution to future Alumni & Friends Fund projects, please go to http://www.soasalumni.org/makeadifference

 August 2010

Charlie Henniker (MA South Asian Area Studies 2009) responsible for the viral sketch hit ‘Gap Yah’ and ‘Gap Yah 2’, will be performing in London this month.

Charlie is a member of the comedy sketch group ‘Unexpected Items’. The group shot to fame in part thanks to their YouTube hits (featured in this article), the second of which was filmed outside SOAS.

The Unexpected Items will be performing in the Leicester Square Theatre 3 July 2010. Charlie's London gig is sandwiched between a recent performance at the Glastonbury Festival and an imminent début at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
 
For more information about the show please see the theatre webpage here.

 June 2010

Burmese human rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi turned 65 this June. Aung San Suu Kyi is the leader of the Burmese National League for Democracy, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. She studied at SOAS in 1988 and later become an honorary fellow.

Aung San Suu Kyi spent her birthday under house arrest in Rangoon. To mark her birthday the Guardian published previously unpublished photographs taken from the private collection of her late husband Michael Aris. To view these remarkable photos click here.

June 2010

 June 2010

This month marked 30 years since the assassination in Guyana of Dr Walter Rodney (PhD History 1966), prominent historian and political activist. Rodney studied for an MA and PhD here at SOAS. His PhD dissertation, entitled ‘A History of the Upper Guinea Coast, 1545-1800’, was widely acclaimed for its originality in challenging the conventional wisdom on the area.

After leaving SOAS Walter Rodney became an important figure of the Black Power movement in the Caribbean and North America. In 1974 Rodney returned to Guyana from Tanzania. He was supposed to take a position as a professor at the University of Guyana but the government prevented his appointment. He became increasingly active in politics, forming the Working People’s Alliance against the PNC government. In 1980, Rodney was killed by a bomb in his car while running for office in Guyanese elections. 

June 2010

SOAS’ professor of International Relations Stephen Chan OBE gives OpenAir Radio his predictions for the world cup and the future of South African Politics.

Stephen Chan was recently awarded his OBE for ‘services to Africa and to higher education' in the 2010 Queen’s Birthday Honour list. To read the full article click here.

June 2010