Welcome to the 5th Conference on Anthropology and Sustainability in Asia (CASA 2018), which is being held Friday and Saturday, January 5-6, 2018 at the KKR Hotel in Hiroshima, Japan. All registered participants will be provided with daily coffee breaks, access to the proceedings and a free, English guided tour of Hiroshima Peace Park – a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

This is an international, peer-reviewed event that is being held in partnership with two other small events focusing on perspectives holistic sustainability: The 5th Symposium on Language for Sustainability in Asia (SELSA 2018).

About CASA 2018


Sustainability is a term of recent origin with widespread contemporary saliency. In its popular use, sustainability tends to focus mostly on issues of natural environment. The lens of environmental sustainability raises questions such as:

Can the natural world recover from damage caused by human activity at a rate faster than the damage is done? Is the use of natural resources at a rate that is compatible with their regeneration?
What changes in human practice can lead to long-term availability of necessary natural resources?

With the theme Anthropological Perspectives on Holistic Sustainability, CASA 2018 will explore these and related questions, but in a way that considers sustainability beyond its ecological dimensions. Trends toward broader consideration of sustainability are in place. The World Bank and other governmental and non-governmental organizations have incorporated the concept of social sustainability into their approaches to development. The notion of a “triple bottom line” that considers profit, people and planet has entered the private sector discourse on sustainability. This conference considers the contributions that anthropology can make to expanding the horizons of sustainability.

As is the case with any field of study, application of anthropology brings certain approaches and worldviews to bear on the issue of sustainability. As sustainability finds its way into business practices, development plans, and government policy, the holistic approach is the most important contribution that anthropology has to offer. Holism applied to sustainability demands that we ask not only about environmental impacts but also social, cultural, economic, and political ones. Additionally, holism demands that we examine how components of socio-cultural eco-systems relate to one another systematically.

We welcome proposals of 250 words in English by Friday, November 17, 2017 on any of the following streams:

◾Archaeology and Sustainability
◾Cultural Sustainability
◾Economic Sustainability
◾Linguistic Sustainability
◾Political Sustainability
◾Social Sustainability
◾Other Areas (please specify)