On Wednesday, the Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) and the Faculty of Film, Theatre and Animation will collaborate with the Center for International Studies as well as the Tun Abdul Razak Chair to feature various art forms of Malaysian cultures.
The Artistic Interspaces of Malaysia Symposium (AIMS) will be held at 1:30 p.m. in Alden Library and will feature guest presenters from UiTM and a documentary screening followed by a forum on the Global Artistic Interspaces.
UiTM and Ohio University hope to use the popularity and accessibility of OU to broaden the knowledge of the AIMS program.
Solehah Ishak, chair of AIMS who will present “From Trance to Consciousness: Through the Eyes of Malay Theatre,” said she wants students and faculty to learn about Malay studies in light of all the different aspects the culture has to offer.
“We want to put Malaysia on the map and create interspaces between the multicultural and multi-religion aspects,” she said.
Ishak added that the AIMS goal is to find a platform for discourse.
“The idea has been ongoing, but there has not been a place to bring it together,” Ishak said.
Maszalida Hamzah, a lecturer at UiTM, said the point of the symposium is to educate people about the culture.
“It’s to introduce the artistic Malaysian enclave to the world and to expand the research and the knowledge of the research,” Hamzah said.
Ishak added that in order for the Malaysian traditions to survive, tradition must evolve.
“A new technology will always impact traditional arts and the traditional arts have to innovate and change,” Ishak said. “You can’t be doing the same thing; you have to move. Otherwise, you cannot bring in new audiences.”
Wan Aida Wan Yahya, the treasurer of AIMS who will be presenting Contemporary Malaysian Films: Grasping Traditions and Beliefs at the symposium, said shehopes that people will walk away from her presentation with a better understanding of Malaysia.
“I would greatly hope that there’s a better understanding of Malaysian practices, what it’s all about, how unique it is, how different it is and hopefully that it will get people inspired and interested,” she said
Habibah Ashari, Ohio’s Tun Abdul Razak Chair, said that she wants faculty and students to be able to learn about the different art forms in Malaysian regions and the research involved with them.
“Most people know about Indonesian arts or Thai,” Ashari said. “But not so much the Malaysian ones.”
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