Description

Biographies of Panellists & Moderators

Barbara Watson ANDAYA is Professor in the Asian Studies Program at the University of Hawai’i and former Director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies. In 2005-06 she was President of the American Association of Asian Studies. Educated at the University of Sydney (BA, Dip.Ed.), she received an East West Center grant in 1966 and obtained her MA in history at the University of Hawai’i. She subsequently went on to study for her Ph.D. at Cornell University with a specialization in Southeast Asian history. Her career has involved teaching and researching in Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, the Netherlands, and since 1994, Hawai’i. She maintains an active teaching and research interest across all Southeast Asia, but her specific area of expertise is the western Malay-Indonesia archipelago. In 2000 she received a John Simon Guggenheim Award, which resulted in The Flaming Womb: Repositioning Women in Southeast Asian History, 1500-1800. Her current project is a history of religious interaction in Southeast Asia, 1511-1900, with a special focus on Christianity.

Andrew HARDING is a leading scholar in the fields of Asian legal studies and comparative constitutional law. He commenced his academic career at NUS before moving to SOAS, University of London, where he became Head of the Law School and Director of the Centre for South East Asian Studies. He joined NUS, as Director of the Centre for Asian Legal Studies and Director of the Asian Law Institute, from the University of Victoria, BC Canada, where he was Professor of AsiaPacific Legal Relations and Director of the Centre for Asia-Pacific Initiatives. Professor Harding has worked extensively on constitutional law in Malaysia and Thailand, and has made extensive contributions to scholarship in comparative law, and law and development, having published nine books as author or editor. He is co-founding-editor of Hart Publishing’s book series ‘Constitutional Systems of the World’, a major resource for constitutional law in context, and has authored the books on Malaysia and Thailand in that series (2011, 2012).

Arif A JAMAL is an Associate Professor of Law at NUS. He studied politics (BA) and law (LLB) in Canada and was called to the Bar of British Columbia. He then undertook post-graduate work in the UK earning an LLM degree, focusing on Islamic law, at the School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS) and then obtaining his doctorate at the Faculty of Laws at University College London (UCL). Arif has been visiting professor at Tel Aviv University, The University of Trento (Italy) and The City University of Hong Kong. Arif’s research and teaching interests include legal and political theory, law and religion and law in Muslim contexts.

Maznah MOHAMED is an Associate Professor at the Department of Malay Studies at the National University of Singapore (NUS), where she also holds a joint-appointment with the Department of Southeast Asian Studies. She previously held positions at the School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang and the University of Toronto (as Visiting Professor of ASEAN and International Studies). Before joining the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at NUS, she was also a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Asia Research Institute of the NUS. Her areas of research interest cover issues relating to gender, political culture, and Islam, particularly in the Malaysian context.

Jaclyn L. NEO is an Assistant Professor of Law at the National University of Singapore (NUS). She specializes in constitutional law, focusing on minorities and religion. She was a recipient of two graduate scholarships from NUS under which she completed her Masters of Law (LL.M.) and Doctor of the Science of Law (J.S.D.) at Yale Law School. Jaclyn has published in the International Journal of Constitutional Law (I-CON), Oxford Journal of Law and Religion, Human Rights Quarterly, and the Singapore Journal of Legal Studies. Her article on domestic incorporation of international human rights law in a dualist state won the Asian Yearbook of International Law’s DILA International Law Prize. Jaclyn is an Executive Committee member of the NUS Centre for Asian Legal Studies and was also recently appointed to the editorial board of the Asian Journal of Comparative Law and the Asian Yearbook of International Law. Jaclyn was appointed as a consultant to WongPartnership in 2015. She is the sole editor of a recently published volume on Constitutional Interpretation in Singapore: Theory and Practice (Routledge, 2017).

Dian A. H. SHAH is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Asian Legal Studies, National University of Singapore. She previously taught at the Faculty of Law, University of Malaya, where she remains a faculty appointee. Her research interests span the fields of constitutional history, comparative constitutional law and human rights, focusing on issues arising from the interaction between constitutional law, religion and politics in selected Asian jurisdictions. She is the author of “Constitutions, Religion and Politics in Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia and Sri Lanka” (CUP 2017) and the co-editor of “Law and Society in Malaysia: Pluralism, Ethnicity and Religion” (Routledge, forthcoming 2017). Dian currently serves as the Deputy Editor of the Asian Journal of Comparative Law.

Kevin YL TAN is an Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore. He graduated with LLB (Hons) from the Faculty of Law of the National University of Singapore in 1986 and joined the teaching staff of the same faculty that same year. Subsequently he obtained his LLM (Master of Laws) and JSD (Doctor in the Science of Law) at Yale Law School, being the first Singaporean to achieve the latter. From 1986 to 2000, he taught at the Law Faculty, specializing in Constitutional and Administrative Law, Law and Government, Law and Society and International Human Rights. He has published widely in his areas of specialization and has written and edited some 30 books on the law, history and politics of Singapore. He is currently a director of Equilibrium Consulting Pte Ltd; Adjunct Professor, S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University; Editor-in-Chief, Asian Yearbook of International Law and Editorial Board member, Korean Journal of International & Comparative Law.

THIO Li-ann teaches and has published widely in the fields of public international law, human rights law, constitutional and administrative law. She was formerly Chief Editor, Singapore Journal of International & Comparative Law (2000-2003), General Editor, Asian Yearbook of International Law and Editor, International Journal of Constitutional Law. She is current on the editorial board of the Journal of East Asia and International Law, National Taiwan University Law Review and on the Advisory Board of the New Zealand Yearbook of International Law, Australian Journal of Asian Law and International Law & Human Rights Discourse. She has taught courses at the law faculties of Hong Kong University and the University of Melbourne. A leading Singapore constitutional scholar, she co-authored Constitutional Law in Malaysia and Singapore (Lexis Nexis, 2010, 3rd ed) and co-edited Evolution of a Revolution: 40 Years of the Singapore Constitution (RoutledgeCavendish, 2009), both with Kevin YL Tan. She was an expert witness before the Australian Federal Court and academic freedom consultant to the University of Warwick (2005). She was twice ranked an NUS Excellent Teacher and received the NUS Young Researcher Award in 2004. From Jan 2007-July 2009, Professor Thio was a Nominated Member of Parliament (Eleventh Session).