Title of Lecture: Studying Population Change in Southeast Asia | 2012 | Title of Event: 7th Singapore Graduate Forum on Southeast Asian Studies SYPNOSIS : I have been incredibly lucky in having an academic career spanning the full half century of demographic transition in Southeast Asia, arguably the most fundamental development in the region over a period marked by many remarkable developments -- rapid economic growth, the spread of universal education and the closing of the gender gap in education, and the shift from cold war confrontations to the ASEAN of today. This talk will reminisce about my experiences in documenting and analysing the demographic transition as it has played out in Southeast Asia and interacted with the other key developments. I will touch on the alternative research approaches I and others have adopted, and the extent to which technology has changed the way research is done, for better or worse. Does one start with a theory and test it through research, or start by trying to get the story straight, and once that is done, use it to build theory or test prevailing theories? What is the relation of researcher to policymaker? Demographers are known for being "the most inductive of social scientists, focused to a greater extent than other social scientists on careful measurement and cautious interpretation". Boring? Perhaps. But not if we can leave our research through close interactions with other disciplines such as economics, sociology, anthropology, history and geography. Gavin Jones is Director of the JY Pillay Comparative Asia Research Centre in the National University of Singapore's Global Asia Institute. He has followed a career combining academic research with advisory roles in the areas of population and development. After completing his PhD degree at the Australian National University (ANU) in 1966, he joined the Population Council, where he worked first in New York, then in Thailand and Indonesia, before returning to Australia. He was then with the Demography and Sociology Program at the ANU for 28 years, serving as head of program for an eight‐year period. In 2003 he joined NUS as Professor in the Asia Research Institute and Research Leader of the cluster on the Changing Family in Asia, with a joint appointment in the Department of Sociology. Professor Jones has conducted joint research with many colleagues in Asia, on subjects as varied as the economic crisis in South‐East Asia, marriage and divorce in Malaysia and Indonesia, population and development in Eastern Indonesia, the dynamics of population and employment change in mega‐urban regions of East and Southeast Asia, and education and human development. He also has a long‐standing interest in the formulation and evolution of population policy in the region. His research interest in recent years has focused especially on very low fertility regimes in Asia, delayed marriage, non‐marriage, and crossboundary marriage, urbanization issues, and equity aspects of educational development. He has served as consultant to many international agencies, including the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Population Fund, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank Institute, the Ford Foundation and the Australian Development Assistance Bureau. He has published about 25 books and monographs and some 150 internationally refereed journal articles and book chapters. SPEAKER : GAVIN JONES, Asia Research Institute and Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore DATE : 18 Jul 2012 TIME : NA VENUE : NA

• published: 16 May 2013
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