The second congress of the Asian Association of World Historians (AAWH) was successfully concluded Seoul, Korea, April 29, 2012. Featuring the twin themes of Global Exchange Networks of Asia and Alternative Modernities in Asia, the conference drew more than two hundred participants from around the world. Associate Prof. Sun Yue of the Global History Center, Capital Normal University, attended the conference and presented a paper titled Why is Big History Neglected in China at the panel The Evolution of Big History chaired by David Christian, the initiator of Big History in the early 1990s.

The Congress invites three keynote speakers, Prof. Yi Tae-jin of the National Institute of Korean History, Korea, who speaks about Neo-Catastrophism and a Global Interpretation of History, a fine case of uniting natural and human histories. The world-renowned economist Dennis Flynn of the University of the Pacific, USA offers a talk on Korea and East Asian Trade Before/After the 1590s: Modeling from a Global Point of View, applying his ??Unified Theory of Prices (UTP) and Hydraulic Metaphor to a historical topic. The retired scholar Arif Dirlik wraps up by Thinking Modernity Historically and asking Is Alternative Modernity the Answer The keynote speeches are printed in a separate collection to facilitate discussion.

The Congress elects Prof. Ji-Hyung Cho of Ewha Womans University, Korea, former executive secretary of AAWH, to be its president, while its former and first president Professor Shingo Minamizuka of Hosei University, Japan, retires after serving a term of four years.

The AAWH Congress takes place every three years. The first AAWH Congress was convened at Osaka University, Japan, 29-31 May, 2009.