Thinking China and Circulation:
Beyond Borders / In Translation / Across Adaptation

Abstract submission: September 1, 2022
Paper submission: October 3, 2022
Dates of Workshop: October 20-22, 2022 (Thu-Sat)
Venue: Zoom

Circulations are at the core of globalization and speak to all fields, periods, and regions. They can be political, economic, cultural, geographical, social, communal, familial, or personal. They may involve the relocation of objects and images; translation, adaptation, and appropriation of texts; or trajectories of individuals. They may be influenced by diverse forms of media. They may be imposed and experienced by individuals, groups, or institutions. They may take place on an equal footing or reinforce power relationships. They may bring about understanding, transformations, creativities, or else misunderstanding, prejudice, and defiance. Circulations also entail a historical process of images, texts, and ideas changing over time.

This historical moment – global pandemic, changing geopolitics, the threat of economic sanctions, and renewed racism against the Chinese diaspora – is a good time to reflect on real-life and virtual circulations in the context of China.

The Department of Comparative Literature and the Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Cultures at the University of Hong Kong invite graduate students working on China and the Sinophone world of the twentieth century to submit paper abstracts on the theme of “CIRCULATION”. We encourage people to interpret the theme in the broadest possible terms. We particularly welcome proposals that discuss circulations in relation to China in/and the world (in any language or across multiple languages). We hope to bring together early-career scholars working across disciplines, including literature, history, philosophy, film and media studies, etc.

Please submit your abstract (up to 250 words) with a working title, and your CV to conf.complit.hku@gmail.com by September 1, 2022. Selected participants will be notified of their acceptance by September 5 and should submit the full paper by October 3. There are no fees to attend the workshop.

The graduate workshop will be held on Zoom October 20-22 HKT. Papers will be circulated in advance among all the participants. Attendees are expected to read the papers of their panel before the workshop and give feedback during the panels. Participants in Hong Kong are welcome for a dinner after the workshop.

Three faculty members will also give advice on each paper during the three-day workshop:

David Der-wei Wang is Edward C. Henderson Professor in Chinese Literature and Comparative Literature at Harvard University. Wang’s specialties are Modern and Contemporary Chinese and Sinophone Literature, Late Qing fiction and drama, and Comparative Literary Theory.

Alvin K. Wong is Assistant Professor in Comparative Literature at the University of Hong Kong. His research spans across the fields of Hong Kong literature and cinema, Chinese literary and cultural studies, Sinophone studies, queer theory, transnational feminism, and the environmental humanities.

Peng Hsiao-yen is research fellow at the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy, Academia Sinica. Her publications include Dandyism and Transcultural Modernity: The Dandy, the Flâneur, and the Translator in 1930s Shanghai, Tokyo, and Paris (Routledge, 2010).

If you have any queries, please kindly email Junlin Ma (jlma@connect.hku.hk), Ying Xing (yingxing@connect.hku.hk), or J. Daniel Elam (jdelam@hku.hk).

This conference is organized by Junlin Ma, Ying Xing, and J. Daniel Elam under the auspices of the Department of Comparative Literature and the Centre for the Study of Globalization and Cultures at HKU.

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Comparing World Literatures in the Postcolonial World
15-17 October 2021

The Department of Comparative Literature and the Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Cultures at the University of Hong Kong held an online graduate workshop, Comparing World Literatures in the Postcolonial World, from 15 to 17 October 2021. The workshop invited postgraduate (PhD and advanced MPhil/MA) students whose work takes theoretical approaches to the notions of national, world, comparative, postcolonial, and transnational South-South literature, to share their work and ideas with their peers.

Papers were circulated in advance and the focus of the three days was to workshop essays with an eye towards publication (either as a stand-alone journal article or as part of a larger project).  The workshop was limited to fifteen people so that participants’ papers could receive close attention. Participants were expected to actively contribute and to offer detailed productive criticism. 

Three faculty members also participated and offered detailed feedback over the course of the three-day workshop: 

Baidik Bhattacharya, Associate Professor at CSDS (Delhi) and author of Postcolonial Writing in the Era of World Literature: Texts, Territories, Globalizations (Routledge, 2018).

Emily Sun, Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at Barnard College and author of On the Horizon of World Literature: Forms of Modernity in Romantic England and Republican China (Fordham University Press, 2021).

J. Daniel Elam, Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Hong Kong, and author of World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth: Anticolonial Aesthetics, Postcolonial Politics (Fordham University Press, 2020).

For details, please email Abolfazl Ahangari (ahangari@connect.hku.hk) or Daniel Elam (jdelam@hku.hk).