East Asian Languages and Societies Commons^™

Las Voces Desde La Liminalidad Sino-Peruana: –Una Lectura Comparativa De Mongolia Y La Vida No Es Una Tómbola–, Jing Tan

LSU Master's Theses

Chinese immigrants first arrived in Peru in the mid-19th Century. Since then, the Sino-Peruvian community has lived through myriad vicissitudes. Today, despite its indisputable influence in Peru’s history, it is still largely invisible in society, just as the concept of an Asian Latin American identity remains elusive in the national consciousness. In the literary and academic world, the scarcity of a voice highlighting Chinese legacies in Peruvian literature is echoed by the dearth of such a voice in the criticism regarding works by Sino-Peruvian writers about Sino-Peruvian experiences.

This comparative analysis engages with two novels that evince deep parallelism with …

“For Now We See In A Mirror, Dimly”: Dialectical Wholeness In Oshii Mamoru’S Ghost In The Shell, Mari Aida

Comparative Literature M.A. Essays

This essay argues that Oshii Mamoru's 1995 animated film Ghost in the Shell, while indicating possible alliances with the political interests of cyberfeminism, ultimately advocates for the oppositional agenda of dialectical wholeness. Foundational texts of cyberfeminism, such as Donna J. Haraway's "A Manifesto for Cyborgs," have criticized narratives of isolation and a return towards a primordial wholeness implicit in Euro-American scientific culture. In the context of these texts, the cyborg symbolizes a departure from such narratives and guides the political project of reimagining epistemological boundaries. However, despite its apparent alignment with such projects, Ghost in the Shell dramatizes and …

The Influence Of The Thirty-Six Stratagems On Chinese Strategy In The Diaoyu Islands, Brent Schuliger

Senior Honors Theses

The Diaoyu Islands are a small, uninhabited archipelago in the East China Sea which has begun increasing in strategic significance due to its advantageous location near Taiwan and along the First Island Chain. The islands are currently under Japanese administration, but the People’s Republic of China considers them historically Chinese and contests Japan’s claim to the islands. A careful examination of China’s actions in challenging Japan’s rule over the Diaoyus reveals the influence of the Thirty-Six Stratagems, a tome of ancient Chinese military wisdom which provides a framework onto which China’s current strategy corresponds. This thesis examines the historical …

Ten Nights' Dreams And Our Cat's Grave, Natsume Soseki

Zea E-Books Collection

Ten Nights’ Dreams (夢十夜, Yume Jūya) is a classic written work from the Japanese master Natsume Soseki. Originally published in 1908, it announced the emergence in Japanese literature of a modernist and impressionistic mode. Short ­vignettes with fantastic, tragic, or magical events convey an exquisite sensibility compounded with stark realism. Love, honor, duty, artistry, desire, despair, and regret all shape events in the dream-world. The stories themselves suggest echoes of meanings beyond the failures of rational sense-making. Ten dreams—each unique and arresting—form a panorama of life and feeling, at once universal and intensely present.

“Our Cat’s Grave” is a brief …

I Am A Cat, No. Ii, Natsume Sōseki, Kan-Ichi Ando

Zea E-Books Collection

What would the neighbors say about you if they didn’t know your cat was listening?

What if it was “The Cat With No Name”? The one who claims “I have, as a cat, attained the highest pitch of evolution imaginable. … My tail is filled with all sorts of wisdom and, above all, a secret art handed down in the cat family, which teaches how to make fools of mankind. … I am a cat, it is true, but remember I am one who keeps in the house of a scholar who reads the Moral Discourses of Epictetus and bangs …

Japanese-English Translation: Katayama Hiroko—Jesus And Simon Peter (June 1953), Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Translation of 「イエスとペトロ」、片山廣子著、昭和２８年６月

Source: Aozora Bunko (a digital archive of public-domain Japanese-language works)

General website: https://www.aozora.gr.jp

Current text: https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/001346/files/50159_41222.html

Japanese-English Translation: Katayama Hiroko—Fifty-Dollar Coffee (June 1953), Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Revised translation of「コーヒー五千円」、片山廣子著、底本「燈火節」暮しの手帖社、昭和２８年

Source, Aozora Bunko (a digital archive of public-domain Japanese-language works):

General website: https://www.aozora.gr.jp

Current text: https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/001346/files/49517_35999.html

Imagined Locality Of A Girlhood Home: A Performative Reading Of Maxine Hong Kingston’S “White Tigers”, Jing Tan

Tête à Tête: Journal of Francophone Studies

Both the locality and the language of Sze Yup are of immense significance to Kingston, as well as to her narrator-protagonist: it is the locus of her mother’s storytelling, the land whence her mother absorbed the incredible power of “talking-story” that has been inherited by Kingston and has permeated her text, the soil whose spirit has been transplanted to her birthplace in America and whose mystery has never ceased to inspire her imagination. Likewise, the Sze Yup dialect is the language that both the writer and her narrator first learned to speak (Jaggi): she “entered school speaking no English” (Talbot …

Friendship In The Confucian Tradition, Andrew Lambert

Publications and Research

An overview of how friendship has been represented and assessed in the Confucian tradition, and particularly in classical Confucian texts such as the Analects and the Mencius. Themes covered include the relationship between the family and friendship, the ambivalence towards friendship in imperial China, and the connection between friendship and the Confucian ideal of personal cultivation. The chapter finishes by exploring novel conceptions of friendship and human relatedness suggested by the Confucian tradition.

“Usefulness Without Use," Or, The Power Of The Virtual: Lu Xun On The Vital Efficacy Of Literature, Wenjin Cui

Faculty Publications

This article explores Lu Xun’s distinct view of the vital efficacy of literature, as

captured in his well-known conception of literature’s “usefulness without use.”

Starting with the highly idealistic vision of his youthful years, which posits an

unmediated flow of power from the free play of poetry to the direct action of politics,

I follow Lu Xun on the strenuous and crisis-ridden path he took in coming to terms

with the uselessness of literature vis-à-vis the power of politics, until he finally

reaffirmed the vital power of literature by pitching the self-transcending virtual

impetus of literature against the conservative actual …

Pensar El Límite: El Símbolo Indígena En Los Proyectos Políticos Cubanos De Principios Del Siglo Xix, Jorge L. Camacho

The Coastal Review

This article investigates the way in which Cuban literature reflected on indigenous people during the early half of the nineteenth century and uses the symbol of the Amerindians to demonstrate a moral disjuncture between them and the colonizer. In this article, I call attention to the way Cuban independentists and Spanish nationalists used this figure to support their views and thus created a split in the Cuban creole imagination. I start by pointing out that these appropriations started at the end of the 18th century when historian José Martín Félix de Arrate, and poets such as Miguel González and Manuel …

La “Border Culture” Del Personaje Mexicoamericano En El Sureste De Estados Unidos En Los Cuentos De Lorraine López Y Mijito Doesn’T Live Here Anymore De Jaime Martínez, Jaime Chavez

The Coastal Review

This paper explores the concepts of "Border Culture" and "Borderlands" by Gloria Anzaldúa in Soy la Avon Lady and Other Stories, Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories, by Lorraine López and the novel Mijito Doesn’t Live Here Anymore by Jaime Martínez. The paper argues that the Mexican American character in the southeast of the United States lives in the "Borderlands" and practices a "Border Culture" because they don't follow the traditional stereotypical role of the Mexican American character within the literary canon of both the dominant culture and Chicana/o literature.

"Writing Unspeakable Things: Speechlessness, Abjection, And The Ethics/Aesthetics Of (Not) Representing Sexual Violence In Three Korean American "Comfort Women' Novels", M Laura Barberan Reinares

Publications and Research

This article analyzes “comfort women” novels by the Korean American authors Therese Park, Nora Okja Keller, and Chang-rae Lee in terms of the ethics and aesthetics of representing sexual violence through language. I specifically look at these authors’ stylistic strategies to describe rape in writing and how they (more or less successfully) avoid voyeuristic portrayals of the “comfort women” by controlling the narrative point of view and relying on traumatic “speechlessness” and abjection. Building on relevant notions from the fields of photography, cinematography, philosophy, and psychoanalysis, this analysis suggests that in-progress representations of rape in language become a futile project …

Ciudad, Movimiento Y Transformación: "23 Segundos" En Dos Tiempos, Mariana Pensa

South East Coastal Conference on Languages & Literatures (SECCLL)

En este trabajo se realiza una lectura del film uruguayo 23 Segundos (2014, dirigido por Dimitry Rudakov). Un punto de entrada al mismo nos remite a los conceptos de acción/inacción, desde donde la intriga toma cuerpo y comienza a formarse. A partir de esto, se focaliza en el personaje principal de Emiliano, y en su recorrido por Montevideo, recorrido que se transforma a lo largo de la película en una forma de adquisición de conocimiento sobre sí mismo y los demás. Esto lo lleva ultimamente a un cambio de vida, a la superación de la alienación y la rutina. Es …

2021 Seccll Conference Program, Seccll Conference

South East Coastal Conference on Languages & Literatures (SECCLL)

Conference program for the 2021 SECCLL.

Writing Gender In Early Modern Chinese Women's Tanci Fiction, Li Guo

Purdue University Press Book Previews

Women’s tanci, or “plucking rhymes,” are chantefable narratives written by upper-class educated women from seventeenth-century to early twentieth-century China. Writing Gender in Early Modern Chinese Women's Tanci Fiction offers a timely study on early modern Chinese women’s representations of gender, nation, and political activism in their tanci works before and after the Taiping Rebellion (1850 to 1864), as well as their depictions of warfare and social unrest.

Women tanci authors’ redefinition of female exemplarity within the Confucian orthodox discourses of virtue, talent, chastity, and political integrity could be bourgeoning expressions of female exceptionalism and could have foreshadowed protofeminist ideals …

The Somaesthetics Of The Multitude: The Politico-Aesthetic Logic Of Antonio Negri And Michael Hardt In Constructing The Subjecthood, Jinying Li

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

"The Multitude", a concept reconstructed by Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt after the deconstruction of the subjecthood by post-structuralism, is a combination of singularity and commonality, and physicality and affection, and it is the subjecthood of postmodern society that overthrows the control of the empire and constructs the commonwealth. In the early days, Negri began to explore social issues from the perspective of the relationship between art and the multitude. From this perspective, his logics in constructing the multitude can be summed up as aestheticization and bio-politicization, and its inner trajectory of reasoning can be summarized as a transformation from …

Nelson Goodman On Exemplification, Hui Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Nelson Goodman holds that there are two forms of symbolizing, namely, denotation and exemplification. In denotation, a symbol is used to refer to an object, while in exemplification the exemplifier has a label or is referred to by a label. Exemplification explains how abstract works perform symbolic functions and express metaphorical exemplifiers. Being highly creative and influential, Goodman's theory is valuable and can serve as a reference for Chinese scholars.

“Inaesthetics” And The “Passion For The Real”: Alain Badiou On The Avant-Garde Art, Kaifeng Xia

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Alain Badiou distinguishes between the didactic schema, classical schema and romantic schema in art, and further suggests that the avant-garde art does not create a new schema, but synthesizes the previous schemata into a didactico-romantic schema. Badiou strives to propose a new schema, the "inaesthetics" schema, which is both immanent and exclusive, that is, taking art as a truth-procedure. The inaesthetics schema is actually modeled around the avant-garde art, as Badiou believes that the avant-garde art embodies the "passion for the real" which implies two approaches of "destruction" and "subtraction." When Badiou attempts to combine these two approaches in his …

Wang Guowei's Theory Of Intuition And New Practice Of Symbolizing With Affective Image In Ci-Poetry, Bailing Yang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The category of "perceiving" runs through all the fields and the whole process of Wang Guowei's research. He insists that art is based on intuition, but this does not mean that he is an anti-rationalist. He is not opposed to the use of bi(comparison) and xing (affective image) in classical Chinese poetry, yet reforms these methods with his theory of intuition, thereby giving them connotations of symbolism in modern Western poetics. Taking sorrows for the change of seasons, observations of moonlights, and astronomical phenomena as examples, this article analyzes the symbolic means of intuitive cognition embodiedin Wang Guowei's statement, "all …

Mao Qiling's Comments On The Romance Of The West Chamber And The Value Of His Concept Of “Lyric Example” In Literary Criticism, Xurong Yang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Theatre critics of the Ming dynasty spoke only occasionally about the "example (li)" of the Yuan-dynasty plays (za ju). In early Qing dynasty, Mao Qiling proposed "lyric example ( ci li)" as the primary commentary approach to The Romance ofthe West Chamber. The concept of "lyric" refers to the Yuan-dynasty plays, and the concept of "example" refers to the conventions, commonalities, laws and paradigms. Mao's concept of "lyric example" provided a comprehensive analysis of the language, the temperament, the system, and the performance as well as the critical standards in evaluating not only The Romance of the West Chamber but …

The Breakthrough And Limitations Of Qi Biaojia's Xiqu-Play Criticism, Shiyang Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

In his letters to friends, Qi Biaojia expressed his hope to compile a collection of xiqu-plays in the Ming dynasty to promote contemporary xiqu-plays with textual criticism of the manuscripts. Qi inherited Wang Jide's idea of being the first to bridge the gap in the xiqu world and Lv Tiancheng's "intention to be close to the secular." Therefore, he tried hard to collect all the xiqu-plays in the Ming dynasty available to him, and compiled a monograph on xiqu-plays. Qi focused on manuscripts rather than on the playwrights or actors as his basis of evaluation. As opera music meters and …

Multidimensional Construction And Deconstruction Of The Claim That The Eight-Legged Essay Was Epitomized In The Ming Dynasty, Xiong Zheng

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The claim that the eight-legged essay was epitomized in the Ming dynasty was solidified by scholars of the Ming and Qing dynasties with the belief that each generation had an exemplary genre since the Yuan dynasty. The claim was constructed from four dimensions of the three relationships between writing and, respectively, societal politics, scholar's vitality, and tradition of adhering to the classics and doctrines, as well as generic transformation and its value. The value of the eight-legged essay in the Ming dynasty had also been criticized in the above mentioned four dimensions by the Ming and Qing dynasty scholars. However, …

The Aesthetic Concept Of On The Absence Of Sentiments In Music And A Reflection On The Construction Of Chinese Aesthetics, Kai Lin

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Ji Kang's ( 223-263) On the Absence of Sentiments in Music has three types of aesthetic concepts. First, listeners of sorrowful music release his emotions through listening. Second, peaceful listeners obtain aesthetic pleasure through appreciating the beauty of musical form. Thirdly, peaceful listeners focus specifically on moderate music, in order to acquire peace and preserve his health. Going beyond utilitarian emotions, Ji Kang laid more emphasis on the second type of aesthetic concept, which was close to Kant's definition of disinterestedness. Yet, he regulated desire due to vigilance, rather than stressing "aesthetic freedom" like modern aesthetics. Therefore, Ji Kang's three …

A Paranoid Anxiety Of Life And Its Artistic Expression: A Thematic Study Of The Story Of Zhuangzhou Drumming The Basin, Yugui Jing

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

The original story of "Zhuangzhou Drumming the Basin" as first appeared in the Stories to Caution the World has been circulated both in China and abroad, and the motif of "unfaithful widow" is given distinctive artistic forms of expression. Zhuang's wife, the female protagonist in the story is constructed as an embodiment of carnal desire. Such representation reflects the status and tragic existence of women in a patriarchal society. Zhuangzi, who tests his wife's faithfulness, is in fact a representative figure of ancient scholars of little means who are separated from society and family, and a sexually jealous character of …

Fictional Text And Reality Of The Possible, Shusheng Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

This article explores the issue of reference in fictional texts, that is, the relationship between fictional texts and reality. Paul Ricoeur thinks that the reference of poetic language is not cancelled, but only suspended. Through its semantic creativity, it possesses the ability to transform reality and to turn our personal environment into a habitable world. The interpretation of the concept "world /Welt" and "environment /Umwelt" by Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer shed light on the significance of fictional texts in reality, for they propose to us possible modes of existence in the ontological sense. In other words, fictional texts can …

Juxtaposition, Narrative Strategies, And Multimedia Explorations: Representation Of Time In Comics, Xu Lian

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Following the tradition of narratology and comics studies, this article explores various ways of representing time in comics and displays the complexity and diversity of temporal representation in the grammar of comics. It focuses on spatialization, closure, order, speed, and innovation enabled by virtue of multimedia explorations. Spatialization strategies such as juxtaposition and collage are basic ways to represent time in comics, and closure of perception is also critical in understanding time. However, new forms like music comics and webcomics have significantly changed the structure of temporal representation.

The New Development Of Marxist Literary Criticism Today: An Interview With Barbara Foley, Shengzhen Zhang, Barbara Foley

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

This interview with Prof. Barbara Foley covers a wide range of critical approaches and new challenges in the fields of Marxist theory, Marxist literary criticism, and Marxist pedagogy. Prof. Foley holds that Marxism provides a meta-theory, a privileged standpoint from which to study the connections between literature, politics and history. After examining fundamental principles of Marxism － － historical materialism, political economy, and ideology critique － － Foley analyzes long-standing debates over the nature of literature and sets forth key concerns of Marxist literary criticism. This interview also examines a broad range of literary works － － from classical to …

“Poetic Wisdom”Or “Poetic Knowledge”: On The Interlingual Transformation Of “Della Sapienza Poetica”, Weixuan Lin

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

While the term “Poetic wisdom” as the translation of “della Sapienza Poetica” helps to convey the aestheticconnotation of the original, it shadows the meaning of “poetic knowledge” and its epistemological background. Since René Descartes's rationality denied the value of philology, Giovanni Battista Vico tried to use “della Sapienza Poetica” as his method to seek truth in philology, and as his determination to defend philology. When approaching “della Sapienza Poetica” from the perspective of “poetic knowledge," we can understand and justify many of the puzzling arguments in Vico's New Science and give due respect to the concept which lacks among Western …

Third Reading Of Early Film Theory: The Turn To Dispositif, Affect, And Action Comedy, Yingjin Zhang

Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art

Early film studies has spread rapidly since the 1990s and become a mainstay in film studies in Euro-American academia, bringing technological innovation, visual culture, and urban modernity into film historiography and thus enriching scholarship in a field previously dominated by close textual reading. This article continues my tracking of early film studies but concentrates on methodological issues of the recent focus on “media archaeology.” My “Reading Early Film Theory: Collective Sensorium and Vernacular Modernism” (2005) introduces Miriam Hansen's theory and Zhen Zhang's book on reconstructing a cultural history of Shanghai film. My follow-up “Rereading Early Film Theory: In Pursuit of …