Speakers: Professor Wang Fansen, Professor Ge Zhaoguang, Professor Dai Yan
Time: 4pm – 6pm, Mar.23th (Thursday)
Location: Fairmont Social Lounge, St. John’s College UBC, 2111 Lower Mall, Vancouver.
Sponsors: Institute of Asian Research, Centre for Chinese Research, St. John’s College UBC, Asian Studies One Asia Forum, UBC Buddhist Studies Forum
In this event, three professors will give a public lecture on an individual topic and lead a discussion. Please see details below.
Self Image of the Late Imperial “China”
Speaker:
Wang Fan-sen (王汎森)
Abstract:
My talk intends to discuss the question: How did the Chinese imagine what “China” was—what was their self-image—in each time period of Chinese history?
This question will deal with at lease four aspects.
First, it is rare to see people in each traditional Chinese dynasty describe themselves by stating that they were from “Zhongguo or China.” Most of them used mainly “dynasty” as a marker. For example, on the tomb inscriptions, we often see terms such as “So and so of the great Ming” or “of the great Qing.” This can also be seen in the texts when traditional Chinese people encountered foreigners; that is, they often also called themselves “So and so of the great Ming” or “of the great Qing.”
Second, how did people in each dynasty conceptualize their “state, dynasty, country” (guojia), or their self-image about their culture and scholarship or knowledge tradition?
Third, what kind of crucial changes occurred in the self-image of their “guojia” during the great transformation in the modern era?
Fourth, I believe that in recent times China’s self-image has been transformed from a “category” to a “process” involving “historicity” or “linear discourse.” In the classification of this period, “category” thinking still existed, but it grew gradually lower in volume while another mode of thought linked “category” together with “process” to produce a particular form of “linear discourse.” A general division then came about. When discussing China’s self-image, the conservative faction often held on to “category” thinking while the new studies faction held on to “process” thinking.
About the Speaker:
Professor Wang Fan-sen is a Distinguished Research Fellow at the Academia Sinica in Taipei. He received his BA and MA from National Taiwan University and his Ph.D. from Princeton University. From 2010 to 2016, he was Vice President of Academia Sinica. He is currently a visiting professor at Princeton University.
His major publications include Chang T’ai-yen and His World (1985), The Rise of the Ku-shih-pien Movement (1987), Fu Ssu-nien: A Life in Chinese History and Politics (in English), 2000, (Translated into Chinese in 2013), Genealogy of Modern Chinese Thought (2003), Ten Essays on Late Ming and Early Ch’ing Intellectual History (2004), The Historian and the Historiography in Modern China (2008), The Capillary Effects of Power: Intellectual, Mentality and Scholarship in the Ch’ing Period (2013, 2014), Obstinate Bass Rhythm: Reflecting on Ways of Viewing History (2014).
In addition to being elected as Academician, Academia Sinica in 2004, he has also won many other awards including the 12th Golden Tripod Awards, Outstanding Scholar Award of the Foundation for the Advancement of Outstanding Scholarship (1998), Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, United Kingdom (2005), and the Paju Book Award Planning Prize in South Korea (2012).
In what periods did China enthusiastically discuss “China”?
—Discussing the background behind the “Discourse On China” from the perspective of intellectual history
Speaker:
Ge Zhaoguang (葛兆光)
Abstract:
Those scholars who are concerned with Chinese academic circles will notice that since 2010 China has published many different works about “China.” All of these works deal with the topic of “What is China?”. Why, since 2010, have Chinese academics, especially in history, been specifically concerned about the question of “what is China”? In other words, what is the historical, political and intellectual background behind the discussion of this question? Exactly what sort of historical contexts have given rise to this collective anxiety about “China”? According to my observation of Chinese history, the discussion of “what is China” often took place during times when China was undergoing huge changes. Among these times, the most important ones are: the Northern Song, the Late Qing and the present time. However, there are similarities and differences in the discussions about “China” during these three periods. I intend to discuss the historical backgrounds, intellectual orientations, and the goals of these views during these three periods from the perspective of intellectual history.
About the speaker:
Ge Zhaoguang is a Distinguished Professor of Fudan University, Shanghai, China. He received his BA and MA at Peking University. From 1992 to 2006, he was a Professor in the Department of History of Tsinghua University, Beijing. From 2007 to 2013, he was the Director of the National Institute for Advanced Humanistic Studies at Fudan University.
Professor Ge ’s research fields include ancient East Asian and China religion, culture, and history. His works include: A History of Chinese Zen Buddhist Thought: From the 6th to 10th Century (1995，2003), A Intellectual History of China (Volume 1-2，1998，2000), Here in China I Dwell: Reconstructing the Historical Discourses of China for our Time” (2011),What is China: Territory, Ethnicity, Culture, and History (2014) and The Inside and Outside of Historical China: A Re-clarification of the Concept of “China” and Its “Borders” (2017), etc.
He was also selected as the first “Princeton Global Scholar” (2009) in US and was a winner of the “Paju Book Award” (2014) in South Korea and the “Asia Pacific Award” (2014) in Japan etc.
“Writing Chinese History of Literature in the World Context”
Speaker:
Dai Yan (戴燕)
Abstract:
In 1901, Herbert Allen Giles (1845-1935) from Cambridge University published the first history of Chinese literature in English. This work soon became the object of study, criticism and competition. Chinese scholars at the beginning of the twentieth century believed that through writing the “history of literature” with the acquired narrative and research method of this history that first originated in Europe, they could show the world the real essence of Chinese literature and also enable Chinese literature to transform itself from tradition to modernity.
About the Speaker:
Professor Dai Yan teaches at the Fudan University. She received her BA and MA from Peking University and the Chinese Academy of Social Science. She was visiting professor in Kyoto University and also City University in Hong Kong. Her publications include works such as The Power of the History of Literature (2005), An Introduction to the Study of the History of Literature of the Wei-Jin and North-South Dynasties (2012), Lectures on the History of the Three Kingdoms (2017).