Southern Encounters: Nanyang and New Cultural Regionalities in Chinese Studies

Please see the attached flyer and the information below about a one-day conference to be held at the University of Oxford China Centre on June 6th, 2025. This event is in-person only.

To register, please contact Margaret Hillenbrand (margaret.hillenbrand@chinese.ox.ac.uk).

Southern Encounters: Nanyang and New Cultural Regionalities in Chinese Studies 

This conference brings together papers that rethink how the "South" is conventionally being approached and articulated in Chinese Studies. Bringing a diverse set of southern encounters into dialogue with existing discourses about Nanyang, China's Southwest and the Sinophone South, this workshop seeks to explore newer ways of conceptualizing cultural regionalities in Chinese Studies. 

Apocalypse from the Borderland: Fengwu, Routes, and the Topopoetics of Tong Mo’s Southwest Narrative

Jannis Chen Ji Zhou (Asst. Prof, Chinese University of Hong Kong)

An Exotic Turn: The emergence of Nanyang-as-Other in Hong Kong cinema
Yeo Min Hui (Asst. Prof, Nanyang Technological University)

Caught between Homelands: Wang Xiaoping and the Anti-bildungsroman

Jessica Tan Li Wen (Asst. Prof, Lingnan University)

Enacting a Global Contemporary: Wang Anyi and Regional Intimacies in the Sinophone South

Chan Cheow Thia (Asst. Prof, National University of Singapore)

10:30: Panel 1 

10:30-10:35: Opening Remarks

10:35-11:00: Apocalypse from the Borderland: Fengwu, Routes, and the Topopoetics 

      of Tong Mo’s Southwest Narrative (Jannis Chen Ji Zhou)

11:00-11:25: An Exotic Turn: The emergence of Nanyang-as-Other in Hong Kong 

      cinema (Yeo Min Hui) 

11:25-11:55: Q&A

11:55-13:00: Lunch for speakers only

13:00: Panel 2

13:00-13:25: Caught between Homelands: Wang Xiaoping and the 

      Anti-bildungsroman (Jessica Tan Li Wen)

13:25-13:50:  Enacting a Global Contemporary: Wang Anyi and Regional Intimacies in    

      the Sinophone South (Chan Cheow Thia)

13:50-14:20: Q&A

14:20-15:00: Roundtable + Closing remarks

15.00: Coffee and cake for speakers and attendees