Friday, March 10, 2017 | 12:00-1:30 p.m. | GPS Dean's Conference Room

“Forget Chineseness: On the Geopolitics of Cultural Identification”

Presenter:  Allen CHUN, Research Fellow, Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica (Taiwan)

Abstract: Forget Chineseness" provides a critical interpretation not only of discourses of Chinese identity—Chineseness—but also of how they have reflected differences between “Chinese” societies, such as in Hong Kong, Taiwan, PRC, Singapore and communities “overseas.” It asserts that identity has meaning not only in cultural, representational terms but is moreover a product of its embeddedness in specific entanglements of modernity, colonialism, nation-state formation, and globalization. By articulating these processes underlying institutional practices vis-à-vis public mindsets, it is thus possible to elucidate various epistemic moments that lay the basis for their socio-political transformation.

From a broader perspective, this should have salient ramifications for prevailing discussions of identity politics. Not only has the concept of identity been predicated on flawed notions of ethnicity and culture in the social “sciences,” but it has been acutely exacerbated by polarizing assumptions that drive our understanding of identity “politics.”
 
http://www.sunypress.edu/p-6355-forget-chineseness.aspx


###

CRW provides a forum for the presentation of original research by China scholars from around the country in social science and humanities, co-sponsored by Fudan-UC Center on Contemporary China and 21st Century China Program at the UC San Diego School of Global Policy & Strategy. To view archive and upcoming workshops list, visit: http://fudan-uc.ucsd.edu/workshop/index.html