Sinophone Studies: A Critical Reader

by Shu-mei Shih (Editor), Chien-hsin Tsai (Editor), Brian Bernards (Editor)

Overview

This definitive anthology casts Sinophone studies as the study of Sinitic-language cultures born of colonial and postcolonial influences. Essays by such authors as Rey Chow, Ha Jin, Leo Ou-fan Lee, Ien Ang, Wei-ming Tu, and David Wang address debates concerning the nature of Chineseness while introducing readers to essential readings in Tibetan, Malaysian, Taiwanese, French, Caribbean, and American Sinophone literatures. By placing Sinophone cultures at the crossroads of multiple empires, this anthology richly demonstrates the transformative power of multiculturalism and multilingualism, and by examining the place-based cultural and social practices of Sinitic-language communities in their historical contexts beyond "China proper," it effectively refutes the diasporic framework. It is an invaluable companion for courses in Asian, postcolonial, empire, and ethnic studies, as well as world and comparative literature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231157506
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	01/22/2013
Series:	Global Chinese Culture
Pages:	472
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Shu-mei Shih is professor of comparative literature, Asian languages and cultures, and Asian American studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, and is the author of, among other works, Visuality and Identity: Sinophone Articulations Across the Pacific.

Chien-hsin Tsai is assistant professor of modern Chinese literary and cultural studies at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of Of Classics and Men: Lian Heng and the Writing of History and Poetry in Taiwan at the Turn of the Twentieth Century.

Brian Bernards is assistant professor of East Asian languages and cultures at the University of Southern California, where he specializes in modern Chinese and Southeast Asian literature and cinema and postcolonial studies.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
List of Contributors
Introduction: What Is Sinophone Studies? Shu-mei Shih
I. Issues and Controversies introduction by Chien-hsin Tsai
1. Against Diaspora: The Sinophone as Places of Cultural Production (2007) Shu-mei Shih
2. On Chineseness as a Theoretical Problem (1998) Rey Chow
3. Can One Say No to Chineseness? Pushing the Limits of the Diasporic Paradigm (1998) Ien Ang
4. Sinophone/Chinese: "The South Where Language Is Lost" and Reinvented (1998) Kim Chew Ng
5. Post-Loyalism (2007) David Der-wei Wang
6. Exiled to English Ha Jin
II. Discrepant Perspectives introduction by Brian Bernards
7. Chineseness: The Dilemmas of Place and Practice (1999) Gungwu Wang
8. Cultural China: The Periphery as Center (1991) Wei-ming Tu
9. On the Margins of the Chinese Discourse (1991) Leo Ou-fan Lee
10. The Structure of Dual Domination: Toward a Paradigm for the Study of the Chinese Diaspora in the United States (1995) Ling-chi Wang
III. Sites and Articulations introduction by Brian Bernards and Chien-hsin Tsai
* Sinophone Hong Kong
11. Intra-Local and Inter-Local Sinophone: Rhizomatic Politics of Hong Kong Writers Saisai and Wong Bik-wan Mirana May Szeto
12. Things
* Sinophone Taiwan
13. Taiwan Fiction Under Japanese Colonial Rule
14. Sinophone Indigenous Literature of Taiwan: History and Tradition Hsinya Huang
15. Writing Beyond Boudoirs: Sinophone Literature by Female Writers in Contemporary Taiwan Pei-Yin Lin
16. Of Guest and Host: Zhong Lihe
* Sinophone Tibetan
17. On the Margins of Tibetanness: Three Decades of Sinophone Tibetan Literature Patricia Schiaffini
18. Danger in the Voice: Alai and the Sinophone Carlos Rojas
* Sinophone Malaysian and Singaporean
19. Sinophone Malaysian Literature: An Overview Kim Tong Tee
20. Transcending Multiracialism: Kuo Pao Kun's Multilingual Play Mama Looking for Her Cat and the Concept of Open Culture E. K. Tan
21. Plantation and Rainforest: Chang Kuei-hsing and a South Seas Discourse of Coloniality and Nature Brian Bernards
* Sinophone New Zealand
22. Inverted Islands: Sinophone New Zealand Literature Jacob Edmond
* Sinophone Manchu
23. Beneath Two Red Banners: Lao She as a Manchu Writer in Modern China Carles Prado-Fonts
* Sinophone French
24. Found in Translation: Gao Xingjian's Multimedial Sinophone Andrea Bachner
* Sinophone American
25. Generational Effects in Racialization: Representations of African Americans in Sinophone Chinese American Literature Sau-ling Wong
26. At the Threshold of the Gold Mountain: Reading Angel Island Poetry Te-hsing Shan
27. The Chinese Immigrant as a Global Figure in Lin Yutang's Novels Shuang Shen
* Sinophone Latin American and Caribbean
28. Latin America and the Caribbean in a Sinophone Studies Reader? Ignacio López-Calvo
Glossary of Sinitic Terms
Index, by ii

What People are Saying About This

Jing Tsu

This is an important and timely resource for anyone interested in Sinophone studies, its conceptual genesis in the 1980s, relationship to earlier debates on 'Chineseness,' and current directions. It will appeal to a broad audience in North America, Southeast Asia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other major and minor communities at cross-sections of the Chinese-speaking world.

Victor H. Mair

The emergence of Sinophone studies within the last decade has been one of the most interesting developments. Most exciting is that nearly all of the very foundations and earliest adumbrations of this novel concept are to be found in Sinophone Studies, which makes it a unique resource for introducing this fresh field to student and scholar alike.

David L. Eng

This pathbreaking anthology maps out a bold and heterogeneous terrain for the field of Sinophone studies. China is one of the oldest extant empires as well as one of the most powerful countries in the world today, yet the term 'Sinophone' is not part of our vocabulary the way 'Anglophone' and 'Francophone' are. This expansive collection will change that. Postcolonial, diaspora, area, immigration, and ethnic studies will never be the same.

Yomi Braester

Sinophone studies defines a new and exciting academic field. Rather than viewing diaspora through a romanticizing lens, the essays reveal the power structure laid down by colonial expansion, overseas settlement, and migration. The book offers important new paradigms for the relationship among nation, state, and language.

Brett de Bary

This landmark volume introduces Sinophone studies as a mode of inquiry. Bursting the boundaries of established 'Chinese literature,' these essays seek to expand the territorial and cultural purchase of a monolingual 'Chinese' language and insist on the Sinophone as a site of heterogeneity, of multiple tongues in ceaseless interaction.

Editorial Reviews

A valuable sourcebook introducing fundamental ideas and major intellectuals in this field...

Journal of Asian Studies