Writing New Females in May Fourth Movement: Case Study on Figure Models in Fiction during Early Republican China

2019.09.25
Event

In early republican China, with the gradual spread of western arts, figure drawings and figure models become a symbolic social topic around that time. “Figure Model Incident” and the debate beyond it, is also represented in the fiction writing, with writers as Zhou Shoujuan, Wang Tongzhao, Bao Tianxiao and Ding Lin involved. In four pieces of fiction presented in this paper, female protagonist build up gender identity and body consciousness with the modern moral system, while they at the same time suffer from sexual violence and males’ visual domination.

Topic: Writing New Females in May Fourth Movement: Case Study on Figure Models in Fiction during Early Republican China

Time& Date: 16:00-18:00, September 27th, 2019

Venue: TA 101

Speaker: Dr. Shao Dong [The Open University of Hong Kong]

Host: Dr. Zhao Ruijuan [CUHK(SZ)]

Language: Chinese

Abstract:

In early republican China, with the gradual spread of western arts, figure drawings and figure models become a symbolic social topic around that time. “Figure Model Incident” and the debate beyond it, are also represented in the fiction writing, with writers as Zhou Shoujuan, Wang Tongzhao, Bao Tianxiao and Ding Ling involved. In the four pieces of fiction presented in this paper, female protagonists build up gender identity and body consciousness with the modern moral system, while they at the same time suffer from sexual violence and males’ visual domination.

Speaker:

Dr Shawn Shao received his PhD degree in Chinese from The The University of Hong Kong. He is currently acting as Research Assistant Professor of the School of Arts and Social Sciences at OUHK. His research interests lie in Modern and Contemporary Chinese Literature, Sinophone Literature, Film Studies and Nanshe Studies. He has published his first academic monograph The Silver Screen among Pages: A study of Yingxi Fiction in Early Republican China in 2017. He is also a member of the Society of Chinese Theories in Literature and Arts.

As a member of The Union of Hong Kong Writers, Dr Shawn Shao has been awarded 9th Global Contest in Chinese Creative Writing 1st prize(2017), Lin Yutang Literary Awards 1st prize(2016), and HK Youth literary Awards short story excellent prize(2015) during recent years. His first book of selected Short stories, named Air Guitar, will come off the press in 2020.

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