CHN 607
"Nativism in 20th-century Chinese-language Fiction and Film"

In this seminar we will explore how “native place” and/or “home” (hometowns, homelands) have been articulated in 20th-century Chinese fiction and film from China, Taiwan and Malaysia. What meanings accrue around the representation of the native place in different temporal and political contexts? In what ways have authors and filmmakers throughout the 20th century adhered to and/or played with the conventions of native soil literature, or, in other words, how has the genre of native soil literature been reinvented by later generations of writers and filmmakers? What is the relationship of the representation of the native place to modernity, identity, gender, sexuality, and diaspora? Texts to be examined include those by Lu Xun, Shen Congwen, Huang Chun-ming, Wang Zhenhe, Li Yongping, Han Shaogong, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Zhu Tianxin, Ng Kim Chew and Jia Zhangke.