Dear members of SSJ-Forum, 

We cordially invite you to GAS Book Talk on June 26 (Wed), 2024. This event will be held in-person only. To join this event, please fill in the form below. Also, please feel free to share this information widely.  　

GAS Book Talk "Untamed Shrews: Negotiating New Womanhood in Modern China"

Date and time: June 26 (Wed), 2024, 14:00-15:30 PM (JST)

Venue: Main Conference Room (3F), Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of Tokyo

Speaker: Shu Yang, Associate Professor of Chinese, Department of World Languages and Literatures, Western Michigan University

Moderator: Yuki Tanaka, Associate Professor, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, University of Tokyo

 

Registration: https://forms.gle/yje8K49X4xTeEy1g8

Language: English

Abstract: Untamed Shrews traces the evolution of unruly women in Chinese literature, from the reviled "shrew" to the celebrated "new woman." Notorious for her violence, jealousy, and promiscuity, the character of the shrew personified the threat of unruly femininity to the Confucian social order and served as a justification for punishing any woman exhibiting these qualities. In this book, Shu Yang connects these shrewish qualities to symbols of female empowerment in modern China. Rather than meeting her demise, the shrew persisted, and her negative qualities became the basis for many forms of the new woman, ranging from the early Republican suffragettes and Chinese Noras, to the Communist and socialist radicals. Criticism of the shrew endured, but her vicious, sexualized, and transgressive nature became a source of pride, placing her among the ranks of liberated female models. Untamed Shrews shows that whether male writers and the state hate, fear, or love them, there will always be a place for the vitality of unruly women. Unlike in imperial times, the shrew in modern China stayed untamed as an inspiration for the new woman.

 

Organizer: GAS Initiative at the Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of Tokyo 

Contact: gas[at]ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp

Best Regards,

Global Asian Studies (GAS) 

https://gas.ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp

Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia (IASA) at the University of Tokyo

https://www.ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp/en/

https://www.ioc.u-tokyo.ac.jp