Writing in and Writing about Modern Chinese Cities

The half-day conference will have one panel on writing in modern Chinese cities and another on writings about modern Chinese cities.

1:30 - 3:00, Panel 1: "Writing in Modern Chinese Cities: Works in Progress." Focusing on literature, this panel will be moderated by Michael Fuller of UCI and feature presentations of current research by Eileen Cheng of Pomona College, Hu Ying of UCI, and Tang Xiaobing (http://china.usc.edu/ShowFaculty.aspx?articleID=155) of USC.

3:00 - 3:30, Coffee break

3:30 - 5:00 After a half-hour coffee break, we will resume with a second session, running from

3:30 - 5:00, Panel 2: "Writing about Modern Chinese Cities: Reflections on Recent Publications." Focusing on historical and social scientific approaches to urban settings, this panel will take the form of a conversation,  moderated by Jeffrey Wasserstrom (History, UC Irvine), with historian Robert Bickers of the University of Bristol, historian Ruth Rogaski of Vanderbilt University, and political scientist Dorothy Solinger of UCI. They will be asked to comment on the decisions they made, in completed projects, about how to try to bring to life and capture the experiences of Chinese cities of the Republican era (in the case of Bickers and Rogaski) and the PRC era (in the case of Solinger).

There will be no designated discussants for either session, but ample time for questions and general discussion will be left.  No papers will be pre-circulated, though familiarity with Bickers' Empire Made Me, Rogaski's Hygienic Modernity, and Solinger's Contesting Citizenship in Urban China may be beneficial for getting the most out of the second session.