Media and Mediation in East Asia: Assemblages and Global Flows
June 2 - June 4, 2021
Asian Studies Center, University of Pittsburgh
Media in all of its various manifestations—old and new, print and virtual, film and video, analog and digital, recorded and streamed, journalistic, artistic, “Youkued” “Weiboed” and “WeChatified”—defines the cutting edge of new and emergent cultural forms in Asia. There is no better time to investigate the modalities of media and mediation in contemporary academia, when the pandemic restricts many physical activities and population flows. Join the Asian Studies Center for this three-day institute that will explore the way in which histories of different periods, encompassing different regions, can be understood in relation to emergent forms of media and mediated knowledge.
The Summer Institute series at the University of Pittsburgh Asian Studies Center invites early career scholars to engage with leading East Asian studies faculty to workshop article-length manuscripts in preparation for peer review journal publication. Presentations by both the early career scholars and the senior scholars during the workshop will highlight research and teaching objectives.
Program in PDF format
Schedule of Public Events
Events take place virtually over Zoom. Times are listed in EDT.
Register for the whole conference here!
Day One: June 2, 2021
10:30-11:00 a.m.: Panel 1
Calvin Hui: “The Art of Useless: Fashion, Media, and Consumer Culture in Contemporary China”
Kun Qian: “Platformativity: The Libidinal and Polictical Economy of Chinese Live Streaming”
Q&A
11:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m.: Panel 2
Dong Yang: “Where Have All the Personal Feelings Gone?: Unpacking Jia Zhangke’s Acoustic Library”
Ho Chak Law: “Unveiling Parodies in Kung Fu Hustle through Music”
Q&A
Break
2:30-3:00 p.m.: Lecture
Joshua Neves: Techonology and Pharmacology
Day Two: June 3, 2021
10:30-11:00 a.m.: Panel 1
Keung Yoon “Becky” Bae: “The Physicality of Gaming: Bodies, Biology, and Boundaries in Esports and Gaming”
Elizabeth Wijaya: “Insomniac Nights and the Aesthetics of Immobility in Tsai Ming-liang's Walker Series”
Q&A
11:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m.: Panel 2
Pao-chen Tang: “Smudged Screens: User Interface and Globalized Capitalism in The Wandering Earth”
Keisuke Yamada: “The Rise of the Synthetic in Global Capitalism”
Q&A
Break
2:30-3:00 p.m.: Lecture
Weihong Bao: Archaeology of a Medium: The (Agri)Cultural Techniques of a Paddy Film Farm
Day Three: June 4, 2021
10:30-11:00 a.m.: Panel 1
Madeline Eschenburg: “Mediated Marginality: The Case of Zhang Huan’s Performance To Raise the Water Level in a Fish Pond”
Joel Neville Anderson: “Tracing Pre-Histories of Nuclear Disaster Between Japan and Unceded Territories of North America: On Kota Takeuchi’s Blind Bombing, Filmed by a Bat (2020)”
Q&A
11:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m.: Panel 2
Marcos Centeno: “Representing the Ainu in Early Documentary Films: Iconography and the Absent Image”
Shu Min Yuen: “Guyz with a Secret: Towards an Alternative Queer Modernity”
Q&A
Break
2:30-3:00 p.m.: Lecture
Daisuke Miyao: Japonisme and the Birth of Japanese Cinema