The Utility of Oral Histories: The case of China

In a discussion for graduate students, Professor Pickowicz asks the questions, "What can be learned from oral histories that cannot be learned from other sources? What is unique about oral histories?" Pickowicz will show clips of several oral histories he filmed in China in the 1980s and 1990s and talk about both the pleasure and […]

Women in Chinese Silent Cinema

Women in Chinese Silent CinemaIn his lecture, Prof. Pickowicz will screen compelling clips from Chinese silent-era films of the 1920s and 1930s. He'll emphasize the diverse roles played by women and ask questions about why the women seen on screen, including such iconic figures as Ruan Lingyu, Li Lili, and Wang Renmei, were far more […]

Koichi Takashima Lecture 2022: Tawada Yōko — Translation as Politics, Translation as Dream

Koichi Takashima Lecture 2022: Tawada Yōko -- Translation as Politics, Translation as Dream The consistent process of disorienting geography, maps, and directions in Tawada Yōko's fiction flies in the face of problematic distinctions between "areas" and the territorial boundaries they imply, assumptions still often dominant in studies of the "boundary-crossing literature" she is taken to […]

Takashima Talks: SPY! The Hunt for the “Enemy Within” During the Battle of Okinawa

THE HUNT FOR THE "ENEMY WITHIN" DURING THE BATTLE OF OKINAWA: RETHINKING WARTIME ATROCITIES DURING THE ASIA-PACIFIC WAR This talk will detail the execution of Okinawans as "spies" by the Japanese military during the Battle of Okinawa, which was the last land battle of the Asia-Pacific War, and the one that resulted in the largest […]

Taiwan Studies Workshop: Western-style Confectionary and Colonial Taiwan

Please join us for “Western-style Confectionary and Colonial Taiwan: Conglomerates, Settler Colonialism, and Tropical Agriculture” with Lillian Tsay (Brown University). 4:30-5:30 p.m. PDT on Thursday, May 19, 2022. Zoom link:  https://tinyurl.com/2p863s22 Meeting ID: 816 8978 5230 Passcode: 500745 Please contact Kanda Polatis at kpolatis@ucsb.edu if you have any questions.