Recent News

Exploring Taiwan with Miss Chizuru: The Fictional Craft of Taiwan Travelogue

Date: February 20, 2025
Time:
3:30–4:50pm
Location: 
Harold Frank Hall 1104

Description:
How can a Taiwanese novel incorporate historical materials from its decades under
Japanese colonial rule? How does two women’s travelogue become a work of fiction?
This talk will examine Taiwan Travelogue’s use of a “Shōwa Taiwan Railway
Gourmet Tour” as its storytelling framework, covering the novel’s early inspirations,
conceptual development, research, fieldwork, archives-building, story conception, and
writing process.

How can historical documents from the Japanese colonial period be material for novel
writing? How do women’s travels in history become the subject of fictional
storytelling? Using Taiwan Travelogue as an example, this lecture will cover the
journey of creating the “Shōwa period Taiwan Railway Gourmet Tour,” from initial
inspiration, concept development, research, and fieldwork to organization, story
structure, and the final writing process.

The Author: Yáng Shuang-zi
Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, whose real name is Yang Jo-Tzu, is a versatile writer from Taichung,
Taiwan. She dabbles in various forms, including fiction, essays, manga scripts, and
literary criticism.

In 2020, she was named one of the Rising Stars of the Twenty-First Century by
Wenshun magazine and was selected by Unitas magazine as one of the Twenty Most
Promising Young Novelists. In 2021, she became the youngest-ever nominee for the
United Daily News Literary Award. In 2022, Wenshun magazine again recognized
Yáng as a Representative Author of Twenty-First Century Taiwanese Popular
Literature.

Her notable works include the novel The Season When Flowers Bloom (花開時節) in
2017, the short story collection Blossoming Girls of Gorgeous Island (花開少女華麗
島) in 2018, and the novel Taiwan Travelogue (臺灣漫遊錄) in 2020. Taiwan
Travelogue received Taiwan’s highest literary honor—the Golden Tripod Award. In
2024, its Japanese translation won Japan’s Best Translation Award, while the English
version earned the National Book Award for Translated Literature in the United
States.

Prof. William Fleming wins second prize in Japanese Literature Publishing Project (JLPP) International Translation Competition

Professor William Fleming’s translation of excerpts of a poetic travelogue by Kobayashi Issa (1763–1828) won second prize in the Japanese Literature Publishing Project’s (JLPP) 9th International Translation Competition.

https://www.jlpp.go.jp/competition9/index_en.html

https://www.jlpp.go.jp/competition9/pdf/works/William%20Fleming.pdf

Congratulations, Prof. Fleming!

Prof. Mayfair Yang publishes new book, elected as President of the Society for Anthropology of Religion

We are pleased to announce that EALCS professor Mayfair Yang has published a new edited volume, titled Anthropology of Ascendant China: Histories, Attainments, and Tribulations (Routledge, 2024). Please visit the book’s website for more details.

Additionally, Prof. Yang was recently elected President of the Society for Anthropology of Religion (SAR), a Section of the American Anthropological Association. Congratulations!

CARE: Archives & Bodies Reading Group

We’re forwarding information about a new reading group initiative, “The Archives & Bodies Reading Group.” It critically examines and reimagines the roles archives play in humanities research and explores intersections between archival practices, embodiment, and marginalized histories – topics that may be of interest to many in our research community. It is part of an event series organized by the Collective for Archival Research of Embodiment (CARE), a UC-wide multicampus graduate student working group, which includes our colleagues Yiming, Uudam (RG ST), Diandian (MUSIC), Tinghao (FAMST), and other UC grad students. Other CARE events include archival writing workshops and an end-of-year performative exhibition. For more information, please take a look at the attached flyer and reach out to the contact people.

The inaugural session details are below:

Theme: “Mnemonic Bodies: Affective Archives, Memory, and Care”
Date&Time: Saturday, November 9, 6:30 PM (PST)
Platform: Zoom

Reading Materials:

  • Jacques Derrida, “Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression”
  • Ann Laura Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power (chs. 1&4)
  • Diana Taylor, The Archive and the Repertoire (ch. 3)

Registration: https://tinyurl.com/ndke3vn2
Access to readings: https://tinyurl.com/pdupmhph

This open-to-all reading group is organized by the Collective for Archival Research of Embodiment (CARE), a UC-wide graduate student working group. It’s sponsored by the UC Humanities Research Institute, the Interdisciplinary Humanities Center, and the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies at UCSB.

For questions, please contact: Yiming Ma (UCSB): yimingma@ucsb.edu; Tianyun Hua (UCD): tyhua@ucdavis.edu

Assistant Professor in Modern Literary and Media Cultures of Japan in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies

Job #JPF02851
East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies / College of Letters & Science – Humanities and Fine Arts / UC Santa Barbara
Apply now: https://recruit.ap.ucsb.edu/JPF02851/apply
View this position online: https://recruit.ap.ucsb.edu/JPF02851

POSITION OVERVIEW
Position title: Assistant Professor
Salary range: A reasonable estimate for this position is a range of $82,200 – $111,800. Applicants that currently hold a senate faculty position at another UC campus should be aware of the policies governing intercampus faculty hiring & transfers. These policies can be found at UCOP APM 510-18.
Percent time: 100%
Anticipated start: July 1, 2025 or later

APPLICATION WINDOW
Open date: October 21, 2024
Next review date: Friday, Nov 22, 2024 at 11:59pm (Pacific Time)
Apply by this date to ensure full consideration by the committee.
Final date: Monday, Jun 30, 2025 at 11:59pm (Pacific Time)
Applications will continue to be accepted until this date, but those received after the review date will only be considered if the position has not yet been filled.

POSITION DESCRIPTION
We seek a scholar trained in Japanese literature from the late nineteenth century to the present whose research and teaching address the contemporary transmedial context of literature as well as the global reach of Japanese literature, media, and popular culture. Applicants should focus on the modern and contemporary periods, but should be able to speak to the historical depth that informs the contemporary world. We would be interested in a focus on cultures of creativity, material culture, and/or formal aspects of verbal and textual production, especially as they moved from primarily book/paper-based formats to film and radio, television and anime, and more recently to the internet and social media production spaces. We are particularly interested in scholars who engage with questions of racial and social justice—for example, work by or about ethnic Koreans in Japan and within the Japanese empire, bilingual works as expressive of immigrant experience, or narratives of Japanese biracial experiences—and who employ digital methodologies in ways that open new questions for literary studies. We are also interested in candidates whose work can complement existing strengths in the department and in the Division of Humanities
and Fine Arts more broadly, especially translation and border crossing, critical bibliography, media studies, and/or gender and sexuality studies.

The successful candidate will be asked to teach courses in English on modern and contemporary Japanese literature and media, including their cultural and social impacts in Japan and across the globe; survey courses on nineteenth through twenty-first-century Japanese literature; and advanced language classes in Japanese focused on readings related to their research interests.

The department is especially interested in candidates who can contribute to the diversity and excellence of the academic community through research,
teaching, and service.

QUALIFICATIONS
Basic qualifications (required at time of application)
The minimum requirement to be considered for this position is the completion of all requirements for a Ph.D. except the dissertation at time of application. The
Ph.D. may be in any field in the humanities with research specialization in Japanese literature.
Additional qualifications (required at time of start)
Ph.D. at the time of appointment.

APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS
Document requirements
– Curriculum Vitae – Your most recently updated C.V.

– Cover Letter
– Statement of Contributions to Diversity – Statement addressing past and/or potential contributions to diversity through research, teaching, and/or
service.
– Writing Sample – 15-25 Pages

Reference requirements
3 letters of reference required
Please arrange to have three letters of recommendation submitted via UC Recruit.
Apply link: https://recruit.ap.ucsb.edu/JPF02851
Help contact: rebeca_adam@ucsb.edu

ABOUT UC SANTA BARBARA
The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age or protected veteran status. For the University of California’s Affirmative Action Policy please visit: https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/4010393/PPSM-20. For the University of California’s Anti-Discrimination Policy, please visit: https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/1001004/Anti-Discrimination.

As a condition of employment, you will be required to comply with the University of California Policy on Vaccination Programs, as may be amended or revised from time to time. Federal, state, or local public health directives may impose additional requirements.

JOB LOCATION
Santa Barbara, CA