Sinophone studies has emerged, in recent years, as a new field of study in the United States as well as across Asia. What are the implications of Sinophone studies for the study of Hong Kong? Hong Kong is Sinophone where various Sinitic languages are spoken, especially Cantonese and Mandarin, and politics concerning language choice is an immanent issue. At the same time, Hong Kong is also Anglophone and there are many other languages, such as Southeast Asian languages, that are spoken. Politics of language is deeply connected to politics of culture and identity, which has literary, musical, and other consequences.
This workshop will gather 11 scholars from Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and the United States to examine Hong Kong culture and literature from and against Sinophone perspectives, as a way to interrogate the conjunction, or lack thereof, between Sinophone studies and Hong Kong studies. In conjunction with the workshop, Prof. David Der-wei Wang (Hung Leung Hau Ling Distinguished Fellow in Humanities, The University of Hong Kong; Edward C. Henderson Professor of Chinese Comparative Literature, Harvard University) will also be speaking with Prof. Shu-mei Shih (Hon-yin and Suet-fong Chan Endowed Professor in Chinese, The University of Hong Kong) at a public forum on the same topic.
