Event Is Feb. 19-20, 1999: For times and events, see the attached schedule FILMMAKER LU WEI CANCELS HIS APPEARANCE AT CHINA CONFERENCE

A probing look at China at the end of the 20th century will be held on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 19-20, at UC Santa Barbara's Interdisciplinary Humanities Center McCune Conference room. The social transformations taking place in contemporary China---the mainland, Hong Kong, and Taiwan---will be examined through presentations on the arts, the economy, homosexuality, and religion. Artistic production will be an important part of the conference, and

excerpts will be shown of the work of film writer-director Lu Wei.

Lu, whose schedule forced him to cancel a planned conference appearance, was screenwriter on two well-received films: Zhang Yimou's "To Live" and Chen Kaige's "Farewell, My Concubine." Last year, his directorial debut, "The Journey to the Xia Empire," won a prize at Santa Barbara's film festival.

"The conference is intended to help people become more aware of China's increasing importance as a cultural influence in the world, because in the next millennium China will be very important in the global scene," said Mayfair Yang, UCSB anthropologist and one of the organizers of "Turn-of-the-Century China: Identity and Cultural Production."

"This conference will try to capture the multiple worlds that are China today, as it struggles with the legacy of Mao, capitalist consumer culture, and traditional China," she added.

For more information, the public may call the Interdisciplinary Humanities Center at 893-3907.

Turn-of-the-Century China: Identity & Cultural Production in a Global Context February 19-20, 1999

UC Santa Barbara Interdisciplinary Humanities Center McCune Conference Room

Friday, February 19 McCune Conference Room

12:30-2:15 p.m. "China's Entry Into Modernity: Historical Considerations"

Mark ELLIOTT (History, UC Santa Barbara)

"China on the Cusp: The Twentieth Century and Beyond"

Joan JUDGE (History, UC Santa Barbara)

"Cultural Continuities: The Politics of Reform at Both Ends of

China's Twentieth Century"

2:30 -5:30 p.m. "Culture, Politics, and the Economy"

Andrew JONES (Asian Languages and Literatures, U. of Washington, Seattle)

"The Gramophone in China:

Music, Media Culture, and Technology

at the Turn of the Century"

CHEN Xiaomei (Asian Languages and Literatures, Ohio State U.)

"The Politics of Representation of China in Diaspora:

The Cultural Revolution and Beyond"

Gail HERSHATTER (History, UC Santa Cruz)

"Of Models and Marriages: Gendered Memories of Socialism

in Two Chinese Villages"

Mayfair YANG (Anthropology, UC Santa Barbara)

"Political Economy and Ritual Economy in Rural Wenzhou"

5:30 - 6:30 p.m. Welcoming Reception

Saturday, February 20: McCune Conference Room

9-11 a.m. "Chinese Arts on the World Stage"

Kuo-ch'ing TU (East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, UC SantaBarbara)

"Chinese Literature Beyond China"

Eugene Yuejin WANG (Fine Arts, Harvard U.)

"A Chinese in Paris: San Yu (1900-1966) and Modernism In/Out of Place"

Michelle YEH (East Asian Studies, UC Davis)

"National Culture and Cultural Nationalism:

Identity Crisis in Modern Chinese Poetry"

11 a.m. -noon "Globalization and the Chinese Film Industry and Audience"

Excerpts from the works of LU Wei (Screenwriter and filmmaker, Xi'an Film

Studio) and discussion. Appearance is CANCELLED 1-3 p.m. "Elite and Popular Culture"

MENG Yue (History, UC Los Angeles and Getty Predoctoral Fellow)

"Culture of Consumption at the Turn of Two Centuries"

Kathy LOWRY (East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, UC SantaBarbara)

"Street Life, Wang Shuo's Fiction and Uses of the City in Contemporary Film"

Allen CHUN and Luke CHENG (Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica, Taipei)

"The Marginalization of the Public Sphere and the Growth of Internet

Communities in Taiwan"

3:15 -5:30 p.m. "Shifting Identities"

Tze-lan Deborah SANG (East Asian Languages and Literatures, U. of Oregon)

"The Transnational Chinese Lesbian:

A Comparative Study of Taiwanese and

Mainland Chinese Avant-garde Fiction on Female Homoerotic Desire"

Lisa ROFEL (Anthropology, UC Santa Cruz) "Is There a Global Culture of

'Gayness'? Cultural Citizenship, Cosmopolitanism and Gay Identities in China"

Shu-mei SHIH (Comparative Literature, UC Los Angeles)

"Visuality and Identity Across the Chinese Pacific"

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