28 Nov 2021 (Sunday)

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Image, Imagination and Imaginarium: Remapping World War II Monuments in Greater China

Speaker: Prof. Pan Lu

Time: 16:00 – 18:00 

Language: English

Abstract:

Joint Book Talk: Co-organizing with the Department of Chinese Culture, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University on one of the book talk series “Spatial Practices in Chinese Art History and Visual Studies”

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Pan Lu's book explores five cases of monument and public commemorative space related to World War II in contemporary Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Through the study on the monuments, the project illustrates past and ongoing controversies and contestations over Chinese nation, sovereignty, modernism and identity. 
 
Specifically, this talk focuses on the second chapter of the book, titled “Between Iconic Image and (Artificial) Ruins: Shanghai Sihang Warehouse and Chinese Modern Visuality of World War II.” Opened in 2015, Sihang Warehouse Memorial Museum is an architectural relic where the fierce and famous “Defense of Sihang Warehouse” during the Battle of Shanghai (August to November 1937) of the Second Sino-Japanese War took place. However, for a long time, the warehouse was barely used as a commemorative site in Communist China’s war memory narrative. This chapter endeavors to bring the warehouse space from the background of the much-studied battle per se to the foreground of its architectural history, painting, photographic and cinematic representations, and its current form of a rare spectacle of artificial ruins in war commemorative culture in present-day China.  
 

​Speaker’s Bio:

PAN Lu is Associate Professor at Department of Chinese Culture, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.  She was visiting scholar and visiting fellow at the Technical University of Berlin (2008 and 2009), the Harvard-Yenching Institute (2011-2012), researcher in residence at Fukuoka Asian Art Museum and artist-in-residence at Z/KU Berlin (2016) and visiting scholar at Taipei National University of the Arts (2018).Pan is author of three monographs: In-Visible Palimpsest: Memory, Space and Modernity in Berlin and Shanghai (Bern: Peter Lang, 2016), Aestheticizing Public Space: Street Visual Politics in East Asian Cities (Bristol: Intellect, 2015), and her new book Image, Imagination and Imaginarium: Remapping World War II Monuments in Greater China is published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2020.​​

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12 Dec 2021 (Sunday)

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Places and Traces of War

Speaker: Mr. Tim Ko

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: Cantonese

Abstract:

When the Pacific War broke out in December 1941, Hong Kong had already been fortified for a century.  Batteries, barracks, redoubts, pillboxes, observation posts, tunnels, trenches, shelters, and bunkers were built extensively.  Despite the seemingly unabated developments since the end of the war, there still lie a large number of ex-defence works around Hong Kong.  For over thirty years, the speaker has been exploring these ruins with immense research and labour.  Illustrated with historical photos, maps, and contemporary photos (including aerial photos taken in recent years), the speaker will talk about these relics, many of which lie in some corners of serenity amidst the commotion of present-day Hong Kong.

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Speaker’s Bio:

Ko Tim-keung is a Hong Kong history researcher. He was formerly council member of Royal Asiatic Society (Hong Kong Branch), member of Antiquities Advisory Board and museum expert adviser for the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. At present he is a member of the collection committee, Hong Kong Maritime Museum. He has written extensively on various aspects of Hong Kong history.​

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9,16 Jan 2022 (Sunday)

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The South-East Asian Theatre of the Pacific War

Speaker: Prof. Brian Farrell

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: English

Abstract:

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Speaker’s Bio:

Professor Brian Farrell is a professor of Military History at the National University of Singapore (NUS). He has been teaching military history, European history, and the history of empires and imperialism at NUS since 1993. During that time Prof. Farrell has published extensively in the main area of research interest, the military history of the British Empire. That interest has led him to a broader engagement with the study of imperialism and its influence on Asian and global history, as well as with wider problems of military history in Asia in the 20th century. He has pursued questions in these areas in libraries, archives, research institutes, and especially in the field, in Canada, the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Cambodia, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea and Japan. Prof. Farrell is also Principal Investigator on the major research project Empire in Asia: A New Global History, and serving as Asia-Pacific Regional Coordinator for the Society for Military History, the largest such professional organization in the world.

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_ Feb 2022 (Sunday)

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Leisure Activities Under the Japanese Occupation

Speaker: Dr. Kelvin K CHOW

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: Cantonese

Abstract:

During the Japanese Occupation, Hong Kong people lived in a difficult and helpless environment, which dominated by insecure and strived to survive from living.  Throughout the troubled times, citizens took leisure activities available in town, such as watching Cantonese opera, holding sports competitions or reading newspapers to release their stress and worries.  Leisure activities were also used as a tool to strengthen the social ties among residents, so as to comfort the soul of each other in getting through the hardship. For the Occupied administration, 

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Speaker’s Bio:

Dr. Kelvin K CHOW completed his Ph.D. in the School of Chinese, The University of Hong Kong.  His research specialisations are in the Hong Kong under the Japanese Occupation, Chinese Canadian History, Hong Kong Football History and Hong Kong Historical Buildings. He is the author of several books on the history of the Hong Kong.

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13 Mar 2022 (Sunday)

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Four Issues on the Military Government of Hong Kong during Japanese Occupation: Banknote Printers, Quarantine Ships, the Hong Kong Shrine and the Bacterial Research Institute of Hong Kong

Speaker: Prof. Fung Kam Wing  

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: Cantonese

Abstract:

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Speaker’s Bio:

Zhu Kezhen History of Science Professor, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Fellow, Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, HKU
Visiting Professor, Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Board Director and Guest Curator of "The World of Paper" exhibition, Hong Kong Maritime Museum

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3 April 2022 (Sunday)

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Hong Kong Internment, 1942-1945：Life in the Japanese Civilian Camp at Stanley

Speaker: Mr. Geoffrey Charles Emerson 

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: English

Abstract:

This talk tells the story of the more than 3000 non-Chinese civilians: British, American, Dutch and others, who were trapped in the British colony and interned behind barbed wire in Stanley Internment Camp from 1942 to 1945. From 1970 to 1972, while researching for his MPhil thesis at the University of Hong Kong, the speaker interviewed twenty-three former Stanley internees. The thesis has been long regarded as an invaluable reference and frequently consulted as a primary source on Stanley Camp.

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Speaker’s Bio:

Geoffrey Charles Emerson has lived in Hong Kong for more than forty years. He retired from St Paul's College, where he taught history and English and served as Vice Principal and Careers Master. He was President of the Hong Kong History Society (1974-1984) and has been a Council Member of the Royal Asiatic Society (Hong Kong Branch).

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15 May 2022 (Sunday)​

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Eileen Chang— From Love in a Fallen City to Lust Caution

Speaker: Prof. Hoyan Hang Fung Carole

Time: 14:30 -16:00

Language: Cantonese

Abstract:

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Speaker’s Bio:

Associate Professor of the Department of Chinese Language and Literature, Director of the Yale-China Chinese Language Centre, The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Professor Hoyan’s research interests include modern and contemporary Chinese fiction and drama, Eileen Chang studies, Hong Kong literature, world literature and Asian studies, and Cantonese pronunciation and teaching. Her publications include Revisiting Modern Chinese Literature: Close Reading, Data and Reception (2020) and Re-investigating Eileen Chang: Adaptation, Translation and Research (2018). She also participates in inter-disciplinary studies and publishes creative writings and film and theatre reviews.

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