Anthologizing Chinese Literature and Reinventing Literary Canons

In view of the importance of canon formation in the rewriting of Chinese literary history and the role of translation anthologies in constructing literary canons, this article examines the process of canonization represented in the anthologies of Renditions from 1973 to 2020. It observes the literary works that the Renditions’ anthologies attempt to build into canons and delves into the reasons behind the canon building. It concludes that the anthologies of Renditions challenge and subvert the literary canons established by the Chinese mainland, while trying to reconstruct and even popularize new canons from a Hong Kong perspective. Moreover, Renditions’ efforts to anthologize Chinese literature open up new possibilities for future canon formation and pave the way for a more comprehensive revision of Chinese literary history.

The Politics of Experimental Translation: Potentialities and Preoccupations

In this article, I will attempt to sketch out a translation practice that runs counter to conventional ideas about translation, which I theorize as ‘experimental translation’. I will first try, and perhaps fail, to situate a definition of experimental translation, to delimit the borders of what might fall into this category; as we shall see, it is a problematic one. Experimental translation opposes itself to the norms, the doxa of current translation practices. But what norms? Whose translation practice? Situating norms is obviously a fluid and problematic, culturally specific activity. Examining what is opposed to these norms serves to accentuate this. And what are the political implications of this opposition, if there are any? To what extent is translation and, in particular, experimental translation a space where justice is negotiated? Lastly, I will discuss the politics of the translator’s voice. Much attention has historically been given to the politics of the voice of the author, in particular to either debunking its transcendent quality or critiquing the dynamics of whose voice gets heard and whose does not. Translation very often is inflected with political or ethical aims, a desire to right wrongs in the original or to intervene in the landscape of authority and canon formation. What does this imply for the role the translator’s voice plays in experimental translation, in how it appears, or does not? Can experimental translation hope to achieve utopian dreams?

Innovative Interpretations: Three Recent Studies by Latin American Women Scholars

This article offers a survey of recent work by women scholars in the field of Latin American Studies. Focusing on the writings of Emily Hind, Ana Forcinito, and Sophia Beal, it identifies dominant threads in their research into masculinity and canon formation in Mexico, women filmmakers in Argentina, poetics of memory in Uruguay, and gender and urban spatiality in Brazil. Set within a larger context of the history of Gender Studies within the discipline, this piece provides a vision of pioneering developments in contemporary Latin American Cultural Studies.

Feminist Aesthetics

This chapter summarizes central issues and themes in feminist philosophical aesthetics in the analytic tradition, although some continental figures are discussed. After introducing the interdisciplinary, intersectional and trans* inclusive approach that feminist aesthetics is starting to take, this essay discusses situatedness, artistic canon formation, humanism vs. gynocentrism, rewriting the philosophical canon, overcoming artworld biases, and the role of the aesthetic in systemic oppression. Specific topics to be discussed include the male gaze, the female nude, the concept of artistic genius, women’s artistic production, the purported universality of correct aesthetic judgment, the sex/gender distinction as it pertains to aesthetics and the arts, and body aesthetics.