Female Assertion of Historical Participation/Intervention in Chinese Popular Romance

Abstract

This paper investigates the unique fantastic structure of Chinese online time-travel romance genre. While primarily romantic fictions that have inherited generic patterns from Chinese romantic traditions, the online time-travel romance deviates from the generally realistic narrative conventions in its world-making. Written in the fantastic mode, this subcategory of romance establishes a two-world structure. This study focuses on how the heterotopian chronotope of the second world is constructed via postmodern linguistic hybridity, multiple times, and spaces. The study will also examine how the general cultural, intellectual, social, and political elements from Chinese imperial past together with modern consciousness and spaces create a unique fantasy world of clashing and dialogic chronotopes for the female protagonists to realize their romantic ideals. However, the most important aspiration and ambition embedded in this romantic idealism is the historical participation and intervention by women generally excluded from history-making.

Presenters

Jie Lu
Professor of Chinese Studies & Film Studies, Department of Mondern Language & Literature, University of the Pacific, California, United States

Details

Presentation Type

Paper Presentation in a Themed Session

Theme

Critical Cultural Studies

KEYWORDS

CHINESE TIME-TRAVEL ROMANCE, FANTASTIC MODE, HETEROTOPIA, CHRONOTOPE, LINGUISTIC HYBRIDITY