Event — Workshop

Women's Cinema from Taiwan: Transnational and Comparative Perspectives

Across the world, women’s work in film, television and related media is gaining more public recognition and scholarly attention than ever before. In Taiwan, women have had a long history of breaking into the film industry and playing key creative roles as directors, screenwriters, producers, designers, not to mention actresses. Yet their contributions are often underappreciated.

This international workshop aims to spotlight women’s work in Taiwanese cinema, exploring topics such as female authorship, the female gaze, women’s networks, feminist media, and women’s contributions to the production of both independent and mainstream cinemas. While the emphasis is on new and recent films by women, the workshop will also hark back to earlier films to explore questions of canonization and the writing of film history. Moreover, the workshop will touch on the issues of female labor and female representation in male directors’ works. A major goal of the workshop is to examine overlooked voices, figures, pioneers, organizations, and collaborations. Another objective is to analyze Taiwanese women’s cinema from local, regional, and transnational perspectives, shedding light on the entanglements between local and global media cultures. 

 

Organisation

This workshop is convened by Professor Tze-lan Sang, Chair of Taiwan Studies at Leiden University and IIAS. It forms part of the Chair of Taiwan Studies Programme, which is supported by the Department of Cross-Strait Education of the Ministry of Education of the Republic of China (Taiwan), the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS), and the Leiden University, Faculty of Humanities.

 

Registration

This workshop is in-person and free of charge. To register, please fill in the form in the column on the right of this page.

 

Speakers and presentation titles - preliminary list

Session 1: Female Authorship and Taiwanese Documentary I

Session moderator: Ming-yeh Rawnsley, IJTS and SOAS, University of London

Zhen Zhang, New York University
Jasmine Ching-hui Lee’s Come Home My Child

Tze-lan Sang, Chair of Taiwan Studies at Leiden University and IIAS
Hu Tai-li’s Visual Ethnography

 

Session 2: Female Authorship and Taiwanese Documentary II

Session moderator: Ling Zhang, IIAS

Hsiu-Chuang Deppman, Oberlin College
Feeling Thought in Motion in Ho Chao-ti’s Documentaries

Kik Tianqi Yu, Queen Mary University of London
Presentation title will be confirmed shortly

 

Session 3: Female Labor and Female Representation

Session moderator: Anne Sytske Keijer, Leiden University

Jens Damm, Albert-Ludwigs-University Freiburg
The Characteristics of Female Actors in Tsai Ming-liang's Films: A Focus on Yang Kuei-mei (楊貴媚), Chen Shiang-chyi (陳湘琪), and Lu Yi-ching (陸弈靜)

Ming-yeh Rawnsley, University of London
Female Characters in Taiwanese-language Cinema of the 1950s-1970s

Alexa Alice Youbin, George Washington University
Transness and Mixed-Race Performance in As We Like It (2021)

 

Roundtable: Transnational and Comparative Approaches to Taiwanese Women’s Cinema

Roundtable moderator: Tze-lan Sang