MCLC: The Fantastic in Chinese Cinemas--cfp

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The Fantastic in Chinese Cinemas–cfp
Call for Papers: The Fantastic in Chinese Cinemas
As a medium which excels at inducing its audience to fully identify with the images on screen and which, however, can also trick and enthrall viewers through the use of various effects, cinema is particularly well suited to portraying aspects of the fantastic, whether it be ghosts and monsters, futuristic scientific advances, or the depiction of the amazing bodily feats of martial arts masters. Though, to be sure, the fantastic in cinema may be seen as a mode of escape from the ennui or drudgery of modern life in a post-traditional society, we need not think of it only in these critical terms. As speculative formulations of alternate realities, the fantastic creates cinematic spaces for audiences to re-conceptualize histories and cultures, to envision utopian hopes and futures, and/or to prognosticate dystopian horrors of life on earth.
We are soliciting papers to join a panel for the SCMS conference in Chicago, IL, March 22-26, 2017, focusing on the fantastic, specifically in Chinese cinemas. While the fantastic already has a sustained presence in Chinese cinematic history, beginning with the silent era of the Shanghai film industry, our interest in directing new critical focus on the subject is generated in part by the momentous shifts toward digital cinema and their impact upon computer-generated imagery, which has allowed the (transnational) Chinese cinema industries to both compete and collaborate with Hollywood in new and productive ways. For example, what does it mean—in terms of culture, economics, technology, politics, aesthetics—for fantasy films like Painted Skin: The Resurrection (Wu Ershan, 2012), Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons (Stephen Chow, 2013), Monster Hunt (Raman Hui, 2015), Mojin: The Lost Legend (Wu Ershan, 2015), and The Mermaid (Stephen Chow, 2016) to dominate the Chinese and Asian markets, as audiences lap up these movies in 3D and at IMAX theaters? How are the fantastic and its focus on visual spectacle changing the landscape and the trajectories of Chinese cinemas in Hong Kong, Mainland China, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora? What are the nature and implications of these transnational collaborations between the Chinese cinema industries and global Hollywood?
Our call for papers includes but is not limited to these topics:
Definitions and theories of the fantastic in Chinese cinemas
Delineation of the formal and/or generic qualities of the fantastic
Realism and the fantastic
Historical traditions of the fantastic in Chinese cinemas
Literary adaptations
The fantastic in national and transnational configurations
The mediation of tradition and modernity through technology
CGI and 3D in Chinese cinemas
Monstrosity
Hybridity and cyborg technology; discussions of the post-human; animal studies
Eco-cinema and the fantastic
Sexuality and gender; body politics; disability studies
Science fiction and the apocalypse in Chinese cinemas
The fantastic in Chinese martial arts cinema
Politics and ethics in/of the fantastic
Specific directors, for example Stephen Chow, Tsui Hark, or Fruit Chan
Experimental and underground cinemas
Censorship of the fantastic
Comparisons of the fantastic in Chinese cinemas to examples from other traditions
Please send paper abstracts (of no more than 250 words) and a brief bio to both Kenneth Chan (kenneth.chan at unco.edu) and Andrew Stuckey (andrew.stuckey at colorado.edu) by July 31, 2016. Notice of acceptance will be sent no later than August 15, 2016.
by denton.2 at osu.edu on June 28, 2016
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