UBC UCCS 2022 Call For Paper
Undergraduate students at UBC are invited to submit abstracts for the UBC Undergraduate Conference of Chinese Studies 3-Minute Thesis Competition 2022, to be held at UBC from February to April, 2022. The conference will provide student researchers with the valuable opportunity to present their academic work in front of UBC faculty and fellow students. We welcome applications from students engaged in research on all fields in Chinese Studies. While applicants may situate their work in disciplines, including language, literature, cinema, history, etc., we especially encourage works that cross disciplinary boundaries to interrogate new possibilities of Chinese Studies.
UCCS 2022 Theme: Boundaries Transcended
Amid the pandemic, the world is plunged into the swirls of closing-off and opening-up. The paradox of separation and connection, indeed, has ever lain in the heart of human inquiries.
Consider the history of Chinese literature. Qu Yuan (340-278 BC), the most self-contained poet of his time, is well-known for hurling rapid-fire questions at the heavens, in a strained hope of going beyond mundane boundaries. Xuanzang (602-664), the most esteemed translator of Buddhist scriptures in China’s history, must have crossed so tremendous a series of confines that the fictional Monkey King with extraordinary power to transform was invoked in tales to come to the aid. Awakened to cultural stagnation under the urge for national modernization at the turn of the 20th century, Lu Xun (1881-1936) heaved an outcry to shake the foundations of the “iron house,” a scathing metaphor for the sealed-off nation facing a clash not only between the East and West, but between the old and new.
Under the view suggested, we ponder the extent and multitude of cultural boundaries. On the map of knowledge, texts, and ideas, how are boundaries drawn between the known and unknown, the local and foreign, and the past and future? How does the vigour of human life benefit or suffer from boundaries entrenched or breached? These questions have no simple answers; yet therein lies our inquiry into Boundaries Transcended, in memory of all the connections we have striven to keep in the historic age of separation.
Call for Papers
Applicants are expected to submit a 200-Chinese-character or 150-English-word abstract, via the self-nomination link at HERE, by January 15, 2022. The proposals will be reviewed by reviewers based on the criteria of theoretical clarity, proposal structure, contribution to the field, and relevance to the conference theme and sub-fields. Acceptance of proposals will be issued afterwards, with instructions on how to upload your 3-minute video-taped presentation onto Canvas for the semi-finals.
UBC UCCS 3MT 2022 will comprise two stages of competition:
1. Virtual Competition (Semi-finals): presenters will give presentations on pre-taped videos, to be posted on the Canvas website of the conference. The semi-finals will take place from February 1-28, 2022.
2. In-person Competition (Final): 10 finalists will each deliver a talk no longer than 3 minutes based on an academic paper, without QA session after the talk. The final will take place on April 1, 2022, at Asian Centre Auditorium, UBC.
