Novel learning

One of the components of job application materials for academics is the teaching statement. Given the amount of introspection needed, it is not an easy piece to write, although it is the perfect piece for stewing over indefinitely. Over all these years of learning how to make myself write (with varying degrees of success depending…Read more Novel learning

A Novel of China: The Mandarin’s Daughter, 1876

While traveling to DC and back last week, I read The Mandarin's Daughter by Samuel Mossman, 1876, which is another 19th century novel about China that I read so you don't have to. (Previously: Out in China by Mrs. Archibald Little, 1902) Mossman's introduction states that the amount of fiction in his novel, The Mandarin's…Read more A Novel of China: The Mandarin’s Daughter, 1876

Too long? Long enough? A long time?

Taiwan Explorer 1, in response to a post on Foreign Sanctuary entitled You Know You've Lived in Taiwan a Long Time When..., called out "taiwanreporter, Love, Dadaocheng, Taiwanvore, The Stinky Tofu, Synapticism, Lao Ren Cha, and any other Taiwan blog to compile a post with the same title, and make a list of good and…Read more Too long? Long enough? A long time?

Thinking about teaching

I spent the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college tutoring and teaching English in my hometown, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, like I had been doing since high school. I biked around the sweltering city from odd job to odd job, cobbling together a workday out of classes with children whose parents who would hire…Read more Thinking about teaching

Review: Fireproof Moth: A Missionary in Taiwan’s White Terror

The title of Milo Thornberry's book, Fireproof Moth: A Missionary in Taiwan's White Terror, comes from the remark of US State Department official, made shortly after the family was deported from Taiwan in 1971: "There is no shortage of American graduate students, missionaries... with both ardent views on Taiwanese Independence and a willingness to conduct…Read more Review: Fireproof Moth: A Missionary in Taiwan’s White Terror

Contextualizing heterodox sects in China

Has anyone else been following this story? NY Times: 5 Sect Members Go on Trial in Killing at McDonald’s in China I first heard about this sect, Eastern Lightning or the Church of Almighty God, when I was in Taiwan last year. Since this murder in May earlier this year, they have been getting far…Read more Contextualizing heterodox sects in China

Sleuthing

When Che Xilun, preeminent Chinese scholar of baojuan (and incredibly kind man, if our email correspondence is anything to go on), compiled his catalogue of baojuan in China, Zhongguo baojuan zongmu 中國寶卷總目, he did so in part by collating previous catalogues into composite entries for each title. Given that his catalogue includes entries for over…Read more Sleuthing

Remarkable likenesses of Liu Xiangnü

While I don't think this is intentional at on the part of whomever put together this text, I find it hilarious that in describing its heroine, the narration accounts for the ill-conceived frontispiece illustrations that would grace so many editions of this text. "A clever illustrator would have difficulty sketching her, her remarkable likeness could…Read more Remarkable likenesses of Liu Xiangnü

Narrative Compass

In my non-academic reading recently, I've been enjoying the essays collected in A Narrative Compass: Stories that Guide Women's Lives. Though it may sound like a self help book, it's actually nineteen essays written by women academics - professors and students of literature, folklore or history; or librarians - about how some narrative affected them…Read more Narrative Compass

Far From Formosa