HICCS 2025

This bilingual panel explores the dynamic interplay between folk religion and cultural adaptation across different communities in East Asia.

Jingyang Zhao
Southwest University of Political Science and Law, Lecturer

Title:
Ancestor Myths and Witchcraft Traditions: Folk Religion As A Strategy Of Cultural Adaption For She People In Eastern Fujian
Abstract:
Pan Hu worship （盘瓠崇拜）and Lvshan Taoism（闾山道法） are of great significance for She people（畲） in Eastern Fujian, by examining local historical documents, and fieldwork data, this paper argues, to hide, or to emphasize the memories of the saga of Pan Hu, which are two opposite cultural orientations of She people，may coexisted in eastern Fujian. In fact, integrating into the society and escaping from that are both strategies of cultural adaption. In the process of She people’s settling down and localization，while resolving the political conflicts of the power and right，they make their identity intensified as the descendants of Pan Hu. At the same time，Lvshan Taoism helps to strengthen She people’s awareness of ethnic boundary by an organic integration of ancestor myths，witchcraft traditions and local Taoism. It also motivates She wizards to take part in more social life activities for they are given title of ritual specialists in a traditional naming system.

Bartosz Czerwinski
Taipei National University of the Arts, Ph.D Student

Title:
The practice of temple isolation (坐禁) in Penghu folk religion: case study of Yu Sheng temple in Baikeng village.

Abstract:
During late Ming and early Qing dynasties, inhabitants of Mainland China provinces of Fujian and Guangdong were migrating in waves to the tiny archipelago of Penghu, situated near the south-western coast of the Taiwan island. Along with their wealth and families, they brought religious customs that turned out to be a foundation for Taiwanese folk beliefs as we know them today. Originating in Penghu, zuojin (坐禁）is probably the most mystical ritual practice in Taiwanese folk religion system commonly referred to as Faism (法教). A rite of passage which was to foster spirit mediums, and high priest is now a nearly non-existent curiosity practiced only by the most devoted Faist priests and their temples. Selected among Penghu’s most talented and bright young minds (usually boys aged 8 to 13), aspiring priests were subjected to the period of forty-nine day in-temple isolation, where under strict vegetarian diet and on purpose sleep deprivation, they were learning about advanced Taoist arts including writing and usage of talismanic scripts (符令）, and ritual hand gestures (手印). Although zuojin used to be a common practice among temples of Penghu and southern Taiwan, during last several decades it started to slowly disappear from country’s spiritual life. The gradual disappearance of zuojin has been regarded as an outcome of globalization, rapidly lowering birth rate in the Republic of China, and growing education standards in the country. Nowadays the practice is nearly non-existent.

Through qualitative interviews and analysis of written materials obtained during field research, I aim to introduce the practice of zuojin through the lens of Yu Sheng temple situated in the Baikeng village of Penghu, which was one of the last places to ever organize the ritual in its full forty-nine day form. My main guide to the spiritual world of Penghu islands was Xu Tianfu (許天富), a long-time head priest of the Yu Sheng temple who supervised the ritual himself, and is now regarded as one of the last remaining final authorities on the Faist ritualistic practices of Penghu archipelago.

Yu Tong Zheng
The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Ph.D Candidate

题目：
「新東北文學」中的「出馬仙」民俗信仰書寫研究

摘要：
「出馬」作為一種動物修煉而成的仙，在深受薩滿教傳統影響的中國東北文化中長期受到尊崇。其中以「胡黃白柳灰」五種動物仙最為常見，通過修煉百年後來到凡塵積累功德，以求能成為正修仙神，在民間通常與治療疾病相關聯。「出馬仙信仰」作為東北文化的重要組成部分，在東北文學的百年歷程中不乏與之相關的文學創作。本文通過分析自20世紀抗戰時期「東北流亡作家群」的寫作至近年來備受矚目的「新東北作家群」中的「出馬仙信仰」與跳神儀式，嘗試釐清「出馬仙信仰」在東北文學中的書寫路徑發生的諸種轉變。進而以「東北文藝復興三傑」之一的作家鄭執及其代表作《仙癥》為例，揭示出馬信仰與東北民俗儀式在這批當代青年作家筆下具有更為複雜的象徵意涵。他們既渴望脫離父輩建立的象徵秩序，卻又無法逃離。故而出馬仙信仰和跳神民俗活動作為東北文化象徵體系的核心，在1990年代的東北下崗潮背景之下逐漸脫離原本昏昧迷信的象徵涵義，一方面蘊藏對父輩失敗的反思與逃離，另一方面暗藏作家對東北土地的懷舊與鄉愁。此外，在對東北文學中的出馬仙信仰進行縱向歷史梳理的同時，對比「新南方文學」中關於巫術與疾病的書寫，指出當代地方文學可能存在的民俗寫作轉向

This panel explores cultural and spatial dynamics across borders, examining the "Burma Road" in China's Muslim Northwest, strategies and styles of youth films in the multimedia era, creative collaborations in China-Europe film co-production, and migration's impact on the cosmology of home.

Peng Hai
University of Pittsburg, Assistant Professor

Title:
"Burma Road” in the Muslim Northwest: Centering Borderlands in Kukan

Abstract:
Reemerging as a high-profile patriotic education film at the Chongqing Three Gorges Museum, Kukan: the Battle Cry of China (1941), thanks to a long sequence of air raids descending on China’s war-time capital Chongqing, has greeted the Chinese public since 2015 as the latest documentary evidence of Japanese WWII atrocities after the publications of Iris Chang’s The Rape of Nanking (1991) and The Diaries of John Rabe (1997). The air raids footage, well over ten minutes long, has since animated much popular and academic discussion in China. The Academy award winning documentary has also engendered intense interest in Li Ling-ai, the “technical advisor” of the film, an under-credited creative force behind the film according to Asian Americanist filmmaker Robin lung. However, the “film proper,” in which at least two thirds are set in China’s southwestern and northwestern borderlands, has received no attention in English language reviews. This article focuses its analysis on the images of those borderlands and their indigenous inhabitants. A proper treatment of the bulk of the documentary’s content, I argue, brings to light little-known facts of border-crossings in the China Theater of WWII. These border-crossings, from Burma to Yunnan, Guangxi to Chongqing, Sichuan to Gansu, eastern Qinghai to the Tibetan Plateau, and extradigetically, northwestern China to Soviet Central Asia, foreground the critical role traditionally non-Sinitic parts of China played in sustaining the Chongqing-based Kuomintang regime in the Pacific War years. Aside from providing rare documentary footages on the well-told story of the “Burma Road,” images of the “Asiatic melting pot” of Gansu and Qinghai underline the heretofore unknown history of China’s northwestern Muslim transporters and road builders, who were a sine qua non force in ensuring critical supplies from the Soviet Union could reach Chongqing’s ill-equipped army via the tortuous Qilian mountains and treacherous Yellow River by mule caravans and goat-skin rafters.

Ying Xiao
University of Florida, Associate Professor

题目：
融媒体时代青春片的类型策略、视听风格与跨时空想象

摘要：
作为一种重要的题材类型，中国式青春片自1990年代第六代导演以青春成长为载体的艺术电影到21世纪新媒介时代以IP电影的商业模式迅速崛起历经了一系列的嬗变。文章通过分析青春片的叙事结构、类型元素、和文化症候对21世纪融媒体时代中国电影的青春化、数字化和微转向进行解读，并探讨其类型发展流变过程中与当代中国科技、媒介、社会转型之间的关联。这一类型的融合、拓展及媒介间性也很好的体现在青春片的视听风格上，尤其是对流行音乐类型及音乐能动性的运用上。本文首次聚焦青春片的电影音乐，通过文本细读及对视听风格的剖析，并采纳“娱乐产业乌托邦”、“异托邦”和“无托邦”等概念的比照框架对中国式青春片的类型特征及融媒体时代复杂而多变的影视文化生态网络提出归纳性的阐释和进一步的理论思考。

Mei Yang
University of San Diego, Associate Professor

Title:
Migration, Space, and the Cosmology of Home: A Comparative Perspective

Abstract:
Embarking from The Wandering Earth (2019), China’s first interstellar blockbuster, in which actions of the main characters are prompted by their wish to go home, this paper surveys the homecoming narratives observed in contemporary Chinese films, both commercial hits and art house films. These films include Jia Zhangke’s A Touch of Sin (2013), Zhang Yang’s Shower (1999), Getting Home (2007), Yung-Shing Teng’s Return Ticket (2011) and commercial hits such as Lost on Journey (2010). I also extend beyond Chinese features and examine how the desire for home is represented against the background of transnational economic flow and cross-border labor movements in recent films. In the South Korean drama Way Back Home (2013), Australian film Lion (2016), Taiwanese semi-autobiographical American Girl (2021), and Hollywood productions such as Nomadland (2020) and Tár (2022), migration, social mobility, and the pursuit of freedom become jumbled and in the end all eerily resemble dislocation. To confront that reality, films either affirm the validity of homecoming or refute it with a more resolute exile. These films posit one question that lies at the center of my inquiry, namely, where is home, then?

I highlight two Chinese filmmakers, Li Ruijun, and Bi Gan, whose answers through the river scenes in their films are revelatory. Li’s River Road (2014) and Return to Dust (2022) tell of marginalized individuals searching for, returning

This panel examines the interplay between media, culture, and storytelling in China, exploring the global localization of Genshin Impact, avant-garde animation in 1980s China, digital reading practices of infinite fictions, and the portrayal of capitalists in socialist-era Chinese TV series.

Tianyi Xu
Fudan University, Masters Student

Title:
Born-Translated Chinese Videogame Genshin Impact and its Glocalization

Abstract:
This paper uses Genshin Impact, developed by Chinese game company miHoYo (HoYoverse), as a case study to connect translation theories with game studies, re-examining translation practices in contemporary Sinophone digital media. Genshin Impact has embedded translation into the game production process, enabling players worldwide to access the latest content simultaneously, altering the inherent sequence between original and translated texts to achieve a “born-translated” state. Additionally, unlike traditional localization strategies in the game industry, Genshin Impact demonstrates a path described as “glocalization” through multicultural creation and translation, providing an equal space for world cultures to showcase themselves and challenging the notion that there are dominant and subordinate cultures. The paper concludes that Genshin Impact should not be seen as a machine for cultural export but rather as one of the possibilities for future world literature. The game belongs not only to China but also to the entire world, and its born-translated characteristic and glocalization strategy welcomes players of different races and languages, allowing them to enter its world as a foreign place and engage in a detached mode of cultural experience.

Yan Zhong
University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, Lecturer in Chinese

题目：
钟泉艺术动画——80年代新中国文艺复兴背景下的先锋派动画

摘要：
在1992年于夏威夷国际电影节上，美国动画家大卫艾力克向美国观众正式介绍了七部中国艺术动画电影，其中两部是艺术动画代表人物钟泉的剪纸动画片《牛冤》与水墨动画片《雁阵》。
1978年中国改革开放以后出现了10年的文艺繁荣。在胡耀邦的文艺路线指导下，在改革开放后中国电影界的经济红利推动下，一种独特的国有经济支持下的文化创新活动在中国出现。当时国务院（现中共中央）电影局的经济支持下，在国务院文化部的宽松政策默许下，中国文化解出现了前所未有的繁荣，人们称之为“新中国文艺复兴的十年”。
长春电影制片厂美术分厂在这一波的文化红利中脱颖而出，在上海美术片的支援协作下，开始利用中央政府的政治经济政策，在厂长、导演钟泉的带领下生产了大批具有人文批判精神与艺术创新精神，而忽略市场需求的先蓬派艺术动画片。从1986年《象虎》、1987年的《鹰》（提名中国电影金鸡奖）、1989年的《牛冤》（获得华表奖）、1990年的《雁阵》（获得中国电影金鸡奖）等无不显示出艺术表现形式的创新与政治思维模式上的深刻反思。
在短暂的政治开放与经济红利双重加持下的动画片创新思潮迅速崛起也快速消。失然以动画家钟泉为代表的艺术院校背景的团队在21世纪迅速占领了中国动画教育产业。
他们充满人文情怀与艺术创新的制作形式成为中国动画教育的主流，在这种先锋派人文艺术动画教育的影响下，千禧一代的中国动画人开始在动画甚至电子游戏领域逐渐创造出令世界瞩目的艺术奇迹。

Chengxi Yin
Duke Kunshan University, Undergraduate Student

Title:
Gaining Pleasure in Infinite Game Worlds: Digital Reading Practices of Infinite Fiction in China

Abstract:
Infinite fiction is a popular genre of Chinese online literature characterized by protagonists navigating through various survival games in distinct small worlds with horror elements. This study examines the audiences’ fascination with this popular media by focusing on their evaluations and motivations for reading this genre. Drawing on audience research, this study challenges the textual determinism model that assumes a fixed meaning in media texts. The study combines both textual analysis of 11 infinite fiction novels with thematic analysis of in-depth semi-structured interviews with 24 readers. This analysis highlights the active role of readers in their discerning criteria and preferences for evaluating satisfactory and unsatisfactory infinite fiction, as well as their active immersion, recognition, and engagement of media texts. Moreover, the findings also expand on Ang’s (1991b) argument in Watching Dallas, demonstrating that despite differences in media and content, audience perceptions and engagement with popular media share notable similarities. By examining infinite fiction through an audience-based perspective, the study provides insights into the evolving dynamics of digital reading practices in contemporary China.

Zhaoxi Liu
Department of Communication, Trinity University, Associate Professor and Carlos Augustus de Lozano Professor of Journalism

Title:
Portraying Capitalists in Socialist China: Investor Characters in Chinese TV Series

Abstract:
Chinese TV shows frequently featuring capitalists and their agents is self-contradictory in a perceived socialist country with a Communist goal of eliminating capitalism. Such a problematic is resolved, this analysis shows, via the work of ideology that is unique to the Chinese context. A close examination of the portrayal of capitalists in a few popular Chinese TV series reveals that these capitalists are not greedy, selfish, and cheating investors portrayed in American movies. Instead, the Chinese investors are socially responsible, honorable, and nationalist noble men. Such a particular construct of investors is shaped by Confucianism and nationalism, the dominant ideologies in today’s China. This analysis demonstrates how ideology shapes popular culture representation within specific context.

This bilingual panel explores diverse expressions of thought, aesthetics, and political philosophy in ancient China

Yurong Ma
Hong Kong Shue Yan University, Ph.D Student

题目：
論莊子「庖丁解牛」的美學意蘊與古代書論道技觀

摘要：
關於莊子在「庖丁解牛」中所蘊含的「技進於道」的美學觀點，以往討論得比較多的，是以哲學的角度闡釋道與技的觀念。但是，從《莊子》庖丁解牛為典型的一系列技藝寓言故事與藝術的關係角度考慮，更值得注意的，應當是其與古代書論道技觀的內在關係。通過具體地考察「庖丁解牛」等寓言的美學意蘊，可以發現「道不離技」「技不離道」「技進於道」三者間相互依存、相互作用、相互制約，進而闡明技藝訓練、法度規矩、精神修養、「道」的境界與「技進於道」這一命題間的密切關係。因莊子道技觀的影響，古代書家要達到審美創造的最高境界，就離不開對高超技藝的掌握，進一步來說需要規矩和法度為基礎。同時，技藝訓練本身並不能作為目的，任何入道境的書家技藝已實現內部的自我超越。

Atichat Khamphuang (江曉強）
National Tsinghua University, Ph.D Candidate

题目：
天的哲學與《春秋》學之結合—— 試論《春秋繁露》政治形而上與治國實踐指引

摘要：
作為西漢時期的重要儒學家，董仲舒在政治思想上的貢獻及其對天、人與治理之間關係的願景廣為人知。本文旨在探討《春秋繁露》中天的觀念與《春秋》解讀之間的互動及其相互關係，這兩者構成了董仲舒哲學的核心結構之一。在為政治目的重構儒學的過程中，董仲舒綜合了先秦以來的天的概念和信仰，並將其整合為宇宙原則，以提供道德指引和合法化專制統治。他強調天人之間的和諧、道德責任以及統治者遵循古代聖王美德的作用。通過基於《公羊傳》對《春秋》歷史事實的分析，他推導出道德範式，並倡導德政。

Erica Brindley
Penn State University, Professor

Title:
Resonance thought and theories of sagely attunement in Early China

Abstract:
Much ink has been spilled describing the Five Phases cosmological system and its underlying ganying theory of resonance in Chinese thought and science. The theorist Zou Yan is considered to have proposed Five Phases thought in the 3rd c. BCE, and it rose to dominance as an all-encompassing explanation of human relationship to the cosmos during the Han. I push this timeline earlier, however, and show that resonance thought – as a logic or way of thinking about the causal relationships between objects – can be apprehended long before Zou Yan. Resonance thought, along with a “sagely attunement” model that might be understood as a specific sub-category of it, began to emerge sometime in the 4th century BCE, around the time that naturalistic cosmologies were articulated to rival competing versions of theistic, or deity-based cosmologies.
This talk examines two such models of sagely attunement: a more Confucian model outlined in the excavated Guodian manuscript, “Five Conducts,” and a Daoist model found in the “Heng Xian” (“The Primordial State of Constancy”) bamboo manuscript. I show how these varying models actually share a fundamentally similar stance that encourages sagely bodies to activate underlying resonant harmonies and responses in the world.

Weiyi Li
Renmin University of China, Masters Student

题目：
北魏元恂案历史叙事生成

摘要：
孝文帝所立第一任太子元恂杀人出逃案，是孝文帝统治期间发生的最为重要的政治事件之一。受正史记载影响，学界长期将元恂案置于代汉矛盾和宫廷斗争的经典叙事视角之下观察，从而忽略了该案本身记载中存在的诸多可疑细节。无论是与此案高度相关的高照容之死，还是事变当日元恂行动的细节，都显示出历史事实本身与传统的经典叙事之间存在难以弥合的裂痕。通过摘取、排列史书中保留下来的带有明确时间标识的原始材料，元恂案在北魏国史中的叙事建立过程可以被复原和建构。被广泛接受的正统元恂案叙事，是在北魏官方意志的参与下，为维护宣武帝即位合法性和正统性而建立起来的。