UCLA-NTNU Taiwan Studies Initiative 2027 Annual Conference
In 2026, the International Booker Prize went to Lin King’s English translation of Yang Shuang-zi’s novel Taiwan Travelogue. The novel not only started conversations around the world about Taiwanese history and culture, but it also put a spotlight on the complexities of cross-cultural comparison and translation as crucial frameworks for understanding Taiwan.
This year’s conference revolves around the concept of comparatism as the self-conscious practice of comparison. It proposes a study of Taiwan’s relationalities with other geographies, histories, literatures, mediums, and languages to excavate new meanings for both the method of comparison and Taiwan Studies itself. It also puts the institution of “area studies” under a microscope, urging scholars to think beyond its prescribed boundaries.
While the focus on Taiwan as a discreet area of research is a crucial part of the belated and ongoing process of Taiwan achieving epistemological autonomy and subjectivity, the process is not complete without a fuller understanding of Taiwan’s relationalities with the world.
This conference also continues the conversations started by the 2015 volume Comparatizing Taiwan, by asking the following questions: Can we trace genealogical shifts both culturally, historically, and methodologically in comparative Taiwan Studies? What does it mean to study different legacies of colonialisms across Taiwan and other areas today? How can Taiwan be comparatized with other East Asian regions such as Japan, Korea, Manchuria, or China? How can Taiwan connect with Southeast Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, or Eastern Europe? How has the Western tradition of comparative studies, such as comparative literature and comparative history, been conceptualized in Taiwan or in relation to Taiwan?
We invite scholars from diverse disciplines such as literature, film, music, media, cultural studies, queer and gender studies, history, sociology, geography and more to imagine new ways to dynamically comparatize Taiwan without losing contextuality.
Date: January 22-23, 2027
Venue: TBA