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1
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On the Evolution of Chinese Character Formation in
Oracle Bone Inscriptions
The analysis of Chinese character construction consists
of two main aspects: the formation of Chinese characters
and the types of their construction. The former is the
way in which the signs of characters are generated; the
latter is the result of analyzing, simultaneously and
statically, the different formations of the characters
constructed. Basically, the formation of characters is a
system that evolves dynamically; it evolves along with
the development of the Chinese character system. That
is, the way characters are formed develops and adjusts
over time. This is reflected in the growth and decline
of characters with different constructions. Analyzed in
terms of morphology, oracle bone inscriptions constitute
a relatively mature character system. Therefore, being
the most ancient characters that form a system, the
development and changes in the formative system of
oracle bone inscriptions have a close and correlative
connection with the formation of the characters that
evolved afterward. Hence, focusing on certain phenomena
of oracle bone inscriptions—such as their morphs,
formation, creation of meanings, the reduction of
signifiers, the interchangeability of different shape
parts with similar meanings, the dissimilation of their
construction, and the tendency to replace shape parts
with sound parts—this article explores the relationship
between oracle bone inscriptions and the evolution and
development of Chinese characters.
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Hsu, Fu-chang
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2
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Comparative Case Studies of the Historical
Commentaries in Shiji and Hanshu: From “Wai Qi Shi
Jia” to “Han Changru Lie Zhuan”
The essence of Sima Qian’s and Ban Gu’s thoughts are
concentrated in their historical commentaries in Shiji
and Hanshu, respectively. A comparison of the content of
and commentary on the historical events that are
narrated in both works will show their similarities and
differences as influenced by the authors’ different
environments, experiences, and thoughts. Instead of
earlier comparisons which focused on the
superiority/inferiority between the two, this paper will
try to emphasize each author’s important and valuable
historical ideas without discrimination, i.e. despite
their differences. This can offer a new research
perspective on the thoughts of Sima Qian and Ban Gu, as
well as on the Han Dynasty. There are 13 cases that will
be compared and analyzed in this paper, ranging from
“Wai Qi Shi Jia” (The Hereditary Houses of The
Empresses) to “Han Changru Lie Zhuan” (The Biography of
Han Changru).
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Lee, Wei-tai
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3
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The Developments and Meanings of the Heaven-Man
Relation in Dou E Yuan
The relation between Heaven and man in the play Dou E
Yuan, composed by Guan Hanqing, passes through five
stages: knowing Heaven and following fate, believing and
petitioning Heaven, questioning Heaven, corresponding
with Heaven (tian ren ganying), and the mutual
surpassing of Heaven and man (tian ren xiangsheng).
These five stages mark the psychological changes in the
protagonist, Dou E, as she faces different situations
ranging from living to dying to revenge. The
contradiction revealed through changes in the relation
between Heaven and man—due to time, location, and
people—highlights a fundamental aspect of this
relationship: it changes through time. Rather than
tracing or exploring the playwright’s philosophical
thoughts, this paper will analyze the Heaven-man
relation from various points of view. In other words,
comparing various plot elements and the description of
different characters’ psyche from the points of view of
the various relations between Heaven and man reveals
abundant layers of meaning in the play.
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Li, Huei-mian
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4
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Textual Research on Original Characters of the
Southern Min Dialects (3)
This paper conducts textual research to verify the
original characters (本字) for select colloquial
pronunciations in the Southern Min dialects, namely, ?
(拖) for thuaE, and汏 (汰) for both thua?E and Itua.
Related issues are also addressed.
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Hsu, Fang-min
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5
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A Comparative Study on Wang Tao and the Intellectuals
of the Meiji Restoration
As an avant-garde thinker, Wang Tao (1828-1897) was a
scholar, a newspaperman, an educator, a political critic
and a historian. During the process of China’s
modernization, he was devoted to cultural exchanges and
the Reformist Movement. The purpose of this paper is to
study the interactions between and consequent
development of Wang’s thought and that of the
intellectuals of the Meiji Restoration, such as Masanao
Nakamura (1832-1891), and Senjin Oka (1833-1914). Among
the modern Chinese intellectuals who argued for
assimilating Western knowledge, Wang identified himself
with Wei Yuan (1794-1857) and considered himself a
vanguard in comparison with Kang YouWei (1858-1927) and
Huang ZunXian (1848-1905). Going abroad was a turning
point in Wang’s life. His belief in strengthening a
country through political reformation attracted the
attention of the intellectuals of the Meiji Restoration.
When Wang left for Japan in 1879, the Meiji Restoration
had just begun. The Japanese were absorbed in studying
Western civilization in order to introduce reforms.
Wei’s two books, Sheng Wu Ji and Hai Guo Tu Zhi, were
introduced during the late Tokugawa Bakuhu period. Wei’s
central ideas in coastal defense, “to learn from foreign
tribes their special skills in order to subdue them,”
awakened many Japanese intellectuals and politicians to
the importance of knowing the Western world. Wang’s Pu
Fa Zhan Ji (Commentaries on the Franco-Prussian War)
also became an essential reference for the Japanese both
in and out of government who were intent on
understanding the trends in world affairs. The new
thoughts of Wei Yuan and Wang Tao complimented each
other in the modernization processes of both Japan and
China, and acted as a bridge for the communication
between the intellectual fields of the two countries.
The main topics of this paper are as follows: (1) to
discuss how Nakamura and Oka responded to the
reformation ideas advocated by Wang by exploring new
historical materials and analyzing their comments on
Wang to make a clear distinction between the thoughts of
both sides; (2) to compare how they maintained the
values of traditional Confucianism, and how they
absorbed Western knowledge, by using new historical data
to discuss the interactions of the intellectuals of both
countries and the changes of their thoughts in the
process of modernization.
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Shyu, Shing-ching
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6
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Two (Singular) Points and One (Abstract) Line: The
General Topology of Gilles Deleuze
There is a particular relation, or we may say a
non-relation (“non-rapport”), between point, line and
plane in Gilles Deleuze’s philosophy. As a philosophy of
difference, thinking signifies for Deleuze the search
for and seizure of (singular) points and the placement
of plural singular points into an abnormal, aberrant and
chaotic communication. This essay attempts to explore
the minimal unit of thought in Gilles Deleuze’s
philosophy: an abstract line between two singular
points. The abstract line is not defined by the two
points; it is not a line linking two points. On the
contrary, the intervention of the abstract line
characterizes anew the two points. It is a topological
relation between two points which is folded and twisted
by force from the outside. Thinking runs across two
points, but it must be the non-relation and the
non-thinking between the two points. This is exactly the
general topology of thinking conceived by Gilles
Deleuze.
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7
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Homosexuality and the Nation: Theorizing the
Op-positionality
This essay starts with the Cold War figuration of
homosexuals as Communists, and parallels it with the
1930s Communist/socialist accusation of the
Nazis/fascists as being homosexual, in order to refute
any essentialist connections between homosexuality and
either political stance. Instead, an overarching
explanation is put forth to encompass both and view them
as in effect consisting in the same politics of Othering
the enemy in terms of sexuality, which only gets
exasperated with the coming of the modern nation. This
leads to a theorization of the overdetermined
op-positionality between the nation and homosexuality,
which is believed to be the real key issue here.
However, there are cases (such as Quebec and Canada) in
which the relation between the two seems to be not only
less tense but rather affirmative—so they are also
examined to decide whether they pose a contradiction to
the above thesis. Throughout the whole essay, a series
of fictional texts are also discussed for illustrations,
including Kiss of the Spider Woman, Strawberry and
Chocolate, Hosanna, The Moor’s Last Sigh, and
Dogeaters.
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Chu, Wei-cheng R.
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8
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Stalking the East End: Iain Sinclair’s White
Chappell, Scarlet Tracings and Lights Out for the
Territory
A new school of London literature has emerged in the
1990s as a response to the neo-modernist regeneration of
London’s East End in the 1980s by the Thatcherite
Conservative government. Using the spatial and literary
density of London as their subject, these new urban
writings juxtapose the present with the past, presenting
a cityscape of heavy fragmentation, elusiveness as well
as dynamics. Of these, Iain Sinclair’s work stands out
as “our greatest guide to London,” and “the most
distinctive voice among an array of
lyricists-cum-satirists of fin-de-siecle British life.”
Sinclair has made a vocation of excavating the hidden,
the lost or erased spatial configurations of London’s
cultural marginalia, in order to construct an
oppositional space on the material and everyday level
against the official historical and spatial discourse of
Thatcherite corporatism. Sinclair practices a method of
psychogeography, where the city and subject collapse
into one, and the city becomes a psychological entity
and a shifting character. Walking the streets of London
has in particular become a recurring theme and metaphor.
This paper examines two of his most famous works, his
breakthrough novel White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings
(1987) and Lights Out for the Territory (1997), a
non-fictional prose work on London. It focuses first on
the spatiality of London’s East End, which is the
primary territory of Sinclair’s psychogeography, and
then on his mode of spatial investigation, that of the
walker/stalker. The paper then seeks to point out the
limitations inherent in such a mode, its assumption of
privileged knowledge and voyeuristic power, and its
inevitable selectivity due to an exclusive interest only
in the erased past and a denial of any redemptive
quality in the present. The dark energies thus
unearthed, despite their resistance to the dominant
spatial discourse, are no less a form of canonization,
albeit an alternative one.
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Chen, Eva Yin-i
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