1103: Cultural Entanglements: Multilingualism and Ethnicity Across Administrative, Commemorative, and Theatrical Texts in Mongol Yuan China

Organizer(s)

• PS

  Patricia Sieber

  East Asian Languages and Literature
  Ohio State University, United States

Chair(s)

• SW

  Shih-pe Wang

  National Taiwan University, United States

Paper Presenter(s)

• LW

  Linda Walton

  Portland State University, United States
• JL

  Johannes Lotze

  Hebrew University of Jerusalem, United States
• PS

  Patricia Sieber

  East Asian Languages and Literature
  Ohio State University, United States
• EW

  Erxin Wang

  National University of Singapore, United States

Discussant(s)

• SW

  Shih-pe Wang

  National Taiwan University, United States

This panel aims to integrate writings in Literary Sinitic, in vernacular Chinese, and in non-Sinitic languages drawn from a variety of genres within a broader conversation about how Yuan culture constituted itself relative to predecessor states within eastern Eurasia (Liao, Jin, Xi Xia, Song) as well as in regards to evolving steppe traditions. Through simultaneous consideration of different types of forms of writing, the panel seeks to identify what important linguistic, literary, ethnic, and spatial variables shaped cultural production. Specifically, the panel brings administrative (Lotze), commemorative (Walton, Wang) and theatrical texts (Sieber) into dialogue with one another. Moreover, it considers political institutions such as the imperial court (Lotze) in conjunction with liminal spaces of cultural production such as academies (Walton) and the theater (Sieber, Wang), while remaining attentive to the mobility between these domains. In terms of language practices, two papers seek to examine how the prominence of a multilingual consciousness—across language families, regional idioms, and language registers--shaped cultural policy (Lotze) and cultural production respectively (Sieber). In terms of ethnic representation, two papers consider whether representation of individuals (Walton) or the dynasty as a whole (Wang) was marked by attention to ethnic difference, or, alternatively by an openness to cosmopolitan or universalist conceptions of literary excellence. Taken together, the papers contribute to an interdisciplinary exploration of the histories of translation, vernacularization, and the potentialities of a polyethnic state situated between the global middle ages and the early modern era.

Presentations:

• The Commemorative Context of Cultural Change: Shifting Textual Tactics in Song-Yuan Academy Inscriptions
  

  Presenting Author: Linda Walton – Portland State University
• Mongol Yuan Rule as a Driver of Multilingual Consciousness
  

  Presenting Author: Johannes Lotze – Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• The Multilingual Origins of Theatrical Language: Yuan Zaju Texts and Yuan Period Language Practices
  

  Presenting Author: Patricia Sieber – Ohio State University
• Genre in Fragments: Mobility, Sociability, and the Rhetoric of Commemorating Yuan Theater
  

  Presenting Author: Erxin Wang – National University of Singapore