Date & Time: Friday 12 April 10:30AM-12:30PM
Location: NTNU Education Building (教育大樓 202)
Chairperson: Ian Rowen (Department of Taiwan Culture, Languages and Literature, National Taiwan Normal University)
Language: English
Topic 1: Studying 228 from Europe: Scholarly Choices and Public History
Speaker: Victor Louzon (Assistant Professor, Sorbonne University)
The “February 28 Incident”, one of the most infamous pages in Taiwanese history, remains poorly known in Europe – surprisingly so, given the increasing attention of Western public spheres to Sino-Japanese relations. In this talk, I will present my new book, The Embrace of the Fatherland. Decolonization, War Aftermath, and Political Violence in 1947 Taiwan, the first French-language account of the 1947 Taiwanese revolt against Chinese Kuomintang rule, and its bloody suppression. Drawing on the cultural history of warfare and postwars that has flourished in Europe in the past 20 years, I focus on the mechanisms and genesis of political violence, and analyze the Incident in the light of the Second Sino-Japanese war of 1937-1945. I will also discuss the interplay between academic and public history in today’s France for a specialist of modern East Asia, particularly Taiwan.
Victor Louzon is assistant professor at Sorbonne University. His research deals with war, militarization, and political violence in the modern Sinophone world.
Topic 2: Memories, Massacres, and Monuments in East and Southeast Asia: Comparative Perspectives on 228
Speaker: Jeffrey Wasserstrom (Chancellor’s Professor of History, UC Irvine)
How can looking at other dramatic acts of protest and tragic acts of repression help us make sense of what happened in Taiwan in 1947, as well as the way that year’s events have been remembered, forgotten, and commemorated? This presentation will explore this question by placing 228 beside selected events that preceded it or took place simultaneously with it, such as the protests and repressive moves that convulsed Shanghai between the mid-1920s and the mid-1940s. It will also discuss later events that took place in East and Southeast Asia. These will range from the Bangkok massacre of 1976, the South Korean Kwangju tragedy of 1980, and the Burmese upheaval and crackdown of 1988 to the struggles that rocked cities across the People’s Republic of China in 1989 and rocked Hong Kong in the 2010s and early 2020s.
Jeffrey Wasserstrom is Chancellor’s Professor of History at UC Irvine. A past editor of the Journal of Asian Studies (2008-2018), his most recent books are, as author, Vigil: Hong Kong on the Brink (2020), and, as editor, The Oxford History of Modern China (2022).
Contact: keyutsao@gmail.com (Ke-Yu Tsao)
