“Taiwan: (no) futures?” Explorations of Taiwanese Science Fiction

Name: “Taiwan: (no) futures?” Explorations of Taiwanese Science Fiction
Start: 2025-03-27T13:30:00+08:00
End: 2025-03-27T17:00:00+08:00
Location: 研究院路二段128號中央研究院人文社會科學研究中心R111室, Taipei, Taiwan 11529

Schedule

Thu Mar 27 2025 at 01:30 pm to 05:00 pm

UTC+08:00

Location

研究院路二段128號中央研究院人文社會科學研究中心R111室, Taipei, Taiwan 11529 | Taipei, TP

International conference: Kao Yi-feng & Gwennaël Gaffric, “Taiwan: (no) futures?” Explorations of Taiwanese Science Fiction
03/27/2025 13:30 - 17:00
Room 1, Research Center for Humanities and Social sciences 中央研究院 Academia Sinica
Kao Yi-feng 高翊峰 (Writer), Gwennaël Gaffric 關首奇 (University of Lyon 3, FRANCE)
Taiwan: (No) Futures? Towards a Taiwanese ‘Pearl’ Punk?
「台灣：（無）未來？邁向台灣的『珍珠龐克』？」
“Taiwan: (No) Futures? Towards a Taiwanese ‘Pearl’ Punk?” is a two-part event exploring the evolving landscape of Taiwanese science fiction. The first session features a talk by Kao Yi-feng (高翊峰), a renowned writer whose recent work delves into sci-fi and the reinvention of Taiwan’s literary imagination. In the second part, a roundtable discussion brings together three scholars specializing in contemporary Taiwanese literature. They will examine the recent rise of science fiction in Taiwan’s literary scene, discussing its socio-historical significance and the ways it reflects and reimagines Taiwan’s past and future.
13:30 – 15:00 | Conference
Speaker: Kao Yi-feng (高翊峰), Writer
Chair: Gwennaël Gaffric, University of Lyon 3 (France)
15:30 – 17:00 | Roundtable Discussion
Participants:
Lee Yu-lin 李育霖 (Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy)
Lin Hsin-Hui 林新惠 (Writer, and PhD Candidate at National Chengchi University)
Gwennaël Gaffric (University of Lyon 3)
About the participants:
Gwennaël Gaffric is Assistant Professor of Chinese studies at the University of Lyon 3 Jean Moulin (France). He has published monographs, translations and many articles on China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, including La Littérature à l’ère de l’Anthropocène – Une étude écocritique autour des œuvres de l’écrivain taïwanais Wu Ming-yi(L’Asiathèque, 2019), also translated in Chinese. His current research focuses on Sinophone science fiction literature.
Kao Yi-feng (高翊峰) is a Taiwanese filmmaker and writer of Hakka descent, born in 1973 in Toufen, Miaoli County. His literary works span novels and short story collections, including The Asylum of Illusions 幻艙 (2011), Burning Crows 烏鴉燒 (2012), The War of Bubbles 泡沫戰爭 (2014), and 2069 (2019). His writing, often exploring futuristic and dystopian themes, has earned him prestigious literary awards such as the Lin Rong San Literary Award (林榮三文學獎), the United Daily News Literary Award (聯合報文學獎), and the China Times Literary Award (中國時報文學獎). In addition to his literary career, Kao teaches creative writing and science fiction at the Institute of Transdisciplinary Literary Creation (文學跨域創作研究所) at the Taipei National University of the Arts (國立臺北藝術大學).
Lee Yu-lin (李育霖) is research fellow at the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy at Academia Sinica (中央研究院中國文哲研究所). His research interests include literary theory, modern Taiwan literature and cinema, translation studies, environmental studies, and Deleuze studies. His publications include Fabulation of a New Planet: Contemporary Taiwan Nature Writing 擬造新地球 (2015) and The Liminality of Translation翻譯閾境 (2009), as well as edited volumes such as Ten Lectures on Sinophone Literature 華語語系十講 (2020) and The Empires on Taiwan: Time, Space, Knowledge, and Sentiment of Colonial Taiwan「帝國」在臺灣：殖民地臺灣的時空、知識與情感 (2015).
Lin Hsin-Hui (林新惠) is a Taiwanese writer and researcher. Her literary work often explores themes of identity, history, and alternative realities. Her short story collection Human Glitches 瑕疵人型 won the 2020 Taiwan Literature Award. In her recent novel Contactless Intimacy 零觸碰親密, she explores how new technologies influence human-machine intimacy. Currently, she is a PhD student in Taiwanese Literature at National Chengchi University (國立政治大學). Her research concerns the relationship between literary texts and ecological and technological humanities.
This seminar will be held in English.
Corrado Neri, Director of the CEFC Taipei, will chair the session.