Speaker:  Dr. Hua Huang, Visiting Scholar, EALL; Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Literature at Capital Normal University in China (Beijing)

The development of women’s poetry in the past forty years presents two distinct trends. One is feminist poetry writing, which is mainly expressed in body writing. The poetess seeks self-recognition, and the female body becomes a vehicle for such expressions. Because it often uses dark images such as night scenes, it is also known as “dark poetry,” represented by Zhai Yongming, Tang Yaping, Yi Lei, etc. The second tendency is quotidian writing from women’s perspectives. It deconstructs the grand narratives of nationalism and collectivism, and conveys women's feelings in life trivia. On the surface, the two styles are distinct, but they are in effect two sides of a single coin. They are essentially the manifestation of identity pursuit and self-confirmation of contemporary poetess in different directions. These poems reflect the living condition of contemporary Chinese women.

Dr. Hua Huang is Associate Professor of Modern Chinese Literature at Capital Normal University of China (Beijing). She is currently a visiting scholar in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research engages with modern Chinese literature and women’s studies. She is the author of Power, Body, and Self: Foucault and Feminist Literary Criticism, and translator of Debra Gimlin’s Body Work: Beauty and Self-Image in American Culture.