Editor’s note: This interview took place in 2021. Amba Tyrie (Amba): Is your book entitled The Unwalled City related to Kowloon Walled City? Xu Xi: Yes, I borrowed the title from the idea of the Walled City, as I grew up when the Walled City was still around—so the idea of ‘unwalling’ was the way…
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“An Intellectual Exchange: A Review of 𝐸𝑑𝑜 𝐽𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑛 𝐸𝑛𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑊𝑜𝑟𝑙𝑑” by James Kin Pong Au
Donald Keene and Shiba Ryōtarō (authors), Tony Gonzalez (translator), Edo Japan Encounters the World: Conversations Between Donald Keene and Shiba Ryotaro, Japan Library, 2018. 137 pgs. Editor’s note: This review is cross-posted on Cha: An Asian Literary Journal. I remember when I was pursuing a Master’s in Japanese literature in London, my teacher in the first…
“Wet, Dry, Wet” by Abel Han Song
I discovered a theory of life while making chow mein. Mix the flour and water and let the dough rest. Pull the dough and the dough also sticks you. Boil the noodles and then fry with beef and vegetable. We always turn the dry things into wet, and wet things into dry. I am a…
“Representing AIDS in China” by Serene Ng Yeuk Shu
The HP Series showcases excerpts from excellent Honours Projects by students from the Department of English Language and Literature. [Read all entries here.] Supervisor: Dr Ruth Y. Y. Hung “Not now! No one’s around to take pictures. Next week, we’ll book our best photographer: If every plasma station’s being shut down, a head must roll… This…
Poetry Speaks: Cheng Tim Tim’s Selections—Reading Felix Chow, Reading Hong Kong
Connecting the Dots I never knew English poetry could look like this, something so close to daily life. I invite you to read the poem below aloud, which contains the sounds from many Hongkongers’ teenage years: So MKby Felix Chow They sat on mallside bannisterssmoking IQOS. Screaming spring.Contact-covered eyes behinda greasy, fringy frame. Bright-haired street…
Poetry Speaks: Nicole Chui’s Selection
On Timeby Faye New York is 3 hours ahead of California,but it does not make California slow.Someone graduated at the age of 22,but waited 5 years before securing a good job!Someone became a CEO at 25,and died at 50.While another became a CEO at 50,and lived to 90 years.Someone is still single,while someone else got…
Poetry Speaks: James Au’s Selection
題西林壁Written on the Wall at West Forest Temple (1084) 橫看成嶺側成峯，It’s a range viewed in face and peaks viewed from the side, 遠近高低各不同。Assuming different shapes viewed from far and wide. 不識廬山真面目，Of Mountain Lu we cannot make out the true face, 只緣身在此山中。For we are lost in the heart of the very place[1]. These days the poem of…
Announcement: Tammy Lai-Ming Ho Named Visiting Scholar at the University of St Andrews
Dr Tammy Lai-Ming Ho (何麗明) has been named Visiting Scholar at the University of St Andrews, the third-oldest university in the English-speaking world. She will be working with Professor Gregory Lee, Founding Professor and Head of the Department of Chinese Studies at the university, on the research project “A Cultural History of the People’s Republic…
Announcement: Benedict Rowlett Awarded ECS Research Grant
We are very pleased to announce that Dr. Benedict Rowlett has been awarded an Early Career Scheme research grant (HKD 273,178) from Hong Kong’s University Grant Council for his important and much-needed research project entitled “A Linguistic Landscape Study of the Gay Games in Hong Kong”. Huge congratulations! Dr. Rowlett shares here on Agora about…
“Writing and Rewriting” by Ivan Delazari
Holding a copy of the book you have written in your own hands is, in a sense, a creepy experience. Creepy in a good way, of course—excuse my oxymoron. You might feel the urge to flip through those pages to check if what’s there is really yours—to recognise those evenly printed lines as the ones…
“Preface to Poetry in Pedagogy: Intersections Across and Between the Disciplines” by Dean A. F. Gui & Jason S. Polley
The image opening this book about “intersections” is an eponymous poem in the shape of a frangipani flower. “Intersections” is one editor’s humble (and humbling) attempt at navigating an online text manipulation generator, which required manually trackpad-drawing the desired mosaic. The poetic montage textually and visually showcases the cross-disciplinary and interdisciplinary praxes of poetry, pedagogy,…
Announcement: English Major Student Excels in Public Speaking Competition
Please click here for original publication. Michael Chong Yat-tsun, a second-year student of the Bachelor of Arts in English Language and Literature programme, won the championship title in the university category of the “21st Century Cup” National English Speaking Competition (Hong Kong Region) organised by China Daily in May. Under the topic “Protecting the blue…
“In the Midst of Fire”
Concept: Paulina Yi-Yan Lee (ENG Alumna, 2015)Performance: Jack Strömberg and Paulina Yi-Yan LeeFilming: Jack Strömberg, Misael Tonars and Paulina Yi-Yan LeeVideo Editing: Gavin Long-Chung Law and Stephanie Hoi-Ling KeungMusic: Jack Strömberg English Descriptionby Gavin Long-Chung Law “In the Midst of Fire” is an introspective exploration on how nature’s dichotomies – fire and snow – can…
Announcement: New Lecture Series “Recomposing the Self”
A new exciting Speakers’ Series organised by the “Creativity, Self and Society” research group of the Faculty of Arts (香港浸會大學文學院 “創意,個人和社會” 研究組舉辦 Zoom 傑出講者系列) will consist of four Zoom talks, open to all, starting in March through June, featuring the following outstanding speakers: New style pop star Serrini, Thursday 18 March 2021 (4-5:15pm), “Compose a Self…
Announcement: ENG professor Tammy Lai-Ming Ho and ENG Alumna Cheng Tim Tim Mentioned in Tatler Hong Kong Article “7 Female Poets From Hong Kong To Know”
Tammy Lai-Ming Ho, an Associate Professor at the Department of English Language and Literature, and Cheng Tim Tim, an alumna of the department, have been named amongst the seven female poets from Hong Kong to know by Tatler Hong Kong. The other five poets are Mary Jean Chan (whose Flèche won Costa Book Award for…
Announcement: Invitation to Participate in the 21st Century Cup National English Speaking Competition (University Category) 2021
ENG/ENGED students studying at the Department of English are invited to participate in the 21st Century Cup National English Speaking Competition (University Category). The details can be found HERE. For enquiries and expression of interest, please contact Dr. Sarah Lee (sarahlee@hkbu.edu.hk) as soon as possible, and no later than Friday 26 February 2021. (Monday 8 February…
Announcement: Taking a Stand: Engaging in Public Discourse through Advanced Research and Writing 2021 Seminar Series
The “Taking a Stand” seminar series is a core component of the GE Capstone course “Taking a Stand: Engaging in Public Discourse through Advanced Research and Writing” (GCAP3056), co-hosted by the English Department and the Language Centre. The course is currently co-organised and taught by Dr Benedict Rowlett (ENG) and Dr Simon Wang (LC). In this course, students…
“Masters” by Ruth Hung
On Sunday 15 November 2020, the Department of English organised a virtual graduation ceremony for MALCS students from the Class of 2019 and the Class of 2020. Here’s Dr Ruth Hung’s speech. Dr Hung was the MALCS Programme Director of 2019-2020. Congratulations! Graduation is a time to mark and celebrate your achievements. While this [the…
Announcement: Tammy Lai-Ming Ho and Jason S Polley are Poetry Mentors for After_
Associate Professors Dr Tammy Lai-Ming Ho and Dr Jason S Polley are amongst two of the mentors for the After_ programme, which is organised by Zolima Citymag and financially support from Design Trust. The programme asked selected young Hongkongers to ‘reflect on the pandemic’s impact in prose, poetry, video and photography’: It was an opportunity to…
“Image, Text, Image & Text, and Other Textual Innovations: A List of Books” by Jason S Polley
Editor’s note: On Thursday 26 November 2020, Dr Jason S Polley took part in the discussion “Ekphrasis City Poetics: Art and Text“, which was part of this year’s One City One Book Hong Kong programme, focusing on Xi Xi and her novel My City specifically. The event was a collaboration with the Hong Kong-based literary…
“What I Am Thankful For?” by Tammy Lai-Ming Ho
Last week, I was asked by Albert Wan, friend and co-owner of Bleak House Books, to tell him what I am thankful for this year. He asked others in Hong Kong as well, such as Antony Dapiran (author of City on Fire: The Fight for Hong Kong), Louise Law (author of As If), Pete Spurrier…
“Take Control” by Magdalen Ki
On Sunday 15 November 2020, the Department of English organised a virtual graduation ceremony for MALCS students from the Class of 2019 and the Class of 2020. Here’s Dr Magdalen Ki’s speech. Dr Ki is the current Director of the MALCS programme. In a time like this, commencement ceremonies are usually held online, but good…
Announcement: Lian-Hee Wee and the Musica in Villam: Online Guqin Concert 2020
Back in the late 1980s, Lian-Hee Wee read about the Qin (aka Guqin) and was shocked to learn that this utmost important instrument to the traditional Chinese literati was (and remains) largely unknown to the ethnic Chinese community. In 2000, while in the USA, he received a newspaper cutting that motivated him to fly to Hong Kong…
Poetry Speaks: Jason S Polley’s Selection
On Shakespeare, Proust, Loss, and Longingby Jason S Polley The equally sonorous and reflective opening two lines of Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 30”, “When to the sessions of sweet silent thought, / I summon up remembrance of things past,” cannot help but conjure Marcel Proust’s inimitable seven-volume novel À la recherche du temps perdu, a title that…
Poetry Speaks: John Wakefield’s Selection
This is an anti-war, anti-group-identity song that I listened to more times than I can count during my junior high and high school years growing up in Lincoln, Nebraska. It is by the British band Pink Floyd from their album The Dark Side of the Moon. The lyrics are by Roger Waters. 1. The first…
Poetry Speaks: Sarah Lee’s Selection
What connections do we, in 21st century Hong Kong, have with a poem written by an American more than 50 years ago? An animation by the Poetry Foundation of Muriel Rukeyser’s “I Lived in the First Century of World Wars” (1968) illustrates this ingeniously by putting side by side images from 1968 and 2018, enabling…
Poetry Speaks: Emily Chow-Quesada’s Selection
The feeling of loneliness might be straightforward for some, but it can also be paradoxical. The pandemic and social distancing has kept a lot of people confined to their homes. Some find themselves literally alone while others are crowded in tiny flats with their parents, siblings, children, partners, and pets. Those are the people you…
Announcement: “Taking a Stand: Engaging in Public Discourse through Advanced Research and Writing”
The “Taking a Stand” seminar series is a core component of the GE Capstone course “Taking a Stand: Engaging in Public Discourse through Advanced Research and Writing” (GCAP3056), co-hosted by the Department of English Language and Literature and the Language Centre at Hong Kong Baptist University. The course is currently organised and taught by Dr…
Poetry Speaks: Lian-Hee Wee’s Selection
Tang Yin (1470-1524), commonly known as Tong Pak Fu in Hong Kong, was a Ming Dynasty poet. Contrary to the popular belief that he was an affluent philanderer, his talents and arrogance in his youth brought him only a miserable life, reducing him to selling pornographic paintings at brothels to make ends meet. His poems, calligraphy and…
Announcement: ENG’s Benedict Rowlett is a winner of the Faculty of Arts Performance Award in Early Career Teaching
Dr Benedict Rowlett, an Assistant Professor at the Department of English, is one of the winners of the Faculty of Arts Performance Award in Early Career Teaching. The Awards Presentation Ceremony will be held on Wednesday 26 August 2020 at 4:00 p.m. You may click here to find out who the awardees are. After many years as…
Department of English, Hong Kong Baptist University 