Sinographies

The essays in this thought-provoking volume investigate ideas of China and Chineseness by means of a broad range of texts, languages, and contexts that surround what the editors call the “various written Chinas” through history. Analyzing discourse of civilization, geography, ethics, ethnicity, writing, and differences about China, this work disrupts the boundaries that have previously defined this country as an object of study.

Sinographies respects the power of texts to shape realities both backward and forward, to create or foreclose possibilities not only of interpretation but of experience. The essays examine topics like colonialism, literary modernism, translation, anime, and Tibet. As a whole, the volume imagines sinography as a new methodological approach to the study of China, one that clears unexpected ground for new kinds of comparative work.