Obscuring the Past: The Writing of the Local Colonial Past in the Socialist Northeast China

Jihyun Han (Ph.D. Candidate, History, Cornell University) leads this workshop.

This paper examines two layers of local history: Northeast China’s colonial experience in the 1930-the 1940s and local historians’ writing of it in the 1950-60s. In analyzing various forms of historical writings about Japanese occupation of the region published in the Mao-period Northeast, this paper argues that local historians developed a discourse strategy of obscuring the past. In obfuscating the enemy and blurring the colonial life of the people in the region, local historians went for three cognitive effects: negotiating locally unique colonial experience with the Chinese Communist Party’s master narrative of the Chinese Revolution; appropriating the concept of enemy in response to contemporary politics, and deferring judgment against everyday colonial compliance of the local people.

Introduction by Su-Yeon Seo (Ph.D. student, Asian Studies, Cornell University)Discussion by Tianyi Shou (Ph.D. candidate, Comparative Literature, Cornell University)

This lecture is organized by East Asia Program's Graduate Student Steering Committee (EAP-GSSC). The GSSC lecture is open to the public but RSVPs are encouraged. Please contact eap-gssc@cornell.edu for RSVPs and questions.