Events

This lecture series is brought to you by Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore; in collaboration with National Library Board Singapore.

Tsai Ming-liang and a Cinema of Slowness
Speaker        :    Dr Lim Song Hwee, University of Exeter, UK, and National University of Singapore
Discussant    :    Professor Pheng Cheah, National University of Singapore, and University of California-Berkeley, USA
Chairperson   :    Professor Chua Beng Huat, National University of Singapore

How can we qualify slowness in cinema, and what is the relationship between a cinema of slowness and a wider socio-cultural “slow movement”? With a body of films that share a propensity towards slowness emerging in many parts of the world over the past two decades, this lecture explores the concept of cinematic slowness and addresses this fascinating phenomenon through the films of the Malaysian-born, Taiwan-based director Tsai Ming-liang. Through detailed analysis of aspects of stillness and silence in cinema, the talk will delineate the strategies by which slowness in film can be constructed and make a passionate case for a slow cinema that calls for a renewed attention to the image and to the experience of time in film. In an age of unrelenting acceleration of pace both in film and in life, this talk invites us to pause and listen, to linger and look, to drift and meander, to contemplate and wander, and, above all, to take things slowly.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Lim Song Hwee is Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at the University of Exeter, UK. His research interests encompass transnational Chinese and East Asian cinemas, cinema and cultural identity, gender and sexuality studies, and postcolonial and diaspora studies. During his tenure as a Visiting Senior Research Fellow in the “Cultural Studies in Asia” research cluster at Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, he plans to develop a major new research project that will lead to his third monograph, tentatively titled “Chinese Cinemas in the 21st Century: Production, Consumption, Imagination”. Dr Lim is the author of Celluloid Comrades: Representations of Male Homosexuality in Contemporary Chinese Cinemas (University of Hawaii Press, 2006), co-editor of Remapping World Cinema: Identity, Culture and Politics in Film(Wallflower Press, 2006) and The Chinese Cinema Book (BFI/Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), and founding editor of the Journal of Chinese Cinemas. His second book, Tsai Ming-liang and a Cinema of Slowness, will appear with the University of Hawaii Press in early 2014.

Pheng Cheah is Professor of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley. He has published extensively on the theory and practice of cosmopolitanism. He is the author of Inhuman Conditions: On Cosmopolitanism and Human Rights (Harvard UP, 2006) and Spectral Nationality: Passages of Freedom from Kant to Postcolonial Literatures of Liberation (Columbia UP, 2003) and co-editor of Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (University of Minnesota Press, 1998). He is also the co-editor of Thinking through the Body of the Law (Allen and Unwin, New York University Press, 1996); Grounds of Comparison: Around the Work of Benedict Anderson(Routledge, 2003); and Derrida and the Time of the Political (Duke University Press, 2009). He is completing a book on theories of the world and world literature from the postcolonial world in an age of financial globalization and a related book on globalization and the three Chinas as seen from the perspectives of the independent cinema of Jia Zhangke, Tsai Ming-Liang and Fruit Chan.

ARI ASIA TRENDS 2013 SERIES

ASIA TRENDS is an ARI flagship public outreach event. This annual series of public lectures is an opportunity for ARI to connect with the local Singapore community through informing and interacting with various public sectors (citizenry, government), civil society organizations, businesses, universities and colleges, by presenting cutting edge research on major trends in Asia. Some trends examined in the past include “Women and Religion in Asia,” “Green Urbanism: How does Singapore compare?” “From Adolescent to Young Adulthood,” “Families, Children, and Domestic Workers in Contemporary Asia,” “Waxing Korean Wave in East Asia.” Each ARI research cluster hosts an evening seminar, during which an overseas speaker, who is a prominent researcher or scholar, is invited to examine an emerging trend in that research field; a Singapore-based researcher then provides comments on local development with regard to the relevant trend. Past seminars have witnessed some interesting interaction between speakers and commentators; some have also seen lively audience participation in the discussions. ASIA TRENDS showcase the work of ARI’s research clusters, highlights the relevance of ARI’s research to Singapore, and relates Singapore to the rest of Asia from the perspective of significant trends in the region.

REGISTRATION

Admission is free, however, registration is required. Kindly register early as seats are available on a first come, first served basis. We would greatly appreciate if you write to Sharon via email at arios@nus.edu.sg your name, email, organisation/affiliation and contact number.