An Empathetic Art: Renwen Masculinity in Asian American Literature 移情艺术：亚美文学的仁文气概

Inaugural lecture: Singapore Comparative Literature Lecture Series

This talk advances an Asian American masculinity that blends the Confucian ideals of  ren 仁 [benevolence, mutual care] and wen 文 [literacy, artistry, cultivation] with the feminist ethic of care. Through the works of David Wong Louie, Russell C. Leong, and Viet Thanh Nguyen, I delineate a unique Asian American legacy and inscribe a new benchmark for masculinity. For Asian Americans historically threatened with (ex)termination, and now, by anti-Asian violence around the Covid-19 plague), renwen is a survival imperative.

About the Speaker:

King-Kok Cheung is Professor of English at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Her publications include Articulate Silences and Chinese American Literature without Borders, both of which have been translated into Chinese, as 《 静墨流声》and《文心无界》respectively. She is editor of An Interethnic Companion to Asian American Literature, Asian American literature: An Annotated Bibliography; and Words Matter; she was also a co-editor of The Heath Anthology of American Literature. 

Organised by: A/P Sim Wai Chew and A/P Yow Cheun Hoe (Singapore Comparative Literature Project)