Anguished Youth in the Transitional Era: May Fourth Intellectuals on Suicide and the View of Life

2019-03-08

Anguished Youth in the Transitional Era:
May Fourth Intellectuals on Suicide and the View of Life

Speaker：CHEUNG Lik-kwan, the Chinese University of Hong Kong
Date：2019/3/8（Fri.）10: 10-13: 00
Venue ：Room C404, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, National Tsing Hua University
*Lecture in Chinese

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Abstract:
Suicide was an important social phenomenon in the late Qing and Early Republican period. Therefore, Li Dazhao named this transitional era as “the era of suicide.” This lecture will investigate May Fourth intellectuals’ reflections and discussions on “suicide.” I will analyze this great debate referring to the international left-wing discourse, the philosophy of life and Buddhist thinking, which were circulated in the transcultural currents across Europe and Asia in the early twentieth century. In the end, this lecture will probe in what sense the May Fourth intellectuals showed a unique mode of thinking in their debate on “suicide,” and provided their own reflection on the view of life for the anguished youth in the transitional era.
 
Speaker Bio:
CHEUNG Lik-kwan is an assistant professor in the Department of Cultural and Religious Studies, the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is presently the examiner of Hong Kong Arts Development Council and corresponding editor of Reviews and Research on Chinese Literature. He is also a member of the editorial board of Fleurs des Lettres and the Research Centre for Foreign Sinology (Chinese Literature) of Soochow University. He was a visiting scholar at the Harvard-Yenching Institute in 2009-2010.

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主辦單位
國立清華大學亞太／文化研究中心、台灣聯合大學系統文化研究國際中心、亞際文化研究國際碩士學位學程（台灣聯合大學系統）、亞太／文化研究室、國立交通大學文化研究國際中心