Pursuing Well-Being: The Theme of Taiwan Travel Literature and Culture

Speaker: Shu-hui Lin, Professor, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan

Discussants: Assistant professor Sami Honkasalo and senior university lecturer Riikka Länsisalmi, University of Helsinki, Finland

Date and Time: Friday 11 October 10:15-11:30 AM

Venue: University of Helsinki Main Building Room U3039

Traveling abroad is one of the ways to understand the self and the world. The Taiwan travelers’ discourses in the context of the Cold War often imply observations and imaginations of the free world. As for the travel literature of the post-martial law period, they often cast the reconstruction of self-identity. Through the observing world culture, they hope to shape a more ideal society and inspire the idea of reforming Taiwan. Travel is an important experience economy. Travel literature and culture represent the weaving and reorganizing of memories and the applications will help to explore the meaning of pursuing well-being.

Shu-hui Lin is a professor at the Department of Taiwan Culture, Languages and Literature, National Taiwan Normal University. She specializes in research on travel writing, Taiwan literature, and culture. She has been a visiting scholar at Academia Sinica, Harvard University, SOAS, and UCSD. She has received many awards in Taiwan: Taiwanese Literature Research and a publishing award from the Research Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Science and Technology. She participated in the study of the U.S. Institutes on U.S. Culture and Society at New York University, TUSA‐Harvard Collaboration Program, received a Fellowship from the Ministry of Education, the National Science and Technology Council, and Scholarly Exchange of Fulbright Scholar. Her academic works include Customs, Memories and Enlightenments: A Digital Archive of Taiwanese Cultural Discourse, The Mood of the Travelers: Taiwanese Travel Writings during the Japanese Colonial Period, Represent Culture: Imagined and Discourse of Moving during Modern Period in Taiwan, and Imagining Space-Time in Taiwan Fiction.