Lillian Ngan

Summary Statement of Research Interests

Lillian’s research at large reorganizes the Sinophone world through the lens of Vietnam. Her dissertation, “Beyond Pacification: Vietnam’s Circulation in Trans-Asian Sinophone Cultural Imaginaries,” reads contemporary Sinophone cultural production as a site for bringing premodern Chinese imperial governance and modern modes of governmentality into a shared genealogy of pacification. It suggests that Sinophone studies’ relational framework can be reorganized through “Vietnam in Sinitic-language cultures,” rather than “Sinophone cultural production in Vietnam.” This reversal treats Vietnam as a positionality constituted through Chinese imperial power yet irreducible to its control, showing how shared yet differently situated Sinophone encounters with an externalized Vietnamese “other” generate distinct negotiations of authority across Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, and Taiwan.

Her work has been supported by the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation, and Lisa Lu Foundation.

Research Keywords

Sinophone literature, film, and media; inter-Asia/ trans-Asia cultural studies; transpacific studies; global Asias studies