UCCA Beijing Open Today, 10:00-19:00 (Final entry: 18:30)
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UCCA Beijing2014.11.2
Mercator Salon XII ：How To Construct Heimat? The Role of Architecture and City Planning
2014.11.2
15:00-17:30
In both Chinese and German culture, heimat [homeland] is a central topic in artistic and literary production. At the same time, literary and artistic images shape the way a society views and understands the concept of heimat.
Departure and separation from and return to one’s heimat feature prominently in Chinese literature, especially in poetry. Nonetheless, it is only in the more recent present that equivalents to the concepts of heimat used in Romanticism or nationalism can be found in Chinese cultural history; the Chinese language makes a clear distinction between guxiang, one’s local or regional homeland, and zuguo, the motherland. After 1949, guxiang played a lesser role than zuguo in both literature and permitted public debate. It was only the mass internal migration of "peasant workers" that began in the 1980s, and the radical and rapid transformation of urban and village structures, that have made guxiang a subject of public debate.
During the postwar decades in Germany, the term heimat was discredited primarily as a result of the intensive use of the word during the National Socialist era. It has only been since roughly the 1980s that the concept of heimat has once again become the subject of public debate and reflection in Europe. Especially since the successful German film and television series of the same name by the director Edgar Reitz, heimat has stood for the non-ideological researching of individual and family history and for the careful and protective handling of both material and immaterial cultural heritage. Heimat also features prominently in the literary and artistic works of first and second generation migrants in Europe, especially those with a non-European cultural background.
What role is currently played by heimat in the art and literature of China and Europe, and which images do they produce? To what extent do art and literature reflect the experience of a "loss" of heimat, and what role do they play in preserving memories?
Ticketing & Participation: FREE. Reservations required.
From Tuesday to Friday 11:00-18:00 please call 57800200 to book. Please note that you can only book 1 seat at a time.
Members can also book by emailing: members@159.138.20.147
Note：
* The deadline for registration is 5 pm on 31 October. Please note that we can only guarantee your reservation until ten minutes before the event starts.
Speakers
Robert Menasse (Novelist and essayist, Senior Fellow at Stiftung Mercator)
Robert Menasse is an Austrian novelist and essayist. He studied German Studies, Philosophy and Political Science in Vienna, Salzburg and Messina and gained his Ph.D in 1980. Between 1981 and 1988, Robert Menasse worked as a visiting professor at the Institute of Literature Theory at the University of São Paulo, Brazil. Since returning to Europe from Brazil, he has mainly lived in Berlin, Vienna, Amsterdam and Brussels as a free writer. His novels are translated into twelve languages.
1996 Writer in Residence at the New York University, 1999 Artist in Residence in Amsterdam, 2007 Poetic-Lectures at University Frankfurt.
Most recently, he wrote about the future of Europe and the European Union, reporting EU-reality, reconstructing the EU idea, criticizing tendencies of re-nationalization and anti-European integration movements (Der europäische Landbote, 2012, and Heimat ist die schönste Utopie, 2014). Currently, Robert Menasse is a Senior Fellow at Stiftung Mercator. In the context of his Mercator fellowship, he has a strong research focus on the current state and future prospects of European democracy.
Li Er (Novelist)
Li was born in Jiyuan, Henan Province, in 1966. Graduating from East China Normal University in Shanghai in 1987, Li currently works as a writer and researcher at the National Museum of Modern Chinese Literature, and also as a part-time professor at both East China Normal University and Beijing Normal University. Li's books include Colorature (《花腔》) and Cherry on a Pomegranate Tree (《石榴树上结樱桃》). He is a winner of the First Dingjun Double Year Prize for Literature in the 21st Century, the First Mass Media Award for Chinese Literature, and the Zhuang Zhongwen Award in Literature, among others. Li’s book Colorature was selected as one of the Best 10 full-length novels of the 30 Years of New Period Literature (1979-2009).His works have been translated into English, German, French, Korean and Japanese and published overseas.
Moderator
Michael Kahn-Ackermann(Stiftung Mercator China Special Representative)
About the Mercator Salon
The Mercator Salon is a series of events run by Stiftung Mercator in Beijing. The salons provide a platform for Chinese and Europeans to exchange ideas and opinions on topical issues relevant to culture and society. The first three rounds of Mercator Salons took place from October 2012 to November 2013 on the topics of “Cultural Metropolis – Metropolitan Culture”, “Money and Happiness” and “Intellectuals and the Role of Science in China and Europe.”
In 2014 Stiftung Mercator will cooperate with Lens magazine in organizing a new round of Mercator Salons on the concepts of “Future” and “Home,” which are held in summer and autumn 2014 respectively.
For more information about Mercator Salon, please visit: www.mercatorsalon.de/en
Partners
Stiftung Mercator is one of the largest private foundations in Germany. It pursues clearly defined objectives in its thematic clusters of integration, climate change and arts education and achieves these objectives with a combination of socio-political advocacy and practical work. Stiftung Mercator implements its own projects and supports external projects in its centres for science and humanities, education and international affairs.
Currently, Stiftung Mercator is funding several projects in China: school and youth exchanges, multiplier encounters and fellowship programs for young managers in the areas of civil society, politics, academia and business. We are working on creating a better and more nuanced understanding of Chinese and European reality in the respective other region through long-term partnership and cooperation.
Please see www.stiftung-mercator.de/en for more information.
Launched in 2005, Lens is a monthly photo-journalistic magazine that explores stories of human nature and reflects social realities. The magazine’s contents focuses on individuals, society, arts, and other various cultural events. Dedicated to incorporating stunning photography with groundbreaking reporting and an edgy perspective, Lens provides a comprehensive reading experience and is one of the most valuable magazines in China.
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