The Division of Humanities and Social Sciences (DHSS) held a lecture on 13 May featuring Professor Carlos Rojas on the subject titled ‘Kangurus and Gavagais: Rethinking Language and Ethnocentrism through ‘Story of Your Life’ and ‘Arrival’.’
Prof Carlos Rojas enthusiastically begins his lecture
Carlos Rojas is Professor of Chinese Cultural Studies; Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies; and Arts of the Moving Image. He is also the President of the Association of Chinese and Comparative Literature. His research focuses on issues of gender and visuality, corporeality and infection, and nationalism and diaspora studies.
A packed auditorium of interested staff and students
Staff and students listened attentively to Professor Rojas’s brief introduction of the film ‘Arrival’, whose protagonist, a linguist, must learn a language based on alien epistemology to communicate with alien invaders.
In his wide ranging talk, Professor Rojas covered a vast array of theoretical frameworks from deconstruction to linguistic theories such as the popularised Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Further, it raised provocative questions, such as whether “language changes how you think” and how to retain and even celebrate one’s ethnic and cultural identity while communicating and interacting with others in a globalised landscape.
Most audience members take notes of Prof Rojas' presentation slides of language
The talk was moving and thought-provoking and finished with a question session where various members of the audience eagerly posed queries on ethnocentrism, translation, and linguistics. Professor Rojas responded to each question in an insightful manner.
After closing the lecture, he met briefly with students from the English Language and Literature Studies (ELLS) and Contemporary English Language and Literature (CELL) programmes who had presented papers at Duke Kunshan University Humanities Research Conference, including Year 4 CELL student, Li Yifan, whose paper was awarded first prize.
A group photo with UIC staff members and Prof Rojas
Reporter/Photographer: Marissa Furney
Editors: Deen He, Samuel Burgess
(from MPRO)
