Panel “Translating History: A Conversation Between Historians and Science Fiction Writers”
︎ Tuesday, July 29 | 19:00-21:00
︎ Tokyo University of the Arts, Hisao & Hiroko Taki Plaza
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Panel Introduction
This panel brings together historians and science fiction writers whose work traverses cultural geographies across Asia while engaging critically with the conditions of Anglophone hegemony masked as globalization. Rather than limit the concept of “translation” to inter-lingual exchanges, we propose to expand it to encompass acts of education, reinterpretation, and reconstruction. Through a carefully moderated dialogue between historical inquiry and speculative fiction, we seek to interrogate the boundary between fact and fiction, and to explore how the past may be mined not only for insight into the present but also for the imaginative projection of alternative futures. Main questions we wish to answer include: how does translation operate not only across languages, but also across temporalities, spatial contexts, and media forms? What are the methods by which historical knowledge is conveyed to broader publics (through archival research or worldbuilding)? As we revisit archival materials that reflect the formation of an East Asian modernity at the turn of the twentieth century – be they translations, documentations, or technical manuals – we are also prompted to rethink the ways in which the past, present, and future are conceptually and narratively constructed.
本场对谈发生在历史学家与科幻作家之间。他们的研究与创作横跨整个亚洲，在连接多元文化与地理风貌的同时，也在审视着以全球化为名的英语霸权。“翻译”不仅仅发生在语言和语言之间，更是一种包含了教育、再诠释与再建构的实际行动。我们意图在历史研究与文学创作之间发起对话，探讨事实与虚构的边界。挖掘过去，是否能够对理解当下、构想未来提供灵感？我们涉及的核心问题包括：突破了语言的限制之后，我们是否能够同样去翻译时间、空间，以及媒介形态？历史知识又是如何被以各种不同的方式传递给大众（通过文献研究，抑或创造虚拟世界）？当我们重新面对那些代表了20世纪初东亚现代性构成的历史档案——译文、记录，与技术手册——我们同时也在思考有关“过去—现在—未来”这一概念及其叙事结构。
Guest Speakers
Stanley Qiufan CHEN 陈楸帆
Chen Qiufan (Stanley Chan) is a writer, translator, and futurist. He is an Assistant Professor in the School of Arts and Social Sciences at Hong Kong Metropolitan University. He also serves as the Deputy Director of the Science Fiction Literature Committee of the China Writers Association, a board member of the China Association for Science and Technology Popularization Writers, a visiting scholar at Yale University, and a Berggruen Fellow, among other roles. His major works include Waste Tide, AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future (co-authored with Dr. Kai-Fu Lee), Algorithms of Life, Zero Carbon China, and Black Mountains, Jade Clouds, among more than a dozen titles. His writings have been widely translated into over twenty languages and have received numerous domestic and international honors, including the Mao Dun Literature Prize for New Writers, the Chinese Nebula Awards, the China Galaxy Awards, Asia Weekly’s Top Ten Chinese Novels of the Year, and Germany’s Business Book of the Year Award. His work spans a wide range of themes, including artificial intelligence and techno-ethics, climate change and environmental protection, planetary civilizations, and the philosophy of the mind.
陈楸帆，作家、翻译及未来学家，香港都会大学人文与社会科学学院助理教授，兼任中国作家协会科幻文学委员会副主任，中国科普作协理事，耶鲁大学访问学者，博古睿学者等。主要作品包括《荒潮》、《AI未来进行式》（与李开复博士合著）、《人生算法》、《零碳中国》、《山歌海谣》等十余部作品，被广泛翻译为二十多国语言，先后多次获得茅盾新人奖、全球华语科幻星云奖，中国科幻银河奖、《亚洲周刊》年度十佳小说、德国年度商业图书等国内外诸多奖项。他的作品主题广泛，涵盖人工智能与科技伦理、气候变化与环境保护、行星文明与心灵哲学等。
Chen Qiufan (Stanley Chan) is a writer, translator, and futurist. He is an Assistant Professor in the School of Arts and Social Sciences at Hong Kong Metropolitan University. He also serves as the Deputy Director of the Science Fiction Literature Committee of the China Writers Association, a board member of the China Association for Science and Technology Popularization Writers, a visiting scholar at Yale University, and a Berggruen Fellow, among other roles. His major works include Waste Tide, AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future (co-authored with Dr. Kai-Fu Lee), Algorithms of Life, Zero Carbon China, and Black Mountains, Jade Clouds, among more than a dozen titles. His writings have been widely translated into over twenty languages and have received numerous domestic and international honors, including the Mao Dun Literature Prize for New Writers, the Chinese Nebula Awards, the China Galaxy Awards, Asia Weekly’s Top Ten Chinese Novels of the Year, and Germany’s Business Book of the Year Award. His work spans a wide range of themes, including artificial intelligence and techno-ethics, climate change and environmental protection, planetary civilizations, and the philosophy of the mind.
陈楸帆，作家、翻译及未来学家，香港都会大学人文与社会科学学院助理教授，兼任中国作家协会科幻文学委员会副主任，中国科普作协理事，耶鲁大学访问学者，博古睿学者等。主要作品包括《荒潮》、《AI未来进行式》（与李开复博士合著）、《人生算法》、《零碳中国》、《山歌海谣》等十余部作品，被广泛翻译为二十多国语言，先后多次获得茅盾新人奖、全球华语科幻星云奖，中国科幻银河奖、《亚洲周刊》年度十佳小说、德国年度商业图书等国内外诸多奖项。他的作品主题广泛，涵盖人工智能与科技伦理、气候变化与环境保护、行星文明与心灵哲学等。
Qingsan LIANG 梁清散
Liang Qingsan is a science fiction writer. He has won the Chinese Nebula Awards multiple times and was shortlisted for the 53rd Japan SF Seiunshō. His published novels include The Unmoving Sky Falls off the Mountain, The New New News Agency: Shadows over the Magic City, The Shanghainese Girl in the Kitchen, The New News Agency: Rise of the Machines, The Literary Girl Detective, among others. Several of his short and medium-length stories have been translated and published overseas.
梁清散，科幻作家。多次获得全球华语科幻星云奖，并入围53届日本星云赏。已出版长篇小说《不动天坠山》《新新新日报馆：魔都暗影》《厨房里的海派少女》《新新日报馆：机械崛起》《文学少女侦探》等多部作品，多篇中短篇小说译介海外出版。
Liang Qingsan is a science fiction writer. He has won the Chinese Nebula Awards multiple times and was shortlisted for the 53rd Japan SF Seiunshō. His published novels include The Unmoving Sky Falls off the Mountain, The New New News Agency: Shadows over the Magic City, The Shanghainese Girl in the Kitchen, The New News Agency: Rise of the Machines, The Literary Girl Detective, among others. Several of his short and medium-length stories have been translated and published overseas.
梁清散，科幻作家。多次获得全球华语科幻星云奖，并入围53届日本星云赏。已出版长篇小说《不动天坠山》《新新新日报馆：魔都暗影》《厨房里的海派少女》《新新日报馆：机械崛起》《文学少女侦探》等多部作品，多篇中短篇小说译介海外出版。
Bo TAO 陶波
Bo TAO received a PhD in history from Yale University and currently is a lecturer at Chiba University, Japan. He teaches on subjects such as religion, social movements, and US-Japan relations. His first book, Cooperative Evangelist: Kagawa Toyohiko and His World, 1888-1960, is forthcoming from the University of Hawaiʻi Press in August 2025.
陶波于耶鲁大学获得历史学博士学位，现任日本千叶大学讲师，教授宗教、社会运动、美日关系等相关课程。他的第一本专著《合作的传教士：贺川丰彦与他的世界（1888–1960）》将于2025年8月由夏威夷大学出版社出版。
Bo TAO received a PhD in history from Yale University and currently is a lecturer at Chiba University, Japan. He teaches on subjects such as religion, social movements, and US-Japan relations. His first book, Cooperative Evangelist: Kagawa Toyohiko and His World, 1888-1960, is forthcoming from the University of Hawaiʻi Press in August 2025.
陶波于耶鲁大学获得历史学博士学位，现任日本千叶大学讲师，教授宗教、社会运动、美日关系等相关课程。他的第一本专著《合作的传教士：贺川丰彦与他的世界（1888–1960）》将于2025年8月由夏威夷大学出版社出版。
Moderator
Emily X. Jin 金雪妮
Emily Xueni Jin (she/her) is a researcher and literary translator, translating both from Chinese to English and the other way around. She is currently a Ph.D. candidate in East Asian Languages and Literature at Yale University. Her most recent Chinese to English translations can be found in The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories, the first Chinese speculative fiction anthology in translation produced by female and non-binary creators, AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future, a collection of science fiction and essays cowritten by Dr. Kaifu Lee and Chen Qiufan, and A View from the Stars by Cixin Liu. Her translation has been nominated for awards such as the Hugo Awards, the Rosetta Award, and the Chinese Nebula Awards. Her essays can be found in her column for Sixth Tone, as well as Paper Republic’s Field Guide to Contemporary Chinese Literature, Vector, Wenhsun Magazine, and more.
金雪妮（Emily Xueni Jin），耶鲁大学东亚语言与文学系博士候选人，青年学者，中英、英中译者，作者。她的中译作品包括《菲利普·迪克传》、《发条王国》系列、《氯水人鱼》等，英译作品见于Clarkesworld等幻想类刊物，及首部中国幻想小说女性与酷儿英译合集《春天来临的方式》（The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories）、由陈楸帆和李开复博士合写的《AI2041》、刘慈欣选集《俯瞰星空》（A View From the Stars）等。她的译作曾被提名雨果奖、罗塞塔奖、华语科幻星云奖等。她的评论类作品见她为第六声网站（Sixth Tone）撰写的中国科幻与当代文化专栏、《矢量》（Vector）、《纸托邦当代中国文学指南》（Paper Republic’s Field Guide to Contemporary Chinese Literature）与《文讯》杂志等。
Emily Xueni Jin (she/her) is a researcher and literary translator, translating both from Chinese to English and the other way around. She is currently a Ph.D. candidate in East Asian Languages and Literature at Yale University. Her most recent Chinese to English translations can be found in The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories, the first Chinese speculative fiction anthology in translation produced by female and non-binary creators, AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future, a collection of science fiction and essays cowritten by Dr. Kaifu Lee and Chen Qiufan, and A View from the Stars by Cixin Liu. Her translation has been nominated for awards such as the Hugo Awards, the Rosetta Award, and the Chinese Nebula Awards. Her essays can be found in her column for Sixth Tone, as well as Paper Republic’s Field Guide to Contemporary Chinese Literature, Vector, Wenhsun Magazine, and more.
金雪妮（Emily Xueni Jin），耶鲁大学东亚语言与文学系博士候选人，青年学者，中英、英中译者，作者。她的中译作品包括《菲利普·迪克传》、《发条王国》系列、《氯水人鱼》等，英译作品见于Clarkesworld等幻想类刊物，及首部中国幻想小说女性与酷儿英译合集《春天来临的方式》（The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories）、由陈楸帆和李开复博士合写的《AI2041》、刘慈欣选集《俯瞰星空》（A View From the Stars）等。她的译作曾被提名雨果奖、罗塞塔奖、华语科幻星云奖等。她的评论类作品见她为第六声网站（Sixth Tone）撰写的中国科幻与当代文化专栏、《矢量》（Vector）、《纸托邦当代中国文学指南》（Paper Republic’s Field Guide to Contemporary Chinese Literature）与《文讯》杂志等。