Chen Qiufan: Why I Wrote a SF-novel on E-waste
Event Information
Description
Chen Qiufan: “Why I wrote an SF novel on e-waste”
Monday 12th August, 8-9pm
Curator: Angela Chan
Churchill Room, Goodenough College
Mecklenburgh Square, Holborn, London WC1N 2AB
Award-winning science fiction writer Chen Qiufan will discuss the thinking behind his novel The Waste Tide. First published in 2013, it has now been translated by Ken Liu and published in English. The hyper-real near future narrative takes our globalised throwaway consumption of electronics into the posthuman, and centres the environmental disaster of Silicon Isle, a fictional e-waste recycling landfill that’s based on one of the world’s largest sites in Guiyu, China. It articulates the social, economic and ecological consequences for migrant labourers, our increasingly embodied relationship with technology and accountability of the consuming classes.
This presentation will conclude with a discussion with the hosts, the London Chinese Science Fiction Group (@LondonChineseSF, LCSFG), and attendees, chaired by Angela Chan and Ma Chen.
Our curator Angela Chan is a creative climate change communicator and independently runs Worm, an online curatorial platform challenging the criteria for climate change expertise through arts practices. She has a background in art history and an interdisciplinary MA in Climate Change: History, Culture, Society. Her research interests span climate and social justice, decolonial and area studies and contemporary Chinese science fiction. She also writes climate speculative fiction as algae-la and co-founded the London Chinese Science Fiction Group hosted at UCL.
Chen Ma is a PhD student in Department of China and Inner Asia at SOAS University of London. Her research interest lies primarily in the increasing role for science fiction as a way of thinking about other fields, such as ecology, urbanism, and socio-political context in contemporary China. Her current research project is funded by Universities' China Committee in London (UCCL). It mainly looks into the ecological narratives from Chinese sf published between 2009 and 2019.
