The RCL CHKL Research Café will host its 7th session on Saturday, July 13, 2024, from 11 am to 1 pm. During this session, Bernice Chau (MA Candidate, Department of History, University of Toronto) and Florence Ma (Independent Scholar) will present their research. Bernice will discuss her work titled “Pornography, Wui Gwai & Female Bodily Representations: A Case Study of Julie Lee Wah-Yuet’s Trilogy of Lust (1995),” while Florence will present her research titled “The Hidden Identity of Hong Kong: Reconnecting Hong Kong’s Vanishing Fishing Community through Urban Interventions on the Tam Kung Festival Route in Shau Kei Wan.” There will be an opportunity for questions and discussion following their presentations.
The Research Café is an initiative based at the Richard Charles Lee Canada-Hong Kong Library, aiming to unite scholars interested in Hong Kong-related research to encourage scholarly exchange and promote multidisciplinary dialogue. Light refreshments will be provided. If you wish to join us, kindly RSVP by sending an email to chk.library@utoronto.ca before Thursday, July 11, 2024.
Pornography, Wui Gwai & Female Bodily Representations: A case study of Julie Lee Wah-Yuet’s Trilogy of Lust (1995)
Bernice Chau (MA Candidate, Department of History, University of Toronto)
This paper examines representations of Wui Gwai,* its local, colonial and transnational expressions of Hong Kong identities through Julie Lee Wah-Yuet’s Trilogy of Lust 血戀 (1995). On April 18, 1995, Hong Kong actress Julie Lee Wah-Yuet 李華月 announced the first ever filiming of unsimulated sex in the history of Hong Kong Cinema. Titled as Trilogy of Lust [TL], a Category III film 三級片 that circulates around the triangular relationship between Chi, Ga Yik-Sang and Un, with a series of unusual sexual images from eel masturbations to cliff sex. Although public opinion deemed TL as a gimmick, the film remains one of the most explicit commentaries that documents Hong Kong identity crisis, skepticisms of British and Chinese regimes and struggles of cross-cultural womanhood.
This paper argues that TL reveals the cultural and political power dynamic of competing identities of Hong Kong as a place, and its population, during Wui Gwai that was dominated by collective trauma living under British and Mainland regimes. Bernice follow Laura Kipnis’ “Pornography is Cultural Expression” (Kipnis, 1998) when perceiving TL and Category III cinema as porn mediums that address the most urgent and unspeakable political discourses of Hong Kong. In particular, TL's graphic sexual representations provide a unique cultural and political space for expressing collective anxieties around Wui Gwai. With the lack of feminist scholarships in Category III genre, this paper will also explore women’s casting in Category III productions, specifically how notions of erotic femininity represent wider local and nationalist intentions of statehood and feminisms.
The Hidden Identity of Hong Kong: Re-connecting Hong Kong’s vanishing fishing community through urban interventions on the Tam Kung Festival route in Shau Kei Wan
Florence Ma (Independent Scholar)
Against the backdrop of the expanding metropolis of Hong Kong, many functioning members of contemporary society have concealed facets of themselves that they now deem irrelevant to their daily lives. Over the last half a century, dramatic changes in Hong Kong’s urban form and industrial life have enticed fisherfolk out of their traditional way of life, dwelling in harbors and on the sea, resulting in the community and individuals moving on land and losing their sense of unique identity. Once forming the famous floating cities in Hong Kong, the community has since been broken up and displaced to the different corners of the metropolis, their presence now barely recognizable to outsiders.
The fisherfolk community faces many challenges promoting their collective identity continually with their lack of on-land architectural presence. Instead of focusing on the more permanent architectural elements, this thesis will investigate one of the main deity celebrations, the Tam Kung Festival, in the neighborhood of Shau Kei Wan, where the presence of the community expands and contracts throughout the year. Combined with the effort of identifying traces of the fishing community buried in the contemporary urban fabric, urbanized traditional ceremonies can be used to build on the existing traces to create new imprints for others to discover the fisherfolk culture. Together, one can weave meaning and memory into the city fabric. Additionally, by learning from the historic nature of the traditional rhythm and fluidity of the fishing community’s lifestyle, we can better understand how to celebrate the different facets of one’s identity.
Florence used mapping exercises based on historical documents, including official maps and annual government reports to help explain the community’s rise and decline and to reveal its shifting presence over a 50-year period in Hong Kong’s growth. She then illustrated the various elements of the Tam Kung Festival to showcase the magical transformation of the streetscape during these special occasions. These drawings, alongside street views and walks, helped me identify what kind of temporary and permanent markers could enhance the urban streetscape for both the fisherfolk and the general public. These elements and the festival act as a spatial catalyst that helps individuals recognize themselves as belonging to the fisherfolk community. By examining and redesigning both permanent and temporary elements of the festival, this thesis proposes a way to aid and expand the presence of the Tam Kung Festival, allowing for the continuous growth and identity renewal of the existing and new members of the fisherfolk community.