2017 Annual Spring Workshop- “Stories Matter”: Narrative Research as Enquiry and Empowerment

Storytelling is as old as civilization and yet more relevant today than ever. Narratives travel across local and global circuits of exchange and new technologies facilitate access to a plethora of texts and theoretical frameworks for understanding them. From oral histories to memoirs, from documentary films to human libraries, narrative inquiry is an interdisciplinary and international enterprise that is often a critical intervention and change agent. Join us to explore how narrative research as methodology and empowerment generates impact. This year we are pleased to welcome internationally acclaimed author Xu Xi to HKU to lead a morning writing workshop and participate in the afternoon general sessions. The annual WSRC Spring Workshop is a forum to share ideas and strategies with university colleagues and community members to deepen diversity and understanding in HKU, Hong Kong and beyond.

PART ONE: WRITING WORKSHOP THE CREATIVE “I-EYE”: NARRATIVE WORKSHOP WITH XU XI (10:00 AM – 1:00 PM)

Xu Xi 許素細www.xuxiwriter.com is the author of eleven books of fiction and essays, including most recently That Man in Our Lives (C&R Press, 2016) and editor of four anthologies of Hong Kong literature in English. Shortlisted for the MAN Asian Literary Prize for her novel, Habit of a Foreign Sky (Haven Books, 2010),  Xu Xi has, among many awards, received the O. Henry Prize and the Cohen Award from Ploughshares for best short story. Her Hong Kong memoir Elegy for HK will be released by Penguin on July 1, 2017.  She has been a distinguished visiting writer or in residence at the La Muse Artists & Writers Retreat in France, Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at Arizona State University in Tempe, City University of Hong Kong’s Department of English, University of Iowa’s MFA in Nonfiction Program, the Philippines National Writing Workshops at Silliman University in Dumaguete, Lingnan University in Hong Kong, Chateau de Lavigny in Switzerland, Kulturhuset USF in Norway, the Jack Kerouac Project of Orlando, Florida, among others. The New York Times once named her a “pioneer writer from Asia in English.” She is the co-founder of Authors at Large http://www.aalauthors.com, offering international writing retreats and workshops. Currently, she inhabits the flight paths connecting New York and Hong Kong.

TO REVIEW XU XI’S WRITING WORKSHOP, PLEASE VISIT WSRC YOUTUBE CHANNEL PART TWO: NARRATIVE AS INQUIRY AND EMPOWERMENT  (2:00 – 5:30 PM)

Session One: Frameworks and Approaches Xu Xi (Authors at Large http://www.aalauthors.com): The Creative Process in Fiction and Non-Fiction Writing Marco Wan (HKU Faculty of Law):  Reading Gender in Legal Cases Petula Ho Sik Ying (HKU Faculty of Social Sciences): Dialogic Filming as a Narrative Research Method

Session Two: Narrative Research as Empowerment: Case Studies Puja Kapai (HKU Faculty of Law/CCPL, Convenor, WSRC): Why Hong Kong’s Hidden Stories Matter: Breaking Through Dominant Discourses Around Racism Caroline Dingle (HKU Faculty of Science): Stories as Statistics: Documenting Gendered Experiences Within the Sciences Tim Gruenewald (HKU Faculty of Arts): Narrating Place and Space: The Story of “Sacred Ground” (Note: We invite you to pre-screen “Sacred Ground” before the workshop on May 6th. https://vimeo.com/ondemand/sacredground)

TO REVIEW THE SPRING WORKSHOP PANEL 1 AND PANEL 2,