Internationales Symposium: Inscribing Identity – Epigraphic Habits in Medieval China

This symposium is co-organized by Michael Hoeckelmann, Jessey Choo, and Alexei Ditter. It is generously supported by the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg and the Tang Research Foundation.

All those interested are invited to join on Friday, August 1 and Saturday, August 2 from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in room 00.3, Philosophisches Seminargebäude (PSG III), Kochstraße 6a, 91054 Erlangen.

The seventh meeting—a symposium—examines the “epigraphic habits” involved in the commissioning, drafting, execution (calligraphy and engraving), and circulation of funerary inscriptions, which reflect the identity of particular groups or communities. Papers by 16 scholars from East Asia, North America, and Europe will explore the following questions:

• What communities of writing and reading were involved in the production and reception of funerary inscriptions?
• How many voices or hands are discernible in the inscription, both as a text and as a material object?
• How did cultural, social, and political institutions define a framework for the epigraphic mode of commemoration?
• How and in what settings were (contemporary and later) readers most likely to engage with the inscription? What strategies of reading or listening would they employ?
• How do communities express various forms of identity and memory through epigraphy?
• In what ways do modern researchers and modes of access (in situ, as rubbing and/or transcription, in print, or through a database) frame medieval inscriptions?

In addressing these questions, the symposium spotlights a range of approaches to the study of epigraphy and illustrates how evolving methods have shaped—and continue to reshape—disciplinary frameworks. In doing so, it offers fresh perspectives on inscriptions as dynamic agents in the negotiation of social, political, and cultural meaning.

All presentations are free and open to faculty and students.

Friday, August 1

9:00-9:15

Welcome and opening remarks

9:15-10:45

Nicolas Tackett (University of California, Berkeley): „Aristocratic Networks and the Authors and Calligraphers of Funerary Inscriptions“

Timothy Davis (Brigham Young University): „The Production of Imperially Commissioned Epitaphs: Written for Tang Era Princes and Princesses“

Michael Höckelmann (FAU): „A Bureaucratic Habit? Institutionalized Commemoration of Eunuchs in the Eighth Century“

11:00-12:00

Li Lan 李瀾 (University of Toronto): „Portraying the Ideal Buddhist Woman: An Interpretation of the Stūpa Inscription of Lu Weicengyou 盧未曾有“

Amy McNair (University of Kansas): „Two Tang Inscriptions at Longmen: The Epitaph for An Pu and the Dedicatory Inscription for Lady Wei“

13:30-14:30

Alexei Ditter (Reed College): “The Stuff of Memory: Oral and Written Sources of Late Medieval Muzhiming”

Tu Chung-cheng 凃宗呈 (National Cheng Kung University, Tainan): “The Representation of Death in the Epigraphic Texts: Han Yu as Subject, Han Yu as Author”

15:00-16:00

round table discussion

Paul Kroll (University of Colorado) & Lu Yang 陸揚 (Peking University)

Saturday, August 2

9:15-10:45

Lance Pursey (Hebrew University of Jerusalem): “Why Kitan language Epitaphs? Lineage, language communities, and cultural memory in the Liao Dynasty”

Emanuela Garatti (Ruhr-Universität Bochum, École Pratique des Hautes Études): “The Life and the Identity of the Tibetan Lun Boyan (c. 804-855) in China according to his entombed epitaph”

Iiyama Tomoyasu 飯山知保 (Waseda University): “Visualizing Kinship in Steles: Evolution and Reutilization of Genealogical Steles in Yuan-Ming-Qing North China

11:00-12:00

Meng Guodong 孟國棟 (Wuhan University): “Cong zongjiao dao qiufen: jisi kongjian de zhuanyi yu mubei de xingqi” 從宗廟到丘墳：祭祀空間的轉移與墓碑的興起

Jessey Choo (Rutgers University-New Brunswick): “The Immortal in a Doomed Tomb: Wu Tong’s Muzhiming and the Quest to Control Rebirth”

13:30-15:00

Lin Chun-I 林郡儀 (National Taiwan University): “The Stone Epitaph of Lady Qu in Turfan and Elite Social Networks”

Cong Ellen Zhang (University of Virginia): “The Women in Han Qi’s Family”

Jeffrey Moser (Brown University): “The Matriarch on the Margins”

15:30-16:30

Final Roundtable

Kategorie: Allgemein, Sonstige Veranstaltungen