Program

Research Programs: Faculty Research Awards

Period of Performance

9/1/2004 - 5/31/2005

Funding Totals

$40,000.00 (approved)
$40,000.00 (awarded)


Local Theater, Transnational Arena: A New Social History of Cantonese Opera, 1860-1945

FAIN: HR-50020-04

Wing Chung Ng
University of Texas, San Antonio (San Antonio, TX 78249-1644)

This proposal seeks funding from the NEH to undertake the final stage of a project on the history of Cantonese opera from 1860 to 1945. Part of the research is to chart the rise of this Southern Chinese theatrical genre, which began in its home region as a lowly peripatetic occupation with troupes performing on makeshift stages constructed in temple courtyards and rural market fairs. Focusing on the operation of theater companies, this study attempts to delineate Cantonese opera's expansion into a commercialized entertainment in the theater houses of Guangzhou and Hong Kong after the turn of the century. The investigation will further unveil intriguing aspects of theater's relationships with local state authorities, its negotiation with emergent nationalist discourses, and its partaking of larger cultural currents in support of modernity and social change. The last part of my inquiry will place Cantonese opera on a broad global canvas by tracing the itineraries of opera companies and actors to Chinese immigrant communities in Southeast Asia and North America. Hitherto unmapped and unstudied, the transnational circuits were crucial to the vitality of this evolving theatrical genre even as the entertaining performance refashioned the identities and enriched the lives of many in the diaspora.





Associated Products

Chinatown Theatre as Transnational Business: New Evidence from Vancouver during the Exclusion Era (Article)
Title: Chinatown Theatre as Transnational Business: New Evidence from Vancouver during the Exclusion Era
Author: Wing Chung Ng
Abstract: This article draws on newly discovered business records from Chinatown, Vancouver, to examine the transnational mobility of Chinese immigrant theater during the exclusion era.
Year: 2004
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: BC Studies: The British Columbian Quarterly
Publisher: University of British Columbia

Cantonese opera as cultural history and culture in Cantonese opera history (in Chinese) (Book Section)
Title: Cantonese opera as cultural history and culture in Cantonese opera history (in Chinese)
Author: Wing Chung Ng
Editor: Cheng Ling Yan
Editor: Chow Sze Sum
Abstract: The essay offers a state-of-the-art assessment of the field of Cantonese opera history research and suggests several avenues for future work.
Year: 2008
Publisher: Cantonese Opera Research Programme, Chinese University of Hong Kong
Book Title: Collected Essays from the International Symposium on Cantonese Opera Vol. 1
ISBN: 9789628104161

A Decade on the South China Stage: Chen Feinong and the Cantonese Operatic World, 1924-1934 (in Chinese) (Book Section)
Title: A Decade on the South China Stage: Chen Feinong and the Cantonese Operatic World, 1924-1934 (in Chinese)
Author: Wing Chung Ng
Editor: Mee-kaw Nyaw
Editor: Ming K. Chan
Abstract: The chapter examines the volitility of opera business in commercial theater in South China through the career of a prominent actor.
Year: 2010
Publisher: Commercvial Press H.K.
Book Title: Perspectives on Modern Lingnan: Guangdong and its Hong Kong Ties, 1900-38
ISBN: 9789620764424

Cantonese opera network as cultural corridor: A case study of the Cantonese in Southeast Asia in the early twentieth century (in Chinese) (Book Section)
Title: Cantonese opera network as cultural corridor: A case study of the Cantonese in Southeast Asia in the early twentieth century (in Chinese)
Author: Wing Chung Ng
Editor: Wong Sin Kiong
Abstract: The chapter surveys the geographical spread of Cantonese opera activities in colonial Southeast Asia before the Pacific War. It argues that the theater was closely intertwined with the growth of the Cantonese communities in different parts of Southeast Asia, and especially Singapore. Immigrant Chinese organizations and business networks played a pivotal role in helping the theater to thrive and the stage, in turn, solidified cultural sentiments and regional identity.
Year: 2011
Publisher: Global Publishing Ltd and the National University of Singapore
Book Title: Ethnicity, History and Culture: Trans-regional abd Cross-Disciplinary Studies on Southeast Asia and East Asia
ISBN: 9789814365765