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International Academic Symposium: “Macao: A Place of Memory Where East Meets West”
2024-12-06 @ 8:00 am ~ 2024-12-07 @ 5:00 pm
2025-01-21T00:00:00+08:00
The concept of “Place of Memory” was invented by the French scholar Pierre Nora, renowned internationally for his monumental work Les Lieux de Mémoire. Amid the significant changes now occurring in the humanities and social sciences, this symposium aims to consider Macao as a “Place of Memory” that bridges East and West, and past and present. In response to the two major “turns” in historiography—global history and public history—we will explore the following issues from both methodological perspectives and practical case studies.
1. The Place of Memory—The Possibility of a New Historiography Using Macao as a Paradigmatic Example. The concept of “Place of Memory” is both simple and ambiguous, natural but also artificial, the most directly perceptible experience and the most abstract conceptions, possessing reality, symbolism, and functionality. Macao’s places of memory naturally include over thirty visible World Heritage sites, one of the official languages—Portuguese, the ubiquitous “egg tarts” on its streets, and its new visage after the return to Chinese sovereignty. Arguably, Macao is a living “museum” reflecting the historical legacy of connections between China and the world. This symposium seeks to explore the possibility of a new historiography that transcends the binary divisions of past and present, East and West, through interdisciplinary methods.
2. Globalization—The Possibility of a Global History Centered on Macao. With the unfolding and growing complexity of globalization, global history faces an opportunity for introspection. Specifically, how can we inherit and carry on the earlier achievements of global history—such as Dependency Theory and the World System approach? How can we go beyond the global historical research one-sidedly focused on the “movement of materials,” to strengthen studies on the “movement of people,” “movement of knowledge,” and “movement of spirits” in order to construct a holistic global history? This symposium will focus on Macao to explore the possibility of a distinctive Chinese global historical narrative that connects Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Americas.
Conference Rundown
Organizer:
Department of History, University of Macau
Co-organizers:
Institute of Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Macau
Translation Team of the Complete Chinese Edition of Les Lieux de Mémoire, Xueheng Institute for Advanced Studies, Nanjing University
Nagasaki Research Group, International Research Center for Japanese Studies（Kyoto）