Visiting scholar Xiaofei Kang will give a public talk titled "Mobilizing Ghosts for the Revolution" on October 23 as part of the UT Humanities Center’s 2023-2024 Distinguished Lecture Series.
 

About the Talk:
Religion has been commonly upheld as the archenemy of Communist revolutions around the world. This talk goes beyond the familiar stories of suppression and resistance to examines how Chinese Communist propaganda deployed traditional tropes of demonology, ritual exorcism, and other religious resources to construct a new gendered narrative of salvation for the Maoist revolution. 
 
The lecture is free and open to the public and will be held in the Student Union on the UT Knoxville campus. Public parking is available in the Volunteer Hall parking garage for our off-campus visitors. Everyone is welcome! 
 
About the Speaker: 
Xiaofei Kang is a professor of religion at The George Washington University. She has a Ph.D. in Chinese history from Columbia University (2000) and has published books and articles on gender, ethnicity, and Chinese religions. Her current work focuses on the intertwined discourses of religion, gender and revolutionary propaganda in the Chinese Communist revolution. Her new book is entitled Enchanted Revolution: Ghosts, Shamans, and Gender Politics in Chinese Communist Propaganda, 1942-1953. 
 
About the Series: The UT Humanities Center's Distinguished Lecture Series brings acclaimed humanities scholars and renowned artists to the Knoxville campus for research-based conversations with UT faculty and graduate students and to give a public talk on a topic of the speaker's choosing. Speakers are nominated and hosted by faculty from our nine affiliated arts and humanities departments. Because only speakers with exceptional records of publication and research activity are eligible to receive a nomination as a visiting scholar, the program brings to campus some of the most cutting-edge and prolific intellectuals in the humanities today. Details on this season's program are available on our website.