062. Transculturalism & Wuxia in My Beautiful Enemy by Sherry Thomas

Shelf Love: Romance Novel Discourse

Guest Jayashree Kamble, romance scholar is back to discuss My Beautiful Enemy by Sherry Thomas. This novel is a cross between Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and a passing narrative, and layers in discussion of Chinese culture and the history British imperialism. Jayashree explored the Wuxia influence and transculturalism in a paper published in March 2020 in the Journal of Popular Romance Studies.

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Show Notes:

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Guest: Jayashree Kamble

Humanities Commons | Twitter | Routledge Research Companion to Popular Romance Fiction

Notes:

• We discuss Jayashree Kamble's article from JPRS: When Wuxia Met Romance: The Pleasures and Politics of Transculturalism in Sherry Thomas’s My Beautiful Enemy
• Characters:
  • MC 1: Ying-Hua aka Ying-Ying aka Catherine Blade. Stepfather: Da-Ren
  • MC 2: Leighton
  • Villain: Lin aka The Centipede
• Vocabulary - as an American English speaker, I was unfamiliar with some of these pronunciations so providing a bit of a guide based on how I heard Jayashree pronounce things to help you match the spelling of these words to what you heard in the episode. I'm sure I'm missing lots of nuance here, so grain of salt and all that:
  • Wuxia - pronounced "Woo-shya"
  • Qing Dynasty China - pronounced "Ching"
  • Bao and Baoying - pronounced "bah-oh" and "bah-oh-ying"
• Video with Sherry Thomas from the Popular Romance Project
  • Also Jayashree has videos too!
  • Love Between the Covers Documentary
• IASPR Digital Showcase 2020 Conference: View every presentation here! Several of these discussions that happened just before Jayashree and I spoke are referenced in the episode.
  • Become a member! I became a member as an "independent scholar" for just $25.
• Thank you to this episode's beta listeners Madison and Kelsey. I appreciate your help!

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