Mgr. Martin Blahota, Ph.D.

AREAS OF INTEREST

• Colonial modernity and identities in East Asia
• Modern Chinese literature
• Intellectual history of modern China
• Asianism
• Manchukuo

EDUCATION

• 2017 – 2022: Ph.D. in Literatures of Asia and Africa, Charles University. Thesis: “The Sinitic Nexus: Becoming Asian in the Chinese-language Literature of Manchuria under Japanese Rule”
• 2012 – 2016: Mgr. (M.A.) degree in Chinese studies, Charles University. Thesis: “Early Prose Works by Gao Xingjian”
• 2008 – 2012: Bc. (B.A.) degree in Chinese Studies, Charles University. Thesis: “Gao Xingjian: 1980s Short Stories”

ACADEMIC CAREER

• From 10/2024: Heidelberg University, MSCA Postdoctoral Fellow (sent by the Oriental Institute)
• 1/2023 – 9/2024: Czech Academy of Sciences, Oriental Institute, Postdoctoral Fellow
• 9/2021 – 5/2022: Harvard University, Fulbright-Masaryk Scholar
• 1 – 7/2020: National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan Fellow
• 9 – 10/2018: East China Normal University, Visiting Scholar
• 1 – 2/2018: Academia Sinica, Oriental Institute Research Center in Taiwan, Visiting Scholar

AWARDS AND SCHOLARSHIPS:

• 2024. Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowships, Seal of Excellence (MSCA Fellowships CZ)
• 2022. Scholarship for Young Researchers, 2022/2023 (Jan Hus Educational Foundation, Brno).
• 2022, 2021, 2020. Award for Outstanding Research Achievement (Faculty of Arts, Charles University).
• 2020, 2019, 2018. Specific University Research Grant (Faculty of Arts, Charles University).
• 2017. Huayu Enrichment Scholarship (Ministry of Education, Taiwan).
• 2017. First place in translation from Chinese to Czech, translation of Gao Xingjian’s short story “Za řekou” [Beyond The River 河那邊] (Czech-Chinese Association, Olomouc branch).

EDITORSHIP:

• 12/2023 – present. Archiv orientální, assistant editor.
• 2022 – present. Manchuria, Literature and Culture Website (https://www.manchurialiteratureculture.uoguelph.ca/), associate editor.
• 6/2021. Journal of the European Association for Chinese Studies, member of the review board.

PAPERS PRESENTED

• August 28, 2024. “Nostalgia for the Countryside in a Decadent City: A Case of Manchurian Literary Resistance to Western Imperialism.” The EACS 2024 Conference, Tallinn, Estonia.
• February 23, 2024. “Vzdorné mandžuské já pohraničního spisovatele Liu Honglina” [The Rebellious Manchu Self of the Borderland Writer, Liu Honglin]. The Science of the Mind Seminar, Faculty of Education, Charles University, Prague.
• December 5, 2023. “The Sinitic Nexus: Becoming East Asian in the Sinitic Literature of Manchuria under Japanese Rule.” The Institute Seminar Series, Oriental Institute, Prague.
• November 14, 2023. “Becoming Asian instead of Communist: The Manchurian Writer Gu Ding’s Tenkō.” The Radical Right in Europe and East Asia Conference, Prague.
• November 11, 2023. “Mu Rugai’s Manchu Voice in Northeast China of the 1920s.” The International Travels of Chinese Text Symposium, Riga, Latvia.
• October 14, 2023. “穆儒丐的《女教与家庭问题》及其文学的身份问题” [Mu Rugai’s Essay ‘Women’s Education and the Problem of the Family’ and the Question of His Literary Work’s Identity]. PThe East Asian Memory and Literary Representation Conference, Qinhuangdao, China.
• June 25, 2023. “Wu Ying: Not Only Chinese but Also Manchu and East Asian Writer.” AAS-in-Asia 2023 Conference, Daegu, South Korea.
• June 5, 2023. “Maoist Nationalism of PRC Literary History: Erasing Transnational Past in Early Socialist China.” The 15th Biennial Conference of Asian Studies in Israel, Tel Aviv.
• August 17, 2022. “爵青的《哈爾濱》新讀： 傾向於王道而反對西方現代性” [New Reading of Jue Qing’s “Harbin”: Favouring Wangdao over Western Modernity]. Colonialism and Cultural Interaction among Taiwan, Manchuria, and Korea International Symposium, Tokyo (online).
• August 25, 2021. “Limits of Freedom of Speech Before and After ‘Liberation’: Social Criticism in Chinese Literature of the Northeast Around 1945.” ICAS 12 Conference, Kyoto (online).
• August 25, 2021. “More than Western and anti-Western: Akutagawa’s Devils in Fiction of East Asian Colonial Subjects.” EACS 2021 Conference, Leipzig (online).
• September 2, 2020. “From a ‘Modern Girl’ to a Teenage Thief: Representation of Women in Jue Qing’s Fiction.” AAS-in-Asia 2020 Conference, Kobe (online). Panel organizer.
• May 27, 2020. “‘The Prostitute’ in Manchukuo’s Proletarian Literature.” Global Chinese Literature Research seminar, Center for Chinese Studies, Taipei.
• November 23, 2019. “Perspektivy čínských, japonských, korejských a ruských spisovatelů v Mandžukuu” [Perspectives of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Russian Writers in Manchukuo]. The 13th Annual Czech and Slovak Sinological Conference, Olomouc.
• September 22, 2019. “殖民地文化审查制度作为创新的启示：伪满洲国作家爵青对西方文学作品的引用为例” [Colonial Censorship as an Inspiration for Innovation: Manchukuo Writer Jue Qing’s References to Western Literary Works as an Example]. International Symposium on East Asian Colonialism, Changchun, China.
• April 26, 2019. “Vzdor vůči japonské nadvládě v Jue Qingově historické próze” [Resistance Against Japanese Rule in Jue Qing’s Historical Fiction]. Orientalia Antiqua Nova colloquium, Plzeň.
• March 9, 2019. “The Modernist Writer and Censor Jue Qing’s Art of Escaping Censorship: Symbols, Allusions, Parody and Perfect Lies”. International workshop “Censorship and Self-Censorship – China and Chinese Studies,” organized by European Association for Chinese Studies, Prague.
• November 24, 2018. “Representation of Manchukuo in Early Work of The Modernist Writer Jue Qing”. The 12th Annual Czech and Slovak Sinological Conference, Prague.
• November 24, 2017. “Ideologický konformismus raných novel Gao Xingjiana” [Ideological Conformism in Gao Xingjian’s Early Novellas]. The 11th Annual Czech and Slovak Sinological Conference, Bratislava.