Lingnan Culture and the World: Waterways, Watermanship and Public Energies

Theme

Focusing on watercourses as vectors of exchange and transformation, the symposium examines both well-known elites such as Cantonese officials, literati, and merchants, as well as the often-overlooked actors who sustained and remade littoral life, including sailors, pirates, sea nomads, boat people, and others whose daily practice of navigation constituted a distinctive maritime knowledge. These communities' multilingual competencies, mobile capital, specialized crafts, and artistic endeavors enabled them to navigate and transform South China land-water interfaces.

Date: 26 - 27 February 2026 (Thu-Fri, UTC+8)

Venue:

Day 1 - C-LP-02, Tai Po Campus, EdUHK
Day 2 - Ma Wan (Invited Scholars Only)

Language: Chinese, English

Symposium Panel

Panel 1. Water-borne Agency and Institutionalization

水生的動能與建制

9:30-10:45

Gliding Beneath the Waves: A Study of Water Scouts (shuimo) in Qing China

Ronald C. Po

Abstracts

“Island within Island”: Shipbuilding, Spatial Displacement, and the Cultural Landscape of North Tsing Yi

Leung Po Shan Anthony

Abstracts

Metamorphosis of the Immortal Bird:
The Oyster from Mythology to Mundanity and Modernity

Chan Timothy Wai Keung

Abstracts

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Paola Calanca

Panel 2. Sensation and Sensibility of Seascapes

海岸景觀的感知系譜

11:10-12:25

The Depiction of the Sea in Hong Kong Literature

Li Yuen Mei Fanny

Abstracts

Lost Horizons: The Interplay of Art and Iconic Venues in Colonial Hong Kong

Chen Fong Fong

Abstracts

Mapping in a Muddle: Zou Boqi, William Mayers, Wilhelm Lobscheid and the Guangdong Provincial Cartography Project (1860s)

Puk Wing Kin

Abstracts

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Lai Chi Tim

Panel 3. Tactic Societies across Waterways

因水制宜的結社組織

14:00–15:15

Operations and Transformations in the Early Years of The North China Herald

Li Zigui

Abstracts

From Market to Xiang (鄉): The Establishment of Gangkou Xiang (港口鄉) and Postwar Social Order in Zhongshan (中山) (1945-195?)

Yang Zhishui

Abstracts

Deviation or Indispensable Connection? Guangzhouwan and the Maritime Networks between Hong Kong and Haiphong, 1900-1940s

Wu Ziqi

Abstracts

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Yim Lawrence Chi Hung

Panel 4. Mobile People at Land-water Interfaces

海陸交界的漂移群體

15:40–16:55

The British Colonial Making of Tanka Boat-Dwellers as an Ethnic Group in Hong Kong

Luk Chi Hung Gary

Abstracts

Across the Waters: Lexical Diffusion in Cantonese-Tanka Contact

Wang Cong

Abstracts

Pressmen, Steamers and Chinese Settlers: From Hong Kong to British North Borneo in the 1880s

Ye Jia Michelle

Abstracts

Lingnan Culture and the World:

Waterways, Watermanship and Public Energies

Panel 1. Water-borne Agency and Institutionalization

水生的動能與建制

9:30-10:45

9:30–9:50

9:50–10:10

10:10–10:30

10:30–10:45

Gliding Beneath the Waves: A Study of Water Scouts (shuimo) in Qing China

Ronald C. Po

“Island within Island”: Shipbuilding, Spatial Displacement, and the Cultural Landscape of North Tsing Yi

Leung Po Shan Anthony

Metamorphosis of the Immortal Bird:The Oyster from Mythology to Mundanity and Modernity

Chan Timothy Wai Keung

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Paola Calanca

Panel 2. Sensation and Sensibility of Seascapes

海岸景觀的感知系譜

11:10-12:25

11:10–11:30

11:30–11:50

11:50–12:10

12:10–12:25

The Depiction of the Sea in Hong Kong Literature

Li Yuen Mei Fanny

Lost Horizons: The Interplay of Art and Iconic Venues in Colonial Hong Kong

Chen Fong Fong

Mapping in a Muddle: Zou Boqi, William Mayers, Wilhelm Lobscheid and the Guangdong Provincial Cartography Project (1860s)

Puk Wing Kin

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Lai Chi Tim

Panel 3. Tactic Societies across Waterways

因水制宜的結社組織

14:00–15:15

14:00–14:20

14:20–14:40

14:40–15:00

15:00–15:15

Operations and Transformations in the Early Years of The North China Herald

Li Zigui

From Market to Xiang (鄉): The Establishment of Gangkou Xiang (港口鄉) and Postwar Social Order in Zhongshan (中山) (1945-195?)

Yang Zhishui

Deviation or Indispensable Connection? Guangzhouwan and the Maritime Networks between Hong Kong and Haiphong, 1900-1940s

Wu Ziqi

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Yim Lawrence Chi Hung

Panel 4. Mobile People at Land-water Interfaces

海陸交界的漂移群體

15:40–16:55

15:40–16:00

16:00–16:20

16:20–16:40

16:40–16:55

The British Colonial Making of Tanka Boat-Dwellers as an Ethnic Group in Hong Kong

Luk Chi Hung Gary

Across the Waters: Lexical Diffusion in Cantonese-Tanka Contact

Wang Cong

Pressmen, Steamers and Chinese Settlers: From Hong Kong to British North Borneo in the 1880s

Ye Jia Michelle

Discussant's comments and Q&A

Discussant: Prof Chan Timothy Wai Keung

Metamorphosis of the Immortal Bird:
The Oyster from Mythology to Mundanity and Modernity