This talk focuses on two important prescriptive manuals for training household singer-actors, one by Li Yu (1671) and one by Xu Dachun (1748) to ask how and why the singing voice was conceptualized as having a gender in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Chinese discourse on Kunqu opera. Dr. Zeitlin’s talk will attempt to chart a historical change in vocal assumptions from the 1670s to the 1740s, which takes into account the major shifts in performing norms and conventions that occurred during this period: the reopening of public urban theaters by 1700 and the Yongzheng era reforms that removed female entertainers from the imperial court.

Judith T. Zeitlin is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor in East Asian Languages and Civilizations and Theater and Performance Studies at the University of Chicago. Her many publications related to Chinese opera, visual culture, and music include "Performing Images: Opera in Chinese Visual Culture," co-edited with Yuhang Li (2014) and "The Voice as Something More: Essays Toward Materiality," co-edited with Martha Feldman (2019). She is currently completing a book on the culture of musical entertainment in early modern China, which focuses on voice, text, and instrument.


Zoom registration link:
https://umich.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_fFXGCnJwTc2VxzAHCN6OnA

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