Chris and Alex are delighted to be joined for Episode 162 of the podcast by Muyang Zhuang (Assistant Professor at Tongji University), who is a specialist in Chinese cinema, media, and visual culture in East Asia, with a special focus on animation and cartoons. In this instalment, the trio discuss Shanghai Animation Film Studio’s Lotus Lantern (Chang Guangxi, 1999), a film based on Chinese folklore whose animated adaptation in the late-1990s comes in a long line of reworkings of this most famous of tales. Topics include the context of state-owned animated production in socialist and post-socialist China; the (trans)national style and aesthetic choices of Chang Guangxi’s film and the politics of its Westernisation; European vs. Chinese folklore, the figure of the trickster, and links between the film’s musical sequences and character; the complex market forces that have helped position Disney animation as China’s monstrous other; and why Lotus Lantern is considered a landmark in contemporary Chinese animation.
This podcast is sponsored by the project “UK-China Animation: Co-Creating Research and Knowledge Exchange,” led by the University of Nottingham and funded by the British Council through an award from its Going Global Partnerships programme, which builds stronger, more inclusive, internationally connected higher education and Technical and Vocational Education and Training systems (TVET).
**Fantasy/Animation theme tune composed by Francisca Araujo**
**As featured on Feedspot’s 25 Best London Education Podcasts**
