Interview with Norman Smith

Sikata Banerjee, University of Victoria, is the author of W arriors in Politics: Hinduism, Nationalism, Violence, and the Shiv Sena in India and Make Me a Man! Masculinity, Hinduism, and Nationalism in India, as well as articles in W omen and Politics, Asian Survey, W omen's Studies International Forum, and International Feminist Journal of Politics. Her latest project is a book m anuscript, On the Borderlands of Nation, Empire and Gender: Armed Masculinity and Muscular Nationalism in India and Ireland. Norman Smith, University of Guelph, conducts research in the areas of modern China, women's history, and the Northeast of China (Manchuria). He is the author of Resisting Manchukuo: Chinese W omen W riters and Japanese Occupation and articles published in Journal of W omen's History, Modern China, Modern Asian Studies, and International History Review. He is currently completing a manuscript on Chinese narratives of alcohol, opiate, and addiction in the popular culture of the Northeast of China in the early twentieth century, siting them at the intersection of gender ideals, consum er culture, and Japanese im perialism .

Introduction Resisting Manchukuo reveals the
literary world of Japanese-occupied Manchuria (1931-1945) and examines the lives, careers, and literary legacies of seven prolific Chinese women writing during this period. In his extremely compelling book, Norman Smith provides a nuanced and intersectional analysis of nation, empire, and literary texts. His work is a complex study of the interweaving of gender, race and, to an extent, class, within wom en's experiences of occupation and the manner in which wom en utilized their location within an im perial space to resist colonialism. An important aspect of this anti-colonial resistance was also an im plicit challenge to patriarchy. One of the intriguing arguments advanced by Professor Sm ith is the notion that these Chinese women, by writing these texts during Japanese occupation, were tracing an interesting social and literary trajectory between "resistance to" and "collaboration with" im perial presence. Drawing on an inter-disciplinary m ethodology and theoretical framework, this book makes a great contribution to women's and gender studies.
Sikata Banerjee Congratulations on winning the 2009 CW SA/ACEF annual book award for Resisting Manchukuo: Chinese W omen W riters and the Japanese Occupation. Can you give us a little background on how you were drawn to this particular topic?
Norman Smith Thank you, Professor Banerjee. I do thank the CW SA for this exceptional honour. I am really grateful for the recognition for Resisting Manchukuo and for this opportunity to discuss my research.
I began this project about ten years ago in a graduate sem inar on m odern Chinese history at the University of British Colum bia. I wanted to learn about Chinese

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women's experiences in the Northeast of China, or Manchuria, during the Japanese occupation in the 1930s and 1940s. The area is as large as France and Germany combined, and then had a population of about 30 million. But despite the size of the area and its population, and the length of the occupation, there were few scholarly studies on the colonial period and most of them did not discuss wom en. Even Ronald Suleski's authoritative bibliography, The Modernization of Manchuria, does not have a single entry especially pertaining to women and their experiences. As well, most works were primarily focused on Japanese- and government-issued sources, not materials produced by the vast majority of the population - the Chinese. Officials in the colonial state of Manchukuo explicitly advocated a m ulti-ethnic modernity project, and I wanted to know what gendered and Chinese dim ensions there were to it.
Som e years before, in 1992, I had participated in a Simon Fraser University field school in Changchun, which had been the capital of Manchukuo. So I returned there, determ ined to find whatever m aterials I could. I had lim ited success in that first research trip, as workers in the archives and libraries were less than thrilled with the topic of Japanese occupation and my intended women-centred focus probably compounded their distaste. W ithout their cooperation, working in those institutions proved quite fruitless. Undeterred, I turned to book stores and markets, and ultimately found two 1940s state of the field articles on the most popular women writers, providing me the nam es of the women who would eventually become the focus of the book: Dan Di, Lan Ling, Mei Niang, W u Ying, Yang Xu, Zhu Ti, and Zuo Di.
I returned to Vancouver, where an internet search of the University of Toronto library turned up a copy of Mei Niang's collected works, which had been published in 1998 - in Brampton! The editor of that volume, the author's daughter Liu Qing, then lived in Mississauga. W hen I contacted her, it turned out that Mei Niang had just gone back to Beijing after a visit to Canada. So off I went

to China, again, and eventually m et four of the surviving women. Interviewing them, and going through the incredibly difficult task of locating as m any of their writings as I could, really brought the project to life for me. That process also underlined the complex nature of their legacies, which had not only been hidden from view for decades but the materials they had produced were widely dispersed and som e materials still remain m issing.
W hen I returned to China that second time for this research, I was cheered on by the Vice-Chair of the Changchun W omen's Federation, Chang Guizhi, and librarians Liu Huijuan and Zhao Shuqin, all of whom were excited at the prospect of these local wom en's works being brought to light again. I was also treated very generously by scholars, such as Pan W u, who welcom ed m e into the field and shared precious materials and time. Many of them were surprised that this project was being taken on by a Canadian m an. But the project proved irresistible to me - as I delved further into their lives and careers, their complicated stories became ever more compelling. I must say that my Canadian background served m e well, both in term s of the welcom e I received in China and in my attem pt to understand Manchukuo's colonial context. I am not sure whether being a man was a help or a hindrance, but it certainly added a curiosity factor to the project, as m y gender influenced how some viewed the work. At times I was aware that some people felt that I was wasting m y tim e on a project of little worth. A few even asked: W hy waste valuable tim e on a study of wom en in a historical period mired in sham e in a backwater like the Northeast? W hy was I not studying the men writers who faced even more difficulties? W ould it not be more appropriate for a woman to work on this wom an question? Can a man really grasp a wom an question? That is a question I constantly grapple with. At other times I felt that being a m an added legitim acy to the project - that if a m an were studying the topic, then this woman question had to be important. My untiring search for their

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writings, for example, was not only tolerated by library staff, but I suspect on some level it was also expected. Through it all, I was convinced that I was doing something that needed to be done, so I just kept at it.
Sikata Banerjee W hen you read the works by the seven wom en authors, what were some of your favourite themes? Did you have a favourite author? If so, who and why?
Norman Smith Those early state of the field articles that I found described in broad strokes the critical nature of the writers' work, but I wondered about the extent to which they could really have written critically within and about a regim e that was infam ous for its violence; Manchukuo has even been described by the Japanese historian Yam am uro Shin'ichi as an "Auschwitz state." To engage in open criticism of the society was to invite terrible consequences yet that is precisely what the group of writers did, both individually and collectively.
The first works I read were by Mei Niang. The passionately critical tone of her stories, especially Xie (Crabs) and "Yu" (Fish), stoked my interest in the writers because I had not anticipated such forthright rejection of the patriarchy and im perialism that lay at the foundations of Manchukuo society. Xie depicts the occupation-era decline of a wealthy Chinese fam ily living in the capital of Manchukuo while "Yu" describes a wom an's rejection of the men in her life and their attempts to control her. Mei Niang is certainly the most published of the writers, and Xie was even awarded a literary prize as novel of the year for the Japanese em pire in 1944. The others were all very gifted as well. Dan Di's vivid and sometimes terrifying depictions of struggles in the ethnically diverse population provided dark social com m entary that challenged m e to think even m ore deeply about the writers' objectives and how they were able to achieve them. Of the more entertaining works, one of my favourites, Zhu Ti's short story "Da

Heilongjiang de youyu" (Melancholy of the Black Dragon River), employs a stream of consciousness technique as a wom an recounts an inter-ethnic relationship in thought provoking ways, through m etaphors of water and borders in the frontier land. Lan Ling's poetic descriptions of life in the northern and western regions of the area were equally enjoyable. And the real-life experiences of Yang Xu in the entertainm ent industry provided me with yet another entree to their tim es; she was famous for having recorded the national anthem as well as for her "wild horse character," on which she often m used and that becam e fodder for social comm entators in popular media.
The writers produced an incredibly rich variety of m aterials with different form ats, individual styles and priorities. Despite their differences, though, each of them sought to "expose reality" in her own way so I felt that a m onograph on them as a group could illuminate a common yet diverse legacy, shedding light on their particular experiences as Chinese wom en living under Japanese colonial rule. In Resisting Manchukuo, I divide discussion of their work into two main categories: first, their attacks on patriarchy and, second, their depictions of colonial society. In term s of patriarchy, I demonstrate how the writers in their work critiqued constructs of "patience and endurance," love, marriage and childbirth, and sex - each of which were key features of the "good wife, wise mother" ideal that officialdom sought to prom ote. W hile the ideal was obedient, subm issive m arried wom en, these writers vigorously criticised women's unequal relationships with m en and the patriarchal structures that influenced their developm ent. I also reveal how the writers' descriptions of Manchukuo society are dom inated by darkness, pessimism, disorder, and destitution. The literature's negativity openly challenges what officials trumpeted as the "paradise land" of Japan's imperial project, Manchukuo.
Sikata Banerjee In chapter two, there is a postcard in which

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Manchuria is depicted as a woman dancing in the arms of the Russian empire (represented by a masculine) figure. This fem inization of a colonial possession to indicate weakness, need for protection, and a lack of martial strength is quite a com m on trope in many im perial histories. Did the Japanese em pire continue this feminization of Manchuria, and if so, what is in your opinion of the dynamic between these authors and this gendered process?
Norman Smith That postcard from the early 1900s is representative of a genre of art in which Manchuria, and later the colonial state of Manchukuo, is regularly depicted either as a wom an or a child, most often with Japan as the parent or otherwise dominant male figure. This trope of local weakness and the need for protection was perpetuated in Japanese-produced m aterials and state structures; the emperor of Manchukuo, better known as the last Qing dynasty em peror Pu Yi, was even accorded a subordinate position within the Japanese im perial family, thus publicly form alising that hierarchy at the highest level of society. Louise Young has written of Japanese enthusiasm for their state's im perial project in Manchuria. Many Japanese believed that it was only right for their m ilitary to be in Manchuria after the great expense in term s of life and resources borne by Japan in regional wars in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As that line of thinking went, the Japanese em pire had a responsibility to liberate and protect m ilitarily weaker neighbouring societies from the grip of European and Am erican dominance; to secure "Asia for the Asians." W hile in theory that may have sounded positive, in reality the Manchukuo regim e was dominated by a harsh military presence, ostensibly to protect the region's vast resources and "virgin" lands against the inroads of militarists, communists, fascists, and bandits - the very narratives that you point to in other im perial histories. Japanese im perialists learnt from their rivals in short order and didn't waste any tim e in engaging

with the same tropes and grand narratives. But, at the same time, that feminization could also sym bolize strengths that might be attained through ideal wom anhood; Japanese women, for example, were encouraged to become "continental brides" or "continental m others" to provide sustenance to the colonizing mission through their "patience and endurance."
The writers' lives and careers also attest to the complicated dynam ic between the colonized and the colonizers. They were all at least partly educated in Manchukuo and therefore experienced from within, at quite a young age, Japan's colonial project. Two of them, Mei Niang and Dan Di, even pursued advanced studies in Japan. Both of them returned to the mainland emboldened by their experiences and determined to continue their careers, all the while beholden to Japanese bosses, censors, and critics who could end their careers at any tim e. In Manchukuo, they all forged public, extra-dom estic careers that enabled them to criticise contem porary society while Japanese intellectuals and officials either supported their work, ignored it, or dismissed it as "women's writings." In fact, Zhu Ti and her husband Li Zhengzhong later argued that official m isogyny enabled the women to forge their careers precisely because officialdom did not recognise their value. Regardless of how they were viewed by the Japanese colonial regim e, though, the post-liberation Chinese communist regime viewed men and women writers as relatively equal, and subsequently m ost of them suffered decades of persecution for their colonial-era careers, regardless of the critical tone of their writings. Although the writers believed that they had done nothing wrong, or at least nothing worse than the other 30 million people living in Manchukuo, their war-tim e association with the Japanese was taken as proof of 'traitorous' behaviour and they and their families suffered enormously.
Sikata Banerjee The Japanese Manchukuo regim e embraced and advocated a conventionally domesticated wom an as the anchor of society. These seven

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authors challenged this feminine image. Yet, they were more or less lauded. How can this be reconciled? W ere there any socio-econom ic changes in female educational and labour force participation that led to this type of backlash?
Norman Smith As in other societies of the time, especially Manchukuo's allies, Japan, Germ any, and Vichy France, but also its enem ies, such as the Republic of China, wom en were expected to marry, bear children, and manage the dom estic sphere. In fact, Manchukuo was idealised by its supporters as a place where "m en will have their rights and the wom en their home." Yet wom en were also expected to fulfil more "modern" roles of working outside of the home when necessary for the state or the m en in their lives. Prasenjit Duara has labelled this a form of "tradition-within-m odernity." The Manchukuo regim e did indeed prom ote the ideal of the "good wife, wise mother," but such a person was expected to be self-sacrificing and willing to engage in extra-dom estic responsibilities, especially as the war escalated. W om en were encouraged to attend schools, which taught literacy and vocational skills, while a few institutions, especially the ones attended by these women, allowed for more scholarly pursuits. These writers employed their colonial educations to pursue high-profile careers yet for all their accomplishments officialdom appeared to have simply dismissed them as wom en whose significance rarely extended beyond the bounds of the "woman question" and who were therefore seen to be of little consequence to the military regim e. The wom en worked as writers, editors, and teachers. All becam e wives and m others despite their critiques of m arriage, and on their own term s. The critical stances that dominate their writings inform ed and reflected the ways in which they lived their lives and perceived them selves as Chinese wom en in, and subjects of, a Japanese colonial regim e.
W hile discussing Manchukuo with the survivors, a word that constantly arose was

fuza - complicated. Manchukuo was a multi-ethnic colonial state driven by a "modernity" project that was riven with contradictions. In term s of cultural production, there were intellectuals and officials who supported the writers, while others viewed them and their work as irrelevant or of only lim ited value, to other wom en perhaps. So while cultural functionaries sought to quell criticism of the state, Chinese m en writers who engaged in such critiques were threatened, jailed, driven to exile, or killed. Yet these wom en writers were for the most part only targeted for persecution in the last year of colonial rule. Their treatm ent allowed for the creation of a vibrant yet long-forgotten Chinese anti-patriarchal, anti-colonial literature form ed within the Japanese colonial context.
For me, this project has been deeply rewarding because of the unexpected paths it took m e on, the people I met, and the fact that it reinforced for m e the im portance of women-centred research even as the discipline of W om en's Studies faces increasing challenges in these times. I really am grateful to the CW SA for confirming in this public way that the project was im portant, after all.
Sikata Banerjee Thank you for your com pelling and persuasive responses. One last question. W hat are some topics you are exploring for future research? W ill they build on this work and/or explore other historical themes from a gendered perspective?
Norman Smith My current research builds upon Resisting Manchukuo by examining shifting notions of alcohol and opiate use in early twentieth century Northeast China. As in other times and places, drug consumption and prohibition were linked with constructs of gender (especially ideals of wom anhood) and modernity. My new project focuses on advertising, medical reportage, and other form s of media to analyse, for example, linkages between consum ption and m odern

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wom en's professions, such as work in the opium industry. I also exam ine rehabilitation treatments, which reflected contemporary gender ideals and more general notions of healthful modern living, but which have subsequently been dismissed as inconsequential. To date, drug history in China has centred prim arily on opiates, especially in term s of im perialist politics and economics. My work follows on Zheng Yangwen's m ore social-oriented work on opiates and their wider existences. I also focus on alcohol, a subject that has only recently begun to spur interest in China. My work will contribute to that field through explicitly women-centred and gendered analyses. W hether in advertisements promoting alcohol consum ption or medicines com bating its poisons, or in accounts of the latest rehabilitation treatm ents, constructs of "man" and "woman" contributed to how individuals viewed themselves, their health, and the state of local society and the nation. I look forward to contributing in this new way to understandings of the Northeast's history a subject that promises to get even more com plicated yet clearer with sustained focus on the "wom an question" and gender ideals.

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