Sociotechnical imaginaries of future war in Chinese science fiction

Research on the Transformation of Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction

In what ways can science fiction (de)stabilise dominant sociotechnical imaginaries of future war? While existing Critical Security Studies scholarship has examined the relationship between science fiction and world politics, this collection of interventions extends these insights by building on the growing conceptual interest in the study of sociotechnical imaginaries. We make two significant contributions to Critical Security Studies scholarship. First, we provide a novel conceptually informed account of how science fiction stories can inform the background understandings of (un)desirable visions of future war held by different audiences. Second, we help expand the empirical remit of sociotechnical imaginaries scholarship beyond its current focus on elite policy discourses by developing the study of science fiction as a key site of everyday sense-making and political contestation. As the introduction to this collection, this intervention contextualises existing understandings of the relationship between science fiction, sociotechnical imaginaries and future war. It also summarises the arguments developed in each of the four other interventions and identifies several areas for future research.

The twenty-first century has witnessed the rise of female science fiction (SF) writers in China. This development marks a significant transformation in the history of Chinese SF. However, very few studies of these works exist. This chapter examines some of the works of Chinese female SF writers side by side with those of male SF writers to lay out the contributions they make to the Chinese SF field and the challenges they face.

New Worlds has had a huge impact on Western science fiction literature and propelled the development of British "New Wave" science fiction novels. Editor in chief Michael Moorcock dedicated to developing new literary styles and cultivating a large number of excellent science fiction writers. Before the 1990s, Chinese science fiction novels had always been a supplement to popular science and children's literature. It was Science Fiction World that cultivated a "new generation" of science fiction writers for Chinese science fiction literature and brought a vigorous development momentum to the Chinese science fiction industry. Although Chinese science fiction in the 21st century is generally showing a steady development trend, it has not yet entered the "golden age" of Chinese science fiction. The experience gained from the development of New Worlds and Science Fiction World provides valuable reference for the development of science fiction magazines in China today.

This article analyzes how recent Chinese science fiction (SF) highlights the pervasive influence of emerging technologies in redefining care ethics within the envisioning of future human societies. It focuses on three SF texts by emerging women authors: Regina Kanyu Wang's “The Language Sheath” (2020), Congyun “Mu Ming” Gu's “Color the World” (2021), and Haihong Zhao's “Baby, I Love You” (2022). My analysis begins with a discussion of care ethics theory and its natural synergy with the speculative nature of SF. It then unpacks how these stories interrogate the increasing role of technology in shaping familial, social, and cultural dilemmas related to care ethics, particularly how empathy-oriented care ethics intersects with the campaign of empathetic technology and the persuasive effects of SF. My examination suggests that recent stories by contemporary Chinese women SF writers push us to reevaluate our concepts of the body, empathy, and care in the face of a future where the lines between these fictional tales and our reality become increasingly blurred. It offers a timely analysis of whether emerging technologies provide optimistic strategies or false promises for invoking care ethics and awakening our innate sense of connectedness.

Chinese science fiction, a subset of the fastest-growing global science fiction, has been largely overlooked by mainstream literature in China. Despite facing socio-political and economic turmoil, it has slowly made a mark in contemporary literature. As society changes, science and technology advance, and the shadow of history remains, new generations of Chinese science fiction writers have successfully triggered its development. Currently, the number of Chinese sci-fi writings has increased rapidly, and some great paradigms are even included in textbooks. However, the emergence of globalization has played a significant role in popularizing Chinese science fiction overseas. Science fiction films and television works that focus on Chinese themes and show Chinese imagination and culture are increasingly recognized, injecting new ideas into China's science fiction industry. Chinese science fiction has always had a transnational nature due to the global presence of overseas Chinese literati and the growing country's stature. A lot has been talked and researched on the development of Chinese science fiction within China, however little has been talked regarding the genre’s potential to become a global phenomenon. Through this paper the researcher has tried to examine the inherent potential of Chinese science fiction as transnational cultural tool for becoming a key contributor to global science fiction.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is one of the core themes of current Chinese science fiction (SF). Its emergence can be traced back to the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods (770–221 bce). Chinese AI-related SF of the twentieth century can be divided into three stages: Stage I—AI-peripheral fiction, Stage II—quasi-AI fiction, and Stage III—AI fiction. In the Mao era (1949–1976), Stage I stories were the most common, with Stage II just beginning to emerge. Stage II fiction then dominated the period between the end of the Cultural Revolution and the early Deng Xiaoping era (1977–1982), when Stage III novels started to appear in largish numbers. There is no strong link between SF and the development of AI technology in China in the twentieth century. Throughout this period, AI novels aimed at children serve a didactic purpose, and they adopt a humorous attitude towards the future development of mechanical intelligence.

This article analyzes the relationship between scientific technology and literary imagination in Chinese Science Fictions and attempts to understand the social significance of these novels at the time. This Science Fictions reflects the science and social reality of China and shows the world of literary imagination. China's Science Fictions reflect the “Chinese dream” of realizing a space project for the moon and space by developing new science and technology amid the growth of politics and economy of the time. Not only can the prototype of Chinese Science Fiction be found in ancient myths and legends, but it was also developed by intellectuals who wanted to discover the future of modern 'New China'. In the early 20th century, Science Fictions also developed as modern writers such as Liang Qichao, Lu Xun, and La She promoted new literary enlightenment projects. In addition, Western science fiction works such as Mary W. Shelly, Jules Verne, and Herbert George Wells were translated and accepted in China, which had a great influence on the development of Science Fictions in China. To understand the development and meaning of Science Fictions of the time in China, this article analyzed the representative works of Liu Cixin, Hao Jingfang, and Wang Weilian. Chinese Science Fictions created literary works by exerting scientific imagination on dark social problems caused by urbanization and capitalization. In addition, it is looking for prospects and alternatives for the future society, reflecting the crises of mankind and the Earth. Thus, human life through scientific knowledge and imagination is reconstructed into literary imagination.

Situated at the intersection of science fiction (SF) studies and Chinese studies, and more broadly of genre studies and area studies, this essay takes the work of contemporary Chinese SF writer Hao Jingfang as a starting point to address what the article's author considers a palpable disconnect in the contemporary reception and study of SF from the People's Republic of China (PRC). This disconnect, which has roots in the positionality of Chinese studies experts vis-à-vis the academic institutions and the field of studies in which they operate, has come to limit and regiment most discourses around the cultural phenomenon of “Chinese SF,” crystallized as it has become into fixed forms of descriptive praise and occasional critique that do not really attend to the political affordances of this genre. Ultimately, the goal of this intervention is to hold both “Chinese SF” and its scholarship up to the standards of literary representation to which they themselves so often appeal. If it is true that “China's reality is more science-fictional than SF” and that “SF is a type of critical realism,” then what must be thoroughly investigated is the linkage between this genre and the reality it lays claims on.

The article examines a set of scientific projects referred to the study of the prehistoric period of the Earth and the resurrection of extinct animal species using the characteristics of a global scientific project developed by I.T. Kasavin. The author reveals the unobvious connections between scientific and extra-scientific factors (such as media, utopianism, the influence of cultural paradigms, etc.), in particular, the influence of such scientific and cultural trends as posthumanism and global evolutionism was shown. The paradoxical nature of this set of projects is reflected by prospects and advantages associated with its implementation, what can be explained by the significant ideological and psychological component in its composition. The author considers the Pleistocene park in Yakutia awaiting its settlement by “resurrected” mammoths, as a Russian example of a global scientific project belonging to this direction. In addition to the identified by I.T. Kasavin characteristics the author proposes such a property of the global scientific and engineering project as the scientific and sociotechnical imaginary. The author briefly discusses a concept of the sociotechnical imaginaries in the context of the works by Sh. Jasanoff. As well the author consideres the scientific imagination (the concept of which is still based on Jasanoff’s ideas) and its role in science diplomacy using the work of S. Robinson. Finally the article concludes about the problematic points of using the concept of imaginaries in the study of science and technology (vagueness, inconsistency, lack of elaboration, if any possible) and makes a comparison of this concept with the idea of a global scientific project.

KEYNOTEYuqin Jiang is Professor of Comparative Literature, at the School of Humanities, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen. Her research interests span cyborg narrative, sci-fi poetics, digital humanities, science fiction, postcolonial literature, and cultural theories. She is currently leading a National Social Science Fund project titled "Cyborg Narrative and the Construction of 21st-Century Science Fiction Poetics". She has recently edited significant works: The New Integration of Science and Technology with Humanities: Research on Science Fiction in the Perspective of New Liberal Arts (Nanjing University Press, 2024) and Interviews with Contemporary Chinese Science Fiction Writes (Nanjing University Press, 2023).Additionally, she has published over 50 essays in both domestic and international journals, exploring topics such as cyborg theory, postcolonial ecocriticism, science fiction studies, cultural criticism, and English literature, establishing herself as a leading voice in the field of science fiction and comparative literature. ABSTRACT Contemporary Chinese cyborg narratives highlight the characteristics of Chinese science fiction. This is manifested in three specific ways: first, the high-tech anti-hero narrative, which expresses the concerns of Chinese science fiction writers about the conflict between humans and machines and their worries about the future society of artificial intelligence; second, the exploration of the cyborg image in ancient Chinese thinking and concepts, using dreams to connect the relationship between humans and machines and to ponder the nature of humanity; and third, to use the cyborg as a cultural practice and social adjustment for human alienation, and to place it in the context of Chinese history and culture to rethink the relationship between past and present, tradition and modernity, and human and non-human, and to attempt to achieve a new balance in the relationship between humans and machines and a stable future.

This intervention examines how science fiction can be mobilised to legitimise the development of human enhancement (HE) and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies in contemporary military discourses. Combining Jasanoff’s concept of sociotechnical imaginaries with Foucault’s notion of the archive, it analyses the shift from Terminator to Iron Man imaginaries in NATO debates on future war. While Terminator figures symbolise autonomous, dehumanised violence, Iron Man articulates a human-centred vision of future war in which technology enhances the soldier. This shift marks a rupture, not a rearticulation of power, as human agency is sustained through privately owned epistemic infrastructures. By conceptualising Iron Man’s use of the AI-enabled J.A.R.V.I.S. system as an archive, I reveal how human enhancement normalises new forms of militarised governance operating through algorithms, optimisation, and control.

After The Three-Body Problem written by Chinese science fiction author Liu Cixin was awarded Hugo Award in 2015, Chinese Science Fiction has become a global phenomenon. However, previous studies often focus on the translation text instead of the social and political context behind the international success of the genre and the role the translator Ken Liu played in the process. Not to mention to bring about the obvious fact that both the author and the translator tend not to discuss political issues in public. Therefore, this thesis aims to explore the important role Ken Liu played in the introduction and translation of Chinese Science Fiction to the Anglophone readership, and highlight the narrative differences between the author and the translator and the mainstream receptions through reviewing the hundred-year development of science fiction in China and the analysis of multiple paratexts and the translation of The Three-Body Problem. Finally, with the detailed analysis of the translation strategies in The Three-Body Problem, this thesis also explores how the translator successfully introduced this classical Chinese Science Fiction novel to the world, and strengthen the identity and status of the translator at the same time. It is expected that this thesis can shed a new light on the identity of translator in translation studies and provide some useful suggestions on the English translation of science fiction written in Chinese.

Wandering Earth, released in 2019, is regarded as a phenomenal film that opens the door to Chinese science fiction movies. The Chinese story in the film has aroused the resonance of domestic audiences, but failed to get high marks on foreign film review websites. In contrast, in recent years, science fiction films in European and American countries are still loved by audiences at home and abroad, such as The Martian and Interstellar, which have both commercial and artistic values. It can be seen that the cultural communication of western science fiction movies is more successful than that of China. Taking the above three works as examples, this paper analyzes the doomsday plot, the beauty of returning home and the role shaping of scientific women in science fiction movies from the perspective of the organic combination of “hard-core elements of science fiction” and “soft value in humanity”, in an attempt to help the foreign cultural communication of domestic science fiction movies. As an attempt to facilitate the global development of Chinese science fiction, this paper concludes that certain Chinese traditional cultural spirit needs further spreading, that Chinese science fiction and humanity should be combined in a more natural way, and that in particular, female character need in depth and multi-dimensional interpretation.

Reviewed by: Found in Translation: "New People" in Twentieth-Century Chinese Science Fictionby Jing Jiang Hua Li Translingual and Transcultural Ties between Western and Chinese SF. Jing Jiang. Found in Translation: "New People" in Twentieth-Century Chinese Science Fiction. Association for Asian Studies, 2021. 144 pp. $16 pbk. Jing Jiang's Found in Translationis a concise but comprehensive exploration of the translingual and transcultural ties between Western and Chinese sf from the late nineteenth century through the end of the twentieth century. The book focuses on the motif of the so-called "new people" with whom Chinese sf writers were often preoccupied over the past century. Through close readings of both original Western works and their Chinese counterparts focused on the idea of creating new people, the author reveals [End Page 175]how this motif has undergone various metamorphoses throughout the history of Chinese sf. This book is a fine complement to existing scholarship. Recent years have witnessed the publication of several English-language scholarly monographs on Chinese sf, such as Nathaniel Isaacson's Celestial Empire: The Emergence of Chinese Science Fiction(2017), Lorenzo Andolfatto's Hundred Days' Literature: Chinese Utopian Fiction at the End of Empire, 1902–1910(2019), Hua Li's Chinese Science Fiction during the Post-Mao Cultural Thaw(2021), and Will Peyton's Chinese and Western Literary Influence in Liu Cixin's Three Body Trilogy(2021). These monographs are either author-based studies or focus on one specific historical period. Jiang's book employs the idea of "new people" as a thread to draw different historical periods together and reveal how Chinese sf has assimilated various features of Western sf while still evolving into a relatively indigenous literary genre in China. By means of the overarching concept of "new people," the book embarks upon in-depth exploration of some important issues such as realism and posthumanism in Chinese science fiction. It situates Chinese sf "within a dynamic model of world literature," exploring the interwoven connections between Chinese sf, translation, and the nation-state (2). It traces how various Western sf works have crossed linguistic and national barriers to reach China, and how various generations of Chinese sf writers have assimilated, transformed, and expanded various Western sf motifs in their own works. Found in Translationdemonstrates the important role that sf has played during the past century in building a modern China. It shows how the elitist aspects of Chinese sf were emphasized at the expense of the genre's connections to popular culture. The book is chronologically structured and topically organized. It contains an introduction, four chapters, and an epilogue. Chapter One, "Medicine for the Mind, Panacea for the Nation," situates the emergence of Chinese sf within the context of intellectual discourse about China's modernization from the mid-nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century. This chapter illustrates how prominent Chinese intellectuals such as Liang Qichao and Lu Xun stressed the instrumental potential of science fiction in disseminating knowledge about modern science and democracy in China, thereby promoting sf as a subgenre of modern-day fiction. Following earlier research by Patrick Hanan, this chapter also examines the pioneering work done by the Anglican missionary John Fryer (1839-1928) in the late Qing period. Fryer not only promoted modern science and underscored the importance of modern fiction, but he also viewed the synergy of modern fiction and science as a panacea for rooting out late imperial China's "three evils"—opium addiction, formulaic civil service exam essays, and foot-binding. Fryer's writings exerted much influence over prominent Chinese intellectuals such as Yan Fu, Liang Qichao, and Lu Xun, who embraced Western science "as a new, enlightened way of understanding the world characteristic of the modern age" (17). Chapter Two, "Scientifically Formed or Reformed," focuses on early Chinese sf writers' fascination with creating artificial humans in a laboratory; [End Page 176]this literary theme "gave rise to a literary vision" of "the malleability or programmability of the soul" (40). This chapter traces the transnational journey of the American novelist Louise J. Strong's sf story, "An Unscientific Story" (1903), through multilingual translations. The original story's skeptical and critical views about creating...