From Antiquity to Modernity Asia in the Mirror

This book aims to offer preliminary answers to the question of Asia’s (self-)representation. It is divided in three parts: “Asia and Itself”, “Asia and the Other,” and “Asia as the Other.” Its 19 chapters explore a number of Asian and European languages and cultures, focusing on both the past and the present. “Asia in the Mirror offers a bold and necessary reframing of Asian studies by situating the continent not as a singular object of knowledge but as a site of intersecting gazes, representations, and epistemic dislocations. Drawing on postcolonial critique, comparative philology, and cultural theory, the volume triangulates self-perception, otherness, and Western reception to interrogate how Asia has been imagined, translated, and contested. In doing so, it provincializes Eurocentric methodologies, foregrounds plural and situated knowledges, and reorients the study of Asia as a dialogic, reflexive, and critically entangled enterprise.” —Deven M. Patel, University of Pennsylvania As Asia’s role in world politics becomes increasingly central, a deeper understanding of the cultural underpinnings of its global entanglements is urgent and overdue. What defines Asia from a cultural perspective? How has Asia represented itself and its diversity to both Asian audiences and different cultures? How has Asia represented other cultures and how, in turn, how has it been presented by them? How have contacts between Asia and other cultures shaped the continent? What is the role of postcolonial and decolonial approaches in enhancing our understanding of Asia and its relationships to other parts of the world in the past and in the present? Asia in the Mirror tries to address these questions through a multidisciplinary approach, bringing together scholars in literary studies, philology, and media studies working across multiple languages and cultures.