The 14th annual conference of the European Association of Taiwan Studies (EATS), titled ‘Translating Taiwan: 1947-1987-2017’ was held in Venice, Italy from 2-4 March 2017.
EATS, funded by the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation, was established in 2004 by the Centre of Taiwan Studies at SOAS. Since then, the EATS annual conference has been held in cities across Europe and has enjoyed strong support from Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) offices in each country. This year’s conference featured academics from institutions across the world, including 11 British universities, demonstrating the rapid growth of the association.
Focusing on what scholars term ‘translation dynamics’, the conference in Venice broke two records in terms of the number of participants, and the number of abstracts submitted. Using a broad definition of translation to examine ‘transformations and adaptations’ in Taiwan, the conference invited papers that addressed the theme of Translating Taiwan from all disciplines, including Taiwan’s social, political, and cultural landscape.
This year’s conference was considered to be of special significance since it marked the 30th anniversary of the end of martial law and the 70th anniversary of the ‘February 28 Incident’.
