Yuefan (Ivy) Wang

My current book project, titled “Constructing Gardens on Paper: Gender, Identities, and Place-making in Late Imperial China,” is a revision and expansion of my doctoral dissertation. This study examines the newfound popularity of garden literature by both men and women in relation to the practice of place-making from the 1600s to the 1900s. It explores how writing about gardens enabled authors from different social classes to produce poetic spaces for mediating their subject construction and gender relations and for shaping cultural and social narratives. The study aims to show that late imperial gardens were the results of collaborative efforts of various roles. That collaboration not only blurred the boundaries between different roles but also led to the emergence of new social identities. Garden literature also offers female authors an immediate and powerful poetic subject to engage in collaboration, communication, and competition with contemporary literati. Situated at the intersections of literature, gender studies, and eco-cultural relations, my project reveals how built constructions and wild nature are combined, stored, and manipulated in texts.