On Oct. 3, he presented a paper titled “Supporting Refusal: Relational Infrastructures and Feminist Performance Ecologies in Chinese Women’s Stand-Up Comedy” at Bowdoin College’s symposium “Matters That Matter: Material Agency and Ecological Entanglements from China and Beyond.”
Focusing on comedian Tang Xiangyu, Wang explored how professional solidarity, female alliances, and audience support help sustain feminist resistance in the face of public backlash. He also examined how these networks of support operate differently across online and live performance settings.
On Oct. 16, Wang delivered an invited lecture titled “The Pulled Punch and the Sheathed Blade: Her Story (2024) as a Feminist Stand-up Film” as part of the University of Virginia’s East Asia Center fall speaker series.
Wang analyzed how the Chinese blockbuster draws on the humor and politics of women’s stand-up comedy to challenge gender norms while navigating censorship and anti-feminist backlash. He also explored how the film embeds critiques of broader social and political issues within a story of women’s solidarity, care, and resilience. During his visit, Wang also gave a guest lecture on the film The Wedding Banquet to faculty and students in UVA’s Department of East Asian Languages, Literatures and Cultures.
Posted November 2, 2026
