Two-Way Mirrors: Cross-Cultural Studies in Globalization

In Two-Way Mirrors, Chen Eugene Eoyang engages in cross-cultural study, shedding light not only on the object of study but also on the subject conducting the study. The book's leading metaphor is that of the shop window, which is at once transparent (allowing a view of the merchandise on display) and reflective (offering an image of the prospective shopper). Eoyang shows the different and oppositional premises in Eastern and Western poetics juxtaposed not as contradictory but as complementary, allowing for a mutual illumination of values. He confronts the question of globalization and postmodernism bidirectionally, from an Asian as well as a Western perspective. Eoyang concludes by speculating on the continuing development of comparative literature, a discipline particularly well suited to new modes of discourse both reflective and reflexive, as illuminating as a two-way mirror.

Table of Contents:
Part 1 Polar Paradigms Chapter 2 Thinking Comparatively: Orienting the West and Occidenting the East Chapter 3 Canon Fodder: The Challenge of Non-Western Literatures Chapter 4 Agon vs. Ritual: East-West Perspectives Chapter 5 The Ethics and Aesthetics of Literature: A Comparative Perspective Part 6 Post-modern Perspectives Chapter 7 Being Familiar and Being Strange: The Subjective Experience of Globalization Chapter 8 Post-Modernism and Traditional East Asian Literature Chapter 9 The Modern and the Postmodern: A Cross-cultural Perspective Chapter 10 The Advent of the Traditional Future: Global Imaginaries Chapter 11 "History," "Herstory," "Theirstory," "Ourstory": Gender, Genre, and Cultural Bias in Accounts of East Asian Literature Part 12 The Globalization/Glocalization of Knowledge Chapter 13 The Globalization of Knowledge: Comparative Literature as Interdisciplinary and Multilingual Discourse Chapter 14 The Glocalization of Knowledge: Tianya-The Ends of the Earth or the Edge of Heaven

About the Author :
Eugene Eoyang is professor emeritus of comparative literature and of East Asian languages and cultures at Indiana University, Bloomington and professor emeritus of humanities at Lingnan University in Hong Kong.

Review :
Two-Way Mirrors is by an eminent cross-cultural comparativist at the top of his game. The book reveals a breadth of vision and depth of knowledge that can be obtained only through a lifetime of reading and reflection on widely different literary traditions and cultures. In twelve lucid and detailed chapters, Professor Eoyang explores the complex and multi-subjective awareness gained from looking at cultures through two-way mirrors: one sees oneself partly reflected as one sees what is on the other side; at the same time, one is seen in the same manner by the subject on that other side. The term 'Glocalization of Knowledge' in the book's subtitle combines 'global' and 'local' into a neologism which describes how the 'glocal'?which is usually displaced to the periphery but a periphery that Eoyang, adapting a Chinese text, praises as 'the edge of heaven'?can lead us to new questions and perspectives and thus to new insights about ourselves and the world.. Two-Way Mirrors is by an eminent cross-cultural comparativist at the top of his game. The book reveals a breadth of vision and depth of knowledge that can be obtained only through a lifetime of reading and reflection on widely different literary traditions and cultures. In twelve lucid and detailed chapters, Professor Eoyang explores the complex and multi-subjective awareness gained from looking at cultures through two-way mirrors: one sees oneself partly reflected as one sees what is on the other side; at the same time, one is seen in the same manner by the subject on that other side. The term 'Glocalization of Knowledge' in the book's subtitle combines 'global' and 'local' into a neologism which describes how the 'glocal'-which is usually displaced to the periphery but a periphery that Eoyang, adapting a Chinese text, praises as 'the edge of heaven'-can lead us to new questions and perspectives and thus to new insights about ourselves and the world.