A PhD candidate at LUCAS, my research project is about late 19th century to early 20 century's western travel writing about China as well as the photographic rendition of these travels. I am specifically interested in the interaction between texts and photographs in the travel accounts published in this period. The advent of photography in the mid-19th century greatly changes the landscape of the genre of travel writing, and more and more travel works started to include photographs as illustrations. The idea of modern travel has since been bound with camera. But what substantial effect does this newly emerged phenomenon bring to travel writings? To what extent the texts now need to negotiate with the photos on the next page, and vice versa? How do representations of the subject matters get transformed accordingly? Embedded in the context of travel writings of China during this period, my research resolves to provide an answer to these questions.

More information about Boyao Zhang

Fields of interest

• Travel writing
• History of Photography
• Cultural Studies
• Visual Studies
• Post-colonial theories

Research

A PhD candidate at LUCAS, my research project is about late 19th century to early 20 century's western travel writing about China as well as the photographic rendition of these travels. I am specifically interested in the interaction between texts and photographs in the travel accounts published in this period. The advent of photography in the mid-19th century greatly changes the landscape of the genre of travel writing, and more and more travel works started to include photographs as illustrations. The idea of modern travel has since been bound with camera. But what substantial effect does this newly emerged phenomenon bring to travel writings? To what extent the texts now need to negotiate with the photos on the next page, and vice versa? How do representations of the subject matters get transformed accordingly? Embedded in the context of travel writings of China during this period, my research resolves to provide an answer to these questions.