Carlos Rojas (sinologist)

Carlos Rojas (born 1970 in Atlanta, Georgia)^[1] is an American sinologist and translator. He is currently Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at Duke University's Trinity College of Arts & Sciences. He is a cultural historian and his work and teachings primarily focus on Chinese culture. He also teaches the subjects of film, gender, sexuality, and feminist studies. He received a B.A. from Cornell University in 1995 and a Ph.D. from Columbia University in 2000.^[2] Before his professorship at Duke, Rojas was Assistant Professor of Modern Chinese Literature and Film at the University of Florida.^[3] Rojas lives in Durham, North Carolina.^[1]

Career

Carlos Rojas and Eileen Cheng-yin Chow translated Yu Hua's novel Brothers. Their translation was shortlisted for the 2008 Man Asian Literary Prize.^[4] Rojas has also translated several books by Chinese novelist and short story writer Yan Lianke.^[5][6][7] His translation of Yan Lianke's The Four Books was shortlisted for the 2016 Man Booker International Prize.^[8] Isabel Hilton of The Observer called it "impeccably" translated.^[9] His translation of Yan Lianke's The Explosion Chronicles was longlisted for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize,^[10] the 2017 Pen Translation Prize,^[11] and the 2017 National Translation Award in Prose.^[12] The Economist praised Rojas' "robust and well-paced translation".^[13] The Guardian called his translation a "model of clarity".^[14]

Rojas served on the jury of the 2015 Newman Prize for Chinese Literature and the 2020 Dream of the Red Chamber Award.

In 2010, Rojas published The Great Wall: A Cultural History through Harvard University Press. The book is a survey of the Great Wall of China and its function and significance. In it, Rojas examines allusions to the Wall from various historical texts and cultural works.^[15][16]

Selected bibliography

Books

• Rojas, Carlos (2008). The Naked Gaze: Reflections on Chinese Modernity. Harvard University Asia Center.
• Rojas, Carlos (2010). The Great Wall: A Cultural History. Harvard University Press.^[17][18]
• Rojas, Carlos (2015). Homesickness: Culture, Contagion, and National Transformation in Modern China. Harvard University Press.^[19][20][21]

Translations

• Yu, Hua (2009). Brothers: A Novel. Translated by Rojas, Carlos; Chow, Eileen Cheng-Yin. Pantheon Books.
• Yan, Lianke (2012). Lenin's Kisses: A Novel. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.
• Yan, Lianke (2015). The Four Books: A Novel. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.
• Yan, Lianke (2015). Marrow: A Novella. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Penguin/Random House.
• Yan, Lianke (2016). The Explosion Chronicles: A Novel. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove Atlantic Press.
• Ng, Kim Chew (2016). Slow Boat to China and Other Stories. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Columbia University Press.
• Jia, Pingwa (2017). The Lantern Bearer: A Novel. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. CN Times Books.
• Yan, Lianke (2017). The Years, Months, Days: A Novella. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. The Text Publishing Company.
• Yan, Lianke (2017). The Years, Months, Days: Two Novellas. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.
• Yan, Lianke (2018). The Day the Sun Died. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.
• Yan, Lianke (2020). Three Brothers: Memories of My Family. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.
• Yan, Lianke (2020). Hard Like Water. Translated by Rojas, Carlos. Grove/Atlantic Press.

As editor

• Wang, David Der-wei; Rojas, Carlos, eds. (2007). Writing Taiwan: A New Literary History. Duke University Press.
• Rojas, Carlos; Chow, Eileen Cheng-yin, eds. (2009). Rethinking Chinese Popular Culture: Cannibalizations of the Canon. Routledge.
• Rojas, Carlos; Chow, Eileen Cheng-yin, eds. (2013). The Oxford Handbook of Chinese Cinemas. Oxford University Press.
• Rojas, Carlos; Bachner, Andrea, eds. (2016). The Oxford Handbook of Modern Chinese Literatures. Oxford University Press.
• Rojas, Carlos; Litzinger, Ralph A., eds. (2016). Ghost Protocol Development and Displacement in Global China. Duke University Press.
• Chen, Jianhua (2018). Rojas, Carlos (ed.). Revolution and Form: The Development of Modernity in Mao Dun's Early Fiction, 1927–1930. Brill.
• Rojas, Carlos; Sung, Meihwa, eds. (2020). Imagining Communities: Reading Contemporary China Against the Grain. Routledge.

Academic articles

• Rojas, Carlos (October 2016). "Language, ethnicity, and the politics of literary taxonomy: Ng Kim Chew and Mahua literature". Publications of the Modern Language Association of America. 131 (5): 1316–1327. doi:10.1632/pmla.2016.131.5.1316. S2CID 151523919.
• Rojas, Carlos (March 2018). "A World Republic of Southern [Sinophone] Letters". Modern Chinese Literature and Culture. 30 (1): 42–62.