Spring 2001
Accidental tourist puts down academic roots at U
Photo by Diana Watters
JOSEPH ALLEN
Education
Ph.D., Chinese literature, U of Washington, Seattle
Professional history
1999 chair, Asian Languages and Literatures; professor of Chinese literature, U of M
1982-1999 Washington U, Chinese language & lit
1991-1995 Dir., East Asian studies, Washington U
Selected honors & awards
Senior Scholar Fulbright Research Fellowship, Taiwan
Harvard , Mellon Faculty Fellowship in the Humanities
Works in progress
A full-length, illustrated study of the cityscape of Taipei; translations of Lo Ch'ing's shorter poems and two novellas--Springtime at United Pork and Old Taipei.
Points of pride
Helping to organize an effort called R.B.I. -- Return Baseball to the Inner City -- which brought youth baseball to the kids of his inner city St. Louis neighborhood.
Editing, with additional translations, The Book of Songs, the ancient Chinese classic originally translated by Arthur Waley. "I didn't provide a different translation. That would be like inventing a new translation of the King James Bible."
The first thing Joseph Allen moved into his Folwell Hall office was the framed, original Chinese calligraphy that now takes up most of one wall. Selected and painted by Allen's friend and collaborator Lo Ch'ing, the poem is one of hundreds in the ancient Chinese classic The Book of Songs.
Coincidentally, and unknown to Lo Ch'ing at the time he painted it, it is also the poem Allen read to his wife at their 1972 wedding.
Such coincidences seem to surface often in Allen's career, which has grown out of a series of chance encounters and improvisations.
Allen's fall 1999 journey to Minnesota to chair the College of Liberal Arts' (CLA) new Department of Asian Languages and Literatures began some years ago as a detour: An education major at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Allen "wandered" into a Chinese literature course because he needed to fill an open slot on his schedule.
What he found, he says, was something "very fascinating, very different from anything I'd ever done before."
Taking the lead
Indeed, the subject was so fascinating that after the professor who had taught the class moved to the University of Washington, Allen later followed him, traveling cross-country in a 1967 Volkswagen with $250 and a decidedly vague understanding of what he was getting into. Years later, finishing his doctorate in Chinese literature, Allen landed what he calls a "fabulous" job at Washington University in St. Louis, where he eventually became director of East Asian Studies.
Even his move to Minnesota had the feel of serendipity. Allen learned of the U's search for a chair of its new Department of Asian Languages and Literature in 1998, just before leaving for Taipei to undertake a months-long research project on the city's design and architecture. Intrigued, but "totally consumed" with his research, he sent his curriculum vita to Minnesota almost as an afterthought.
With the job offer from Minnesota came "a slow process of thinking about a huge change," says Allen. He had done administrative work and wanted a chance to teach and do research, an opportunity afforded by staying where he was. In the end, though, the prospect of building a new department drew him to Minnesota. So far, he says, the creative process has been "totally occupying."
Pushing the boundaries
"When the glass is half full, it's really incredible," he exults. "We're creating a department from scratch here. We're looking to build an entire team." That team will eventually include six more faculty positions in Japanese, two in Chinese, and one in South Asian studies.
"The future will be decided by the people we bring in," Allen says. Now that the undergraduate major and minor are up and running, he adds, "The task for the faculty next fall will be to design a graduate program. We have the opportunity to define the vision and lay the foundations for Asian studies at the graduate level for the 21st century."
Not just an exciting prospect for the faculty, this developmental work is especially important at this time of great cultural change in Minnesota and enormous growth in Minnesota's Asian populations.
As he works to strengthen partnerships with China's Nankai University and to build a cooperative program with National Taiwan University, Allen sees limitless possibilities. And he believes the new department can set a national standard, a prospect he finds "exhilarating, exhausting, phenomenal."
"If we become a national model, it will be because we have partnered with other strong parts of the U," he says. "When partnerships create new synergy, where you're not just borrowing but integrating resources with areas like comparative literature, women's studies, sociology, and others, it's exciting. It pushes interdisciplinary boundaries. We can truly share resources."
"It's like chess," he says. "The opening gambits can be brutal, but the end game will be fantastic."