A Field Guide to Getting Lost in the Southern Universe project is supported by Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab. This project aims to create a fictional Field Guide in the form of radio drama by integrating writings of western explorers in the 19th and early 20th century who “discovered” colonies, science fiction texts (e.g., radio drama The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), first-person writings such as travelogues or reports, and particular economic landscapes during the colonial periods of Taiwan and Malaya. Aside from reading literature and images, study groups, and interviews, four podcast episodes of interviews and the Field Guide will be broadcasted during the residency at C-LAB. (Keywords: Southeast Asia, Ecocolonialisation, Plantation, Opium, Harbour, Sandbox).

The first and the second episodes are respectively titled The Southern Universe Archives (conducted in English) and 南方宇宙檔案館 (conducted in Mandarin). With the guided English / Mandarin tour of the fictional “Archives”, as well as the real colonial archives in the Southern Sphere, the audience may go through the Exposition, harbor, monopoly, coal mine, and the rest material or non material documents in the colonies, and feel like walking through the scenes of the Southern Universe. Voiceover: (English) John Stephenson, Cheung Han, Candice Jee; Rikey Tenn. Recording/ Sound effect: Feng Chih-ming.