In January 2010, City University of Hong Kong will accept applications for the first low-residency MFA in Asia. This 45-credit, two-year degree will specialize in Asian writing for creative nonfiction, fiction, and poetry, and will accept new students once a year.  Based at the English Department of Hong Kong’s largest university, this innovative new degree will be assessed on international and Hong Kong education standards. The Hong Kong-New York writer Xu Xi assisted in its development and will join the department next March as their first writer-in-residence to help oversee the program.

“We anticipate the majority of applicants to be from Asia,” Xu says, “but many writers in the West, both of Asian and non-Asian ethnicity, are increasingly drawn to Asia, especially China. They’re not always best served by MFA programs in the U.S. where there’s limited focus on either a contemporary Asian perspective or literature.” The faculty will all be writers who “know Asia, live Asia, read Asia, write Asia” as their launch ad reads.

The first residency is scheduled for summer 2010. Timothy Mo is the visiting writer, and the faculty for 2010-12 features an international cast from Hong Kong, India, the U.K, Canada and the U.S., with connections and roots in China, Japan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, and elsewhere.  The writers include Tina Chang, Marilyn Chin, Luis Francia, Robin Hemley, Justin Hill, Sharmistha Mohanty, James Scudamore, Ravi Shankar, Jess Row, and Madeleine Thien. For further information, please visit http://www.english.cityu.edu.hk/MFA or contact Dr. Rodney Jones at enrodney@cityu.edu.hk.