All in Translations

The Power of Taiwan Literature: An Interview with Shuo-bin Su (Part 1)

The Power of Taiwan Literature: An Interview with Shuo-bin Su (Part 1)

The Taiwan Gazette
Events & Interviews, The Taiwan Gazette, Translations

Before the lifting of martial law in 1987, the research, preservation, and promotion of Taiwan literature in Taiwan either failed to receive organized institutional support or was subsumed under a China-centered historiographical perspective. The establishment of Taiwan literature as a field of academic inquiry became possible thanks to the political liberalization of Taiwanese society and the emergence of a “Taiwan consciousness” since the 1980s. What might be the challenges and possibilities facing the field of Taiwan literature, then and now? What might be the new directions of the field? This interview features as part of our special issue: Encountering Everyday Life: Taiwan in Museums.

U.S. Aid and the Origins of Taiwanese Wheat Culture

U.S. Aid and the Origins of Taiwanese Wheat Culture

National Museum of Taiwan History (國立臺灣歷史博物館)
Translations

Wheaten foods play an important role in the everyday life of Taiwanese people. However, the mass introduction of wheaten foods to Taiwan and even Taiwan’s own domestic production of flour are fairly recent phenomena. Why did Taiwanese begin integrating large quantities of wheaten foods into their diet? The answer to this question is intimately linked to U.S. aid. A story of food culture and U.S. Cold War cultural policy in Asia, this article features as part of our special issue: Encountering Everyday Life: Taiwan in Museums.

Ordinary Straw Hats Guided Colonial Taiwan to International Fashion

Ordinary Straw Hats Guided Colonial Taiwan to International Fashion

National Museum of Taiwan History (國立臺灣歷史博物館)
Translations

In the early stage of Japanese colonial governance, the Government-General of Taiwan encouraged the straw hat business—the growth of which not only brought Taiwan to the stage of international fashion, but also consolidated Japan’s colonial imaginary of Taiwan as a southern island, a strategic site from which the southward advance policy could be launched. A story about colonial modernity and imaginaries, this article features as part of our special issue: Encountering Everyday Life: Taiwan in Museums.

Thinking Outside the Pot: The Bond between Taiwan and the Steam Rice Cooker

Thinking Outside the Pot: The Bond between Taiwan and the Steam Rice Cooker

Sci-Tech Vista (科技大觀園)
Translations, Sci-Tech Vista, StoryStudio (故事)

In Taiwan, using a steam rice cooker is an everyday experience. However, up until the 1960s, the big stoves, briquette stoves, and kerosene stoves still enjoyed widespread popularity. How did the steam cooker eventually step into Taiwanese homes and become one of its essential kitchen appliances? This article will present a few facts about the steam rice cooker, examining the history of its growing popularity in Taiwan.

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