The Taiwan Gazette translates and publishes original reporting from Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. Our goal with the platform is simple: We want original reporting from the Sinosphere to have a wider impact on global civil society.
During WWII, there were hundreds of Taiwanese living in Southeast Asia. They were regarded Japanese, lost everything overnight and were detained in internment camps. Shu-min Chung (鍾淑敏) had dug up historical materials in search of the Taiwanese in internment camps, trying to fill in the forgotten history of overseas Taiwanese.
Last year, the Taiwan Railways Administration imposed a ban on public sitting in the lobby of Taipei Main Station, citing COVID-19 concerns. This sitting ban raised urgent questions: Who has claims over this space? What might be the historical and ideological forces shaping the usage of this space? And why is Taipei Main Station associated with the signs of “Free China” and the rise of “Little Indonesia”?
The Taiwan Gazette screened the documentary film Our Youth in Taiwan from March 8 to 14, 2021. We sat down with University of Toronto Professor Michelle Cho to discuss Taiwan-China geopolitical relations and the usage of “worlding” within the context of the film.
Bubble tea and handmade drink shops are an indispensable part of Taiwanese food culture. For years, they play the role of a cultural ambassador, promoting Taiwanese cuisine to the international community. How did bubble tea rise to its current status of Taiwan’s “national drink”? How did this “bubble tea kingdom” come to be? What can we learn from the rise of handmade drink shops in Taiwan?
Between 1949 and 1999, the National Defense Medical Center was located around what is now the Shuiyuan Campus of National Taiwan University. Ghastly rumors about the site circulated among present-day college students. Why was the site haunted and by whom? What might be the ghosts’ unfulfilled wishes? How have fictions and oral narratives about the White Terror in Taiwan contributed to a haunted remembering of the site? And how should we reckon with the ghastly heritage of NTU’s Shuiyuan Campus and beyond?
How is Taiwan seen under the gaze of others? What might hinder people from understanding Taiwan as it is through a more realistic approach? How can Taiwanese establish and present its own subjectivity? Lin Wei-Yun ‘s (林蔚昀) insightful critique of a Polish edited volume on Taiwan might provide some meaningful clues.
Australian musician Brett Dean's diagnosis of COVID-19 on March 5 2020 shocked Taiwan's art world. Cho Hsiao-ching (卓曉青), the first violinist of the National Symphony Orchestra shares her personal journey as an artist, mother and victim of the pandemic, following her experience of self-health management.
During COVID-19, exceptional public health measures were adopted by nations to secure their populations from disease and death. In imperial Japan, practices and discourses of public health played an equally important role in transforming the nation into a civilizing power fit to survive in the modern world. What can we learn from the practice of mask-wearing in colonial Taiwan?
The Taiwan Gazette interviews Taiwan-based cultural studies scholar Chien-ting Lin to discuss how Taiwan’s treatment of Mainland Chinese students (lusheng) during COVID-19 can be understood in terms of war and love. Divided into two parts, this interview is the fourth piece of our special series: Lusheng in Taiwan: Contradictions and Anticipations.
The Taiwan Gazette interviews Taiwan-based cultural studies scholar Chien-ting Lin to discuss how Taiwan’s treatment of Mainland Chinese students (lusheng) during COVID-19 can be understood in terms of war and love. Divided into two parts, this interview is the fourth piece of our special series: Lusheng in Taiwan: Contradictions and Anticipations.
Pop songs in Taiwan have been an inseparable element in people’s everyday life. How was its rise and popularity linked to Japanese colonial governance in Taiwan? How did the reception and prohibition of pop songs shift under the Nationalist government’s martial law regime?
In 2019, the China Film Administration banned mainland Chinese films and related personnel from participating in the 56th Golden Horse Awards. How did filmmakers, curators, and critics in Taiwan, mainland China, and Hong Kong react to this ban? What are the implications behind a Golden Horse Awards without China?
Pei is a Mainland Chinese student who has studied in both Taiwan and Hong Kong. How is she “represented” in debates in different places? What are her insights on identity politics, nationalism, and populism? Introducing the third piece of our special series: Lusheng in Taiwan: Contradictions and Anticipations.
“Kabar Ma Kyay Bu” (ကမ္ဘာမကြေဘူး), also translated as “We Won't Be Satisfied Until the End of the World”, is the Burmese-language anthem of Myanmar’s 1988 pro-democracy movement. On February 6, protestors sang this anthem in Taiwan’s “Little Burma”, showing overseas support to their detained leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other arrested political figures. Many see the latest military coup as a serious hindrance to Myanmar’s road to democracy since 2011.
In our second feature for the 2020 Big Ideas Competition: Exploring Global Taiwan series, award recipient Pranav Dayanand makes a case for what TikTok can tell us about the complex state of Indonesian migrant worker affairs in Taiwan.
Many in Hong Kong see immigration as a means to escape China’s tightened control over the city they called home. The Reporter interviews immigrants who moved from Hong Kong to Taiwan between 1969 to 2020 for different reasons. What were their strategies of adaptation and integration? How did they deal with their feelings toward immigration—a feeling of being so close yet so far?
2021 marks the tenth anniversary of Mainland Chinese students (lusheng) pursuing degrees at Taiwan's higher education institutions. However, in fall 2021 China’s Ministry of Education will suspend their enrolment. How might we address the changing political economy that shapes and contests policies for lusheng? What will become of these students? Introducing the second piece of our special series: Lusheng in Taiwan: Contradictions and Anticipations.
Stephanie Tai, author of Tempting Formosa and 2020 Big Ideas Competition: Exploring Global Taiwan award recipient, talks to our Deputy Editor Elizabeth Shaw about her process of creating a Taiwanese dessert cookbook and using it to pay homage to her homeland of Taiwan.
When Covid-19 broke out in China in January 2020, Chinese students studying in Taiwan (lusheng) found themselves caught between geopolitical tensions. The pandemic is not only a health issue for these young people, but a political issue as well. Introducing the first piece of the special series: Lusheng in Taiwan: Contradictions and Anticipations.
What is the “Taiwan Model” for COVID-19 and why is it considered a success? Taiwan Gazette Deputy Editor Elizabeth Shaw introduces how, with a population of over 23 million people, Taiwan has had a total of only 851 cases since the start of the pandemic.
