Taipei's Huashan Culture and Art Center on Saturday hosted an event in honor of Black History Month, which was certainly an eyeopener to those who only know about this activity from reading the Boondocks comic strip. One Web site which narrates the history of Black History Month points out that when the event was first created in the 1920s as Negro History Week, black history as such was barely recognized as a subject of study. There is no doubt that the lack of interest in the academic community at that time in black history in the US -- the history of a large community that had been present since colonial times -- was simply a result of exclusionary attitudes towards black people. Since they were seen as inferior and their society marginal, what history of significance, scholars asked, could they possibly have?
Such attitudes are long dismissed from campuses in the US today, and the struggle to raise the consciousness of black communities and, once raised, to step forth and demand civil rights scandalously denied in a modern democracy, is a historical story of not just American but international significance, being hugely influential in the wholesale reevaluation of attitudes towards minorities that has been a feature of late 20th century Western societies. Just as Gandhi's picking up a handful of salt was the iconic image of the struggle against Western colonialism, Rosa Parks' refusal to leave her bus seat has a direct link to the fights within those Western countries against bigotries of all kinds. Just to remember how bad it was, and how recently, it is worth pointing out that as late as the 1970s no aspiring Britisher working for one of the banks or the big hongs could marry a Chinese wife without it destroying his career.
But that people celebrate Black History Month in Taiwan brigs us to an interesting question: When is anyone going to celebrate Taiwanese History Month? Of course some might say that since Taiwanese represent the majority culture, the idea of a special month of celebration is absurd. Historical events are celebrated all the time whenever an important anniversary arises.
If only that were so. Most of Taiwan's traditional historical commemorations involve things that happened in a foreign country (Double Ten National Day, Constitution Day), to people who had nothing to do with Taiwan (Sun Yat-sen (
The Californian academic Sande Cohen has called Taiwan an "ahistorical society" and so it is. For example, December saw the 90th anniversary of the foundation of, and events surrounding, the Assimilation Society (同化會). This movement, led by Lin Hsien-tang (林獻堂), was the first major political movement in Taiwan. It was formed to try to redress the second-class citizenship of the Taiwanese under colonial Japanese rule by demanding the equality under the Meiji constitution that Taiwanese, as Japanese nationals, were constitutionally entitled too. The movement's leaders were castigated by other Taiwanese for using the idea of assimilation, but as they candidly explained, it was the only platform that could get support in Japan. The story of the movement is replete with so many of what seem like traditional motifs of Taiwanese nationalism: Confused demands, insecure identities, internal dissent over a "soft" approach, an external power it is impossible to fight.
A discussion would have been interesting, but don't expect it in ahistorical Taiwan. For the same reason don't expect anyone to remember the 90th anniversary of the Hsi Lai An (西來庵) rebellion this August. When are Taiwanese going to take our history seriously?
In the past month, two important developments are poised to equip Taiwan with expanded capabilities to play foreign policy offense in an age where Taiwan’s diplomatic space is seriously constricted by a hegemonic Beijing. Taiwan Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) led a delegation of Taiwan and US companies to the Philippines to promote trilateral economic cooperation between the three countries. Additionally, in the past two weeks, Taiwan has placed chip export controls on South Africa in an escalating standoff over the placing of its diplomatic mission in Pretoria, causing the South Africans to pause and ask for consultations to resolve
An altercation involving a 73-year-old woman and a younger person broke out on a Taipei MRT train last week, with videos of the incident going viral online, sparking wide discussions about the controversial priority seats and social norms. In the video, the elderly woman, surnamed Tseng (曾), approached a passenger in a priority seat and demanded that she get up, and after she refused, she swung her bag, hitting her on the knees and calves several times. In return, the commuter asked a nearby passenger to hold her bag, stood up and kicked Tseng, causing her to fall backward and
In December 1937, Japanese troops captured Nanjing and unleashed one of the darkest chapters of the 20th century. Over six weeks, hundreds of thousands were slaughtered and women were raped on a scale that still defies comprehension. Across Asia, the Japanese occupation left deep scars. Singapore, Malaya, the Philippines and much of China endured terror, forced labor and massacres. My own grandfather was tortured by the Japanese in Singapore. His wife, traumatized beyond recovery, lived the rest of her life in silence and breakdown. These stories are real, not abstract history. Here is the irony: Mao Zedong (毛澤東) himself once told visiting
When I reminded my 83-year-old mother on Wednesday that it was the 76th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, she replied: “Yes, it was the day when my family was broken.” That answer captures the paradox of modern China. To most Chinese in mainland China, Oct. 1 is a day of pride — a celebration of national strength, prosperity and global stature. However, on a deeper level, it is also a reminder to many of the families shattered, the freedoms extinguished and the lives sacrificed on the road here. Seventy-six years ago, Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong (毛澤東)
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