Democratic Progressive Party Chairman Yu Shyi-kun recently coined the term Chinese Taiwanese, to describe himself and others in Taiwan. In addition, Insight City Guide: Taipei, a tour book published by a German company in May, but partially sponsored by the Taipei City Government, claimed that the term "Taiwanese" made some Mainlanders feel uncomfortable.
These incidents stirred up a lot of opposition. It is clear that identity is important to people in Taiwan in terms of both political gains and self worth. Samuel Huntington of Harvard University summarized in his 2004 book Who Are We? that there are six primary sources of identity: one, Ascriptive, Cultural, Territorial, Political, Economic and Social.
Moreover, in 2004 Melissa Brown of Stanford University described in her book Is Taiwan Chinese? The impact of Culture, Power, and Migration on Changing Identities that several assumptions and concepts about Han (
One, Han ethnic identity is linked to Chinese national identity.
Two, Chinese national identity is linked to Han culture.
Three, Chinese national identity has a clear border, and a person or a group is located on one side or the other. This border separates Chinese from non-Chinese, Han from non-Han. All of these assumptions and concepts, some derived from Confucian "culturalist" principles, have serious problems in "stamping" others' identity. However, based on her excellent field work in Taiwan and in China, Brown theorized and successfully demonstrated that the following points were true:
One, identity is based on social experience, not cultural ideas or ancestry. Two, cultural meanings and social power constitute two distinct -- though interacting -- systems that affect human behavior and societies differently. Three, demographic forces such as migration affect human behavior and society in other ways.
I am an active board member in the St. Louis chapters of both the Taiwanese Association of America and the North America Taiwanese Engineers' Association. In these organizations, we call ourselves Taiwanese and Taiwanese Americans.
However, because of this, the organizations and its members were often labeled by Chinese Americans as "Taiwan Independence groups" and "exclusive."
They sometimes prescribe a remedy that asks us to be "inclusive." This kind of characterization is not only overly simplistic, but also mean-spirited. The root cause I think for this mischaracterization is their premeditated bias and agenda.
The term "Chinese" in English means "Zhongguo ren (
However, the meaning of "Zhongguo ren (
But, on the other hand, I often wonder what the problems are for those who were born in Taiwan, grew up in Taiwan and were educated in Taiwan that make them so fearful or uncomfortable to be identified as Taiwanese or Taiwanese Americans?
Instead, they are most comfortable calling themselves and others "Zhongguo ren" -- people of China, a country that is authoritarian, barbaric and most of all, extremely hostile to Taiwan.
Most ironic of all, when others want to be called Taiwanese or Taiwanese Americans, they are now labeled as "exclusive."
They should learn to be "inclusive." It is sad and pitiful. I maintain that striving for a de jure independent Taiwan and inclusiveness are not at all mutually exclusive.
Donald Shengduen Shih is a materials scientist at the Boeing Company.
Because much of what former US president Donald Trump says is unhinged and histrionic, it is tempting to dismiss all of it as bunk. Yet the potential future president has a populist knack for sounding alarums that resonate with the zeitgeist — for example, with growing anxiety about World War III and nuclear Armageddon. “We’re a failing nation,” Trump ranted during his US presidential debate against US Vice President Kamala Harris in one particularly meandering answer (the one that also recycled urban myths about immigrants eating cats). “And what, what’s going on here, you’re going to end up in World War
Earlier this month in Newsweek, President William Lai (賴清德) challenged the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to retake the territories lost to Russia in the 19th century rather than invade Taiwan. He stated: “If it is for the sake of territorial integrity, why doesn’t [the PRC] take back the lands occupied by Russia that were signed over in the treaty of Aigun?” This was a brilliant political move to finally state openly what many Chinese in both China and Taiwan have long been thinking about the lost territories in the Russian far east: The Russian far east should be “theirs.” Granted, Lai issued
On Tuesday, President William Lai (賴清德) met with a delegation from the Hoover Institution, a think tank based at Stanford University in California, to discuss strengthening US-Taiwan relations and enhancing peace and stability in the region. The delegation was led by James Ellis Jr, co-chair of the institution’s Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific Region project and former commander of the US Strategic Command. It also included former Australian minister for foreign affairs Marise Payne, influential US academics and other former policymakers. Think tank diplomacy is an important component of Taiwan’s efforts to maintain high-level dialogue with other nations with which it does
On Sept. 2, Elbridge Colby, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development, wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal called “The US and Taiwan Must Change Course” that defends his position that the US and Taiwan are not doing enough to deter the People’s Republic of China (PRC) from taking Taiwan. Colby is correct, of course: the US and Taiwan need to do a lot more or the PRC will invade Taiwan like Russia did against Ukraine. The US and Taiwan have failed to prepare properly to deter war. The blame must fall on politicians and policymakers