National Taiwan University

immigrants, I did not live in a tight-knit immigrant community, and my parents did not bring many elements of their home culture into the house. I grew up listening to American music, learning American history, and my friends were predominantly non-Asian. As a result, I never understood much about my parents’ background, and Taiwanese culture. Sensing my curiosity about my background (perhaps from the number of questions I began asking them), the summer before I left for college, our family visited Taiwan for the first time in 6 years. My parents also saw this as an opportunity to enroll me in the Overseas Compatriot Youth Formosa Study Tour, informally known as the Love Boat, a four-week summer program for college-aged Taiwanese born outside of Taiwan. This tour helped reacquaint participants with Taiwanese culture and language, by enrolling in brief language/art courses, learning popular Taiwanese songs, and visiting important cultural centers such as the Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA)("A More Complete Description of Loveboat."). My experience at the Beijing opera performed by the TNUA has led me to believe that every immigrant child should receive…

In A City of Sadness, movie director Hou Hsiao-Hsien vividly captures the despair of the Taiwanese through the Lin family following the surrender of Japan in 1945 to when the Nationalist Party completely retreats to Taiwan after losing the Mainland to the Communist Party in 1949. Throughout the movie, despair is depicted through the collapse of the Lin family, where one after another, members (the sons) of the family are lost as they struggle against the power of new government implemented by…

However, there is a common historical platform which the Islands get affiliated. Ideally, the islands under disputes have a contentious geographical location between China and Japan. Accordingly, the land gets located on the east of the Chinese territory and from the southwestern side of the Japanese territory. After China was defeated in the Sino-Japanese War, under the Treaty of Shimonoseki the Qing dynasty (1644- 1911) formally ceded Taiwan "and its surrounding islands" to Japan. China claims…

Introduction Taiwan is a small island located in Southeast Asia, right next to Japan and the Philippines. As of 2015, the population of this country is about 23.4 million, across an area of 13, 972 square miles. Taiwan is predominately Chinese making up most of their population. Thus, their official language is a Chinese dialect called Mandarin, also known as Guoyu. About two-thirds of Taiwan is covered by mountains, including the tallest mountain in northeast Asia known as Jade Mountain…

Not a Self-Help Book: The Misadventures of Marty Wu written by Yi Shun Lai is a story concerning a young Taiwanese-American woman, living in Manhattan, seeking her place in the world through a variety of self-help books. The novel was written in the form of a diary from the main character’s perspective. The story follows Marty, who has moved to New York from Taiwan when she was five, at the beginning of the novel she has a job in Manhattan working in advertising sales for a magazine. Although…

with empathy towards the West, China’s leaderships or rulers were sending a strong message that China was on a higher pedestal on matters of development and the capacity to meet the needs of their subjects. Chinese believed that the West was less powerful and had to submit to them. In light of that, they had to preserve their power, which was manifest in their goods. They had had a lot of power evident in the abundance of goods and resources. Allowing trade with the West would erode the…

They were introduced to terms such as “national,” translated as guomin, which also mean “citizen,” and “nationalism,” translated as minzu zhuyi, as well as theories such as social Darwinism and Marxism. Using these terms and ideas, Chinese intellectuals would attempt to inform the public of what is an ideal nation for China and Western nationalism. More specifically, they used these concepts to inform the Chinese people of what they should do to make China a modern nation because the…

that USSR was no longer fully reliable. The 1971 Ping-Pong Diplomacy can be viewed as the demonstration of a friendly gesture to America Facing the deteriorating relationship with the Soviets, China set aside their ideological differences and other issues, such as the Taiwan problem, agreeing on the Sino-American Rapprochement. For the next part of the essay, I will focus on the how various historians’ viewed the significance of Nixon’s speech and his trip. The orthodox historical analyst of…

conditions in the northern parts and tropical weather in the southern portion ("World", n.d.). China’s flag is red with a large yellow star on the upper left corner and four smaller yellow stars to the right of it. The red color represents revolution and the stars represent the four social classes (working class, peasantry, urban petty bourgeoisie, and the national bourgeoisie class). China’s national anthem is “Yiyongjun Jinxingqu”…

However, Chinese, at least the emperor in Yuan and Qing dynasty did not pay too much attention to the western science. The devices Europe thought genius was thought as toys in China. Some Chinese scientist in early Ming dynasty such as Xu Guangqi did realize some value in western science, but there [was] no more progressive scientific thought after early Ming. Dramatic change Qing dynasty remained its fake prosperity until the Opium War in late Qing period. Discovered great business…