Telling Taiwan’s Story Well: Shaping Perspectives on the Beautiful Island

2024 ANU TAIWAN UPDATE

Telling Taiwan’s Story Well: Shaping Perspectives on the Beautiful Island

The Portuguese decision to name Taiwan Ilha Formosa was only the first in a series of decisions made by cultural intermediaries that shaped Western perspectives on what would become one of the most important geopolitical locales of the twentieth century. This talk will examine the construction of an imagined Taiwan in the West through four modes, largely focusing on events in the past few decades.

How much agency do the people of Taiwan have in constructing these images? Which elites from inside and outside of Taiwan have achieved hegemony as cultural intermediaries in presenting Taiwan as an exotic island, oppressed colony, capitalist factories or progressive society? With these questions in mind, Dr Smith will examine pivotal individuals and organisations who have engaged in various means of representation, translation and commercialisation to tell Taiwan’s story well (or not so well).

Speaker

Craig A. Smith is Senior Lecturer of Translation Studies at the University of Melbourne’s Asia Institute and president of the Australasian Taiwan Studies Association (ATSA). His publications include Chinese Asianism (Harvard University Asia Center, 2021). He graduated from Taiwan’s National Chung Cheng University with an MA in Taiwan Literature in 2010 and regularly writes about or translates Taiwan’s literature and history.

Afternoon tea will be provided at 3pm. View the 2024 ANU Taiwan Update Program.

If you require accessibility accommodations or a visitor Personal Emergency Evacuation plan please contact ciw@anu.edu.au.


The ANU Taiwan Update is an initiative under the ANU Taiwan Studies Program 2022-25, which a partnership between the College of Asia and the Pacific at the Australian National University and the Ministry of Education, Republic of China (Taiwan).

Photo Credit: KAART VAN HET EYLAND FORMOSA EN DE EYLANDEN VAN PISCADORES on Wikimedia Common.