Event Type: Branch

Takes Place: 10th December 2024

Time: 7pm

Venue: Room 2.01 Park Building, King Henry I St, Portsmouth PO1 2BZ

Description: This talk follows a chronological order, starting from the 17th century when Taiwan was a Spanish and Dutch colony on their trading routes, and ending with an overview of the socio-economic and political challenges the islanders have encountered since the 1950s. The talk will touch upon the ‘opening’ of Taiwan to the West when ‘treaty ports’ were established after the Second Opium War, the colonisation of Taiwan from 1895 to 1945 by Japan after the Qing Empire’s signing of the Treaty of Shimonoseki, the ‘retreat’ of the Republic of China from the Chinese mainland to Taiwan under the leadership of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, the ‘split’ of China between the Communist China, or the Red China, and Taiwan, the Free China, as ideologically known during the Cold War. Against this Cold War background, the talk will discuss the development of Taiwan as an Asian Tiger, thanks to its export-oriented industrialisation, before addressing recent migration from China and Southeast Asia to Taiwan. The incorporation of these regional migrants complicates the demography of the island nation, which was otherwise composed of 98 per cent Han Chinese and 2 per cent Indigenous Peoples, constitutionally recognised as the First Nation. Overall, this talk projects a dynamic and evolving identity more complicated than the usual discourse of the trade-off between Chinese identity and Taiwanese identity.

How to book: No need to book, just turn up

Price: £4

Email: portsmouthhistorybranch@gmail.com

Lecturer: Dr Isabelle Cockel, University of Portsmouth

Region: South-East England

Branch: Portsmouth