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Fictionalizing Taiwan’s White Terror (review of ‘Transitions in Taiwan’ for Taipei Times)

The following book review appeared in today’s Taipei Times: Violence and oppression, we are told in the introduction to this collection of tales, are foundational to modern Taiwan, providing “a legacy that continues to influence its contemporary society.” It is interesting, then, that an anthology subtitled “Stories about the White Terror,” offers few instances of […]
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Taiwan entwined in WHO’s history (Review of Harry Yi-Jui Wu’s ‘Mad By the Millions’ for Global Asia)

The following book review appeared in the September issue of Global Asia: Taiwan’s relationship with the World Health Organization (WHO) has been problematic at best since the country was expelled from the UN agency in 1972.1 From 2009 to 2016, as then-President Ma Ying-jeou fostered a cosy relationship with Beijing, Taiwan was granted observer status […]
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Taiwan’s free quarantine leaves little cause for complaint

The following article was published in today’s Taipei Times I’m writing this on a beachfront balcony with a spectacular ocean view. My hotel room is spotless, spacious and well-equipped. Meals are delivered to the door thrice daily, and my all-inclusive two-week stay is free. True, the beach remains tantalizingly inaccessible. But that’s the only downside […]
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The complexities of two worlds colliding (review of Ken Chih-Yan Sun’s ‘Time and Migration’ for Global Asia)

The following review appeared in the June issue of Global Asia. Time has become such a preoccupation of migration studies in recent years that the “temporal turn” the field has taken has itself become a research topic. What makes Ken Chih-Yan Sun’s approach in Time and Migration conspicuously different is not so much the longitudinal […]
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Neither here nor there: Study casts light on aging Taiwanese migrants to the US (review of Ken Chih-Yan Sun’s ‘Time and Migration’ for Taipei Times)

The following book review appeared in today’s Taipei Times. With droves of Taiwanese Americans reportedly bolting stateside on “vaccine tours,” the issue of transnational healthcare opportunism is back in the public eye. If you’re wondering if that’s a real thing, well, while I believe I may have just coined the phrase, the phenomenon it describes […]
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Of pigs and prudery

Anyone who has lived in Taiwan long enough, or for that matter any place where they stand out in terms of appearance or culture, will probably have experienced Othering. In Taiwan, it’s rarely of the nasty, aggressive kind nor, necessarily, even of the intentionally discriminatory type– though, as I’ve made clear elsewhere, that obviously exists, […]
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Time to stop ducking uncomfortable truths

When it comes to social etiquette, Taiwanese society resembles the United Kingdom’s House of Commons in one key aspect: directly calling someone a liar is taboo. Since its introduction by a young Winston Churchill in 1906, the preferred euphemism for an untruth at Westminster has been “terminological inexactitude.” Churchill, who used the phrase to weasel […]
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The master of small things

The following feature appeared in today’s Taipei Times: But for a banana, I wouldn’t have met Chuang Hsin-li (莊新利). En route to the mountains of Yunlin County, I stop for sustenance at a fruit truck in Gukeng Township (古坑). It’s the second day of Lunar New Year; the vehicle is sparsely stocked: sprigs of lycees […]
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Razam! United with Belarus

The following feature appeared in today’s Taipei Times: Anastasia Kurlenia recoils in mock horror. Her daughter Sophie has broached the unthinkable. “Those are the Russian colors,” says the six-year-old, pointing at the red and white of the flags and traditional attire on the walls of Liuminzhan Bar & Bed, a cosy cafe on a backstreet […]
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My animals and other family

It sounds like a case of spectacularly misplaced priorities now, but the first thing I thought of when my then-wife and I agreed it was best for me to move out was my guinea pigs. It was early August 2014, and I’d just returned from six weeks in Latin America with my elder son. At […]
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