Remembering Historian Arif Dirlik

In "Raise the Umbrellas", Arif Dirlik compares Tiananmen protests  
in 1989 to Hong Kong 2014: "Didn't they occupy Tiananmen Square"?
Screenshot from the documentary'

My memories of Arif Dirlik, the eminent historian of Marxism and anarchism in China, will seem more personal, and rooted in Hong Kong, where I am currently based.  This distinguished scholar, whom I'll refer to by his first name, was a not infrequent visitor and resident, although based at Duke University in Chapel Hill, NC, and later at the University of Oregon, Eugene.

Only recently, just prior to a 13 November 25 2017 Chinese University of Hong Kong screening of Evans Chan's "Raise the Umbrellas", an insightful, lengthy documentary on the 2014 Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, in which Arif Dirlik appears, its director announced to a stunned audience that he was saddened if honored to have received what he believed to be Arif's final email, and that Arif "was dying".  Arif indeed passed away 18 days later, on 1 December, 2017, in Eugene, Oregon.  Evans Chan dedicated that CUHK screening to Arif, and says he plans to also dedicate future screenings to Arif.

In around 2004, when he was teaching at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, I was visiting Hong Kong and we met over lunch at the massive New Town Plaza in Shatin, two train stops away from his campus.  I recall accompanying him as he loaded up a shopping cart at the City'super supermarket on a higher level of the shopping center, where he politely asked the sales clerks to carve meats and cheeses.  As we reached the cashier he suddenly became frustrated and angry, at having to pay the 50-cent (Hong Kong currency, or 8 cents in US) charge for each plastic bag.   Arguing he had not be forewarned, he dumped his shopping load on to the counter and stormed away.

Here was my only public experience with his temper, usually  aimed at other academics privately but not, I would have thought, at members of the working class, especially on an environmental issue for which he is generally supportive.  As I related that incident to friends later, I realized that was part and parcel of what made Arif special, if not adorable, i.e., his stubborn unwillingness to compromise, but to stick to his principles, however misguided as in this instance.

An October 2004 interview with Arif at CUHK appears (in English) in indie musician and radical Lenny Kwok's bilingual (Chinese and English) retrospective compilation that came out in 2007, Body of Work, 1984-2004 (see cover image below), by Blackbird (i.e., Lenny Kwok).

In that 2004 interview ("WTO Protests, Place-based Democracy, Tiananmen & 7-Chinas: The Arif Dirlik Interview", see image below) Arif is amazingly prescient about Hong Kong, saying that democracy has to be grassroots-based.  Referring to the then-forthcoming WTO protests in Hong Kong, Arif said:

"In the case of Hong Kong, I think it is really important to keep in mind the community bases...The local community bases.  And the linkages between the local bases of the other bases...".  He expected China to crack down on protesters, given the Chinese government "made such a big effort to get into WTO... they are not going to like anti-WTO protests in Hong Kong.... They'll certainly pressure the SAR government to suppress the movement", athough he did not think they would use the army (PLA).

Arif continued:  "Hong Kong is really interesting because Hong Kong was a global city before globalization! It has economically been tied in so many ways with the world and that you have the local elites.

And they're not gonna like this.  The PRC government is going to get together with them to suppress the actions."

He suggested instead of activists focusing exclusively on protests, they convene a "counter meeting. In other words, do a Counter-WTO, rather than an Anti-WTO. The alternative of what's happening.  Contribute to the education of the people.  You might be able to include people from the PRC under those circumstances, because there are people willing to talk about the enormous waste involved in the so called globalization craze - the waste of money building the Olympic Centre in China, so that it could represent itself as a global power.  The problems of ecology, the problems of social inequality etc.  This might be the time to bring people together to talk about these things."

On the 7-Chinas, including Hong Kong, Arif told Lenny:  "To me it is really important these various Chinese societies achieve some kind of democracy.  And I don't see how you can achieve a democracy in a country of this size ruled from Beijing, according to habits which are very dictatorial.  I try to conceive of it in reverse, that the government in Beijing, instead of fearing that if Taiwan separates out, then maybe Tibet would follow, and then Xin Jiang too.  I think that's what they are afraid of.  But they also could use Taiwan, or Hong Kong, as an example of creating democracy slowly from the bottom up rather than controlleĥd from the centre.  That could happen.  Why not?"

He warned against the rise of "Chinese chauvinism" as China asserts a more "racialized nationalism". In contrast what he is suggesting is "this other thing", that "democracy must be based on differences, not homogenate."  And he explained that is why he is "all for what's going on in Taiwan... democracy from the bottom up."

I suspect while Arif, an avowed radical, would have been critical of some of the pan-democrats and localists in Hong Kong, he would totally embrace their assertion of democracy from the bottom up.

Indeed in one of his last pieces written for publication, he endorsed the activists in Hong Kong who were in the streets fighting against an authoritarian Chinese government across the border.  In "The Mouse that roared: The Democratic Movement in Hong Kong," Arif called "one country, two systems" an "unstable arrangement "openly favoring the corporate and financial ruling class in Hong Kong which is in turn prepared to align its interests with those of the Communist regime in a mutually beneficial relationship."

Originally published in Turkish and English in the newspaper Agos, near the end of the Umbrella Movement on 6 October 2014 and in boundary 2(29 October 2014), an updated version appeared in 2016 in on-line public access journal, Contemporary Chinese Political Economy and Strategic Relations: An International Journal.

Arif then ties the Umbrella Movement to "the latest chapter in a narrative that goes back to the 1980s, the emergence of a neoliberal global capitalism of which the PRC has been an integral component, and the Tienanmen movement which was one of the earliest expressions of the social and political strains created by shifts in the global economy."

In the article, Arif writes that [s]truggles for autonomy in Hong Kong raise significant theoretical and political questions about issues of "Chineseness" as well as the relationship between colonialism and historical identity-formation."  Both in Taiwan and in Hong Kong, Arif argued that "there are different ways to be Chinese."  He adds:  "Declarations that 'we are not Chinese, we are Hong Kongers' or 'we are not Chinese, we are Taiwanese' are at one level protests against political homogenization that presupposes a homogeneous political identity centered in Beijing.  In a deeper sense, they raise questions about a racialized ethnic and national identity in the name of local identities that nourish off the experience of diverse historical identities that challenge de-historicized and de-socialized notions of "Chineseness.' "

For Hong Kong, the "colonial legacy has proven to be more deep-seated than the regime had wished.  It would be simplistic to attribute Hong Kong demands for democracy and independence to lingering nostalgia for colonial rule, or even the political and legal norm established under it."

He continues, "What is equally significant is that the colonial pasts offer alternative historical narratives that are invoked against the nationalist narrative of a single history based on common ethnicity and imagined homogeneity that justifies Beijing's claims".   Indeed, "from the perspective of these alternative narratives... unification with the Mainland adds up to little more than a new round of colonialism."

He also spoke at the local cultural studies bookstore, Hong Kong Reader, in March 2008.

I also visited with him earlier when he taught once at the Hong Kong University of Science and

Source: ICAS 8 Day 2 Newsletter

Technology. I tagged along with Chinese American poet and editor Russell Leong, who had been invited to Arif's class to guest lecture there, on that beautiful, then-new campus.  Arif was generous enough to let me talk to the students about my mother, who was a U.S. born woman of Chinese ethnicity. More recently, he gave a lecture at ICAS 8, meeting in 2013 in Macau.  Just past the casino tables he gave a keynote speech on the rise of Asia, warning not to be deceived by the rhetoric.

I will miss his pugnaciousness, generosity of spirit, and willingness to mentor emerging scholars.  I regret never having interviewed him for my show, and especially these last months, not making the trip up to Eugene from southern California to meet up with him, although we kept in email communication and on Messenger until he fell ill.  His final email (August 24, 2017) to me was uncharacteristically succinct:  "Neat" in response to my email about finding some historical material of interest from my own archive before heading to Hong Kong for an extended research stay at CUHK.  I did not learn till writing this blog entry that he also was once a Fulbrighter.  -  Daniel C. Tsang.

Justin Chin in Hawaii: A Remembrance

E wai ānuenue ana nā wāwae o nā koa.

The feet of warriors form the colors of the rainbow.[1]

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

My old and good friend, Justin Chin, died in San Francisco just before Christmas.  I just found out via a post on Facebook.  Here are a couple of obituaries:

http://www.sfgate.com/books/article/San-Francisco-poet-Justin-Chin-dies-at-46-6719862.php

http://ww2.kqed.org/arts/2015/12/23/justin-chin-san-francisco-poet-off-life-support-after-stroke

I first met Justin at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in the late 80s when he was a journalism student there and a reporter for the campus newspaper, Ka Leo o Hawai‘i.  He lived in the student dorm on the lower campus, the one with the painting of the tidal wave flooding Honolulu.  He frequented the gay beach at Waikīkī, where he made many friends and interviewed many people for the paper.  His great love was poetry, and he wrote searingly beautiful and frightening poetry.  He is surely the best gay poet I know of, but he did not write for the squeamish for faint-hearted.  Of his several amazing books and collections of poetry, my favorite is Bite Hard (1997).  I have quoted it in my own writings.

With several other friends, he became part of an informal writers’ group that met at our homes once a week to read each other’s writing and offer help and criticism.  Justin’s presence and influence on our work were palpable.  My short story, Trade, emerged from that group.  It contains much of Justin, both within the story itself as well as in his deep influence on the writing:

Robert J. Morris (1991) “Trade,” Tribe: An American Gay Journal 1(4): 51-63 (short story).  www.robertjmorris.net/ShortStoryTribe.pdf

He moved to San Francisco to pursue performance or “slam” poetry, at which he excelled.  Over the years, he returned to Honolulu several times, sometimes to visit friends, and sometimes on his way to or from visiting family in Malaysia and Singapore.  On those visits, we usually met at the Spaghetti Hale near Ena Road for dinner and conversations about writing.  We could talk for hours.

            Justin was a good guy.  I knew him as very kind and gentle and funny, retiring and soft-spoken in person, yet with a fierce intellect and curiosity that came out when he performed—a good ally to have in the culture wars.  He was 46, much too early to leave us.  But we have his books, and you can find him reading his poetry on You Tube.  He was an eloquent witness to our lives and struggles.  My thoughts go with him in the words of another favorite slam poet (William Shakespeare, Hamlet):

“Good-night, sweet prince;
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. ”

ROBERT J. MORRIS, JD, PhD
Retired Professor, University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law

www.facebook.com/Kapaihiahilina

www.robertjmorris.net

[2]

---

[1] Mary Kawena Pukui and Samuel H. Elbert, Hawaiian Dictionary (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1986), p. 26; my translation.

[2] Reproduction of petroglyph of two males in close proximity from a site in Moanalua Valley, O‘ahu, in Elspeth P. Sterling and Catherine C. Summers, Sites of O‘ahu (Honolulu: Bishop Museum Press, 1978), p. 338.  The Hawaiian text is from Hawaiian Dictionary, op. cit., p. 338.

Remembering Performance Artist and Poet Justin Chin

 Irvine -  Over the holiday break came sad news of the passing 24 December 2015 of a powerful gay Asian voice, that of the performance artist and poet Justin Chin.  Born in Malaysia, he grew up in Singapore and subsequently emigrated to the United States.

Justin Chin

In 1999, I interviewed him perhaps when he was already a rising and powerful alternative voice, by phone from San Francisco where he was ultimately based after a detour in Hawaii.  His interview delves into controversial issues (he first had sex when he was 12), Bill Clinton's sexual liaisons and impeachment, oral sex, Asian identity and small press publishing.  The original interview was webcast in January 1999 on KUCI's Subversity Show, in RealAudio (remember that format?).  I've converted it to mp3 and uploaded it to the KUCI server.

Listen and remember him! I shall miss his biting and raw literary voice.  -  Daniel C. Tsang.
  
To listen to the KUCI Subversity Online reformatted podcast of my 1999 interview with Justin,  click on:

See also:
Lambda Literary remembrance.
Obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle by its book editor.
KQED report on his passing.
SF Weekly earlier account.
Poetry Foundation profile.

The original press release announcing his then-forthcoming show appearance is as follows:

Date: Fri, 15 Jan 1999 23:44:35 -0800 (PST)

Peformance artist/Author on Subversity webcast

Irvine -- Subversity, a KUCI public affairs radio program, this Tuesday features an interview with gay Asian Justin Chin, the author of "Mongrel," a new book of "essays, diatribes and pranks" from St. Martin's Press. The show airs from 5-6 p.m. on Tuesday, January 19, 1999, on KUCI, 88.9 FM in Orange County, and is also Webcast live at kuci.org:8080 The topic: "Performance artist as writer." Chin is also a performance artist with a long list of achievements. His earlier work was Bite Hard (Manic D Press), a finalist in the Firecracker Alternative Book awards and the Lambda Literary Awards. His writings have also appeared in Queer 13 (Rob Weisbach Books), Best American Gay Fiction 3 (Little, Brown), Flesh And The Word 4 (Plume), and Men On Men 5: New Gay Writing (Plume), among others.
His solo performances, described as "the raw stuff of serious risk taking," (San Francisco Bay Times), include "And Judas Boogied Until His Slippers Wept," "Go, or, The Approximate Infinite Universe of Mrs. Robert Lomax," "Born," "These Nervous Days," "Holy Spook," and "Attack of the Man-Eating Lotus Blossoms." He has performed his work nationally, including at Highways and East-West Players in L.A; P.S. 122 and Dixon Place in N.Y.; Josie's, Center for the Arts, Intersection for the Arts, the LAB, the Asian Art Musuem, and the SF Art Institute in San Francisco; the Cleveland Performance Art Festival, and the New York International Fringe Festival.
Along with Dan Schott, he wrote and co-directed Downloads, an experimental video documentary that was screened at film festivals in New York, San Francisco, Mexico City, London, and Amsterdam. Other collaborations include Cockfight, a performance work with L.A. performance artist Hung Nguyen.
Chin received fellowships and grants from the California Arts Council, the Djerassi Artist Residency, PEN American Center, and PEN Center USA West, and the Franklin Furnace Fund for Performance Art. In 1996, he was awarded a "Goldie" by the San Francisco Bay Guardian in their annual awards honouring local artists. Chin was on the 1995 and 1996 San Francisco National Poetry Slam teams.
Chin will be interviewed by show host Daniel C. Tsang. Listeners can call (949) 824-5824 to chat with Chin during the show, or send us comments or questions via e-mail to subversity@kuci.org.

The Real Lillian Baker: Historical Revisionism in Our Times

From the Tsang Archives, a 1996 article:

MEDIA WATCH

"I HOPE SHE DIES A SLOW DEATH," Chicago Shimpo newspaper English-language editor Arthur Morimitsu told the Chicago Tribune three years before her death. He was referring to revisionist writer Lillian Baker, who died in Gardena on October 21, 1996 of natural causes at age 75.

Baker was the nemesis of Japanese Americans everywhere, a purveyor through her Orange County foundation of misinformation about the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. But you would have thought she was a great American from the laudatory obituary the Orange County edition of the Los Angeles Times ran October 29, 1996.


My original article appeared in OC Weekly 29 November-5 December 1996, pages 9-10

Here's our correction:

Baker founded the now-defunct, Anaheim-based Americans for Historical Accuracy (AFHA), a group that, not unlike the O.C.based Institute for Historical Review (the Holocaust-is-myth folks), argues that what the history books tell us about the U.S.' treatment of Japanese Americans during World War II is a lie. AFHA, founded by Baker in 1972 in Lawndale, became a "public benefit" California corporation in 1992 in Anaheim, but it lost its corporate status on Oct. 3, 1994, when it was suspended by the Franchise Tax Board. The most likely reason, according to a source at the California secretary of state's office, was failure to pay corporate taxes.

In the last two decades of her life, Baker became the darling of the Right, campaigning (without success) against congressional legislation to pay reparations to the 60,000 surviving Japanese Americans rounded up by the U.S. in World War II. In her four books, she touted her revisionist thesis: that the internees owed allegiance to Japan's emperor, that military necessity justified the "relocations," that internment was constitutional, and that Japanese American camps like California's Manzanar were not concentration camps. The barbed wire was there to keep cattle out, not to keep people in, she insisted, arguing that there were no machine guns in guard towers. Internees, park historians and photos say there were; Baker insisted that the photos had been doctored  and the internees and park historians had lied to advance the cause of Japanese American internees.

Baker aroused emotions wherever she spoke. When she testified in August 1981 against reparations before the U.S. Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians in Los Angeles, more than 200 Japanese Americans walked out in silent protest of her "hysterical diatribes against evacuees,"according to an account in the Santa Ana Wind, the newsletter of the Orange County Japanese Americans Citizens League. That same article noted that the next day, "Baker was ejected from the hearing room by the state police for attempting to snatch written testimony from James Kawanami, president of the Southern California 100th/442nd Veterans Association, while he was giving his testimony." The 442nd, composed entirely of Japanese Americans freed from the camps, was one of the most decorated U.S. units in World War II.

But right-wing groups embraced Baker's cause. The Valley Forge, Pennsylvania-based Freedoms Foundation awarded her a certificate for "promoting a better understanding of America and Americans." The Stanford-based conservative think tank Hoover Institution started a Lillian Baker collection (The Lillian Baker Papers now comprise some 113 boxes of her "research" materials) and paid for the National Archives photographs used in one of her books.

Those books, published by an obscure press in Medford, Oregon, Webb Research Group, included Dishonoring America: The Falsification of World War II History (a 1994 revision of her 1988 work). The publisher's introduction to that book claims that another Baker compilation, American and Japanese Relocation in World War II: Fact, Fiction & Fallacy, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1990. The tome, which was actually nominated in 1991 by the Freedoms Foundation, never received any awards.

In Baker's case, it's pretty safe to judge her books by their covers. Her first was 1983's The Concentration Camp Conspiracy: A Second Pearl Harbor, her last, The Japanning of America: Redress & Reparations Demands by Japanese Americans (l991). "Japanning," according to the publisher, refers to the covering up of historical fact and the "blackening of America's honor by persons of Japanese ancestry in the USA. "Baker gave copies of three of her books to the Anaheim Public Library, including one signed, "Compliments of Lillian Baker in the interest of historical accuracy." But her supporters, mistakenly thinking the books would not be circulated, staged a small demonstration (replete with picket signs) outside the library in December 1991. Jane Newell, the library's local-history curator, said the books are shelved in the local-history reading room because they are "revisionist history not based on fact" and thus more appropriate for a special
collection. Only one person (besides me) has asked to see them since Baker died, Newell said.

Baker's revisionist L.A. Times obituary was penned by staffer Myrna Oliver, who cited-without qualification-Baker's view that Japanese-Americans were "voluntary guests" free to leave the camps as soon as they proved their loyalty. Oliver wrote that Baker believed the internees "benefited from the education and free food they received at Manzanar." Baker continued to wage unsuccessful battles against Manzanar being designated a national historical site until her death.

Oliver's apologist obituary even invited readers to send donations to the Lillian Baker Memorial Fund for scholarships for history srudents. But the post-office box the Times listed is not registered to AFHA. An Anaheim Hills postal employee who manages box rentals said that the box has been rented since 1985 by H .D. Garber and his family members. That would be Howard D. Garber, a retired Anaheim Hills optometrist, Baker clone and a one-time controversial KUCI talk host. Garber used the same box in his campaign literature to raise money for his unsuccessful 1992 Assembly campaign. Garber also uses it for the plethora of other front groups he heads, including the anti-ACLU American Civil Responsibilities Union, the California Coalition for Capital Punishment and Advocates of Penal Euthanasia. Garber, AFHA's registered agent according to records on file with the secretary of state's
office, admitted that its corporate status had been suspended but said he couldn't tell us why. He would only say that they'd never had secretarial help with the paperwork. He also said Republican politico Gil Ferguson (a fellow AFHA board member) is "leading the effort" to decide what to do with the donations.

"Since the L.A. Times article,  I've received various checks," Garber added, saying that they will probably be used for a bronze plaque and an annual scholarship for students doing historical research into "inaccuracies" about the "relocation" camps. Garber did not recognize my voice or name in 1996; nor did he remember challenging me months earlier to a debate on World War II after calling me a liar for describing the internment camps as "concentration camps." When we talked, he questioned my ethnicity again {for the record, I'm Chinese American) and inquired why I wasn't concerned about the Nanking massacre of Chinese by Japanese troops in 1937. He also said that his group is planning to sue some Japanese Americans (whom he wouldn't name) for linking Baker and AFHA with the Institute for Historical Review. He added that, as a Jew, he had fled the smokestacks of Europe. "Do you know what  smokestacks are?" he asked. "Those were the real concentration camps."

 - Daniel C. Tsang.

_________________

Revised  and hyperlinks added 21 July 2014 for this blog from the original article, "The Real Lillian Baker" that appeared in the OC Weekly 29 November- 9 December 1996, pages 9-10.  OC Weekly editor Will Swaim had commissioned that article, and as I recall it was my first for the publication.

See also: Robert Ito, "Summer Camp or Concentration Camp: A New Generation of Revisionists Tries to Put a Happy Face on the Japanese American Relocation Camps," Mother Jones, 15 September 1998.

Remembering Cataloger Lowell Herbrandson

[Update 23 April 2014:  There will not be any public services; cremation is private, pending completion of an autopsy by the Orange County Coroner.  The  Herbrandson family feels it is somehow fitting that Lowell's last hours were spent at UC Irvine, where he had many friends and colleagues.  A family member was notified by the police the day after his heart attack and contacted Hoag.  He also was able to retrieve Lowell's car from the UCI Student Center parking structure (although later he received in the mail a parking ticket for Lowell's car - which he has appealed).  In addition, a Humanities administrator passes on the information that a Humanities staff member - who wishes to remain anonymous - valiantly tried (in vain) to revive Lowell before the arrival of the EMT crew, by giving him CPR.  See also the comments field for further information on Lowell's last day.]

It is with great sadness I share news of the passing of Lowell D. Herbrandson, who worked at UCI Libraries from 1985-2004, last Friday afternoon, 4 April 2014.   Lowell succumbed to a massive heart attack on Ring Road near Humanities at UC Irvine and, despite the valiant efforts of the EMT crew and the medical staff, remained unconscious, even after being transported to Hoag Hospital, Irvine.  His passing was confirmed this morning by the Orange County Coroner's office.

Lowell enjoying Chinese cuisine, May 2013. 

Photo © Daniel C. Tsang

Lowell, 67, was on one of his periodic visits to the campus from his home in Lawndale - anticipating having lunch with a former colleague in the Catalog department, and then dinner with other former colleagues  He had emailed me last week to say he also had library books to return.  When he collapsed, he had the books with him, walking on the outer ring circling the campus, and headed toward Langson Library from Ayala Science Library.

Lowell served UCI a serials cataloger and union representative.  He had arrived at UC Irvine a year before I did, so our friendship lasted almost 30 years.  After retiring, he also did a stint as Acting Assistant Librarian at the Museum of Natural History in Los Angeles.  An Anglophile, he also was deeply engaged in his passion in researching things British, including heraldry.   In September, 2011 he also finished compiling a list he had started in 1975 of Los Angeles County place names.  The document spanned over 3,000 pages of annotations.  [Description updated.]

He was proud of his days at UC Irvine Libraries.   His recent emails had below his name "Lowell":

"UCI (1985-2004)
10 yrs of retirement on 11 June 2014"


Two days before his passing, he had this below his signature line:

"2004-2014, UCI Retirement on 11 June, my birthday."

Right before his retirement in 2004, he sent out an email to his UCI Libraries co-workers, noting in part: "I have a particular fondness for my early years from 1985 to 1994, the "Boyer Years", before we moved into the Science Library in June 1994. It was another time, and another place that will not be forgotten by those of us..."  Calvin Boyer was during that early period the Library Director.


His commentary in his personal emails to me on current events were often short but pithy.

In his 2 April 2014 email: "Did you feel the Quake? We are on the Inglewood-Newport Fault here, and the house had a jolly shake. The rain has been nice too, but not the cold winds."

In a May Day 2008 email, he wrote:

"A Happy May Day to you both. In Elementary School in the early 1950's we still honoured May Day." Note the British spelling.

 Later that year, after the financial collapse, he emailed :

"Is it not wonderful that we have our retirement $$$  in 403b's, IRA's, mutual funds and individuals stocks in the STOCK MARKET? Let's see there was 1987, 2001, and now  2008. It would seem that except for the monthly UC retirement check, and the current check from the museum that things could look a lot worse real soon. I wonder about all of the UCI retirees that took their lump sum bye outs?  The market giveth, and the market taketh away!!"

A registered Republican, he often was more liberal than his party.  In the same email (15 September 2008) he also noted sardonically:

"Saint Palin has boosted the extreme base so the polls are now  tighter than a few weeks ago. The race is closer, but the margin of error is still pro-Obama based on some current polling. Some are saying that the increased  Palin interest  may be just a  bump? Some are also suggesting the increased voting registration numbers could or  should push the Dem's over the top? Can they blame the Stock Market Crash on the Dem's is really lame, so what is new."


He ended his email commentary: "I wonder how long it will take before the market will head back over 12,000 again?"

Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 16,437.18.

He was looking forward to eating out last Friday evening.  In various emails, he deplored the lack of good Chinese restaurants in his neighborhood in Lawndale.  For example, in the May Day 2008 email, he was already noting: "I really miss our Friday evening meals, and your good company. The best Asian food around here is the Panda Express which is about 0.25 mile away." Just 8 days ago, he wrote: "It would be good to see you again, and 'to break bread together'."

When Eddie (another retired colleague) and I went out eating with him, he was forever the gentleman, solicitous towards Eddie (whom he referred to as "Herr Doktor"), making sure Eddie got portions before he did.  A typical after-dinner excursion was to a mall - where during the holiday season, I recall teenagers running by him and yelling "Hi, Santa" - with his white beard and Norwegian stock and jovial personality - Lowell undoubtedly looked like Santa Claus.  Eddie would tell the teens: "He really is Santa Claus" because he fit Santa to a T.

His mind was always thinking of ways to improve library services.  Noting he had to come in to renew his retiree library card by 14 June, 2014, he had what turned out to be a final plea in his 2 April 2014 email: "I wish that I could do this online via a secured line?"

Services have not been announced.   -- Daniel C. Tsang.

Remembering Joan Wang

Update 9/26/2012: A Powerpoint look back at Prof. Wang's life, shown at the memorial service in Tapei, is available for download. Also, NTNU colleague Prof. Joan Chang's account of Prof. Wang's last moments is posted on the NTNU history department memorial page.

Revised 8/28/12; see also obituary update below...

Historian Joan S.H. Wang [王秀惠 or Wang Shiow-Huey], who was suddenly stricken ill and collapsed 18 August 2012 while at an international conference in Manila, and passed away the next day, was a renowned Taiwan scholar of Chinese overseas. She was 52.

Just this past February, she had co-led a delegation visiting UC Irvine and other universities with ethnic studies collections, but I was tied up with a data curation workshop and missed their visit.

Joan Wang listens attentively at UCI Libraries' Southeast Asian Archive, February 2012. Photo credit: Eric Chang.

I was lucky enough to visit Taipei in late March this year, and honored to be invited by Joan's colleague in Chinese overseas studies, Edwin Yang, to speak on ethnic Chinese in Vietnam as portrayed in Hong Kong films, before a graduate seminar at their institution, National Taiwan Normal University. After the class, we all gathered at a nearby Japanese restaurant, where Prof. Wang joined us.

Joan in 1996 completed her graduate work in history at Carnegie Mellon with a dissertation, " 'No Tickee, No Shirtee': Chinese Laundries in the Social Context of the Eastern United States, 1882-1943."

Her published articles in English include:

"Race, Gender, and Laundry Work: The Roles of Chinese Laundrymen and American Women in the United States, 1850-1950," Journal of American Ethnic History, 24/1 (Fall, 2004), 58-99.

and:

"The Double Burdens of Immigrant Nationalism: The Relationship between Chinese and Japanese in the American West, 1880s-1920s," Journal of American Ethnic History (Winter 2008) 27/2, 228-58.

Joan Wang (center) flanked by NTNU colleague Edwin Yang and myself,
at Japanese restaurant, Taipei, March 2012.

After my trip, Joan and I managed to exchange some emails on her research, with her expressing thanks for locating "rich" materials for her research. She asked me: "Please keep an eye for me". At her death she was engaged in researching a timely topic, the disputed Tiaoyutai (Senkaku) Islands. Her specific focus was Chinese students in America and their past activism over the issue. She was looking forward to coming to California to delve into the research materials on the Tiaoyutai student movement but alas, this work will have to be taken on by others.

Web tributes are beginning to appear online. A Malaysian scholar pens this online tribute in Chinese.

I am sad I will not be able to see her again. Services take place Saturday, 1 September 2012, at 2-4 pm at Taipei Second Funeral Parlor [台北市立第二殯儀館]. - Daniel C. Tsang.

---

Update:
Obituary from the International Society
for the Study of Chinese Overseas

Announcement From: PROF. LEO SURYADINATA, ISSCO President

It is with great sadness and profound regret that we announce the sudden demise of our colleague Dr. Joan Wang （王秀惠）, Professor of History at the Taiwan Normal University on August 18, 2012. She was just 52 years old (1960-2012). She finished delivering a paper at the recent conference on “Chinese-language education and teaching in a Globalizing Southeast Asia” jointly convened by the Confucius Institute of Ateneo de Manila University and ISSCO. After the lively open forum where she animatedly answered the questions, people went up to her to shake her hands, but she couldn’t stand up and eventually collapsed. She was then rushed to the hospital but unfortunately passed away the next day despite desperate attempts to save her, putting her on life support. She is survived by her husband, Dr. Wu Chi-Sheng, a professor in Chemical Engineering at the National Taiwan University and daughters Emily and Kimberly.

Prof. Wang had attended almost all of our ISSCO conferences. She was very conscientious in all her work. We have certainly lost a very dedicated and fine scholar on Chinese overseas. Let us all pray for her eternal peace and strength for the family she left behind.

A memorial ceremony of Prof Joan Wang Shiow-Huey, initiated by the family and National Taiwan Normal University, will take place at 2-4pm on Saturday, Sept. 1st in the Taipei city 2nd funeral house. We hope our ISSCO members in Taipei will attend the ceremony on ISSCO’s behalf.

ISSCO members who knew her and wish to write tributes or expression of sympathy can send them to isscosecretariat@gmail.com by August 31 and we will collect them before forwarding to her family prior to the memorial service.

Dr. Joan Wang Shiow-Huey was born in Taiwan, on August 30, 1962. Her research interests include history of Chinese Overseas, gender, and Chinese education, on which she published two scholarly books, numerous journal articles and book chapters, while presenting her work in many countries.

In Memoriam: Judith Ladinsky, True Friend of Vietnam

Prof. Ladinsky, left, receives health award from Vietnam in 2004.

A true friend of Vietnam has died.

Judith L. Ladinsky, a humanitarian and population health sciences professor from the University of Wisconsin, who devoted her life to improving the health of the Vietnamese people, died 12 January 2012 at the age of 73 in Madison, Wisconsin.

In 1984, Ladinsky had succeeded as head of the Committee for Scientific Cooperation with Viet Nam [Uỷ bạn Hợp tác Khoa học Mỹ-Việt](USCSC),another humanitarian who devoted his life to Vietnam, Ed Cooperman (Prof of Physics Emeritus at Cal State Fullerton), who was assassinated in his Orange County, California, office in 1984 (about which more in a later blog).

A cultural profile site still lists her contact information and describes the committee as follows: "Composed of scientists, physicians and scholars from across the USA, the US Committee for Scientific Co-operation with Việt Nam (USCSC) seeks to alleviate the academic isolation suffered by the people of Việt Nam by working with their counterparts at Vietnamese institutions, hospitals and universities on joint training and research programmes and projects that empower people to pursue their own development. In the cultural field the Committee sponsors tours by Vietnamese performing artists, Vietnamese film festivals and exhibitions of work by Vietnamese artists in the USA."

Her obituary is here.

The U.S. Government has officially mourned her passing as a "great loss to both countries": U.S. Embassy, Hanoi statement. In Washington, Vietnam's Ambassador Nguyen Quoc Cuong also lauded Ladinsky as a person who "devoted her life-long passion and energy to the cause of improving the medical education and health of many people in Vietnam": Vietnam Embassy, Wash. D.C. statement.

In Little Saigon, news of her death has been covered in the English-language Nguoi Viet 2.

Here's the eulogy prepared to be read by Vietnam's Minister of Science and Technology , courtesy of Vern Weitzel, who chairs the Australian Committee for Scientific Cooperation with Viet Nam.

SPEECH IN MEMORY OF PROFESSOR JUDITH L. LADINSKY

Read by Minister Nguyen Quan at the Memorial Service held in honor of Professor Judith L. Ladinsky on January 17, 2012, at the Ministry of Science and Technology

Ladies and Gentlemen, (if the U.S. Ambassador is attending, address him first)

We are deeply saddened by the death of Professor Judith Ladinsky – a beloved friend of the Vietnamese people. She passed away Thursday, January 12, 2012, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Hospital, after more than 30 years helping to improve Vietnamese people’s lives by providing asssistance in the fields of education, health, and science and technology. Her assistance was of great value to Vietnam, especially during the post-war period, when Vietnam was facing many hardships and difficulties.

Today we gather here to remember Professor Ladinsky and honor her contributions to Vietnam’s science and technology, education, and health sectors, as well as to the relationship between Vietnam and the United States.

Professor Ladinsky was born on June 16, 1938, in Los Angeles, California. She grew up in New York City and received degrees from the University of Michigan and a PhD from the University of Wisconsin. She was a professor in the Department of Population Health Sciences in the UW Medical School for over 30 years and was the Director of the Office of International Health. She held affiliation with the Center for Southeast Asian Studies. In the early 1970s, she changed her career focus to preventive medicine on a community level linking rural clinics to centralized specialty care. She began this work in rural Wisconsin, progressing to the Indian Health Service, and finally to Southesast Asia, particulary Vietnam.

Professor Ladinsky made the first trip to Vietnam in 1978, when Vietnam and the U.S. did not have diplomatic relations. “She developed an instant passion for the nation and its people” - said by her colleagues. In 1980, she became the Chair of the Health Committee of the U.S. Committee for Scientific Cooperation with Vietnam at the invitation of the then Chair, Dr. Edward Cooperman. In 1984, after Dr. Cooperman was murdered, she assumed Dr. Cooperman’s chairmanship and was determined to continue his work in Vietnam.

Until she died, she had made about 106 trips to Vietnam during which she delivered tons of medical supplies, books and journals to medical trainees and professionals throughout Vietnam. She also managed to mobilize millions of dollars to her humanitarian work and research in Vietnam. She paid special attention to rural health and the issue of shortage of doctors and nurses in Vietnam’s rural areas. Therefore, she assisted with lab development, training of scientific technicians and surgeons, teaching in a wide range of disciplines alongside her village health work.

She conducted extensive research and developed projects on a variety of health care topics in Vietnam, such as rural health, primary care, surgery, nutrition, HIV/AIDs and cancer treatment, and most recently on malaria, diabetes and Japanese encephalitis. She organized TOEFL tests twice a year for Vietnamese students and helped obtain scholarships for hundreds of Vietnamese students, researchers, and government officers to study and carry out research at U.S. universities. She also facilitated the treatment of numerous critically ill Vietnamese children at U.S. medical centers, enabling their receipt of life saving therapies not available in their homeland.

It’s hard to list all the difficulties she encountered during all these years, especially when Vietnam was still under U.S. embargo and later when she aged and became weaker; however, with her her great love for Vietnam, she managed to do so many meaningful things as mentioned that Vietnamese people would never forget. Professor Ladinsky was not only a respectable scientist and colleague of ours, a kind American with a goodwill towards Vietnam, but for many Vietnamese people, she was the one to whom they would be forever grateful for how she changed their lives for the better.

For her undaunted efforts and extraordinary medical service to Vietnam, she was honored by various ministries and organizations both in Vietnam and in the U.S.

She was awarded 5 medals by leaders of the Vietnamese State, ministries and organizations, including the Friendship Medal by President Tran Duc Luong in 1999, the Medal for the Cause of Education by the Ministry of Education and Training in 2001, the Medal for Dedication to the health of the people by the Ministry of Health in 2004, the Medal for the Cause of Vietnamese Women Liberation by Vietnam Women’s Union, and the Medal for the Cause of Science and Technology by the Ministry of Science and Technology in 2007, recognizing her contributions to Vietnam-U.S. science and technology cooperation over 30 years.

Most recently, in 2011, she received the prestigious 2011 Peacemaker of the Year Award from the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice for her long-term dedication to the cause of improving people’s health in Vietnam.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Not many people make great contributions that are remembered and appreciated even after they die. Only a few great people continue to live after death in people’s memory. For Vietnamese people, Professor Ladinsky is one of those. Many Vietnamese people love her and call her lovingly “Madame Vietnam”. She was considered a U.S. unofficial diplomat to Vietnam, and even was mentioned by the first U.S. Ambassador to the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Pete Peterson, as Vietnam’s real “first ambassador”.

Now Professor Ladinsky is gone forever but we will never forget her. May she rest in peace!

Once again, on behalf of Vietnam’s science and technology community, I would like to share the great sadness for the loss of Professor Ladinsky’s family, friends and colleagues.

May I please request that we spend one miniute of silence to remember our beloved friend and colleague, Professor Ladinsky.

(1 minute of silence)

Thank you very much for your participation in this ceremony.