The Zoryan Institute was pleased to partner with the UCLA Asia Pacific Center and UC Berkeley Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies to host a webinar on the Chinese Diaspora: Challenges and Possibilities in a Time of Uncertainty.

Prompted by the release of The Chinese Diaspora: Its Development in Global Perspective, the first title in the Zoryan Institute’s brand new series, The Diaspora Collection, the webinar discussed themes such as as the recent upsurge in COVID-19 related racism directed against Chinese Canadians, increasing geopolitical tensions involving the Chinese-speaking world, the challenges that the US-China rivalry and geopolitical competition have created for diasporic Chinese communities.

What was presented: A discussion on contemporary issues facing the Chinese diaspora and a Q&A Session

• Professor Lok Siu: Introduction to The Chinese Diaspora: Its Development in Global Perspective, and a discussion of what it means to be diasporic Chinese today. A discussion about key issues confronting Chinese Americans and a consideration of their different responses in order to understand how the shifting geopolitics between China and the United States have affected sense of belonging, cultural affinities, and political positions among Chinese Americans.
• Professor Min Zhou: The challenges that the US-China rivalry and geopolitical competition have created for diasporic Chinese communities and impacts of immigrant integration in the US context, aside from the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Professor Chris Lee: A contextualization of the recent upsurge in COVID-19 related racism directed against Chinese Canadians in the context of increasing geopolitical tensions involving the Chinese-speaking world, as well as the ways in which the COVID-19 pandemic has starkly revealed deeply embedded forms of structural racism while prompting new emancipatory projects especially in localized contexts.