Talking Taiwan

Wan-jen Lin ( 林宛蓁 ) is an award-winning architect who has worked on Weiwuying ( 衛武營 ) National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts  along with her husband Ching-Mou Hou ( 侯慶謀 ) Together they formed studio HOU x LIN, an architecture and urban design firm, and some of the projects that they have worked on as studio HOU x LIN include the Echo Across the Harbor ( 大港迴聲 ) public art installation...

While Felicia was away attending the World Federation of Taiwanese Associations (WFTA) meeting, that was held in Helsinki, Finland this year, back in New York the annual UN for Taiwan Rally was taking place on Saturday, September 12 th . Kaju was there and he spoke with Dr. Dean Shih ( 史書華 ) who is now serving as President of TAIUNA, Taiwan United Nations Alliance. We met and interviewed Dr. Sh...

In July of 2025, we brought Talking Taiwan to the Taiwanese American Conference West Coast hosted in San Francisco/Silicon Valley, where we interviewed several of the conference's speakers. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/from-the-sunflower-to-the-bluebird-and-great-recall-movement-a-conversation-with-dr-dean-shih-%e5%8f%b2%e6%9b%b8%e8%8f%af-ep-363/ Dr. Dean Shih ( 史書華 ). Dr. Shih is a...

This year marks the 25th anniversary of 9/11. September 11, 2001 when four commercial passenger airplanes were hijacked by terrorists linked to the Islamic extremist group al Qaeda. Two of the planes struck the World Trade Center in New York City causing the twin towers to collapse and a third plane hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. The passengers and crew of t...

The last time that Taipei elected a mayor from the Democratic Progressive Party was Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) in 1994. At the time it seemed like some kind of a breakthrough because Taipei is known to be a Chinese Nationalist Kuomintang stronghold. During his tenure as mayor of Taipei, Chen Shui-bian had a very high public approval rating of over 70% to nearly 80%. In spite of this he was not reelec...

In July Puma Shen (沈伯洋) who's currently a Legislator in Taiwan's Legislative Yuan came to the U.S. for an eight-day trip. Puma is an Associate Professor at National Taipei University's Graduate School of Criminology, Co-Founder of Doublethink Lab, Co-Founder of Kuma Academy, and this year's Taipei City mayoral candidate for Democratic Progressive Party.   Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.co...

Earlier this year, in March we met and interviewed 13-year-old artist Ashton Yeh right before the opening of his debut exhibition in New York. Born in Taiwan Ashton moved to Japan to immerse himself in his passion for animation and Japanese Manga. He has already had successful solo shows in Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, and the Philippines. Ashton's artwork is a vibrant portal of monsters, pop-culture...

Vincent Hsu (徐崇育) is a Taiwanese bassist, composer and the leader of Vincent Hsu & Soy La Ley Afro-Cuban Jazz band. We sat down to speak a few days before his concert, Spirits from Both Sides. The concert was held on August 15th at Flushing Town Hall with Vincent and Arturo O'Farrill- a six-time GRAMMY Award winner and two-time Latin GRAMMY Award winner. Hsu planned to premiere a big-band arran...

We were invited to help out with book packing for an organization called Books for Taiwan, which was spearheaded by Amy Lin (賴淑娟). In July the Taiwanese Chamber of Commerce in New York gave Amy the Community Spirit Award and we are sharing her inspiring story in this episode. The concept behind Books for Taiwan, is pretty straightforward. They collect children's books and ship them to schools,...

This year Taiwanese Waves is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and will be back at SummerStage in New York City's Central Park's Rumsey Playfield on Sunday August 16th. Doors open at 5:00pm. When Taiwanese Waves debuted in 2016, it set an all-time record for the highest single-day attendance at SummerStage. And since then it's continued to introduce audiences to Taiwanese Music. This year...

While we were at last year's Taiwanese American Conference West Coast in July of 2025 which was hosted in San Francisco Silicon Valley, we sat down with Akio Yaita (矢板明夫), the keynote speaker of the conference. As a senior journalist at Sankei Shimbun Akio has covered Beijing and Taipei. He's been a strong advocate for Taiwan. In 2024 Akio obtained citizenship in Taiwan and founded the Indo-Pa...

The Taiwanese American Arts Council is celebrating its 10 th  anniversary and third year as an organization in residence on Governors Island. Island Reverence is the theme of this year's residency. I recently sat down to interview three of the artists in residence at TAAC's house 17 on Governors Island: Chia-Che Tsou, Dena Paige-Fischer, and Leon Chuang. Chia-Che has a fascinating story about how...

We were at the dress rehearsal of BIRDY, one Hung Dance's most critically acclaimed productions, which will be premiering in New York at NYU Skirball on July 17 & 18 th . BIRDY explores the relationship between freedom, limitation, and identity through a distinctive movement language inspired by Tai Chi, traditional Peking opera and contemporary dance. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/bird...

We sat down to speak with Claire Wang (王婉諭), chairwoman of the New Power Party, one of Taiwan political parties, that emerged from the Sunflower Movement. While she never imagined herself going into politics, personal circumstances changed that. She's a powerful example of transforming personal tragedy into action. Wang is a passionate advocate for progressive values and local democracy, from j...

Dr. Hsing-Huan Wang is Chairman of the Taiwan Statebuilding party. Last July we sat down to speak with him at TAC-WC, the Taiwanese American Conference West Coast hosted in San Francisco/Silicon Valley.  We talked about how he went from studying Buddhist philosophy and aspirations to pursue academic research as a professor, to accidentally becoming a politician. The Taiwan Statebuilding has a clea...

Happy Pride month! Cony Hsieh is President of the Kaohsiung Pride Parade Association. We recently spoke with Cony about her experience as a lesbian woman serving in Taiwan's military, and how she hopes her research on gender issues in the military can help push for reform in Taiwan's military. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/cony-hsieh-kaohsiung-pride-president-focuses-on-lgbtq-issues-and...

This year's Taiwan Pride Float at the New York City Pride March was inspired by Taiwan's Betel Nut Beauty culture. The concept and design was conceived by Nymphia Wind, who was already an established drag queen in Taiwan when she won RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 in 2024. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/nymphia-wind-brings-taiwans-betel-nut-beauty-culture-to-the-new-york-pride-march-ep-349...

Jotham Hung is a ceramic artist and educator based in Southern California reflecting on his early experiences with art. Late last year I sat down to speak with Jotham about his evolution and journey to becoming a full-time educator artist and he shared the dark moment that led to his creative process which has resulted in pieces that reflect the themes of deconstruction & reconstruction, damage &...

Late last year, I sat down to speak with John Enger Cheng about the early roots of his creativity in childhood, his creative process as an artist, what it means to him to be Taiwanese American and how that shows up in his art. We also talked about how he maintains a creative practice and believes that inspiration finds you working. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/john-enger-cheng-on-his-c...

We sat down to speak with George Yin, Board Chair of the Vincent Price Art Museum Foundation & Political Law Attorney about his interest in supporting the arts, why he thinks it's important to do so, and how so-called "non-artists" can support the arts and more specifically artists in their community. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/george-yin-arts-advocacy-can-be-a-lifelong-passion-tuf-p...

We stepped out in the drizzling rain for this year's Passport to Taiwan on Sunday, May 24th in New York City's Union Square Park, and were happy to see that the weather hadn't put much of a damper on the number people that came out for this annual tradition. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/passport-to-taiwan-2026-making-our-rounds-with-taiwanese-community-organizations-fapa-tccny-natma-ep...

In part two of our interview with Vickie Wang (王宇平), she talked about how the COVID lockdown of 2022 in Shanghai affected her mental health, her thoughts on the Great Recall movement in Taiwan last year, how she questions her Taiwanese-ness i.e. if she's Taiwanese enough, generative propaganda, and how she got into stand-up comedy. Vickie Wang a writer, interpreter, and stand-up comedian born a...

Vickie Wang (王宇平) is a writer, interpreter, and stand-up comedian born and raised in Taiwan. She's lived in Shanghai, China for nearly a decade, where she started doing stand-up comedy under censorship. Last year I sat down to interview Vickie. in part one of my interview with Vickie, we talked about the perceptions and attitudes that many Taiwanese have about the Chinese, and on the other end...

Every year we try to dedicate an episode of Talking Taiwan to 228, an important date in Taiwan's history, marking the 228 Massacre. 228 stands for February 28 1947. February 28th is now commemorated as a national holiday in Taiwan known as the 228 Peace Memorial Day. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/kita-foundation-mapping-the-path-of-the-trailblazers-that-paved-the-way-for-taiwans-democra...

Last July, we brought Talking Taiwan to the 2025 Taiwanese American Conference, West Coast. While we were there, I sat down to speak with Dr. Shih-Fen Chen (陳時奮), who's also been known by his pen name Wēngdáruì (翁達瑞). Dr. Chen is Professor Emeritus at Ivey Business School, and a Professor at Western Washington University. He's an outspoken political commentator, self-described as a scholar w...