Date:
-
Location:
Pre-registration required: https://uky.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_iQW3GabIRZaWPpvt2rka4Q
Speaker(s) / Presenter(s):
Darren Byler, Nellie Chu, Yu Luo and Shui-yin Sharon Yam
Far from a monolithic population, the contemporary People’s Republic of China is host to a vast array of ethnic and linguistic minority cultures. Minority groups are found in China’s borderlands and recognized autonomous ethnic regions, but also in the factories, fields, mines, and other workplaces that symbolize China’s recent economic boom. This economic expansion is intertwined with migration: both internally within China’s borders, and drawing migrants from the Middle East, Africa, and Southeast Asia. According to official statistics, there were more than 245 million internal migrants in 2017, with thousands of foreign-born migrants now working in China as well. Few Americans are aware of the minority experiences embedded within China’s economic and political rise. This panel presentation brings together emerging scholars from a variety of disciplines who focus on migrant and minority groups in China. The panel’s featured speakers are Darren Byler, whose research focuses on Uyghur experiences in Chinese Central Asia; Nellie Chu, a scholar of Western African communities in involved in textile manufacturing in Guangzhou; Yu Luo, whose focus is on the branding and self-representation of the Buyi ethnic minority; and Shui-yin Sharon Yam, who has studied transnational subjects and domestic labor in Hong Kong. This panel is part of the University of Kentucky College of Arts & Sciences "Year of Cultures Without Borders," and is co-sponsored by the Passport to the World Program, the History Department, and the A&S Cooperative for the Humanities and Social Sciences.