Research & Reflections

fulbright Taiwan online journal

Research & Reflections

fulbright Taiwan online journal

Tag: English

Reflections: Track in Taipei

Taili Ni 倪泰麗 September 11, 2018

      My Fulbright experience in Taiwan has allowed me to pursue a master’s degree in International Studies and explore different facets of student life in Taipei. One of the ways I have involved myself in the campus community at National Chengchi University has been by joining the track team. Running was a critical part of my undergraduate experience in the U.S.; after seven years of track and cross-country throughout high school and college, I was not ready to give it up quite yet. Running track in Taiwan has been a very different experience than running track in the U.S. This was unexpected, since I figured that running in circles and making left turns was pretty intuitive and would be exactly the same regardless of geography. I did not anticipate how different the sport, and my experience in it, would be here, and it has surprised me many times throughout this 2017-18 school year.      Transitioning to life in Taipei has been easy for me. From the very beginning I felt quite at home in this friendly city with its many stunning views, delicious food and lovable stray dogs. Even though the past nine months have been filled

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Bringing a Piece of Kentucky to the Taiwanese Classroom

Alexandra Hezik 賀琳 August 22, 2018

     For the 2017-18 academic year, my alma mater, Western Kentucky University (WKU), hosted a Taiwanese Foreign Language Teaching Assistant (FLTA) to help tutor students currently studying Mandarin Chinese in the university’s Chinese Flagship Program. As a recent graduate of that program, I thought it was an interesting coincidence that the two of us essentially switched places—she went to WKU and I came to Taipei. The FLTA was named Pia Lin. She also happened to be the co-founder of The World In Your Classroom (TWIYC), a non-profit organization that provides foreigners living in or visiting Taiwan the opportunity to share information about their home country with Taiwanese students by guest lecturing at local middle and high schools.      Around March, Pia contacted me to ask if I would be interested in volunteering as a guest lecturer for TWIYC. After reading about TWIYC and their work, I figured this would be a great opportunity to share a piece of my home, the great Commonwealth of Kentucky—a place most Taiwanese people know very little about, compared to U.S. cities like New York and Los Angeles—with students.      On April 28th, I attended the second of two training days held

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From Pennsylvania to Taiwan: Reflections on Fulbright International Education Administrators Seminar

Kati Csoman August 22, 2018

Professional Development      My participation in the Fulbright International Education Administrators Seminar in Taiwan in March 2017 broadened my professional experience in East Asia, which was previously limited to organizing site visits to Japan (2007) and China (2016). The Fulbright experience helped me contextualize a deepening engagement with partnerships in Taiwan and explore new opportunities for both student exchange and faculty collaboration.      The Fulbright Taiwan IEA seminar provided me with an in-depth professional and intercultural learning experience quite different from the experiences I have had leading site visits or student groups. I was able to focus on my own learning and experience for a substantial period of time rather than being responsible for the organization and logistics for a group. As an academic administrator, the daily demands of my position’s responsibilities and the constraints of the academic calendar do not allow for intensive and extended experiences abroad.      From lectures and cultural visits to direct access to officials in the American Institute in Taiwan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Education and even the President of Taiwan, the overall structure of the Fulbright Taiwan IEA seminar provided invaluable information about the politics, economics, and culture

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Chinese Energy Security and the South China Sea

Kaiwen Lin 林凱文 August 2, 2018

     Oil has been a critical national resource since the early 20th century, when the British Empire began using oil to power its ships, and Parliament voted to acquire a majority stake in a Persian oil firm in order to ensure that it would be able to maintain access to oil for the Royal Navy.[1] With the development of the oil-powered airplane and tank, oil became even more important to strategic planning, and many nations created their own state-owned oil companies to ensure continued access to foreign oil. After the close of the Second World War, it was discovered that the Middle East had large reserves of easily-tapped oil. Not coincidentally, this was when the United States first established a foothold in the region, promising “U.S. military aid to any state in the region that came under attack from Soviet or Soviet-backed forces.”[2] The West’s dependence on Middle Eastern oil was revealed in 1973, when the Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries (OPEC) cut off all petroleum exports to the United States and decreased its exports to other countries in response to American support for Israel in the 1973 Yom Kippur War.[3] Defense correspondent Michael T. Klare writes that from that

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Inside Taiwan’s Sunflower Movement

Ian Rowen 伊恩 August 2, 2018

“Say goodbye to Taiwan,” wrote political scientist John Mearsheimer in a widely read article in the March-April 2014 issue of The National Interest.1 Threatened by China’s rising economic might and abandoned by a weakening United States, one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies was facing, in his “realist” analysis, an almost inevitable annexation via economic if not military force. “Time,” he wrote, “is running out for the little island coveted by its gigantic, growing neighbor.” But only days after publication, on March 18, activists and armchair analysts alike said hello to a new reality. That evening, the assembly hall of Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan was stormed by a motley crew led by students from the “Black Island Nation Youth,” a loosely organized student political action committee formed the previous year. The several hundred occupiers repelled police efforts to eject them, escorted out the few officers on duty, and barricaded the doors with seats tied together with rope. None of them expected that the occupation, later known as the 318 or Sunflower Movement, would last twenty-four days, spawn the biggest pro-democracy protest rally in the island’s history, reframe popular discourse about Taiwan’s political and social trajectory, precipitate the midterm electoral defeat of the ruling party,

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One Belt One Road and China’s Energy Security

Kaiwen Lin 林凱文 August 2, 2018

     The Belt and Road Initiative, initially known as One Belt One Road, is China’s latest national development strategy, which aims to: Promote the connectivity of Asian, European and African continents and their adjacent seas, establish and strengthen partnerships among the countries along the Belt and Road, set up all-dimensional, multi-tiered and composite connectivity networks, and realize diversified, independent, balanced and sustainable development in these countries.[1] The initiative is composed of six sections: the Eurasian Land Bridge, the China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor, the China-Central Asia-West Asia Economic Corridor, the China-Indochina Peninsula Economic Corridor, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, and the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar Economic Corridor.      The “Cooperation Priorities” put forth in the 2015 “Visions and Actions” plan are: policy coordination, facilities connectivity, unimpeded trade, financial integration, and people-to-people bond.[2] The relationship between One Belt One Road and China’s energy policy first becomes apparent through these priorities. Under “facilities connectivity”, the plan states that “[w]e should promote cooperation in the connectivity of energy infrastructure, work in concert to ensure the security of oil and gas pipelines and other transport routes…”[3] In the next section titled “unimpeded trade”, the plan also encourages: “[C]ooperation in the exploration and development of coal, oil, gas, metal

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From Raleigh to Taipei: Insights Gained Abroad

Amanda Frederick August 2, 2018

     Having been an international educator for more than ten years, my entire career has been focused on supporting and enhancing internationalization efforts at various institutions.  Several years ago, I attended a session on the Fulbright International Education Administrators (IEA) seminars at a NAFSA conference. In this session, attendees mentioned the invaluable opportunity they had to participate in the Germany seminar.  Little did I know that I, too, would be afforded such an opportunity of tremendous personal and professional value. Senator J. William Fulbright had a vision to make the world a more peaceful and friendly place through his programs. I believe the Fulbright IEA seminar is a prime example how we, as international educators, can help bring “a little more knowledge, a little more reason, and a little more compassion into world affairs” through unwavering commitment to our work, institutions, faculty and students.      Upon learning that I had been accepted into the program, I was thrilled to make my second trip to Asia.  I first went to Asia a few years ago when I visited Florida Atlantic University’s exchange partner, Chulalongkorn University, in Bangkok, Thailand; it was a memorable, first-hand experience of an Asian culture that

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Fulbright Mission: MA Student Living in Tainan

Brittany Mayne 梅曼麗 July 30, 2018

     September 7, 2017, marked the day I first began my journey on my Fulbright grant in Taiwan. First and foremost, I wish to give thanks to all the Fulbright Taiwan staff and those who supported me throughout my first year here. The amount of effort and consideration you all put into the program created a safe and sound experience in my new host country. This unique opportunity granted me the opportunity to pursue my master’s degree and the chance to continue my studies in Mandarin Chinese. I cannot express how gratifying it has been living in Taiwan and learning from its residents and about their culture. With that said, I welcome everyone to read my journal and hope to inspire those who also wish to travel and open the world to future participants coming to Taiwan.   My Experience as a Master Student at NCKU      My first year at National Cheng Kung University: Institute of Creative Industries Design has been an enjoyable experience. At first, I was overwhelmed by this unfamiliar environment and the challenges that came with it. I had to absorb a unique educational environment, deal with new professors, and I also had to

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Zhongshan Road

John Gregory 葛約翰 July 30, 2018

       I arrived on the “beautiful island” with my wife, originally a native of Taiwan, and five children nearly ten months ago. That arrival was not unlike many of our arrivals over the last twenty years. But, although over the years we have also experienced many departures, this departure was unlike any in the past. Unlike other times, the children and I left this time less as foreigners. Rather than returning from a place we were merely visiting, we left a place we had lived. Indeed, during this time, we lived in Shulin District of New Taipei City. More importantly, we lived on Zhongshan Road, and what a road it is. In this essay, I use Zhongshan Road as a focal point to say a little bit about Taiwan’s history, its current society, and what it was like to live in such a place.        To understand that Zhongshan Road translates to Sun Yat-sen Road in English is to understand something essential about the recent history and ongoing question of identity in Taiwan. The name itself is both a relic of a bygone era and a symbol of a continuing journey. The three districts surrounding Shulin—Banqiao,

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Reflections, Refractions, and Reorientations: Conducting Ethnographic Research in Indigenous Taiwan

Chris Upton 歐啟祥 July 30, 2018

     I spent my Fulbright year engaged in ethnographic research on Taiwan’s indigenous communities and their practices, and the ways in which these practices are being addressed under Taiwan law. This year has been a year of returns for me. My family lived in southeastern Taiwan when I was young boy. At that time, the area in which we resided had a high concentration of indigenous peoples, and members of the Amis, Puyuma, and Paiwan tribes were some of our closest friends and neighbors. As a result, this year has been an opportunity for me to return to an island nation that has since transitioned from martial law to democracy; to reconnect with indigenous communities that were so much a part of my life as a youth; to revisit old memories and places; and to create new memories and visit new places, and experience all this newness through the eyes of my two young daughters who accompanied me on my Fulbright research project.      Over the past year, I worked closely with the Bunun, Puyuma, and Truku tribes, and with judges and lawyers involved in the Hualien District Court. I spent my time observing legal proceedings involving indigenous

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