By Niki Alsford and James Lin
The Pioneering Taiwan Studies Workshop, held at the University of Washington and co-organized with Niki Alsford from the University of Central Lancashire, brought together a distinguished cohort of early-generation Taiwan Studies scholars whose research has significantly shaped the field. The workshop provided a unique platform for reflecting on the transformative academic journeys of these pioneers and their foundational contributions to Taiwan Studies.
The workshop convened leading figures such as Hill Gates, Robert Weller, Stevan Harrell, Barbara Harrell, John Shepherd, and David K. Jordan. These scholars shared their personal narratives, fieldwork experiences, and reflections on Taiwan’s socio-political transformations from the 1950s onwards. Discussions touched on Taiwan’s distinctiveness within East Asian studies; themes of childhood, gender, family, kinship, identity, class, community, and religion; and Indigenous Taiwanese fieldwork and perspectives. The cross-disciplinary format enriched the discourse, drawing connections between anthropology, sociology, history, political economy, and political science.
One of the sessions was a talk by Jing Xu on her recently published book on children’s moral development in a 1950s Taiwanese village, drawing from historical field notes by Arthur and Margery Wolf. Xu discussed how children actively learn morality through family and community interactions, offering fresh perspectives on cultural and ethical growth.
Dominic Meng-Hsuan Yang led a discussion based on the publication of his co-edited oral history volume, Studying Taiwan before Taiwan Studies: American Anthropologists in Cold War Taiwan (Academia Sinica Institute of Taiwan History, 2024). Many of the workshop participants were interviewed for that volume. Barbara Harrell also discussed her memoir, The Anthropologist’s Wife: For Better or Worse in an Old Taiwan Village, providing a personal account of 1970s fieldwork in Sanxia (三峽), Taiwan, and fostering discussions on ethnographic methodologies.
Recognizing the importance of preserving these unique narratives, the conversations were professionally filmed and published on YouTube so that the insights and reflections of these pioneering scholars are accessible to a broader audience and future generations.