In celebration of Alumni Weekend 2013, the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre will be hosting a program featuring UBC alumnus Dr. Laifong Leung who will talk about the Chinese community in Canada in the 20th century in “Chinese Canadian Stories: From Early Literature to Modern Archives.” Having completed extensive research to reconstruct the much neglected literary contributions of the immigrants from Guangdong province in China to the body of Chinese Canadian literature, professor Leung discusses groundbreaking research on the literary activities of the early Chinese immigrants in BC, examining the literary and cultural activities of the Cantonese speaking Chinese immigrants in B.C. from the Gold Rush era to the 1990s in order to present an accurate picture of Chinese community.
In examining the “wall poems” written by early Chinese in the detention center in Victoria, B.C, to the huge Collection of Poetry in 1957 by the Chinese Times newspaper, her talk explores the major characteristics of these poems and particularly the incorporation of images in order to show the transformation of Chinese classical poetry in the diaspora. As part of this program, tours of UBC’s cultural collections will complement this talk afterwards: (A) The Museum of Anthropology featuring the oral history lab and Cantonese Opera collection; and (B) The Chung Collection of early Chinese Canadian historical materials at UBC Rare Books & Special Collections.
Time/Location
Speaker Biographies
Dr. Laifong Leung taught Chinese literature, language, and calligraphy at the University of Alberta. Her publications include many books on classical Chinese poetry and post-Mao literature, and a Mandarin language textbook. Her current projects include developing the Chinese learning courseware Concise Interactive Chinese and working on a forthcoming co-authored book History of Literary Interactions between China and Canada. She is the co-founder and current Chair of the Chinese Canadian Writers Association and editor of the e-journal of the Canadian Teaching Chinese as a Second Language Association. A UBC alumnus, Laifong Leung completed her MA and PhD at the University of British Columbia in Asian Studies.
Sarah Romkey graduated from University of British Columbia’s joint Masters in Archival Studies and Masters in Library and Information Studies program in 2008. She has since that time worked in UBC Library’s Rare Books and Special Collections division initially as the Librarian and Archivist for the Chung Collection and since 2009 as the Rare Books and Special Collections Archivist. Sarah is responsible in this role for acquiring, providing access to and preserving the archives of individuals and organizations external to UBC
Allan Cho is Community Engagement Librarian at the University of British Columbia’s Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, where he is responsible for designing programs and services that support the broader community as well as variety of learners and instructors. Initiatives he is involved in include the Chinese Canadian Stories, working with twenty-seven communities across Canada, from Victoria, BC to St.John’s, Newfoundland in documenting and promoting the research of Chinese Canadian history.