Saturday, January 05, 2008

Linda Arrigo: Experiencing Taiwan Social History

Linda Arrigo graciously consented to let me put this presentation on my blog as JPGs. These are photos and slides from a presentation on cemetaries around her university in Taipei. The photos were taken by someone who accompanied Linda, not me.

The trip follows the windy road in the center of the picture.

The gatehouse on the left reminds that during the early KMT era, mountain areas were restricted, even the hills around Taipei.

As they went up the road, they saw this historic site.

Here, apparently, lies the tomb of Dr. Chiang Wei-shui, an early Taiwan autonomy activist who died in 1931 at the tender age of 40. According to George Kerr's book on the interwar home rule movement in Taiwan, during the 1920s Taiwanese in Tokyo organized the Home Rule Association,AKA the League for Local Autonomy, but the Japanese did not permit it to operate on Taiwan. As a result, Dr. Chiang (Japanese: Sho I-so), a medical doctor, established the Taiwan Bunka Kai, the Taiwan Culture Society, which preserved itself by calling for harmonious Japanese-Formosan relations, and acted as the local front for the Home Rule movement. In 1926 the movement was suppressed and broken up, with thousands of individuals dragooned into police stations and interrogated. Chiang called on young Formosans to leave Formosa, and many did. Some members of the Home Rule movement went to China and Russia and became Communist, like the famous Snow Red, Hsieh Hsueh-hung, who went to Moscow and studied there in 1926-27.

Chiang then led a group of moderates under the guidance of Lin Hsien-tang to establish the Peoples Party. They rewrote the platform until it met police approval, and called for peaceful change. Even that was too much,and the police broke up the first meeting. Chiang went on to organize labor unions and in 1928 brought them together to form the Taiwan Labor Federation. Strikes at Japanese factories began, countered by police state tactics. Chiang also made gestures to win KMT support for the cause, sending representatives to the placing of Sun Yat-sen's body in his mausoleum in 1929. Tragically, his career was cut short in 1931 by cancer. 10,000 people attended his hearse.

Chiang's tomb.

Chiang and his wife.

Those of you who live in this area might want to visit these fascinating tombs further up the road. They are graves of the island's Muslim community, almost all of whom are buried here, Linda told me.





Another interesting spot on the road is this small cemetery. Here lie the graves of some 100 individuals executed by the KMT. Among them is this grave, of the artist....

...who drew these famous woodcuts of 2-28. He was murdered by the government in 1952.

My Flickr account has all the slides up. Enjoy.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

WSEAS Conference on Taiwan
---------------------------

WSEAS headquarters in USA together with Professor Yiming Li in Taiwan are going to organise a conference
on INTERNET FRAUD DETECTION and NETWORK SCAM

Especially, we will focus on Junk
and Scams Against Businesses.

So, if some qualified person wants to help these efforts of WSEAS:
www.wseas.org
against the Internet Scam, Internet Fraud, Internet Junk and all the other relevant topics should send us an email: info@wseas.org
with WSEAS in the Subject
(this rule, i.e. the WSEAS on the Subject protect us from SPAM i.e. JUNK MAIL)


SPECIAL SESSION in this WSEAS
CONFERENCE
----------------------------
Individual consumers aren't the only victims of fraud. Businesses, from large corporations to small "Mom and Pop" stores, are targets for a variety of illegal schemes. No matter whether the con artist uses the mail, the telephone, or the Internet, the best defense against scams is to follow these basic rules:

* Do business with companies you know and trust. If you don't know them, check them out.
* Understand the offer. Get all the details and promises in writing.
* Check all bills and invoices carefully. It's hard to get your money back once you've paid it to a con artist.
* Guard your financial or other account information. Don't provide it to anyone unless there is a legitimate reason to do so as part of a transaction.
* Educate your employees about avoiding scams. Make sure they understand their roles and responsibilities.

You can help stop fraud by recognizing these common scams


BEST REGARDS

The WSEAS Organizing Committee
www.wseas.org

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