How she built this: sophomore Taliyah Huang invents a Taiwanese-English translation tool to bridge language gaps

Taiwanese American Taliyah Huang is an engineering student who has built a suite of programs, including BobaWay, a web-based Taiwanese translator. We were excited to interview her about the project and her broader passions.  Hi Taliyah! Can you tell us a little bit more about yourself?  My name is Taliyah Huang, and I am a sophomore student studying biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. My parents immigrated from Taiwan, but I was born and raised in…

From Ilha Formosa to Passport to Taiwan: Comparing the 2006 and 2018 Taiwanese Tourism Bureau Campaigns

Editor’s Note: There are so many ways to advocate for Taiwan: on the streets with Keep Taiwan Free, in DC with organizations like the Formosan Association for Public Affairs, and, like Washington University in St. Louis freshman Vivienne Chang shows, in the classroom by incorporating thoughtful research and analysis on Taiwan into open-topic schoolwork. We were so moved by her decision to, in her words, “write every optional paper I get for each class about something that is related to Taiwan.”…

Students: Apply by January 31 for the OFTaiwan Award

LAST UPDATED: JANUARY 12, 2020 The OFTaiwan Award, co-sponsored by TaiwaneseAmerican.org and the Intercollegiate Taiwanese American Student Association (ITASA) awards student organizations that host programming about Taiwanese heritage, culture, and identity. Recipient organizations will be selected based on their events’ and program’s impact, content, and engagement with attendees.  All high school and college student organizations planning events and programs about Taiwan or Taiwanese…

ITASA 2019 National Conference

The ITASA National Conference will be held at the University of Pennsylvania from Thursday, February 14 to Sunday, February 17.  Our theme this year is "Me and Ama: Weaving together stories of our past with memories of our future". Through Me and Ama, we hope to create a space for intimate dialogues and communal growth around Taiwanese American identity. We aim to begin answering the questions: What does it mean to belong to Taiwanese America? What are our family stories? What are the questions,…

Taiwan Documentary Screening with NATSA in NorCal

Film Director: Alder Yang, Founder of Awakening Lab in Taiwan Moderator: Ruo-Fan Liu, University of Wisconsin-Madison Moderator: Yu-Hui Chang, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities People always believe that pursuing academic achievement will ensure them to get higher degrees and stable jobs. In Taiwan, this conventional belief is tied with an imperial examination system which intensifies the pressure for students to learn. However, will students be able to remember their passion of learning and…

Midnight Carnival: A Film Project by Chung Wei Huang

TaiwaneseAmerican.org's Monica Chenglo chats with Chung Wei Huang, the director of Midnight Carnival, a new film project in the works. Her Kickstarter video caught our attention because of the sample film footage with a captivating storyline involving a Taiwanese girl who runs away from Taiwan and finds work at a carnival. Based off her personal life experience, the script reveals a flavor for what it’s like to chase after an “American Dream” from a youthful perspective. Above all, the…

Survey on Culture and Identity for Asian American High School Students

Are you a high school aged student or a parent of one? Are you interested in the Asian American experience and how it affects perceptions of identity? Read on to see how you can help and be rewarded with a $10 gift card! HELLO! My Name is Wells Ling, and I am currently a graduate student at Saint Louis University working towards my doctorate in developmental psychology. As a second generation Taiwanese American growing up in the Midwest, I rarely wondered or truly appreciated my family’s…