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Kirsten Han’s ‘The Singapore That I Recognise’ Provides a Personal Account of Singaporean Activism Today

·December 2, 2023·2 min read

Kirsten Han’s The Singapore That I Recognise provides a glimpse of Singaporean civil society activism in recent years. The book stands out not only as a personal account of Han’s own journey as a journalist and activist, but also with regards to what it shows about Singapore today Read More

A Powerful Look at the Hopes, Fears, and Bravery of Hong Kong Demonstrators: A Review of “Among the Braves”

Books English

·November 21, 2023·2 min read

Among the Braves, by Shibani Mahtani and Timothy McLaughlin, is a gripping, powerful narrative of the events surrounding the 2019 Hong Kong protests Read More

“Dear Chrysanthemums” Offers a Humanistic Lens on Chinese History

Books English

·November 4, 2023·1 min read

Dear Chrysanthemums, by Fiona Sze-Lorrain, is a well-crafted set of stories set during various points in modern Chinese history Read More

Review: Social Forces in the Re-Making of Cross-Strait Relations

Books English

·October 22, 2023·2 min read

Andrew Beckershoff's Social Forces in the Re-Making of Cross-Strait Relations is a useful look at the backdrop of events that later led to the 2014 Sunflower Movement. Read More

Social Distancing 2.0: A Review of Hsin-Hui Lin’s Contactless Intimacy

Books English

·July 13, 2023·7 min read

Hsin-Hui Lin's Contactless Intimacy is a claustrophobic character study, a dazzling exercise in worldbuilding, and a chilling thought experiment: what would happen if artificial intelligence gained the power to dictate human intimacy? In a world where physical contact is prohibited, relationships are optimized by machines, and free will is exposed as fiction, what might become of individual agency? Read More

社交距離2.0——讀《零觸碰親密》

Books Chinese

·July 8, 2023·1 min read

林新惠的《零觸碰親密》是一部深入角色直至引發幽閉恐懼的作品。小說建構的世界令人讚歎不已，同時也是令人不寒而慄的思想實驗：如果有一天人工智能得以支配人類彼此的親密關係，會發生什麼？在一個身體接觸被明令禁止、人際關係被機械優化、自由意志近乎虛無的世界，個人的能動性將會發生什麼變化？ Read More

A Glimpse of Singapore from Afar: A Review of Eternal Summer of My Homeland

Books English

·June 14, 2023·1 min read

Agnes Chew's Eternal Summer of My Homeland, written about the author’s homeland of Singapore while living in Germany, is a capable collection of short stories. Consisting of eleven short stories, the collection is briskly paced given their length Read More

A Refreshing, Elucidating Take on Tsai Ming-liang’s Oeuvre

Books English

·January 18, 2023·3 min read

Cruisy, Sleepy, Melancholy: Sexual Disorientation in the Films of Tsai Ming-liang by Nicholas de Villiers is a strong entry in the English-language literature on one of Taiwan’s most distinguished contemporary filmmakers Read More

An Elegaic Tale of the Cold War Past in Taiwan: A Review of Lily Narcissus

Books English

·December 17, 2022·3 min read

Jonathan Lerner's Lily Narcissus is an elegiac novel, reflecting on a period of history long gone Read More

心得：《疫病與社會的十個關鍵詞》

Books Chinese Life

·October 1, 2021·1 min read

劉紹華是一名醫療人類學學者，長年在中國與臺灣研究衛生管理。從2002年起，她在中國四川涼山以民族誌方式研究涼山彞族的愛滋、毒品與流動青年的現象，深入分析社會變遷與國家衛生政策的關係。劉紹華從她對愛滋病與麻風的研究而深知，疫病、污名歧視、人權以及政治的互相關聯。在2020年出版的書籍《疫病與社會的十個關鍵詞》裡，她從正在肆虐全球的COVID-19疫情切入，以多年積累的知識提醒讀者，這一波疫情所引發社會、人權及政治的困境與爭執，並非新穎之事，反而是歷史中反覆再現的問題。劉紹華舉各種例子描述在面對疫情的過程中，不可淡忘的歷史教訓。本書的特點在於，剖析國家所採取的、看似理所當然的政策，如「防疫大作戰」等口號標語或高舉前線醫療人員為「道德模範」，探討其未料的後果，以及其掩蓋社會基層問題的企圖。 Read More

Democratic Experiments in Action

Books English Life

·September 24, 2021·3 min read

Deliberative Democracy in Taiwan: A Deliberate Systems Perspective by Mei-Fang Fan is a useful look at contemporary democracy in the Taiwanese context. Read More

Having Faith in a Secular World

Books English Life

·July 20, 2021·6 min read

Joshua E. Livingston’s Sunrays on the Beachhead of the New Creation, a book with 54 short stories with black and white graphic illustrations that serve the tales beautifully and integrally, deals with what it means to have faith (specifically Christian faith), and what it takes to have faith when our daily reality is decidedly secular. When secularism is practically a religion, what does it mean to believe, be spiritual, and attempt to see beyond ourselves? Does life have no meaning beyond what we are capable of understanding? Read More