Exploring Chinatown


Book Description

Come along on a trip to discover Chinese culture! You'll learn about family, religion, celebrations, music, and more. You'll discover how Chinatowns came to be, and how today's lively neighborhoods are home to culture and traditions more than 2,000 years old. Learn more about how North American Chinatowns were established, and why these proud, lively, and vital communities still thrive.




Exploring Vancouver


Book Description

Vancouver's streetscapes and neighbourhoods have changed drastically in recent years. New buildings representing current architectural trends are mixing with and often replacing those of earlier eras and tastes, and a maturing architectrual melange is emerging. This book invites the reader to explore the city's continually evolving urban landscape in a highly readable, yet authoritative, guide to its architecture. In this completely updated edition of Exploring Vancouver, with brand-new entries and accompanying photographs, Harold Kalman and Robin Ward have divided the city (including the North Shore, Richmond, Burnaby and New Westminster) into fourteen areas, selecting buildings and structures in these neighbourhoods that represent the best exakmples of the new and old architecture. Each area is preceded by an informative introduction that provides historical context for the entries that follow. There are over 400 entries, each featuring a short description that combines architectural, historical and social commentary. The prose is lively as the authors consider the new and the old, the modest and the grand, the attractive and the not-so-attractive in a wide-ranging work that encompasses everything from heritage to "monster" homes. This book is designed as a walking tour guide, with a map of each area showing the location of every entry.




Exploring Innovative Pedagogy in the Teaching and Learning of Chinese as a Foreign Language


Book Description

Teachers of Chinese as a foreign language in many international contexts are searching for pedagogic solutions to promote effective learning. Models of innovative and successful approaches are urgently needed. This volume presents a collection of compelling and empirically rich research studies that showcases innovative developments in the practice of teaching Chinese as a foreign language. The studies focus on three interrelated areas: learners, teachers, and applications of new technologies. Specifically, the studies explore methods for fostering learner-centred classrooms, autonomous learners, intercultural learning, the role of teacher views and identities, the nature of a ‘middle ground’ approach, and technologies that accommodate the unique aspects of the Chinese language, with new options for mobile and interactive learners. Providing both inspiration and practical models for language practitioners and researchers, it offers a vital resource for teachers’ professional development, and for pre-service teacher education.




San Francisco's Chinatown


Book Description

Tensions of opposites in America's oldest Chinatown Following up his award-winning book on San Francisco's Mission District, Dick Evans turns his attention to the fifth of a square mile that attracts more tourists than the Golden Gate Bridge but where the median household income is a quarter of the citywide average--Chinatown. From delicious dim sum to wok-filled shops, from iconic red lanterns to elaborate parade floats, from inside single-room occupancy apartments to outdoor games of Chinese chess in Portsmouth Square, Evans captures a place filled with diverse residents and a unique mélange of American and Chinese architecture, cuisine, and culture. Vibrant images are interspersed with sidebars highlighting particular people and institutions, deepening viewers' immersion into this community. Kathy Chin Leong's lucid text introduces readers to the history of the neighborhood, as well as to themes of tourism, daily life, and celebrations. At the heart of the book is a tight-knit community and a thriving neighborhood, which welcomes immigrants with supportive institutions and entices tourists to experience a wide array of Chinese traditions. Evans's photos highlight a place undergoing visible progress but, unlike other San Francisco neighborhoods that are gentrifying, maintaining its unique character and authenticity.




Interior Chinatown


Book Description

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • From the infinitely inventive author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe comes "one of the funniest books of the year.... A delicious, ambitious Hollywood satire" (The Washington Post). A deeply personal novel about race, pop culture, immigration, assimilation, and escaping the roles we are forced to play. Willis Wu doesn’t perceive himself as the protagonist in his own life: he’s merely Generic Asian Man. Sometimes he gets to be Background Oriental Making a Weird Face or even Disgraced Son, but always he is relegated to a prop. Yet every day, he leaves his tiny room in a Chinatown SRO and enters the Golden Palace restaurant, where Black and White, a procedural cop show, is in perpetual production. He’s a bit player here, too, but he dreams of being Kung Fu Guy—the most respected role that anyone who looks like him can attain. Or is it? After stumbling into the spotlight, Willis finds himself launched into a wider world than he’s ever known, discovering not only the secret history of Chinatown, but the buried legacy of his own family. Infinitely inventive and deeply personal, exploring the themes of pop culture, assimilation, and immigration—Interior Chinatown is Charles Yu’s most moving, daring, and masterful novel yet.




Chinatown, Europe


Book Description

Is Chinatown a ghetto, an area of exotic sensations or a business venture? What makes a European Chinese, Chinese? The histories of Chinese communities in Europe are diverse, spanning (amongst others) Teochiu speaking migrants from French Indochina to France, and Hakka and Cantonese speaking migrants from Hong Kong to Britain. This book explores how such a wide range of people tends to be - indiscriminately - regarded as 'Chinese'. Christiansen explains Chinese communities in Europe in terms of the interaction between the migrants, the European 'host' society and the Chinese 'home' where the migrants claim their origin. He sees these interactions as addressing several issues: citizenship, political culture, labour market exclusion, generational shifts and the influences of colonialism and communism, all of which create opportunities for fashioning a new ethnic identity. Chinatown, Europe examines how many sub-groups among the Chinese in Europe have developed in recent years and discusses many institutions that shape and contribute ethnic meaning to Chinese communities in Europe. Chinese identity is not a mere practical utility or a shallow business emblem. For many, China remains a unifying force and yet local and national bonds in each European state are of equal importance in giving shape to Chinese communities. Based on in-depth interviews with overseas Chinese in many European cities, Chinatown, Europe provides a complex yet enthralling investigation into many Chinese communities in Europe.




American Chinatown


Book Description

Tsui offers a unique full-access pass to America's most famous Chinatowns--New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Honolulu, and Las Vegas--revealing a captivating world-within-a-world. b&w photos throughout.




Chinatown Pretty


Book Description

Chinatown Pretty features beautiful portraits and heartwarming stories of trend-setting seniors across six Chinatowns. Andria Lo and Valerie Luu have been interviewing and photographing Chinatown's most fashionable elders on their blog and Instagram, Chinatown Pretty, since 2014. Chinatown Pretty is a signature style worn by pòh pohs (grandmas) and gùng gungs (grandpas) everywhere—but it's also a life philosophy, mixing resourcefulness, creativity, and a knack for finding joy even in difficult circumstances. • Photos span Chinatowns in San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York City, and Vancouver. • The style is a mix of modern and vintage, high and low, handmade and store bought clothing. • This is a celebration of Chinese American culture, active old-age, and creative style. Chinatown Pretty shares nuggets of philosophical wisdom and personal stories about immigration and Chinese-American culture. This book is great for anyone looking for advice on how to live to a ripe old age with grace and good humor—and, of course, on how to stay stylish. • This book will resonate with photography buffs, fashionistas, and Asian Americans of all ages. • Chinatown Pretty has been featured by Vogue.com, San Francisco Chronicle, Design Sponge, Rookie, Refinery29, and others. • With a textured cover and glossy bellyband, this beautiful volume makes a deluxe gift. • Add it to the shelf with books like Humans of New York by Brandon Stanton, Advanced Style by Ari Seth Cohen, and Fruits by Shoichi Aoki.







The Chinese Lady


Book Description

Afong Moy is fourteen years old when she’s brought to the United States from Guangzhou Province in 1834. Allegedly the first Chinese woman to set foot on U.S. soil, she has been put on display for the American public as “The Chinese Lady.” For the next half-century, she performs for curious white people, showing them how she eats, what she wears, and the highlight of the event: how she walks with bound feet. As the decades wear on, her celebrated sideshow comes to define and challenge her very sense of identity. Inspired by the true story of Afong Moy’s life, THE CHINESE LADY is a dark, poetic, yet whimsical portrait of America through the eyes of a young Chinese woman.