News and Events
Remembering Our Chinatowns Author Readings
April 24, 2012
Three China Stories from British Columbia and Mexico Book Signing
March 17, 2012
Vancouver Public Library Reading
January 11, 2012
Mami: My Grandmother's Journey Book Launch
November 24, 2011
Gold Mountain Series and Author Celebration at UBC
October 14, 2011
After dinner with authors Rebeca Lau (Mami: My Grandmother’s Journey), Larry Wong (Dim Sum Stories: A Chinatown Childhood), and Chad Reimer (Chilliwack’s Chinatowns: A History) at St. John’s College UBC, INSTRCC, UBC, and CCHSBC launched the new Gold Mountain Stories book series. It was a wonderful night complimented by author readings, french pastries, and in-depth questions to the authors posed by the audience.
Prof. Henry Yu’s statement for the evening sums up Gold Mountain Stories best:
I wanted to congratulate all of the authors for their work in bringing their own books and the “Gold Mountain Stories” series to life. Right from the moments when I returned to UBC in 2004, it has been one of my dreams to have exactly what we are having today, a celebration of a new kind of partnership between UBC and its community partners at the Chinese Canadian Historical Society, a partnership that would publish books that might otherwise not fit with existing publishing venues.
Jean Barman and Jean Wilson very early on were part of this shared vision of a publication process that would help authors who had an important story to tell to find voice–books that did not have to “prove” commercial worth in order to be published, or to engage with scholars who have not always been supportive of Chinese Canadian history. What we wanted was a supportive process where community authors could find their own voices and tell important stories.
I want to thank the two Jeans for their important role in bringing this series to fruition, but most of all I wanted to thank Jennifer Yip for nurturing these books from start to finish. Every step of the way, Jennifer was both learning the publishing trade but also bringing incredibly creativity and diligence to the process. She exemplifies what can be done when we empower a talented young person and trust them by getting out of their way as they learn and accomplish great things. Jennifer as an editor and publisher today, you might say, is as much a product of this process as the three books, and we are all incredibly proud of the work she has done.
Congratulations to her, and to Rebeca, Larry, and Chad. There is much to celebrate today, and I hope that you will all enjoy tonight’s festivities.
About Gold Mountain Stories:
A new and groundbreaking Chinese Canadian series, Gold Mountain Stories is reimagining North America’s engagement with the Pacific world by bringing to light the long ignored and untold stories of Chinese migrant experiences through their interactions and relationships with other Asian migrants, indigenous peoples, and European migrants.
Gold Mountain Stories Authors on OMNI TV
October 13, 2011
Rebeca, Chad and Larry were interviewed by Bowen Zhang, anchor of Omni TV’s Mandarin news about their books and the new series. The Mandarin edition of the interview ran October 14, 2011 at 8:00 pm on channel 8, and the Cantonese version was aired October 17, 2011 at 5:00 pm.
Gold Mountain at Vancouver's Word on the Street
September 25, 2011
Dim Sum Stories: A Chinatown Childhood by Larry Wong, Mami: My Grandmother’s Journey by Rebeca Lau, and Chilliwack’s Chinatowns: A History by Chad Reimer all made an appearance at Word on the Street this year! Rebeca and Larry were also on hand to sign copies of their books.
Gold Mountain Stories Author Party
September 22, 2011
An intimate gathering for authors and friends, the Author Party celebrated all the work of the authors on their books, and the first time that all the books and authors were together in the same room!
—-
About Gold Mountain Stories
Books in the Gold Mountain Stories series are published by UBC’s Initiative for Student Teaching and Research in Chinese Canadian Studies (INSTRCC), and the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of British Columbia (CCHSBC).
A new and groundbreaking Chinese Canadian series, Gold Mountain Stories is reimagining North America’s engagement with the Pacific world by bringing to light the long ignored and untold stories of Chinese migrant experiences through their interactions and relationships with other Asian migrants, indigenous peoples, and European migrants.
Dim Sum Stories: A Chinatown Childhood by Larry Wong, a local historian and past president of the Chinese Canadian Historial Society, is about his 1940s-1960s childhood in Vancouver’s Chinatown. A close friend of Wayson Choy, author of The Jade Peony, Wong’s personal short stories reveal a world filled with people from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
In Chilliwack’s Chinatowns: A History, independent scholar Chad Reimer follows dual trails of arson in 1921 and 1934 to discover the previous existence of two Chinatowns in small town Chilliwack, British Columbia. Bolstered by interviews and archival research, Reimer brings the Chinese, Whites, and Natives characters of Chinatown North and Chinatown South to life. Their lives of success, labour, leisure, and family show how history can be used to restore our common past.
Mami: My Grandmother’s Journey by Rebeca Lau, traces Lau’s return to Tapachula, Mexico from Vancouver in 2002, to eat her grandmother Mami’s Chinese-Mexican cooking and learn of her family’s history. Lau opens her heart and home to readers as she and Mami revisit longtime friends and childhood haunts, while reflecting about how three generations of her family have spread their lives around the Pacific.
—-
St. John’s College UBC
St. John’s College UBC is a graduate residential college committed to enhancing the intellectual and cultural life of graduate students at UBC, and to deepening the understanding and practice of multicultural education and international understanding within the university and the larger community of which it is a part. The College is home to 150 graduate students in all faculties and departments across the University, as well to a dozen postdoctoral fellows, junior faculty, and visiting scholars.
Initiative for Student Teaching and Research in Chinese Canadian Studies (INSTRCC):
In 2007, built from the ground up by students over a three-year period, UBC officially launched INSTRCC, the first program at a Canadian university dedicated to engaging and empowering students to reimagine and recover a “Chinese Canada”. With the commitment of its participating community donors, students, and faculty, INSTRCC students create films, oral histories, family stories, websites, and databases that give voice and preserve the stories and histories of Asian Canadians for future generations. www.instrcc.ubc.ca
Chinese Canadian Stories
“Chinese Canadian Stories” is a path-breaking project gathering the work of universities and community groups from across Canada. Our vision is to give Canadians–young and old–the tools to discover and make their own history, using the latest advances in digital technology to access, recover, and record our neglected past. chinesecanadian.ubc.ca
Chinese Canadian Historical Society of British Columbia
The Chinese Canadian Historical Society of British Columbia is a non-profit, participatory provincial organization dedicated to broadening our shared understanding of history of the Chinese in British Columbia through research, documentation, preservation and education.www.cchsbc.ca
About Larry Wong:
Larry Wong was born in Vancouver’s Chinatown in 1938 and attended Strathcona School and Vancouver Tech High School. After attending the University of British Columbia in the late fifties, he began a career with the federal government, retiring in 1994. Since then he has been active in various community activities such as the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of British Columbia, Tamahnous Theatre, Federation of BC Writers, and Chinese Canadian Military Museum. He has written in newspapers and magazines and currently writes in a blog, Ask Larry, at www.cchsbc.ca.
About Chad Reimer:
Chad Reimer holds a PhD in history from York University, and works as an independent scholar and author. He lives in Chilliwack, British Columbia.
About Rebeca Lau:
Rebeca was born and raised in a small town in Mexico by Chinese parents and grandparents and working in the family grocery store surrounded by Cantonese and Spanish. Rebeca currently lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, and works at the University of British Columbia.www.rebecalau.com