301: The Chinese in American History: How Afong Moy, Mayling Soong and Bruce Lee Changed the Narrative About China

BackStory

History, Education

4.7 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 11 November 2019

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Conversations about US-China relations often revolve around tariffs, trades and recently, President Donald Trump’s tweets. So on this episode of BackStory, Nathan, Joanne and special guest host Erika Lee go beyond the standard narrative of US-China relations and learn about three Chinese and Chinese American people who worked to change American perceptions of China.

Support for this podcast comes from International Education at the University of Richmond and The Rose Chen Group for Cultural Understanding.

BackStory is funded in part by our listeners. You can help keep the episodes coming by supporting the show: https://www.backstoryradio.org/support

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Matrix Founding for Backstories provided by an anonymous donor, the National Dama for the Humanities, and the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation.
0:11.0	From Virginia Humanities, this is Backstory.
0:20.0	Welcome to Backstory, the show that explains the history behind today's headlines. I'm Nathan Connolly.
0:25.0	And I'm Joanne Freeman.
0:27.0	If you're new to the podcast each week, along with our colleagues Ed Ayers and Brian Ballot, we explore a different aspect of American history.
0:36.0	All right, the trade wars first shots are officially fired at midnight. The president's tariffs on Chinese goods went into effect at the US hit China with tariffs on $34 billion worth of goods.
0:46.0	China immediately responded with its revenge tariffs of equal value.
0:51.0	Today's tariff announcement is another protectionist move against China threatening to disrupt the world economy.
0:57.0	For close to two years now, President Donald Trump has been sparring with China. The issue? US tariffs on Chinese imports.
1:06.0	Late last week, news broke that a potential deal between the US and China is imminent. The story is ongoing, but so far it's not clear when or how the trade war will end.
1:17.0	When it comes to the topic of US-China relations, the conversation often revolves around trade tariffs and lately the president's tweets.
1:26.0	But we want to get below the surface of all this trade talk to take things in a slightly different direction.
1:32.0	And we're honored to have a special guest here to help us host the show. Eric Lee, welcome to Backstory.
1:38.0	Hey Nathan, thanks for having me.
1:40.0	Erica teaches Asian American and immigration history at the University of Minnesota. She's also the author of several award-winning books.
1:47.0	Her latest book, America for Americans, a history of xenophobia in the United States, hits shelves later this month.
1:54.0	And I guess I should be saying welcome back to Backstory because you've been a guest on the show before.
1:59.0	Yeah, that's right, but this is my first time co-hosting Backstory, so I'm excited to be here.
2:04.0	And we're ecstatic to have you. So Erica, you ready to start the show?
2:08.0	Definitely.
2:14.0	On this episode of Backstory, we're bringing you the extraordinary stories of three Chinese and Chinese American people,
2:21.0	who made an indelible imprint on American culture from the 1830s and beyond.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BackStory, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BackStory and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.