Hong Kong's Rewritten Histories

On the Media

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4.6 • 8.7K Ratings

🗓️ 6 July 2022

⏱️ 13 minutes

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Summary

This fall, students in Hong Kong will learn a new version of history — one that erases the fact the region was ever a British colony. According to four history textbooks currently under development in China, Hong Kong has always been a part of China, despite over a century of British dominion. And so continues a pattern of effacing and repainting histories.

During her years as a reporter in Hong Kong, Louisa Lim, author of the new book Indelible City: Dispossession and Defiance in Hong Kong, stumbled across shards of her city's various, conflicting histories — some imposed by colonial forces, others originating from Hong Kongers themselves. This week, Annalee Newitz talks to Lim about the myths that obscure the region's past, and the impact this myriad of histories has had on Hong Kongers' sense of political and cultural identity.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is the On the Media Podcast Extra and I'm Annelie Nuehats.
0:06.0	I'm an author and the co-host of the podcast, Our Opinions are Correct and I've been helping
0:10.4	out around On the Media for the past couple of weeks.
0:13.8	I recently read a great book about Hong Kong that hit some sweet spots for me, history,
0:19.8	myth, activism, and what it means to call a place home.
0:23.7	It's by reporter Luizalim who grew up in Hong Kong and has covered China for NPR and
0:29.1	BBC.
0:31.1	The book is called Indellable City, Dispossession and Defiance in Hong Kong.
0:37.1	Lim's work feels particularly relevant now because this fall, students in Hong Kong will
0:42.2	learn a new version of history, one that erases the fact that Hong Kong was ever a British
0:48.1	colony.
0:49.5	According to four history books now under development in China, Hong Kong has always been a part
0:55.1	of China, despite 156 years of British dominion.
1:00.5	China has promoted this narrative ever since 1997 when the British left the hundreds of
1:05.5	islands and one peninsula that make up the territory of Hong Kong.
1:10.1	However, many Hong Kongers cannot forget their colonial history.
1:14.9	Once such Hong Konger was the so-called King of Kaolun, Lim describes him as a graffiti
1:20.6	artist who went from being a, quote, toothless, often shirtless, disabled trash collector
1:26.4	to a symbol of Hong Kong's defiance by the time he died in 2007.
1:31.7	He believed that the peninsula of Kaolun rightfully belonged to his family and that the British
1:36.4	had stolen it in the 1860s.
1:39.6	In 1956, he took to the streets, painting calligraphy on the walls of Hong Kong and his shaky,
	...

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