Events
CCTL Transnational Legal History Group Book Talk – ‘Chinese Workers of the World: Colonialism, Chinese Labor, and the Yunnan–Indochina Railway’ by Prof. Selda Altan (Online)
17 Oct 2024
9:30 am – 10:30 am (HKT)
Online via Zoom
Selda Altan is Assistant Professor in the Department of History at Randolph College, Virginia. Her fields of specialization encompass modern Chinese and Asian history, labor history, and comparative approaches to empires and colonialism in Asia and the Middle East. Her first book, Chinese Workers of the World: Colonialism, Chinese Labor, and the Yunnan–Indochina Railway (Stanford University Press, 2024), analyzes labor conflicts during the construction of the Yunnan railway (1898–1910) in the larger context of twentieth-century French colonialism and capitalist development in China. Currently, she is working on her second book project, which explores Chinese Industrial Cooperatives and the role of women in China’s resistance against Japanese occupation during World War II.
https://cloud.itsc.cuhk.edu.hk/webform/view.php?id=13693354
Registration Deadline: 12:30 pm (HKT), 16 October 2024
This talk explores the construction of the French railway between China and Vietnam from 1898 to 1910 as an episode in the rise of a global working class in China. By drawing on Chinese, French, and English sources, the discussion reveals how inter-colonial competition for cheap labor and the expansion of overseas work opportunities in the 19th century fueled domestic activism among Chinese workers. These developments set the stage for labor to emerge as a radical force in Chinese politics.
Language: English
