Miranda Jiang
“Rice all the Time?”: Oral History Performance and Bay Area Chinese-American Experiences
Studying oral histories allows us to prioritize the experiences of common people in the context of broader historical events. Oral history performance presents these experiences to the public, placing the voices of multiple people in conversation with each other. This summer, I will continue transforming my oral history performance script about the diversity of Chinese-American life in the Bay Area from the 1920s to the 1950s into an episode of the Berkeley Remix, a podcast from the Oral History Center. This script explores themes such as second-generation identity, discrimination from the playground to the housing market, and varying experiences with language. I will then work with my mentors, Amanda Tewes and Roger Eardley-Pryor of Berkeley’s Oral History Center, to complete a journal article about the process of researching and creating this
Message To Sponsor
I'd like to profoundly thank my donor for supporting undergraduate researchers like me. This summer, I worked with two mentors on a journal article and an oral history performance about Chinese Americans, in podcast form. I didn't expect to have such an opportunity to do an independent project as a lower division undergraduate, so thank you. My participation in this program will be a milestone in all I hope to accomplish studying history.