About New Stories, Bold Legends: Stories from Sydney Lunar Festival
From artists to brain surgeons, fashion designers to board directors – this series brings you the unique stories of people who celebrate Lunar New Year. Hosted by Valerie Khoo – Curator of the City of Sydney's annual Sydney Lunar Festival – it’s a journey into the Asian Australian experience. You’ll discover the personalities and passions of people who meld their cultural traditions with the sunburnt country that they call home.
S2 Episode 6: A constellation of Sydney’s Asian communities
This series, we’ve been looking at some prominent Chinese personalities from Sydney’s history. As we’ve learned, there has been a small but strong Chinese presence in Australia right from the start of colonisation. But what about other Asian communities? Walk down any main street in Sydney and you’ll find restaurants serving Thai food, Malaysian dishes and Vietnamese delicacies. Census data shows that about 16% of Australia’s population has Asian heritage. Asian-Australains are an essential part of Sydney’s multicultural make-up.
In the Chinese zodiac, 2020 is the Year of the Rat. The Rat is actually the first sign of the lunar zodiac and heralds the start of the 12-year lunar calendar cycle. So I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to explore 12 other Asian communities which make Sydney special.
https://newstories.net.au/episode-6-a-constellation-of-sydneys-asian-communities/ (https://newstories.net.au/episode-6-a-constellation-of-sydneys-asian-communities/)
See omnystudio.com/listener (https://omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.
1 Jan 2020
S2 Episode 5: The lives of Sydney’s early Chinese women
In the stories of Chinese and Asian people in Australian history, there’s one group that’s noticeably missing: women! There were many notable Chinese men in Sydney’s early days and in the 20th century. If you’ve been listening to this podcast series, you’ve discovered some of them. But where are the ladies?
Many historians have glossed over Chinese women in Sydney’s history. It’s true that they were a small population, especially in the very early years of the colony. But they were not non-existent! Combing through newspapers and archives, we can find hundreds of women of Chinese descent making their lives in Sydney in the 1800s and 1900s.
So it’s up to us. We can continue to ignore them or we can try to find out more about them. We may not know everything about their lives – where they came from, how they spent their days – but by researching their stories we can begin to have an idea of these early settlers.
In this episode, we touch on the lives of a handful of Sydney’s Chinese women. Their weddings and parties, their fundraising for the Red Cross, their activism – and we will say their names.
https://newstories.net.au/episode-5-the-lives-of-sydneys-early-chinese-women/ (https://newstories.net.au/episode-5-the-lives-of-sydneys-early-chinese-women/)
See omnystudio.com/listener (https://omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.
1 Jan 2020
S2 Episode 4: Sun Johnson – The linguist, educator and media mogul
Sun Johnson was the editor of Australia’s first national Chinese newspaper, which started publication in 1894. He was born in Hong Kong and educated in London, before moving to Australia as a young man.
Sun used his linguistic skills to create a Chinese-Australian dictionary, aimed primarily at helping Chinese people deal with Australian merchants.
The Chinese Australian Herald, which was actually established by two European men, was launched at a time when the Chinese population of Sydney was changing. Migrants were moving away from the goldfields and bushland and into the city. They were setting up market gardens and import businesses. Many of them didn’t speak English, but they could read Chinese.
Over the next few decades, the Herald – helmed by Sun Johnson – would provide this small community with news from abroad and across Australia. Sun and the paper were also instrumental in helping the Chinese community engage with events within the European community, most importantly Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee in 1897.
For a time, Sun Johnson was one of the most influential people in Sydney’s Chinese community.
https://newstories.net.au/sun-johnson-the-linguist-educator-and-media-mogul/ (https://newstories.net.au/sun-johnson-the-linguist-educator-and-media-mogul/)
See omnystudio.com/listener (https://omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.
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