Crossing the Borders
Wai Yin SocietyJul 2018-Mar 2022
Archives
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This collection is composed of the outputs of the Crossing the Borders project undertaken by the Wai Yin Society 2018-2019. The core of the collection is 20 oral history interviews undertaken with Manchester Cantonese speakers who migrated to the UK from Hong Kong, China, Vietnam, Macau and Malaysia. The bulk of these interviews are in Cantonese. Topics in the interviews include naming of the interviewee, information about their family and ancestral homes, childhood, life prior to migration, reasons for migration, migration journeys, settling in the UK and finding a sense of belonging. The archive also documents other project outputs including the exhibition held at Manchester Art Gallery in July 2019, radio plays based on the oral history stories, project publication and a visual record of the project through photographs.
Title:
Crossing the Borders
Creator:
Date of work:
Jul 2018-Mar 2022
Reference number:
GB3228.90
Level of description:
Collection
Includes:
Custodial history:
Transferred directly from the Wai Yin Society to the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah RACE Centre
Arrangement:
GB3228.90/1 Oral histories and portraitsGB3228.90/2 Exhibition at Manchester Art GalleryGB3228.90/3 Project publicationGB3228.90/4 Radio playsGB3228.90/5 PhotographsGB3228.90/6 Project EvaluationGB3228.90/7 Project Legacy
Finding aids note:
Indexes and summaries of each oral history interview, in English, are available from the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah RACE Centre Library
Source:
Wai Yin Society
Access restrictions:
Unrestricted
Use restrictions:
RestrictedFor private research only. No copies of oral history indexes and summaries.If you wish to reproduce any material from this collection please contact the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah RACE Centre at rrarchive@manchester.ac.uk with the specific reference number(s) and full details of reproduction request.
General notes:
According to the 2011 census, there are 400,000 Chinese people in the U.K., which makes up around 0.7% of the population. There are 14,000 Chinese people currently living in Manchester. Within the number the population is made up of people from mainland China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Malaysia and other places.The Elderly Project was set up at Wai Yin Society in 1998 and later, the Luncheon club was given the name Sheung Lok (means always happy). It is based at the current Sheung Lok Centre in Manchester.Most of the Sheung Lok members are older Cantonese and Hakka speakers who came to the U.K. between 1960s and 1980s. Amongst them, some experienced the Japanese invasion of China between 1937 and 1945; the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong for three years and eight months in 1941; Political differences and the fall of mainland China to communism in 1949; the effect of political and economic turmoil before and after the Chinese Cultural Revolution; the boat people who came from the Vietnam War and the consequences after the insurgency in Malaysia in 1969.There has been significant and rapid change in the development within the Chinese communities. The registration of Wai Yin members indicates a decrease in Cantonese speaking people who were born in the 1930s and 1940s, but an increase in Mandarin speakers who were born in the 1960s. A consultation was held in 2017. Members of Sheung Lok were urged to preserve the life experience of those Cantonese speaking Chinese in Britain, the result was the "Crossing the Borders" oral history project.The "Crossing the Borders" project was funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. The project collected twenty audio recorded interviews from four male and sixteen female participants, who were born between 1932 and 1963; fourteen participants came from Hong Kong, two from China, two from Vietnam, one from Malaysia and one from Macau.The admin history to this point was written by Louise Wong and is taken from the Crossing the Borders booklet. For the full text see GB3228.90/3.As a part of the project an art workshop was developed and delivered by the artist Julie Mosley. The session were held at Manchester Art Gallery on the 19 and 26 Feb 2019. The art created by the participants is a visual expression of their feelings associated with arriving and settling in England. The outputs of the art workshops became the content of the project exhibition which opened at the Manchester Art Gallery on the 13 Jul 2019.Another outcome of the project was the publication of a book containing extracts of participants stories. The booklet includes a foreword by Circle Steele, Chief Executive Officer Wai Yin Society and introduction by Louise Yuen Ming Wong, booklet editor. This publication was nominated for, and won the won the Alan Ball Award for the Community Publication 2020. Louise Wong and Circle Steele accepted the award on behalf of the project at the Alan Ball Awards (online) and were able to share their story of the project with a national audience.Three stories from project participants were adapted into radio dramas given the name “On Lok Wo” (a safe and happy home). The stories were written, edited and recorded by volunteers with the support of the playwright Julian Hughes. The stories were broadcast on the Radio Sheung Lok show on All FM 96.9 in July 2019. The group who came together to produce the radio shows have continued to broadcast on All FM 96.9 as Dragons Voice. They continued to do this through lockdown in 2020-2021. In Oct 2021 they received Community Radio Bronze Award and Gold Award in Nov 2022 for these broadcasts.The legacy of this project is ongoing. Jo Robson, project archivist has been interviewed for the Dragons Voice radio show as part of the ongoing promotion of the collection and sharing of knowledge about archives and archiving. The wall mounted section of the exhibition remains on show at Manchester Art Gallery (Nov 2022). The exhibition has been recreated as part of the British Library exhibition ‘Chinese and British’ (17 Nov 2022- 23 Apr 2023) including items on loan from the archive collection. There has also been a project between Dragons Voice, University of Hull , University of Hertfordshire , Wai Yin and All FM to carry out a research project on the extended working life of Chinese immigrants.
Copies available:
A copy of the oral history interviews have also been donated to the University of East London Archive
Related material note:
The Wai Yin Society has a website: https://www.waiyin.org.uk/The project Exploring Our Roots included interviews with members of the Chinese community. Transcripts of these interviews and the archive are available from the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah RACE Centre library Ref: MAN/HI.3/EXP and GB3228.40.
Record types:
Ahmed Iqbal Ullah RACE Centre
Language:
CantoneseEnglish
Record number:
15960994
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Total copies: 1