Diverse Writers CHINA – introducing guest blogger Wing Yi Chan

 

Peril is delighted to welcome, Wing Yi Chan, Diverse Writers CHINA, Project Officer, who will be guest blogging with Peril as a part of this great Writers Victoria initiative, which looks to enhance professional development, profiling and publishing opportunities for Chinese Australia writers in Melbourne.

Wing Yi Chan, our new guest blogger looking very #melbournebrr at Writers Victoria
Wing Yi Chan, our new guest blogger looking very #melbournebrr at Writers Victoria

As a part of Peril’s partnership with this initiative, we are delighted to bring you Wing Yi’s insights and experiences over the coming months, as she connects with Victoria’s Chinese Australian literary community, organisations and individuals, in an effort to share process, provide insight and to highlight the barriers and enablers faced by writers from culturally diverse backgrounds in Australia. In addition, several Peril authors will be featured on the Writers Victoria website over the coming month, enabling that work to reach new audiences in a different context.

Wing Yi is an Australian-based Chinese writer and academic with a passion for literature, language and translation. She has a doctorate in creative writing. Her bilingual work has appeared online and in print. Growing up in Hong Kong, Wing Yi’s writing is nourished by a hybrid culture from early days. When she came to Melbourne seven years ago, her Chinese heritage underwent a significant challenge in the greater diaspora, which eventually revealed to her the wonder and barriers of embracing an in-between identity. Wing Yi is committed to bridging literary relationships between China and Australia, hence her passion for the Diverse Writers Project.

Chinese Australians continue to be one of the largest groups of overseas Chinese people in the world, with links to mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, to name but a few. The impact of the Chinese diaspora on Australia’s history and culture is undeniable, even as that impact has sometimes been sidelined and marginalised, challenged and challenging.

Today, in the arts and media alone, prominent voices such as Tony Ayres, Alice Pung, Shaun Tan, Lee Lin Chin, Li Cunxin, Ouyang Yu, Annette Shun Wah, Lawrence Leung, and Benjamin Law (The list goes on!!) are contributing their perspectives and talents to the Australian cultural landscape.

Here at Peril, we’re committed to showcasing work that is not only of high creative merit, but of cultural relevance, so we’re excited to see organisations like Writers Victoria reaching out to the Chinese Australian literary community. More importantly, we hope to see lessons learned from initiatives like Diverse Writers CHINA contributing to our collective understanding of the ways that Australian culture can learn and grow from its diverse cultural heritages. Stay tuned to hear more from Wing Yi here on Peril starting next week, and look out for Peril writers on Writers Victoria’s website!

For those of you who can’t wait to hear from Wing Yi next week, she can be found in the Writers Victoria office on Mondays. She can be reached by phone 03 9094 7842 (Mondays) or email: [email protected].

 

Author: Eleanor Jackson

Eleanor Jackson is a Filipino Australian poet, performer, arts producer and community radio broadcaster. Eleanor Jackson is a former Editor in Chief and Poetry Editor of Peril and currently Chair of the Board.