Impacts of Travel Culture on the Formation of Chinese, Japanese, and U.S. Modernity and Global Identities from 1880 to 1940

FAIN: FT-278869-21

Constance J. S. Chen
Loyola Marymount University (Los Angeles, CA 90045-2623)

Writing a chapter for a book on the impact of transpacific travel on U.S.-Asian cultures and relationships, 1880-1940.

Situated on the intersection of Asian American studies, U.S. history, and East Asian studies, my book manuscript uses archival materials in China, Japan, Taiwan, and the United States to analyze the ways in which transpacific exchanges between the 1880s and 1940s unsettled and reframed political, racial, and cultural modalities for Asians and Americans within the dual contexts of the U.S.' global rise and shifts in Asian axes of power. It seeks to highlight the role of Asians and Asian Americans as cultural intermediaries and to contribute to the study of U.S. history by incorporating transnational perspectives. The vogue for travel among Americans and Asians developed coterminously with the creation of new forms of intercultural relations and recalibrated nationalist projects on both sides of the Pacific. Ultimately, encounters between China, Japan, and the United States enabled the three nation-states to craft global identities and definitions of modernity for their own purposes.