Settler colonial Taiwan: Shu-Mei Huang, ‘Here we are together: unpacking Indigenous Historical Justice and heritage as essentially embedded in colonial institutions in Taiwan’, International Journal of Cultural Policy, 31, 2025, pp. 611-631 | settler colonial studies blog

Settler colonial Taiwan: Shu-Mei Huang, ‘Here we are together: unpacking Indigenous Historical Justice and heritage as essentially embedded in colonial institutions in Taiwan’, International Journal of Cultural Policy, 31, 2025, pp. 611-631

22Jul25

Abstract: In Taiwan, arguably a settler colonial state, “colonial heritage” is a loaded concept that requires unpacking. While the Han-oriented mainstream society generally assumes “colonial heritage” to be culture heritage associated with the Japanese colonial period or earlier, the Dutch period in the 17th century, the Indigenous People of Taiwan has experienced multiple colonializations that go beyond the two, not to mention that even the notion “heritage” itself is constituent of and resulting from the colonializing process. Among others, war memorials built by the Japanese regime and the heritagization of them in the postcolonial years, are particularly difficult subject matters and a key to the greater entangled memory of Taiwan. This research examines the recent interrogation into the particular war memorials in the context of the state-led effort of Indigenous Historic Justice and Transitional Justice in Taiwan from 2016 onwards. It explores how the contested colonial heritage of war has simultaneously enabled multiculturalism for national rebranding and, regrettably, prevents a critical reflection on settler colonialism in Taiwan. Working with Indigenous communities, however, the researcher also observed the ways in which the communities themselves actively engage with heritage making in their own agenda to search for opportunities for collective actions over and beyond memory politics, including but not limited to trans-ethnic, transnational dialogues over history rewriting and territory remapping.

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