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November 25, 1996

Historian to speak on Chinese immigrant women for December humanities lecture

[Picture of Judy Yung] Judy Yung, associate professor of American studies, is the featured speaker in this month's Humanities Lecture Series, presented jointly by UCSC's Humanities Division and the Museum of Art and History. Yung's talk, "Unbound Feet: Reclaiming Chinese American Women's History," takes place from 7 to 8 p.m. on Thursday, December 12, at the Museum of Art and History at the McPherson Center, 705 Front St., Santa Cruz. The talk is free and open to the public. A reception follows.

Yung's talk, which will include slides, is based on her award-winning book, Unbound Feet: A Social History of Chinese Women in San Francisco (University of California Press, 1995). Yung uses foot-binding as a central theme in her book to trace the stages of "unbinding" that took place in the lives of Chinese immigrant women in San Francisco from the late 1800s through the end of World War II.

San Francisco was home to nearly 50 percent of all Chinese women in the U.S. at the turn of the century. Yung presents an engaging history of these women by supplementing factual information with case studies, profiles, and oral histories of immigrant and American-born women who lived in those times. Her facts were meticulously researched using U.S. census and immigration documents, Chinese- and English-language newspapers, and oral history.

The book recently received the 1996 National Book Award in History from the Association of Asian American Studies and the Robert C. Athearn Award from the Western History Association.

Yung is also the author of Chinese Women of America: A Pictorial History (University of Washington Press, 1986) and, with Him Mark Lai and Genny Lim, Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, 1910-1940 (University of Washington Press, 1991), winner of the 1982 Before Columbus Foundation Book Award.

For more information, call the Humanities Division at ext. 2696 or the Museum of Art and History at (408) 429-1964.

--Barbara McKenna