Museum Across Borders: Toward A Dialogical Approach to Museum Representations of Chinese Diasporas Around the World

Museum has become a vital platform of making and preserving diasporic heritage, articulating identities and negotiating the relationship between diasporas and the homeland. This talk first outlines the emerging landscape of diasporic Chinese museums around the world. Next, it introduces a dialogical approach to museums that underpins the ‘Global Diasporic Chinese Museums Initiative’ project. It argues for the value and urgency of developing a global network as a platform for open and interdisciplinary dialogue between academics and museum professionals on this important but so far under-studied topic. By initiating and facilitating dialogues across geographic and national boundaries, the project seeks to generate new insight on the research and practice of diasporic museum and heritage in the diasporic Chinese context and beyond