Many states, with Europe in a leading position, have created Indo-Pacific strategies with goals to preserve stability and the rule-of-law in the Taiwan Strait. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy is unique in its acknowledgment of historical connections between Indigenous peoples, while promising to pursue reconciliation through enhanced relations with Indigenous peoples of Taiwan, Australia, and New Zealand. Canada’s inclusion of Indigenous peoples is based, not only on contemporary politics of reconciliation, but on recognition of a historical relationship between Indigenous peoples of Taiwan and Canada dating back to Presbyterian missionary activities beginning in the 1870s. The depth of this relationship is broadly recognized among Indigenous Presbyterians in Taiwan.

A deep dive into Ottawa’s foreign policy archives reveals the archaeology of Canada’s approach to Taiwan, dating back at least to the 1950s Taiwan Strait Crises when Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Lester Pearson sought to craft a foreign policy independent of the UK and USA. In addition to understanding the exigencies of the Cold War, decision makers referred to Taiwan’s complex history and even to the presence of Indigenous peoples who had nothing to do with the Chinese Civil War. In this paper, I explore the evolution of Canada’s policy toward Taiwan that led it to famously only “take note” of China’s claim over Taiwan in 1970 and to now highly value relations with Indigenous peoples. How does Canada’s Taiwan policy reflect a relational historical perspective? How can it contribute to a deeper engagement with Taiwan that includes, and transcends, contemporary security concerns?

This paper explores the beaches of Kinmen to illustrate an alternative aspect of maritime borderlands beyond the often-discussed themes of gyres, infrastructures, and drifting objects associated with border governance. By examining the “unclean things” - waste from the Chinese mainland found on Kinmen’s beaches and the ‘ghosts’ of soldiers who perished on these shores - I aim to bring in the immaterial aspects of spirituality and local techniques of living with “the haunted”; and how this immaterial aspect is integrated into local inhabitants’ response to the unexpected material “invasion” of waste and animal remains on their shores from the mainland.

From China’s African swine fever outbreak, when dead pigs from the mainland regularly washed ashore, to today’s uncountable medical and household waste, Kinmen’s beaches have, for decades, become destinations for mainland waste carried by current and tides. From the border governance perspective, actively securitising these beach debris as threats has been seen as a way for Taiwan to construct a sovereignty distinct from PRC through daily practices of institutional forces. Nevertheless, Kinmen’s local residents often perceive this waste as unintentional encounters that impact their everyday lives, and often become the counterforce of the securitisation.

Viewing waste as both mediums and agents of border negotiation, I examine how Kinmen residents’ grassroots understanding of beach waste intertwine with their interactions with another type of “unclean thing” on the shores — ghosts. This blended perspective fosters Kinmen inhabitants’ grounded approach to the “unclean things” arriving from PRC, promoting inclusivity and diverse oceanic imaginations.

Modernization processes in indigenous communities in Taiwan began with a certain delay as compared to modernization of Taiwanese society as a whole. Communities located in large areas of the “savage territories” were largely left out of the main modernization processes before the Japanese rule in Taiwan ended. Modernization in such communities reached its full swing only in the second half of the 20^th century, when the dominantly Han society in economically developed regions primarily along the western coast had already been enjoying its benefits in most areas of everyday life. Disparities between regions as well as various ethnic communities contributed to migration of indigenous people; migration became a significant feature of modernization of indigenous communities.

The presentation is based on interviews carried out in indigenous communities in lowland districts of Taidong County in the second decade of the 21^st century. It explores the types of migration common in indigenous communities, its motivation as well as role in the development of those communities.

In 2020, thirty-two years after its initial publication, Nieh Hua-ling’s 1970s novel Mulberry and Peach was republished in Taiwan, sparking renewed discussions. Once representative of Cold War political literature, Mulberry and Peach is now frequently situated within the framework of diasporic literature amid a new Cold War era. However, Nieh’s strategies and aesthetics in her Taiwan writing deserve closer attention. This paper closely examines how Mulberry and Peach explicitly references Eileen Chang's The Golden Cangue in its environmental portrayals, analyzing Nieh’s methods of employing environmental construction inherited from the textual landscapes of earlier works in her depictions of Taiwan and cross-strait comparisons. In consciously drawing upon established works of classic Chinese novels for her environmental writing, Nieh achieves a method of synthesis that both inherits and innovates, presenting a promising approach to Taiwan writing.