Chinese WhispersSM comprises a suite of multi-platform art and storytelling projects that bring to light the overlooked history and experiences of the Chinese who helped to build the American West, through their work on the railroads and in the mines, agriculture, fisheries, industries, and various enterprises. Founded by artist Rene Yung in 2006, the organization emphasizes an interdisciplinary approach that integrates research with artistic production and place-based public programming, to bring this history to broad audiences in fresh, engaging ways.

Storytelling productions unfold along the route of the Transcontinental Railroad from San Francisco, California to Ogden, Utah, where the railroad’s western and eastern segments met. A 2009 pilot, Chinese Whispers: Sierra StoriesSM took place in Roseville, California, featuring stories from the Sierra Nevada foothills. Chinese Whispers: Golden GateSM, our flagship production about the San Francisco Bay Area, premieres in 2016, in a multimedia theater work written and directed by Yung, with an original soundscape by Jeremiah Moore.

Each production is developed from an in-depth research process that includes oral history interviews with local participants from a broad range of cultures in addition to the Chinese American community, and workshopped in site-specific readings that activate local memories of place. Interwoven fragmentary stories in these productions connect forgotten individual lives with the larger historical context, to illuminate social and cultural issues today.

Our ground-breaking project, Chinese Whispers: Bay ChroniclesSM, retraces the overlooked history of Chinese shrimp fishing in San Francisco Bay through a series of research voyages on a replica 19th century Chinese shrimp junk, and a multimedia art installation by Yung that features sound and video captured on the voyages. Place-based convenings at former Chinese shrimping sites connected knowledge experts from diverse fields with the local shrimp fishing story.

We are also developing an online mapping project, Chinese Whispers: Mapping the TracesSM. It will combine research data, locative media, and Chinese WhispersSM stories in an interactive website, to reframe the contributions of the early Chinese immigrants to the building of the West in a visually accessible way, and connect local histories to the national narrative.

Chinese WhispersSM connects contemporary viewpoints to historical memory, to foster greater stewardship of fast-fading local history, and to transform absence and ambiguity into positive community experiences that bridge time, place, and people.

About our name:
Chinese Whispers takes its name from the game also known as “Telephone,” where a sentence is whispered from one player to the next, becoming garbled in successive retelling. The title refers ironically to the stereotyping that equates unintelligibility with the Chinese, and comments on how cultural attitudes shaped social memories of the early Chinese immigrants in America.

Hear our community talk about why Chinese Whispers is important to them.

 
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