Colors of the Empire: Visual Representations of Race and Gender in Colonial Taiwan (1895-1945)

“Colorism” — the institutionalized hierarchy which privileges white or light skin color — appears to have been increasingly globalized in recent years. However, how does global colorism operate in societies where people are all considered the same “color”? Yen-Yu Lin’s research project investigates how the Japanese Empire applied and adjusted the Western tactics of color-based differentiation in one of the Asian-Pacific colonies—Taiwan, through visual culture. Utilizing the methods of visual sociology and archival analysis, this research project offers new evidence and perspectives about empires, race, gender, and global colorism.