Life of Anna May Wong, a pioneering Chinese American Hollywood star, focus of March 24 program

Born Wong Liu Tsong in 1905 in Los Angeles, she became known as Anna May Wong, and is considered the first Chinese American film star in Hollywood. Her life will be the topic of the next Modern China Lecture at 1 p.m. Monday, March 24, at Cal State San Bernardino.

Katie Gee Salisbury, author of “Not Your China Doll: The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong,” will present her talk in person in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, room SB-210, and on Zoom. The program is free and open to the public; those attending in person will have the opportunity to meet the author and enter a drawing for a copy of the book.

Salisbury’s work has appeared in The New York Times, MSNBC, Vanity Fair, The Ringer, The Believer, and the Asian American Writers' Workshop, among other places, and she gave the TED Talk titled “As American as Chop Suey.” A fifth-generation Chinese American who hails from Southern California, she now lives in Brooklyn. “Not Your China Doll” is her first book.

“Before Constance Wu, Sandra Oh, Awkwafina, or Lucy Liu, there was Anna May Wong,” according to the book’s publisher. ”In her time, she was a legendary beauty, witty conversationalist, and fashion icon. Plucked from her family’s laundry business in Los Angeles, Anna May Wong rose to stardom in Douglas Fairbanks’s blockbuster ‘The Thief of Bagdad.’ Fans and the press clamored to see more of this unlikely actress, but when Hollywood repeatedly cast her in stereotypical roles, she headed abroad in protest.”

The Modern China Lecture Series was initiated in January 2014 to promote awareness of important issues related to China for those on the CSUSB campus and in the community. Since then, it has presented more than 100 lectures, workshops, film screenings and roundtable forums featuring China scholars from UC San Diego, UC Riverside, the Claremont Colleges, UCLA, USC, UC Irvine, Columbia, Oxford and other institutions, who have visited the CSUSB campus or joined via video conference to share their expertise and opinions.

Upcoming programs will take place on different days of the week, different times and different locations; however, the Zoom link will remain the same. Also, some talks will feature book giveaways for attendees in a free raffle.

The spring semester Modern China Lecture Series schedule:  

• Monday, April 14, 10:30 a.m.: "Ethnic Chinese and the Politics of the Indochinese Refugee Crisis," with Lisa Tran, professor of history, Cal State Fullerton; at the Pfau Library, room PL-217, and on Zoom
• Tuesday, April 15, 5 p.m.: A Conversation with Guardian senior China correspondent, Amy Hawkins, and UC Irvine professor of history, Jeffrey Wasserstrom, on Zoom only
• Monday, April 28, 1 p.m.: "Curry Rice and Li Ang’s Crafting of Transcultural Hybridity," a lecture and discussion with Yenna Wu, professor of Chinese and the Distinguished Teaching Professor, Chinese/ Civilizations/Comparative Literature, UC Riverside; at the  College of Social and Behavioral Sciences, SB-210, and on Zoom

The Modern China Lecture Series is supported by the CSUSB History Department, Pamela Crosson, Lucy Li and the Yotie Oso Undergraduate Retention & Success (YOURS) Program, and the AANHPI (Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander) Academic Success & Undergraduate Advising (ASUA) Team.

For more information on the Modern China Lecture Series, contact Jeremy Murray at jmurray@csusb.edu.