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Wayne Soon

@waynesoon.bsky.social

1.3K followers 1.6K following 89 posts

Historian of Medicine, China, Taiwan, and Diaspora at the University of Minnesota. Associate Professor. Currently researching on global health insurance histories in East Asia. https://a.co/d/4tahHXR

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Nov 19

Pleased to share my new article on the history of health insurance in Taiwan through the lens of ethnicity, politics, and global health. (Open Access) 1/

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Health Insurance, Medicine, and Society in Taiwan: Chinese Authoritarianism, Taiwanese Ethnicities, and Global Actuarial Science

This article explores the history of the Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang KMT) government’s expansion of health insurance in Taiwan from 1950 to the 2010s through the lens of ethnicity, politi...

www.tandfonline.com

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · 25d

Thank you!!

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Aug 21

I think the rise of an anti covid vaccine movement in Japan and the rise of Sanseito requires an in depth studies. I’ll be interested to read scholarly studies on the history of contemporary vaccines in Japan, in relations to the rise of right wing populism. 1/

www.asahi.com/sp/ajw/artic...

Sanseito retains populist message after silencing vaccine stance | The Asahi Shimbun: Breaking News, Japan News and Analysis

The minor opposition party Sanseito, which is projected to capture double-digit seats in the July 20 Upper House election, has muted some of its conspiracy theories.

www.asahi.com

Reposted by Wayne Soon

Hopkins Press @hopkinspress.bsky.social · Jul 28

Read Wayne Soon's review of Fighting for Health: Medicine in Cold War Southeast Asia Edited by C. Michele Thompson, Kathryn Sweet, and Michitake Aso

From the new issue of Technology & Culture, available at @projectmuse.bsky.social

muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

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Reposted by Wayne Soon

Miranda Yaver @mirandayaver.bsky.social · Jul 28

Woohoo, I have page proofs for my book!

120 370 4.9K

Reposted by Wayne Soon

NUS Press @nuspress.bsky.social · Jul 24

Review in Technology and Culture of "Fighting for Health" by @waynesoon.bsky.social:

"In sum, this is an excellent volume that deserves to be widely read by scholars of the #ColdWar, military medicine, #healthcare, and (post)colonialism."

Read: muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jul 23

Pleased to share my review in T&C on the edited volume on Fighting for Health: Medicine in Cold War Southeast Asia. @nuspress.bsky.social

I enjoyed reading the essays in the volume, and learned a lot from them.

muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jul 20

Looking forward to Joan Judge’s forthcoming new book.

press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

The Politics of Common Reading

Examines the transformation of vernacular knowledge during a pivotal period of modern Chinese history, 1894 to 1954. In The Politics of Common Reading, Joan Judge examines an era of modern Chinese h...

press.uchicago.edu

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jul 18

Ebook version of my 2020 book, Global Medicine in China: A Diasporic History is on sale at $16 from @stanfordpress.bsky.social Consider buying a copy!

www.sup.org/books/asian-...

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jul 12

Pleased to share my interview with the excellent team at the Infectious Historians podcast.

I hope it will be useful for folks interested in incorporating the history of SARS and COVID in a non-western context in their classes!

infectioushistorians.com/2025/05/09/c...

Episode 137 – Covid in Taiwan with Wayne Soon, Infectious Historians

Marian Devotion and Plague in Late Medieval Italy with Bianca Lopez Episode 134 - March 7, 2025 Bianca Lopez (Southern Methodist University) joins the...

infectioushistorians.com

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jun 30

Pleased to be sharing my review essay in HSNS on “New Directions in Global Health Histories of China and Taiwan”. I reviewed Mary Brazelton, Rachel Core, Fang Xiaoping and Yi-Tang Lin’s monographs & identified key themes in global health histories.

online.ucpress.edu/hsns/article...

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jun 3

Both books reveal how Sichuan and Manchuria were places of deep meanings for their residents: from mountains to gravesites; from rivers to houses. Without wonders (Daston and Park), there cannot be science and technology. Yet beyond wonders, there cannot be order without meanings. 3/

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jun 3

Key takeaways: history of science and technology in East Asia should consider the broader meanings of geomancy, place, and religious beliefs as actors on the ground ; fengshui brought the state and society closer together in organic ways, despite the calamities that surrounded the Late Qing. 2/

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · Jun 3

Enjoyed reading Tristan Brown‘s book. Pairs well with Rogaski’s new book on Knowing Manchuria, which I enjoyed reading too. 1/ @tristangbrown.bsky.social @princetonupress.bsky.social

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 26

@stanfordpress.bsky.social

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 26

Thank you Dr. Hsieh for a kind review of my book in Asian Medicine!

brill.com/view/journal...

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 26

Read Rana Mitter’s piece in FP’s latest issue. I enjoyed it, but was also hoping that some of Sulmaan Wasif Khan’s insights in his recent book on US-China-Taiwan historical relations will make it more into the piece.

www.foreignaffairs.com/china/once-a...

The Once and Future China

If you dropped in to China at any point in its modern history and tried to project 20 years into the future, you would almost certainly end up getting it wrong. In 1900, no one serving in the late Qin...

www.foreignaffairs.com

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 21

Do folks know of any presses that are open to publishing shorter monographs, besides Columbia Shorts and Cambridge Elements? Thanks!

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Reposted by Wayne Soon

Javier Cha @javiercha.bsky.social · Apr 15

I had a lot of fun teaching the Geopolitics of Chips session in today's HUDT3001 class using Honghong Tinn's fantastic new book, Island Tinkerers.

I'm not sure whether my students understood the technical details I explained, but they recognize the centrality of high-end chips produced in Taiwan.

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Reposted by Wayne Soon

Jay Shaw @nacahistorian.bsky.social · Mar 10

An amazing book.

The Book Island Tinkerers. A book about technology in Taiwan.

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 4

It's a great book!

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 3

AAHM Asia network breakfast meeting. Great to meet everyone! @aahmhistmed.bsky.social

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 1

Mohammad's article highlights the role of the “insurantial imaginary” as a condition that shaped the articulation of the sickly, idle and risky racial minorities within Singapore’s public health discourse on diabetes 6/

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Sickly, Idle and Risky Minorities: Race and Diabetes under Singapore’s Emergent “Insurantial Imaginary”

This article highlights the role of the “insurantial imaginary”, defined as a social context in which profitable, useful and necessary uses can be found for insurance technology, as a condition tha...

www.tandfonline.com

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 1

Timothy Sim's article in the Bulletin of History of Medicine furthers this theme, but showing how coevolution of state and society further the party, but also public health's aim. Which circles back to Cherian's arguments. 5/

muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

Project MUSE - The Citizen as a Public Health Actor: Complaints as Public Engagement with <i>Aedes</i> Mosquito Control in Singapore, 1965–1985

muse.jhu.edu

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Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 1

Greg Clancey's excellent article reveals that public housing was central to organizing Singapore's health and ethnic politics, even as it reveals sites of resistance. 4/

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Hygiene in a Landlord State: Health, Cleanliness and Chewing Gum in Late Twentieth Century Singapore - Gregory Clancey, 2018

This article provides historical context for Singapore’s fabled preoccupation with cleanliness. Beyond the legacy of British colonialism and post-colonial conce...

journals.sagepub.com

Wayne Soon @waynesoon.bsky.social · May 1

Sikko Visscher's book on how the party sought to tame the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce is one of the most understudied read, but it shows the promises and perils of collaboration. 3/

www.google.com/books/editio...

The Business of Politics and Ethnicity

This book describes the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce's changing relationship with the state and with businesses in the region. Some of the wealthiest and most influential businessmen i...