EVENT DETAILS

A talk by Professor Joseph Orser, Siam's Twins and America's Anti-Chinese Racism

Please join us on April 27 for a fascinating talk by Professor Joseph Orser.  Popularly known as the “Siamese Twins,” Chang and Eng achieved fame exhibiting their conjoined bodies across nineteenth-century America. Born in Siam, they became U.S. citizens at a time when naturalization was limited to whites.  The two brothers also married two white sisters in North Carolina, had 21 children between them, and owned dozens of slaves.

Prof. Orser is the author of The Lives of Chang and Eng: Siam’s Twins in Nineteenth-Century America, a book published by University of North Carolina Press and named a Top 10 New Release in the Social Sciences for Fall 2014 by Publisher’s Weekly.  He previously worked as journalist for almost ten years, five in his native Florida and the rest in Bangkok, Thailand. In addition to the April 27 talk, Prof. Orser will participate in the “Thriving in Differences:  Interdiscplinary Symposia on ’Strange’ Body, Ethnicity, and Language, “ sponsored in conjunction with the UCI Drama Department’s performance of I Dream of Chang and Eng by Philip Gotanda.

Please see the Illuminations website (https://goo.gl/n2yO3Y) to rsvp by April 26 and find out more about the events related to I Dream of Chang and Eng.