Written by Eric Siu-kei Cheng
Image credit: Provided by Eric Siu-kei Cheng.
Teaching in Taitung County, located in southeastern Taiwan, has been a treasured adventure in my academic career. Renowned for its spectacular 176-kilometre coastline, Taitung has celebrated its “Taitung Blue,” characterised by crystal-clear blue skies and seas on sunny days, in recent years. I have been fortunate to work at National Taitung University, where I can enjoy this breathtaking view directly from my office. Inspired by this unique setting, I have been eager to incorporate maritime culture and history into the design of my courses on field methods, environmental protection, cultural heritage, local industries, and food culture.
Transforming the coastal landscape into a teaching and learning field site requires cultivating strong personal networks. Contrary to the stereotype that building relationships with fishermen depends on drinking alcohol together, I have consumed very little beer. Instead, I have built connections with marine biologists, personnel from fishermen’s associations, local seafood retailers, young fishermen, and fish farmers, learning from their rich maritime knowledge and practical expertise. I have connected students with these ocean experts through on-site learning opportunities, despite the challenges of bringing students onto fishing boats to experience fishing firsthand or participate in shrimp farming.
Environmental protection and the preservation of fishing culture require self-discipline in both thought and action. On Green Island (綠島), now well known for its water sports, my students, as novice scuba divers, develop a deep appreciation for marine life and coral reefs. They understand their responsibility to keep the ocean clean, yet they continue to consume plastic straws, paper cups, bento boxes, and non-recyclable cutlery in their daily lives. They also show little interest in fishing communities and their traditional practices unless my colleagues and I introduce them to local cultural associations dedicated to preserving these traditions.
Green Island and many of Taiwan’s other offshore islands are facing overtourism, which has marginalised local fishing traditions and ways of life. To address this issue, I provide students with fieldwork opportunities to interview community members and learn from their perspectives and lived experiences. Students also produce short documentary videos to examine environmental challenges and cultural change. Although I have found it difficult to change students’ daily behaviours, they consistently demonstrate respect for the people they meet and learn from during their fieldwork.
Taiwan’s maritime history closely intertwines with the history of the White Terror and authoritarian rule from the mid- to the late twentieth century. For example, the politically significant maritime cultural heritage on Green Island includes the White Terror Green Island Memorial Park, formerly the New Life Correction Center and a complex of political prisons. The island’s remote location from Taipei once made it an ideal site for detaining so-called “political prisoners,” many of whom were in fact victims of authoritarian repression. The preserved architecture continues to bear witness to these victims’ struggles for human rights and their enduring pursuit of transitional justice.
I have led my students to visit the Memorial Park and participate in guided tours led by museum docents. They paid close attention to the stories and historical narratives presented at the site. Standing in the former prison where many victims once suffered, my students developed a deeper sense of empathy for those affected by political persecution and gained a greater appreciation of the importance of human rights.
Local fisheries and aquaculture continue to make significant contributions to the local economy and to the livelihoods of many residents. Throughout my academic career, I have been actively involved in University Social Responsibility (USR) projects sponsored by Taiwan’s central government. Accordingly, I have redesigned my courses to integrate student learning with meaningful community engagement.
In several of my courses, students collaborate with community members or local industry practitioners, such as farmers, fish farmers, and small business owners, to support and enhance aspects of their businesses. For example, my students have learned how fish farmers cultivate shrimp along Taitung’s coast. They have also gained hands-on marketing experience by promoting sea salt traditionally produced by Indigenous elders. In 2024, a group of students participating in a local festival market creatively developed a seasoning by blending coffee powder with sea salt to accompany boiled shrimp. Although their contribution to the local economy may have been modest, these experiences brought them closer to the Pacific Ocean, both intellectually and through practical engagement.
One of my most rewarding teaching experiences in Taitung has been working with students to promote food education featuring the freshwater mitten crab at the Taitung Slow Food Festival. The festival provided an ideal learning environment in which students could engage directly with local producers, chefs, and consumers while exploring the relationships among biodiversity, sustainable fisheries, and regional food culture. Rather than simply introducing a local delicacy, my students and I encouraged visitors to appreciate the ecological and cultural significance of the mitten crab to Indigenous communities, particularly the Paiwan people, and to understand how responsible consumption—or, in contexts unrelated to Indigenous cultural practices, the choice not to consume it—can contribute to the sustainability of river ecosystems and local livelihoods.
While I took the lead in designing the educational materials, my students participated in every major stage of the project, from documenting Indigenous knowledge and cultural traditions related to the freshwater mitten crab to interacting with festival visitors. They learned to communicate scientific knowledge in accessible language and to explain how traditional harvesting practices, seasonal consumption, and local culinary traditions reflect the close relationship between people and nature. Through these activities, students developed practical skills in public communication and recognised that seafood education can serve as a bridge between environmental conservation and cultural heritage.
The Slow Food Festival transformed teaching from a classroom-based activity into a public learning space, where students became active participants in community engagement. By collaborating with local stakeholders in the Slow Food movement, they gained a deeper appreciation for place-based learning and the social significance of local food culture. This experience fostered a stronger connection between students and Taitung’s maritime environment, reinforcing their understanding that food education can contribute to both environmental sustainability and cultural preservation.
Teaching maritime culture and history in eastern Taiwan has convinced me that the ocean is not merely a geographical boundary but also a living cultural landscape with educational values. Through fieldwork, community collaboration, and food education, students gradually discover that the Pacific is intertwined with Taiwan’s environmental sustainability, Indigenous knowledge, democratic memory, and local livelihoods. In an era marked by the need for transitional justice, sustainable tourism, and diverse food practices, maritime education should extend beyond the transmission of knowledge to cultivate empathy, civic responsibility, and a more profound understanding of people’s relationships with the ocean. Taitung’s coastline and islands have therefore become more than a backdrop for my teaching; they have become places where students can learn to see Taiwan from the perspective of its ocean and to recognise that protecting maritime heritage ultimately means safeguarding the diverse communities and histories that have long depended on it.
As a Hong Kong-born and Taiwan-based economic and environmental anthropologist, I study food and life forms that are entangled with water and microorganisms. My current book project, a multi-species ethnography (tentative title: Entanglement under Water: Co-nurturing, Frozen Nation, and Aquaculture Value Chain, sponsored by the National Science and Technology Council, Taiwan), explores Taiwanese aquaculture, the global frozen seafood supply chain, and human-water-microorganism-seafood entanglement. I serve as the current president of the Taiwan Association of Anthropology and Ethnology (since December 2025) and was the past president of the North American Taiwan Studies Association (term: July 2018-June 2019).
This article was published as part of the special issue on Maritime Borders and Fisheries in Taiwan.