A conversation with Zak Dychtwald, author of Young China: How the Restless Generation Will Change Their Country and the World
Tuesday, May 1, 6:30 – 8:00 PM
Speaker: Zak Dychtwald
Moderator: Miao Wang
Event Fee: Members Free; Non-Members $10
Location: 40 Rector Street, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10006
Chinese born after 1990 have been referred to as the Strawberry Generation (草莓族), a reference to the lack of the group’s need to “eat bitterness” (吃苦) or endure the hardships faced by Chinese born during the tumultuous years before China’s rise. On May 1, join China Institute for a far-reaching discussion about the emerging identity of China’s youth with Zak Dychtwald, author of Young China: How the Restless Generation Will Change Their Country and the World.
So much of the “China story” in the United States focuses on the government. Dychtwald thinks that is a sure-fire way to misunderstand the younger generation, whose lives by and large have little connection to ideology or the Communist Party. At this talk we will delve into issues of national pride, marriage, sex, schooling, LGBT issues, and the pursuit of “fun”—something the older generation couldn’t dream of at their age. China’s 400 million millennials have tremendous economic power, too: marketers are striving to understand what makes Chinese young people tick.
Zak Dychtwald is a world-traveler, writer, consultant, and public speaker. After graduating from Columbia University in 2012, he moved to China to explore the country and get to know China’s young people on their own turf, and is now the author of Young China: How the Restless Generation Will Change Their Country and the World and Miao WANG, an award-willing filmmaker, director of Beijing Taxi (2010) and Mainland (2018).
Through his writing, speaking, and consulting, Zak’s overarching goal is to change the way the world understands China: to expand the narrative away from headline politics towards identity and cross-cultural understanding. He has recently relocated to New York City where he is the founding CEO of the Young China Global Group – think tank and consultancy. A fluent Mandarin speaker, he spends a third of the year in China.
Miao WANG (Director/Producer/Co-Editor) is an award-winning filmmaker who focuses on creative and cinematic documentaries that inspire cultural understanding and a humanist perspective of the world. Her critically-acclaimed documentary films Beijing Taxi (feature-length) and Yellow Ox Mountain have screened at over 70 international festivals and institutions such as SXSW and the Guggenheim Museum, with US theatrical release, and broadcast nationwide. Beijing Taxi is digitally distributed by Sundance Artist Services. She directed Made by China in America, a documentary short in Morgan Spurlock’s acclaimed We the Economy series. Wang is a recipient of grants and fellowship from the Sundance Institute, the Jerome Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Tribeca Film Institute, Tribeca All Access, IFP Filmmaker’s Lab, Independent Film Week, Women Make Movies, and the Flaherty Film Seminar.
For questions please contact Aaron Nicholson at 212-744-8181 ext. 138 or by email at [email protected]
