text by Chen Chieh-Jen
Travel for most non-westerners usually includes enduring suspicion, humiliation and degradation at the discretion of an interviewer during the visa application process. The visa interview isn't merely a matter of a country exercising its sovereignty, controlling its borders and immigration, but rather is a dominant country's disciplinary strategy towards weaker countries and an empire's system for supervising the citizens of the world.
Taiwan has been politically and economically dominated by the United States since the Cold War period. [1] Furthermore, misleading images of America's value constructed by mainstream media were fully internalized by various domains of Taiwanese society long ago. Because of this, Taiwanese people make the U.S. their first choice for studying abroad, sightseeing and immigration.
However, in order to apply for an American visa, Taiwanese citizens must produce considerable documentation ensuring they will not reside in the United States illegally, as well as provide fingerprints which are maintained in U.S. government security files. There is also an interview at the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT), [2] where many applicants have been subjected to discriminatory language and humiliation, and then denied a visa for unclear reasons. A proportionally higher number of applications submitted by young, unmarried women and people unable to provide proof of adequate financial resources are denied. When refused a visa, the applicant is handed a document which includes the sentence "today's decision cannot be appealed."
Humiliating treatment during visa application interviews at AIT is common knowledge among Taiwanese citizens, although no one has discussed this situation publicly before now.
Conversely, American citizens do not need a visa to enter Taiwan, nor do they need to provide fingerprints, undergo rigorous background checks or attend interviews. Although this kind of colonial master/servant relationship exists, the Taiwanese government has never registered a formal complaint. Since a constructed simulacrum of America's value has been internalized into the collective thinking of Taiwanese society—to the point of forming subconscious self-censoring mechanisms—when visas are denied, people start to wonder what they have done wrong, or feel they are not up to American standards.
In late September of 2008, I also encountered difficulties applying for a U.S. visa, and subsequently established the blog The Illegal Immigrant to protest the verbal abuse I suffered at the hands of an AIT interviewer. [3] The blog was open to Taiwanese people who wished to share similar stories of verbal abuse at AIT, and subsequently several-hundred responses were posted to the blog.
Postings not only reflected humiliating treatment and hundreds of denied visas, but also suggested that the Taiwanese authorities needed to take a closer look at their own border policies towards others. Spousal immigrants and migrant workers from developing countries are particularly vulnerable to similar prejudicial and inhumane policies when arriving in Taiwan. Of course, there were also many posts supporting America's value, and maintaining that this colonial-style institution and unequal visa-granting relationship have a basis in law. Based on the posts to my The Illegal Immigrant blog which narrated experiences of denied visas and questioned the Taiwanese government's imperial-style monitoring and discriminatory policies toward the other, I produced the video Empire's Borders I.
Empire's Borders I is composed of two parts. The first part narrates eight typical experiences of Taiwanese citizens who applied for American non-immigration visas at AIT. In each of these cases, the applicant was treated roughly by the interviewer and then denied a visa for indefinite reasons. The second part of the video tells the stories of eight Mainland Chinese brides who immigrated to Taiwan to live with their spouses. The video describes the Taiwanese National Immigration Agency's inhumane scrutiny of each Mainland bride starting from the immigration interview at the airport. [4]
For the filming of Empire's Borders I, I constructed sets resembling the interview areas at AIT and the airport in Taiwan. My desire was not to create a theatrical effect in the videos, but rather to reclaim these spaces that have been cordoned off by mechanisms of authority. In both AIT and the Taiwan airport—spaces symbolic of national sovereignty—neither video recording nor the carrying of electronic communication devices is permitted. Both America-visa applicants and Mainland brides were completely isolated for the duration of their interviews, and therefore it is impossible to produce any evidence of unreasonable treatment. In the video's recreated reportage-style scenes, performers stand in for those who posted their AIT experience on my blog, and the Mainland brides relate their own experiences. These monologues transform formerly silenced voices into conversations with the video's audience.
I believe making these videos amplifies otherwise hushed voices, and documents these otherwise impossible to record collective memories and incidents. The video can also generate discussion within different audiences regarding ways to root out imperial ideologies.
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[1] A clear example of the United States' domination of Taiwan is a statement by previous President Chen Shuibian. In Semptember of 2009, President Chen indicated that when in office, the AIT Chairman frequently advised him on how to conduct certain affairs, even influencing policy making and courses of actions.
[2] The American Institute in Taiwan was established to maintain American interests in the western Pacific region at the time when the United States shifted diplomatic relations from the ruling party of Taiwan to the government of the People's Republic of China. Pursuant to the Taiwan Relations Act, the institute was established on January 1, 1979 as a nonprofit organization (nongovernmental organization). One of AIT's missions is to process visa applications for Taiwanese citizens who wish to travel to the United States.
[3] The blog The Illegal Immigrant was established after an AIT interviewer harshly said to me, “I suspect you intend to illegally immigrate.” I went to AIT on September 23, 2008 to apply for a non-immigrant visa (tourist/business visa) after being invited to participate in the New Orleans Biennial. Later, AIT responded to my protest regarding this incident in a press release, claiming it was “nonfactual.”
[4] The Marriage Association of Two Sides of China assisted in providing personal accounts of private interviews conducted with Mainland spouses at the Taiwan airport.
[5] In an August 26, 2008 news release, the Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that if Taiwan can meet the seven technical requirements of the U.S. Anti-Terrorism Cooperation framework, including microchip-embedded passports and anti-terror intelligence sharing, Taiwan may become a candidate for visa-exempt status. |
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