Dr. Jolan Hsieh is a Taiwanese indigenous scholar
from the Siraya Nation.

 

Her research areas are Law and Society, Human Rights, Identity Politics,
Global Indigenous Studies, Gender/Ethnicity/Class, Environmental Justice, Indigenous Research and Ethics.

Jolan's recent scholarly publications include:

  • Collective Rights of Indigenous Peoples: Identity-Based Movement of Plains Indigenous in Taiwan (Routledge, 2006 / 2010).
  • Indigenous Research and Activism as Ceremonial Journey (in Chinese, Daw-Shiang, 2017), and;

"The Changing Identities of Taiwan's Plains Indigenous Peoples" (Changing Taiwanese Identities, Routledge, 2017: pp.12-26).  

Jolan received the Research Excellence Award and several Teaching Excellence Awards from NDHU. She has been a visiting fellow to the Institutum Jurisprudentiae, Academia Sinica (2008) and Canadian Studies Faculty Research Grant fellow (2009) and is recipient of Ministry of Science and Technology's Humanity and Social Science Visiting Scholar's Grant (2017-18).

Jolan has served with many national / regional / international organizations as an indigenous scholar and activist. Her current professional services include advisor to the Presidential Office's Indigenous Historical Justice and Transnational Justice Committee / convener of Reconciliation Subcommittee, Executive Yuan's Indigenous Peoples' Basic Law's Working Committee, Council for Indigenous Peoples Affairs' PingPu Peoples Affairs' Working Committee, Tainan City Ethnic Affairs Committee / Ethnic Mainstreaming Committee,  and country representative in World Indigenous Nations Higher Education Consortium and World Indigenous Nations Universities.  

Jolan was Chairperson for the Standing Supervisor Board for the Indigenous Peoples' Cultural Foundation, Secretary General of Taiwan International Studies Association, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Taiwan International Studies Quarterly, Executive Editor of Taiwan Journal of Indigenous Studies, Editorial Board for Journal of Native American and Indigenous Studies, co-Chair of Green Party Taiwan, Board of Director member for the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy, Chairperson of Amnesty International Taiwan Section, council member of Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, and Board of Director of MacKay Memorial Hospital Foundation / MacKay Medical College.

As an indigenous activist and scholar, Jolan is also active in indigenous language and cultural revitalization movements and critiques indigenous politics. Due to her personal research interests and her need to understand other countries' indigenous politics and related social issues, she also does research on indigenous studies around the world. Jolan's priority is to foster strategies and collaborations at NDHU to enhance research, education and innovation cooperation with various international educational institutions with indigenous focus, most notably recent partnership with Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Canada, US, Sami Land, Hawaii, and Japan.

Jolan led many government funded projects, including Ministry of Education funded projects, "Taiwan – Aotearoa Connection" and "Indigenous Cultures and Languages Mainstreaming Project", and as Principal Investigator for several Ministry of Science and Technology and Council for Indigenous Peoples' research projects.