Denise Chong
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Denise Chong, OC (; born 9 June 1953) is a
Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...
economist and writer.


Early life and schooling

A third-generation Chinese Canadian, Chong was born in
Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...
, British Columbia on 9 June 1953,Diana Lary, "Denise Chong", ''The Canadian Encyclopedia''.
and was raised in Prince George. She studied economics at the
University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a Public university, public research university with campuses near University of British Columbia Vancouver, Vancouver and University of British Columbia Okanagan, Kelowna, in British Columbia, Canada ...
(UBC) earning her bachelor's degree in 1975. She received an MA from the
University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university whose main campus is located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded by ...
in 1978.


Career as an economist

Chong's career as an economist began when she moved to
Ottawa Ottawa is the capital city of Canada. It is located in the southern Ontario, southern portion of the province of Ontario, at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the cor ...
to work in the Department of Finance, where she was employed until 1980. She then worked for one year as a special advisor in the Prime Minister's Office, dealing with issues pertaining to British Columbia. In 1981 she became a senior economic advisor and worked closely with the late
Pierre Elliott Trudeau Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau (October 18, 1919 â€“ September 28, 2000) was a Canadian politician, statesman, and lawyer who served as the 15th prime minister of Canada from 1968 to 1979 and from 1980 to 1984. Between his no ...
until the end of his term in 1984. It has been noted that her presence, as a Chinese female, was remarkable in the white male dominated world of government finance and that "she was a trailblazer for the more inclusive public service that was to come." Denise Chong's career in the
Canadian government The Government of Canada (), formally His Majesty's Government (), is the body responsible for the federal administration of Canada. The term ''Government of Canada'' refers specifically to the executive, which includes ministers of the Crown ( ...
is made even more significant with her realization, through her familial and historical research, that her "grandparents lived in Canada at a time when they could not participate in White society. They were excluded from it: they could not take out citizenship, they couldn't own land, they couldn't vote." With the end of Trudeau's term in 1984, Denise Chong left her role as a public servant in order to pursue a career as a professional writer.


Writing career

Though her professional writing career did not begin until much later, Denise Chong was a journalist for the ''
Ubyssey ''The Ubyssey'' is the University of British Columbia's official, independent student-run paper and is published bi-weekly on Tuesday. Founded on October 18, 1918, ''The Ubyssey'' is an independent publication funded by a $7.09 annual fee, from ...
'', a student newspaper at UBC, while she was an undergraduate student there. Denise Chong has published four literary non-fiction books and edited one compilation of short stories. Because of the importance of the Canadian historical research in Chong's first book, a memoir of her family, '' The Concubine's Children'', she has become "renowned as a writer and commentator on Canadian history and on the family." This book, one of the first non-fiction narrative accounts of the Chinese in Canada, was a ''Globe and Mail'' best seller for ninety-three weeks. A speech that she gave for Citizenship Week in 1995 entitled "Being Canadian" has been widely anthologized, including in the books ''Who Speaks for Canada: Words that Shape a Country'' by D. Morton and M. Weinfeld (1998), and ''Great Canadian Speeches'' by D. Gruending (2004). Chong's emphasis on the voices of women, as well as her particular brand of nationalism (which is more than a little critical), are both reflected in her edited compilation ''The Penguin Anthology of Stories by Canadian Women''. That many of the authors published in this anthology are also women of transnational identities is a reflection of Denise Chong's concern for the multicultural quality of being Canadian. In Chong's own words, "Canadian citizenship recognizes differences. It praises diversity. It is what we as Canadians ''choose'' to have in common with each other €¦How we tell our stories is the work of citizenship". In her introduction to the anthology, Chong highlights what attracted her to the stories, seeming to also articulate one of the strong characteristics of her own writing: "The plot that interested me was life lived in the chaos and uncertainty of everyday happenings and relationships." All of Chong's books evoke such "everyday happenings and relationships" amidst the extraordinary circumstances of war, communism, immigration, and racism. Denise Chong's second book, ''The Girl in the Picture'', about iconic Vietnamese napalm victim
Kim Phuc Phan Thị Kim Phúc (; born April 6, 1963), referred to informally as the girl in the picture and the napalm girl, is a South Vietnamese-born Canadian woman best known as the child depicted in the Pulitzer Prize–winning photograph, titled ' ...
, portrayed everyday life in war-torn Vietnam. Her book '' Egg on Mao: The Story of an Ordinary Man Who Defaced an Icon and Unmasked a Dictatorship'', released on 29 September 2009 by
Random House Canada Random House of Canada was the Canadian distributor for Random House, Inc. from 1944 until 2013. On July 1, 2013, it amalgamated with Penguin Canada to become Penguin Random House Canada. Company history Random House of Canada was established i ...
, was Chong's first book in a decade. ''Egg on Mao'' tells the story of Lu Decheng, a bus mechanic, who, with two friends, challenged his family's communist allegiance by defacing a portrait of chairman
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...
during the 1989 protests in
Tiananmen Square Tiananmen Square or Tian'anmen Square () is a city square in the city center of Beijing, China, named after the Tiananmen ("''Gate of Heavenly Peace''") located to its north, which separates it from the Forbidden City. The square contains th ...
. In an interview about this story exploring
human rights in China Human rights in the People's Republic of China are poor, as per reviews by international bodies, such as human rights treaty bodies and the United Nations Human Rights Council's Universal Periodic Review. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), th ...
, Chong said, "It was a very Chinese act. In the West, we would view something like this as a quixotic and think how naive these men were. But in China, it's your only gesture. Of course they were naive. But you have to balance the futility of the gesture against the weight of repression… people are willing to make a futile gesture for the nobility of having acted." Her 2013 non-fiction book, '' Lives of the Family: Stories of Fate and Circumstance'', relates stories about the experiences of Chinese-Canadian families who settled in Canada's National Capital Region. This work earned her praise in ''Toronto Star'' and ''Vancouver Sun'' book reviews.


Publications

* '' The Concubine's Children'' was published in 1994 by
Penguin Books Penguin Books Limited is a Germany, German-owned English publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers the Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the ...
in Toronto. * "Being Canadian" is a speech given by Denise Chong during the 1995 Citizenship Week. This speech has been widely anthologized, including in the books ''Who Speaks for Canada: Words that Shape a Country'' by Desmond Morton and
Morton Weinfeld Morton Irwin Weinfeld (born 1949) is a Canadian sociologist, who has conducted studies on Canadian Jewry. He is chair in Canadian ethnic studies and former chairman of the sociology department at McGill University. Weinfeld was born to Polish Jew ...
(1998), and ''Great Canadian Speeches'' by D. Gruending. * ''The Penguin Anthology of Stories by Canadian Women'' was published in 1997 by Penguin Books in Toronto. * '' The Girl in the Picture: The Kim Phuc Story'' was published in 1999 by
Viking Press Viking Press (formally Viking Penguin, also listed as Viking Books) is an American publishing company owned by Penguin Random House. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheimer and then acqu ...
in Toronto. * '' Egg on Mao: The Story of an Ordinary Man Who Defaced an Icon and Unmasked a Dictatorship'' was published in 2009 by Random House Canada. * '' Lives of the Family: Stories of Fate and Circumstance'' was published in 2013 by Random House Canada.


Other public service and personal life

In addition to continuing her career as a writer, Chong serves on the boards, task forces, and committees of several organizations including the Task Force on the Participation of Visible Minorities in the Federal Public Service, the National Advisory Board on Culture Online, and the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada. In 2013, she was appointed to the
Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...
, the country's highest civilian award. Denise Chong lives in Ottawa, Ontario, with her husband, CTV reporter Roger Smith, and her two children, Jade and Kai. She received honorary doctorates from York University in October 2007, Bishop's University, and the University of Northern British Columbia.


References


External links


Interview with Author Denise Chong Published interview in which Denise Chong discusses her work''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' entry on Denise ChongInformation about Denise Chong's 2009 book, published by Random House
* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20090626174013/http://www.bcachievement.com/nonfiction/2005/jury.php Chong's bio as a member of the Jury for the British Columbia Award for Canadian Non-Fictionbr>Site based on Chong's research and interviews behind her 2013 book ''Lives of the Family''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chong, Denise Living people 20th-century Canadian biographers 20th-century Canadian memoirists Canadian people of Chinese descent People from Prince George, British Columbia Writers from Vancouver Canadian writers of Asian descent University of Toronto alumni 1953 births Canadian economists Canadian women memoirists Canadian women biographers Canadian women economists Officers of the Order of Canada 20th-century Canadian women writers 21st-century Canadian biographers 21st-century Canadian women writers