Documentary film screening
B/K/018 Diana Bowles Lecture Theatre, Biology Building, Campus West, University of York (Map)
Event details
How did people deal with water crises in a rapidly urbanising city with limited welfare provisions and a narrow tax base? The history of Hong Kong can offer lessons that are relevant to many places around the globe today. This documentary explores the history of water in Hong Kong- from day-to-day use, natural disasters and water emergencies - to deepen our understandings of environmental change and urbanization. It weaves together stories of infrastructure, society, culture, foodways, industry and water management to offer a timely and original contribution to the environmental, political, social, and economic history of Hong Kong, while providing insights for anyone engaged in conversations about contemporary climate challenges.
After the documentary, there will be a Q&A session with the film makers
Dr. Florence MOK is a Nanyang Assistant Professor of History at Nanyang Technological University. She is a historian of colonial Hong Kong, modern China and British colonialism, with an interest in environmental history, the Cold War and state-society relations. She is the author of Covert Colonialism: Governance, Surveillance and Political Culture in British Hong Kong, c. 1966-97, published by Manchester University Press (Studies in Imperialism series) in 2023 and the co-editor of A New Documentary History of Hong Kong, 1945-1997, published by Hong Kong University Press in 2025.
Dr. Siu-hei LAI is Lecturer at Faculty of Humanities, Chiang Mai University, Thailand. He is an anthropologist focusing on youth, aspiration and Chinese migration in Mainland Southeast Asia. Obtained his PhD in Anthropology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong , his doctoral thesis examines how the young Yunnanese Chinese in the Thai-Burmese borderland pursue their aspirations by migrating within and beyond the borderland.
Mr. Sahil BHAGAT is a Research Associate in the History Department at Nanyang Technological University. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of St Andrews and a joint master’s degree from Columbia University and the London School of Economics (LSE). His work pertains to the transnational labour and environmental histories of plantation-based communities in British Malaya and Singapore.