Rutgers History Ph.D. candidate Laura De Moya-Guerra was recently awarded the 2024 Joe Arbena Latin American Sport History Grant by the North American Sport History Association (NASSH) at their annual conference. She was awarded the grant for her paper, “Canastas y clavados: la disputa deportiva y diplomática entre Taiwán y China en Colombia 1970-1980” / “Baskets and Slam Dunks: The Diplomatic Sporting Dispute Between Taiwan and China in Colombia 1970-80,” which she presented during the sports history panel at the XXI Congreso Colombiano de Historia that was held this past May in Ibagué, Colombia.
This paper examines the role of sports in Taiwanese diplomacy within Colombia during the period from 1970 to 1980. As China made diplomatic strides in Colombia during the Cold War, Taiwan's embassy and consulate in Barranquilla organized a series of basketball and ping pong exhibition games to counteract these advances. Through her investigation of these events, Laura explores the intersection of sports and diplomacy, the gendered nature of sporting events, and the presence of Orientalism in Colombian society.
The Joe Arbena Latin American Sport History Grant that Laura’s project was awarded is aimed at advancing the study of Latin American sports history. It will support Laura as she continues her archival research on Taiwanese exhibition games in Colombia.
Additionally, while in Colombia, Laura presented another paper, “Chinese in the Barranquilla Carnival: Gender and Diplomacy 1960-1980,” at the 55th Annual Conference of the Association of Caribbean Historians (ACH), held in Santa Marta from May 26-30. This paper investigates how a group of Chinese women, through their participation in the Barranquilla Carnival, embodied Taiwan’s diplomatic efforts during the Cold War era. This work was recognized with the Gould-Saunders Memorial Endowment Travel Fund, which was presented to Laura by Carla Pestana of the University of California Los Angeles.
If you’d like to watch Laura’s full presentation at the XXI Congreso Colombiano, you can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAQJB_nGeTM