More than a century after colonisation, the Ainu language almost vanished. Now machines are listening to hours of old recordings and learning to give it a new voice | BBC Future

Dafen once produced 60 per cent of the world’s oil paintings—now this village of copyists is under threat | Financial Times

Japanese colonialism is infamous for its brutalization of women, abducted and forced into sex slavery. Less known is women’s role in fighting against the Japanese Empire, brilliantly brought to life in two recent novels | Jacobin

Meet “Looty,” a dog stolen by the British in the looting of China’s Old Summer Palace and gifted to the queen. Her journey sparked a craze–and left behind a legacy mired in imperialism and racism | CNN

Trans and queer people and their supporters suffer ‘systemic persecution’ as country pushes increasingly conservative values | The Guardian

I wrote about how my wedding dress anxieties became less about the look itself, and more about what it had come to represent—my identity in a mixed-race marriage | CNN

The Biden administration sent Phoeun You, a former child refugee, to Cambodia after more than four decades in the US | The Nation

One Christmas, 12-year-old Wang’s classmate died of cancer. It was the first time one of her friends had passed away, and she wasn’t sure how to feel. Wang had written a letter to Santa the year before, so she decided to sit down and write another | Quartz

What a “historical nihilism hotline” and a new party resolution tell us about Xi Jinping’s vision for China | New Statesman

Protesters are using the military's fear of women against it | Foreign Policy

Jessie Lau ponders Emily Feng’s “Let Only Red Flowers Bloom: Identity and Belonging in Xi Jinping’s China” | LA Review of Books

Women and girls in the ongoing protest movement are up against a deeply unequal society | The Nation

The Black Lives Matter and Hong Kong democracy movement can learn a lot from each other | The Nation

As Beijing gets ready to embrace the Taliban, China’s propaganda machinery has been working in overdrive to convince Chinese people that partnering with the militant group isn’t as problematic as it seems | Quartz

The country’s dramatic youth-led protests are dividing generations, families and the nation | New Statesman

The current film has sparked a fierce fight over Mulan’s soul: what she should represent, both as a symbol for women and for Chinese-ness | The Diplomat

Just a short minibus ride from the MTR, the rich history of Hakka villages lies in ruins along the Starling Inlet | Zolima Citymag