Cover of Undergrad Magazine 1992:1 © University Archives of HKU
Undergrad Magazine 1980:1 © University Archives of HKU Undergrad Magazine 1988:1 © University Archives of HKU
April, 1929, taken by the Arts Association of the Faculty of Arts. Li Shiu-tong (1907-93), looking dapper with a bow tie, wearing jacket and white trousers, standing on the very left side in the photograph, was a student at the University of Hong Kong in 1929.
In 1931, a sexologist arrived in colonial Shanghai to give a public lecture about homosexuality. In the audience was Li, a medical student who left Hong Kong for Shanghai. The Ger- man-Jewish sexologist, Magnus Hirschfeld, fell in love with him and he voluntarily became Hirschfeld’s assistant during his 18-month lecture tour around the world.4 Li (or Taoli), was the grandson of the famous Qing reformer Li Hongzhang (1823-1901). He came from a wealthy Chinese family and was the son of the Hong Kong businessman Li Kam-tong. He was a 24-year-old medical student at St. John’s University in Shanghai5
back then and was so inspired by the lecture that he made a sudden decision to become the ‘Chinese Hirschfeld’ and to accompany the famous sexual scientist.
December 2023
Expressing his confidence in Li, Hirschfeld once wrote ‘in him I believe that I have found the long-sought pupil whom I can form in my image’. Li also became Hirschfeld’s companion, accompanying him into exile – first to Ascona, Switzerland, then to Paris and Nice. Hirschfeld designated both Li and Karl Giese as his heirs and after his death, Li resumed his medical studies in Zurich. Li matriculated at the University of Hong Kong but continued his studies in many European counties afterwards before settling in Vancouver, Canada, where he died in 1993. Li’s heirs donated his personal papers in a suitcase containing some of Hirschfeld’s private papers to the Magnus Hirschfeld Institute in Berlin, Germany.6 However, in many countries or institutions, minorities and marginalised groups are faced with a number of challenges regarding access to and organisation of information concerning themselves and their personal, cultural, social and political inter- ests. This is because they did not participate, were not involved or invited, in the creation of public or institutional records from the beginning. The powerful can always introduce silences into the archives by denying marginalised groups their voices and opportunities to participate in the archives. Having a voice is associated with empowerment and self-expression, while silence is represented as passivity and as a direct effect of oppression and exclusion.7
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