Articles

HCC Director pens groundbreaking book on Houston’s Chinatown

May 10, 2024

Houston Community College (HCC) Southwest Communications Director Zen Zheng has written a panoramic history of Houston’s two Chinatowns, The Significance of Chinatown Development to a Multicultural America: An Exploration of the Houston Chinatowns.

Written in collaboration with Yali Zou, Ph.D., of the University of Houston (UH) and 16 years in the making, the book examines the city’s Chinese neighborhoods’ dramatic metamorphosis from an ethnic enclave to a continually expanding multicultural boomtown today.

Sponsored by the UH Asian American Studies Center led by Zou, the study delves into the rise and fall of Old Chinatown and explores the distinctive character of New Chinatown. It underscores New Chinatown’s innovative progress that sets it apart from the nation’s oldest major Chinatowns, a quintessentially Houston story. The book illuminates the contributions of the Chinatowns to the economy and multicultural fabric of the city, state and nation.

The book is published by Emerald Publishing, an international scholarly publisher based in the United Kingdom.

“It was an honor to pioneer the documentation of such a significant piece of Houston history,” Zheng said.

Zheng has served at HCC Southwest since 2017. His career includes 12 years with the Houston Chronicle and other municipal, healthcare and higher education institutions in marketing, communications and public affairs.