With the 2008 Olympics in Beijing less than a month away, the UCLA Asian American Studies Center has released its U.S.–China Media Brief, an innovative print and electronic tool aimed at providing detailed information on China and U.S.–China relations to journalists, policymakers and media pundits.

 

The media brief, which can be found at www.uschinamediabrief.com, features in-depth analyses of China's economy, environment and human rights record and lists academic experts from UCLA and other institutions who can discuss these issues.

 

The brief also includes an illustrated timeline that covers 200 years of relations between China and the U.S. and highlights 50 landmark events in which China, the U.S. and Chinese Americans have been interlinked culturally, politically and economically.

 

Little-known facts about China's carbon-neutral eco-cities, United Nations human rights covenants and the trade balance between the U.S. and China also are included in the brief.

 

"U.S.–China relations are almost as old as the United States itself, at least since 1784, when bilateral trade was first established between the two countries," said Sharon Owyang, the brief's lead researcher and an Emmy-nominated writer. "For more than 200 years, Americans and Chinese have played a part in each other's historical, economic and cultural development."

 

"Today," she added, "the two countries are inextricably linked through globalization."

 

Don Nakanishi, director of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center, and Russell Leong, UCLA adjunct professor of English and Asian American studies and editor of the UCLA Amerasia Journal, also contributed to the brief.

 

For a printed copy of the brief, journalists can contact Leong at 310-825-2974 or uschinainfo@aasc.ucla.edu, or download a PDF version at www.uschinamediabrief.com.