Chen, Michael was born in Monterey Park, California, in 1985 to Taiwanese immigrant parents and grew up between the San Gabriel Valley and the Bay Area. He studied history at UC Berkeley and earned an M.A. in public history from San Francisco State University. A former oral historian with the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation, he has published essays and features in ZYZZYVA, Hyphen, and Pacific Historical Review. His work often explores migration, labor, and the ways communities keep memory. He lives in Oakland, where he volunteers with a neighborhood archive and tries not to accumulate more vintage typewriters than his apartment can bear.
