Adjunct Faculty

David W. Choi
Adjunct Professor, David Lam Centre

David Choi is active in the local community, and is a founding Council member of the Simon Fraser University Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue, and a member of SFU’s President’s Club. He is a senior associate of the University of British Columbia Liu Institute for Global Issues, an International Advisor to the UBC Institute of Asian Research, a member of UBC’s President’s Circle, and an advisor to the UBC Dean of Commerce and the Dean of Education.

David serves on the BC Children’s Hospital Foundation, is an Honorary Advisor to Vancouver’s Chinese Cultural Centre (CCC), and chairs the CK Choi Foundation. He has chaired the Vancouver Economic Development Commission and was vice-chair of S.U.C.C.E.S.S. He is the recipient of many awards including the Business in Vancouver “40 under 40,” for outstanding business achievers, the Georgie Award for Marketing, the CCC’s S. Wah Leung Award for the promotion of Canadian Heritage, Cultural Understanding and Harmony, and the SFU Chancellor’s Distinguished Award for outstanding contribution to British Columbia.
David has a Bachelor of Commerce Degree urban land economics from the University of BC.

David Chuenyan Lai
Emeritus Professor, Geography, University of Victoria
Adjunct Professor, David Lam Centre

David Chuenyan Lai (C.M.), Professor of Geography, has taught at the University of Victoria for 35 years. He received his B.A. (First Class Hons.) and M.A. in Geography from the University of Hong Kong, and Ph.D. in Geography from the London School of Economics and Political Science, University of London. After his retirement in 2003, he was appointed as Research Affiliate at the Centre of Aging; Adjunct Professor of the Department of Pacific & Asian Studies; and an Associate Member of the Centre for Asia-Pacific Initiatives at the University of Victoria.

His research interests include: Chinatowns, overseas Chinese, Hong Kong and Chinese culture. Of his 260 publications, almost half were related to Chinatowns and Chinese communities in Canada. His books include: Chinatowns: Towns within Cities in Canada; The Forbidden City within Victoria: Myth, Symbol and Streetscape of Canada’s Earliest Chinatown; Building and Rebuilding Harmony: The Gateway to Victoria’s Chinatown; A Study of Asia-themed Malls in the Aberdeen District of City of Richmond, British Columbia; Canadian Steel, Chinese Grit: No Chinese Labour, No Railway; Arches in British Columbia; Land of Genghis Khan: The Rise and Fall of Nation-States in China’s Northern Frontiers.