Joanne Missingham

Joanne Missingham (Chinese name: 黑嘉嘉, Hanyu Pinyin: Hēi Jiājiā) is an Australian-born 7 dan professional player of the Taiwan Qiyuan.

Joanne Missingham was born in Brisbane, Queensland on 26th May 1994, to an Australian father and Taiwanese mother. Missingham plays professionally under her mother's maiden name and Chinese given name, Hēi Jiājiā.Missingham moved with her family to Taiwan when she was four years old, and started to play Go at the age of six. Two years later she passed the amateur 1-dan milestone. Studying under Zhou Keping, Missingham continued to progress in Go, while also pursuing her interests in gymnastics, music (piano and pipa), Chinese calligraphy, and swimming. In 2005 she moved with her family to San Diego, California, USA. Her first language is Chinese, and she also speaks English.

Missingham studied with Ruan Yunsheng for two months in 2007, and took the Chinese professional exam that year, but without success ( ref). In April 2008, she and her mother moved to Tianjin, China, where she studied with Wu Kai until her promotion to professional shodan in July 2008. She thus became the first Australian-born professional go player.

• 2004 - Represented Taiwan in the Amateur Pair Go Championship.
• 2005 - Represented Taiwan in the Ing World Youth Goe Championship in Barcelona, Spain.
• 2006 - Oceania Toyota and Denso Cup Open 3rd place.
• 2006 - Taiwan National Female Champion.
• 2008 - Oceania Toyota and Denso Cup Open Champion.
• 2008 - Took second place in the Chinese professional qualifying tournament in July, and was awarded professional status, the first Australian citizen to achieve this.
• 2008 - Represented Oceania in the World Oza tournament, the youngest player ever to do so.
• 2008 - Represented Australia at the World Mind Sports Games in Beijing. Reached the quarter-finals of the Women's Individual Go tournament, where she lost to Park Jieun 9p of South Korea, the eventual bronze medal winner.
• 2009 - In October, chosen to represent Taiwan at the 2010 Asian Games, with 8 wins and 2 losses in the selection tournament.
• 2010 - In January, became a 1-dan member of the Taiwan Qiyuan.
• 2010 - In September, representing Oceania, was runner-up in the inaugural Bingsheng Cup, defeating Aoki Kikuyo 8p, Li He 3p and Zheng Yan 2p, but lost the final game against Park Jieun 9p.
• 2010 - In October, one of eight Taiwan representatives at the All Asia New Star, scoring 2:1, which included the only Taiwanese win against Korea. Qualified for the 3rd Taiwan Qisheng, winning the preliminary league with a score of 5:0.
• 2010 - Promoted to 2 dan on 31st October, after 20 victories as 1 dan, including international games and domestic tournaments.
• 2011 - Promoted to 5 dan on 5th January for her performance in 2010 Bingsheng Cup.
• 2011 - League participation in the 4th Taiwan Qiwang (finishing 3:4)
• 2011 - League participation in the 7th Taiwan Guoshou (finishing 5:2, tied with 4 other players for 1st place but, by previous performance, played the play-off for 4th place, defeating Zhou Junxun).
• 2011 - Qualified for the 4th Taiwan Qisheng, winning the tie break against Zhou Pingqiang who shared 3-2 score.
• 2011 - Ranked no.6 of the Taiwan Qiyuan, winning 64 games (most wins in the year in Taiwan) and losing 34.
• 2011 - Led a boycott of female players at the Qiandeng Cup? when they learned that male players were paid 2000 Yuan (US$886) per game while female players were paid nothing.
• 2011 - Tied for second place in the first Female Taiwan Mingren
• 2012 - Promoted to 6 dan in 2012-05-27 (70 wins as 5 dan).
• 2012 - League participation in the 5th Taiwan Qiwang (finishing 3:4)
• 2012 - League participation in the 8th Taiwan Guoshou
• 2012 - Reached the semifinal in the 5th Taiwan Qisheng.
• 2014 - Illness (leukemia) and death of her mother Hei Nanping. Jiajia's grieving over her mother, also her manager, companion at tournaments, and encourager, meant less play and success.
• 2015 - Promoted to 7 dan due to winning the 1st Female Zuiqiang
• 2016 - Highest ranked female player in Taiwan.

Outside go, in 2016 she signed a record deal with Taiwanese record company Seed Music (種子音樂) to appear in adverts and television productions. She is also an actress, and played a post officer in the award winning Taiwanese romantic comedy My Missing Valentine (2020).

References

• New Zealand Go Society webpage (archived version of April 2013)
• American Go Association eJournal report dated 28 July 2008
• Ranka Online interview dated 6 October 2008
• Taiwan team preparing for Asian Games 2010. View clip on YouTube
• Taiwanese news feature on Asian Games 2010 trials. View clip on YouTube.
• Four page article in Weiqi Tiandi October 1st, 2010 issue.
• Joanne Missingham Stands up for Gender Equality in Go, webpage, American Go E-Journal, 7 Nov 2011.
• Meng-Hsuan Yang, “Taiwanese Go Champion Joanne Missingham: I Only Finished Middle School, But I Am Who I Am” webpage, CommonWealth? Magazine (Taiwan), vol. 685, 12 Nov 2019.