Publications
BOOKS, CHAPTERS IN EDITED VOLUMES AND PEER REVIEWED JOURNALS
Fight the Tower: Asian American Women Scholars’ Resistance and Renewal in the Academy. Kieu Linh Caroline Valverde and Wei Ming Dariotis, Editors. (Rutgers University Press 2020).
“Reclaiming Home: Lê Q. Dinh’s Artistic Journey in Vietnam.” The San Jose Museum of Art Catalogue for the exhibit, “Dinh Q. Lê: True Journey is Return” (2018).
“My Mother, Not My Mother.” Completely Mixed Up: Mixed Heritage Asian North American Writing and Art. Brandy Lien Worrall-Soriano Ed. Rabbit Fool Press. Vancouver, Canada. 2015.
“A Review of Presumed Incompetent: The Intersections of Race and Class for Women in Academia.” The Feminist Wire (February 5, 2014).
“Fight the Tower: A Call to Action for Women of Color in Academia.” Seattle Journal for Social Justice. 12(2): 367 – 420 (2013).
Transnationalizing Viet Nam: Community, Culture, and Politics in the Diaspora. Temple University Press. (October 5, 2012).
“Creating Identity, Defining Culture, and Making History from an Art Exhibit: ‘Unfinished Story: A Tribute to My Mothers’.” Crossroads Journal Diaspora Issue. 20:1. Nathalie Nguyen Ed. (2009 Winter).
“Making Vietnamese Music Transnational: Sounds of Home, Resistance and Change.” Amerasia Journal Vietnamese American issue. Linda Vo and Russell Leong Eds. (2003). Reprinted in East Main: Asian American Popular Culture. Shilpa Dave, LeiLani Nishime, and Tasha Oren Eds. (2006).
“Doing the Mixed Race Dance: A Multiracial Vietnamese American Class Typology.” Chapter in The Sum of Our Parts: Mixed Heritage Asian Americans. Teresa Kay Williams and Cindy Nakashima Eds. Temple University Press. (September 2001).
“From Dust to Gold: The Vietnamese Amerasian Experience.” Chapter in Racially Mixed People in America. Ed. Maria P.P. Root, Ph.D. Sage Publications. (1992).
“Nguyen takes stand against tyranny.” San Jose Mercury News. (February 7, 2008).
“Ao Dai Revival.” In Ao Dai: A Modern Design Coming of Age. Valverde, C.K.L. Ed. Association for Viet Arts and San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles. (2006).
“The Good Guys: An American Tragedy” theater review, co-written with Lucy Burns for the Journal of Asian American Studies, Vol. 3, No. 3. The Johns Hopkins University Press. (2001).
“Will War Images Overshadow Potential of Present-Day Vietnam?” San Jose Mercury News. Sunday. (November 12, 2000).
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“Fight the Tower: Asian American Women Scholars’ Resistance and Renewal in the Academy.”Kieu Linh Caroline Valverde and Wei Ming Dariotis, Editors (Rutgers University Press 2020).
Our perception of higher education as the pillar of intellectual thought and meritocracy masks the reality that academia has been used to cultivate and disseminate ideas of difference to suppress dissent while advancing oppressive forms of capitalism and imperialism through “social engineering” projects. This social engineering of superior and inferior categories that serves to divide and conquer objectors is particularly apparent in the case of Asian American women scholars, who have long occupied the socially constructed role of the privileged oppressed—perceived as advantaged but actually positioned to be disposable. The growing accounts of these injustices and resistance to them, presented in this anthology and elsewhere, exemplify how Asian American women are increasingly woke to the realities of academia and are ready to work together with others for positive change. Studies in this anthology challenge “socially engineered” systems by employing methods of what we term reverse social engineering. It involves deconstructing systems of oppression to reveal the real motivations behind the actions of power holders and the (un)intended effects of their projects on society. From this knowledge point, we can better determine what to resist and how to exact change. These collective actions, and the promise of more to come, give much hope for a truly inclusive, equitable, and dynamic academia.
“Reclaiming Home: Lê Q. Dinh’s Artistic Journey in Vietnam.” The San Jose Museum of Art catalogue for the exhibit,“Dinh Q. Lê: True Journey Is Return” (2018).
As individuals and groups fight for their truth to be heard regarding the legacies of Viet Nam, one particular artist has emerged to bring a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the Vietnam War and its visual legacies. Lê Q. Dinh lived through wars, escaped from Viet Nam, resettled in the US, and returned to live and work in Viet Nam, infusing experiences that are embedded in his rich background. Lê utilizes deconstructed photography installation and film to push viewers to question their accepted notions of history, community, and memory. These themes are highlighted in his solo artist exhibition, ¨Dinh Q. Lê: True Journey is Return,” at the San José Museum of Art. Located in the city with the largest Vietnamese population outside of Vietnam, it serves as a poignant homecoming.
“My Mother, Not My Mother.” Completely Mixed Up: Mixed Heritage Asian North American Writing and Art. Brandy Lien Worrall-Soriano Ed. Rabbit Fool Press. Vancouver, Canada. 2015.
As a pioneer mixed race scholar known for my work on the sociopolitical ramifications and realities of Vietnamese Amerasians legislation and Amerasian agency, in maneuvering through class typologies to offset racial bias, I was invited and contributed to the anthology: Completely Mixed Up: Mixed Heritage Asian North American Writing and Art. This much awaited anthology on visual art, writing, photography, and performance, was the INDIEFAB award finalist. My piece is a creative non-fiction titled, “My Mother, Not My Mother.” Here I complicate and challenge dated tropes of: mother-daughter relationships, biracial identity, war victims, and tragic mixed race lives – through dramatic creative storytelling of multigenerational mixed race family dynamics during war and displacement.
“Fight the Tower: A Call to Action for Women of Color in Academia.” Seattle Journal for Social Justice. 12(2): 367 – 420 (2013).
“Fight the Tower: A Call to Action for Women of Color in Academia” chronicled my fight for tenure while engaging with the literature on the corporatization of the university and workplace discriminatory practices against women of color (WOC). I further broadened the scholarship by bringing to light the complex inter-ethnic power dynamics that exists below normative understandings of relations based on race, ethnicity, class, and gender. My piece came from a long tradition of critical feminist scholars challenging dominant knowledge paradigms by injecting personal narratives that reflect objective understanding and universal experiences, otherwise known as testimonios. This style of writing highlights the lived realities of those that have historically been masked or relegated to the margins, such as women of color in the academy. Beyond the merits of storytelling in dialogue with the most current debates about the University-Industrial Complex, my article puts forth a powerful political call to action for women of color academics and offers practical strategies for those battling for equality and justice in the workplace.
Transnationalizing Viet Nam: Community, Culture, and Politics in the Diaspora. 2012. Temple University Press.
Transnationalizing Viet Nam offers an in-depth look at the dynamic and long-standing connections between Viet Nam and its diaspora in the United States. These links are especially astounding considering the many decidedly anti-diasporic elements in not only the home and host countries but also the ethnic community itself. This rich transnational history—which has gone largely undetected, or at least unrecognized—is revealed through nearly two decades of careful longitudinal, multisite research, punctuated by the voices of 250 interviewees.
This book explores transnational connections between Viet Nam and its overseas population in the United States from 1975 to 2012 in four areas of activity: (1) exchanges and interchanges of Vietnamese and Vietnamese American popular music; (2) sociopolitical transformations in information and communication developments in Viet Nam from an influential transnational virtual community, Vietnam Forum (VNForum); (3) (re)negotiations of political and cultural identities of overseas Vietnamese communities through ethnic news media, looking at the controversial art works of Vietnamese American artist Chau Huynh as a focal point for this debate; and (4) an overseas Vietnamese battle over defining community and representation as seen through a business district naming controversy involving the first Vietnamese city councilwoman in the United States, Vice-Mayor Madison Nguyen.
“Creating Identity, Defining Culture, and Making History from an Art Exhibit: ‘Unfinished Story: A Tribute to My Mothers’”. Crossroads Journal Diaspora Issue. 20:1. Nathalie Nguyen Ed. Winter 2009.
This article looks at the controversial artworks of Chau Huynh and the subsequent protests against the largest Vietnamese American ethnic newspaper, Nguoi Viet Daily, for publishing her works. This article proceeded to discuss how cultural production becomes a forum for shaping the political, cultural, and social landscape of recent immigrant groups like Vietnamese Americans. Community members in turn self-censor knowing not doing so may result in ostracization or worth. Chau’s case highlights of the cost of utilizing freedom of expression in a highly heated political climate of extreme anti-communist fever.
“Making Vietnamese Music Transnational: Sounds of Home, Resistance and Change.” Amerasia Journal Vietnamese American issue. Linda Vo and Russell Leong Eds. 2003 Reprinted in East Main: Asian American Popular Culture. Shilpa Dave, LeiLani Nishime, and Tasha Oren Eds. 2006
Here, I discuss how conditions in Viet Nam and abroad influenced the production, dissemination and consumption of contemporary popular Vietnamese music. I document this by discussing popular Vietnamese music history 1975-2002 — highlighting voices of musicians, producers and consumers in the United States and Viet Nam.
Originally published in Amerasia Journal and republished in East Main Street
Áo Dài: A Modern Design Coming of Age. Valverde, C.K.L. Ed. Association for Viet Arts and San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles. 2006
The edited catalogue accompanies the historical exhibit of áo dài, Viet Nam’s national costume, in which I curated. The edited catalogue includes articles about the United States’ connection to Viet Nam, the history of the áo dài, and the evolution of its design in contemporary times.
Áo Dài: A Modern Design Coming of Age
“Doing the Mixed Race Dance: A Multiracial Vietnamese American Class Typology”
In The Sum of Our Parts: Mixed Heritage Asian Americans. Teresa Kay Williams and Cindy Nakashima Eds. Temple University Press. 2001
This chapter explores the mixed race class typology that exists in the Vietnamese American community and documents how Vietnamese multiracials negotiate and create a social space for themselves in this environment of multiple categorizations.
“The Good Guys: An American Tragedy”
Theater review, co-written with Lucy Burns for the Journal of Asian American Studies, Vol. 3, No. 3. The Johns Hopkins University Press. 2001.
This is a review piece for “The Good Guys: An American Tragedy” play by Michael Edo Keane and Miko Lee.
Journal of Asian American Studies
“From Dust to Gold: The Vietnamese Amerasian Experience”
In Racially Mixed People in America, Ed. Maria P.P. Root, Ph.D. Sage Publications. 1992.
In, “From Dust to Gold: The Vietnamese Amerasian Experience,” I provided a description and analysis of Amerasian history, legislation, and experiences in Viet Nam and their eventual resettlement in the United States.