Vietnamese diasporic relations affect—and are directly affected by—events in Viet Nam. In Transnationalizing Viet Nam, Kieu-Linh Caroline Valverde explores these connections, providing a nuanced understanding of this globalized community. Valverde draws on 250 interviews and almost two decades of research to show the complex relationship between Vietnamese in the diaspora and those back at the homeland.In the series Asian American History and Culture, edited by Sucheng Chan, David Palumbo-Liu, Michael Omi, K. Scott Wong, and Linda Trinh Võ

The figure of the Polish plumber or builder has long been a well-established icon of the British national imagination, uncovering the UK's collective unease with immigration from Central and Eastern Europe. But despite the powerful impact the UK's second largest language group has had on their host country's culture and politics, very little is known about its members. This painstakingly researched book offers a broad perspective on Polish migrants in the UK, taking into account discursive actions, policies, family connections, transnational networks, and political engagement of the diaspora. Born out of a decade of ethnographic studies among various communities of Polish nationals living in London, Michal P. Garapich documents the changes affecting both Polish migrants and British society, offering insight into the inner tensions and struggles within what is often assumed to be a uniform and homogeneous category. From Polish financial sector workers to the Polish homeless population, this groundbreaking book provides a street-level account of cultural and social determinants of Polish migrants as they continually rework their relation to class and ethnicity.

This collection examines aspects of the Vietnamese diaspora resettlement experience in various national settings. It investigates issues such as community politics, identity formation, generational conflicts and how different conditions of exit from Vietnam have created fractures within the contemporary Vietnamese diaspora.

In recent years, the Vietnamese diaspora, including some of whom are Protestant Christian Việt Kiều, have returned to their natal homeland of Vietnam in large numbers. This book investigates the phenomenon of the Protestant Christian Việt Kiều who have returned and reestablished belonging in Vietnam with a missional purpose and the perspective of non-migrant local Protestant Christian leaders as a case study of diaspora missiology. It is based upon doctoral research utilizing in-depth interviews which sought to answer the following questions: 1) What are the motivating factors of Protestant Christian Việt Kiều returning to Vietnam for mission-related purposes? 2) What has been the experience in ministry of the returning Protestant Christian Việt Kiều regarding mission-related reasons for returning? 3) How have the non-migrants experienced the phenomenon of return? This book explores the answers to these questions as a case study of diaspora missiology. Findings suggest that the Protestant Christian Việt Kiều are welcomed back in Vietnam and contributing in many dynamic ways in the homeland. At the same time, the return journey is a road layered with complexities, contradictions, opportunities, and unique challenges. Findings from this diaspora community engaged in missions by and beyond the diaspora give insight into the paradigm of diaspora missiology and temper the enthusiasm for widely promoted theory. Important questions arise regarding how far diaspora as a framework can carry us.

Vietnam’s shift to a market-based society has brought about profound realignments in its people’s relations with each other. As the nation continues its retreat from the legacies of war and socialism, significant social rifts have emerged that divide citizens by class, region and ethnicity. By drawing on social connections as a traditional resource, Vietnamese are able to accumulate wealth, overcome marginalisation and achieve social mobility. However, such relationship-building strategies are also fraught with peril for they have the potential to entrench pre-existing social divisions and lead to new forms of disconnectedness. This book examines the dynamics of connection and disconnection in the lives of contemporary Vietnamese. It features 11 chapters by anthropologists who draw upon research in both highland and lowland contexts to shed light on social capital disparities, migration inequalities and the benefits and perils of gift exchange. The authors investigate ethnic minority networks, the politics of poverty, patriotic citizenship, and the ‘heritagisation’ of culture. Tracing shifts in how Vietnamese people relate to their consociates and others, the chapters elucidate the social legacies of socialism, nation-building and the transition to a globalised market-based economy. With compelling case studies and including many previously unheard perspectives, this book offers original insights into social ties and divisions among the modern Vietnamese.

Asian American women scholars experience shockingly low rates of tenure and promotion because of the ways they are marginalized by intersectionalities of race and gender in academia. Fight the Tower shows that Asian American women stand up for their rights and work for positive change for all within academic institutions. The essays provide powerful portraits, reflections, and analyses of a population often rendered invisible by the lies sustaining intersectional injustices to operate an oppressive system.

Banksy is known worldwide for his politically subversive works of art, but he is far from the only artist whose creations are infused with internationally relevant, activist themes. How else can the arts help activate citizen participation in social justice movements? Moreover, what is the role of culture in a globalizing world? Transnationalism, Activism, Art goes beyond Banksy by investigating how the three complementary political, social, and cultural phenomena listed in the title interact in the twenty-first century. Renowned and emerging critics use current theory on cultural production and politics to illuminate case studies of various media, including film, literature, visual art, and performance, in their multiple manifestations, from electronic dance music to Wikileaks to bestselling poetry collections. By addressing how these artistic media are used to enact citizen participation in social justice movements, the volume makes important connections between such participation and scholarly study of globalization and transnationalism.

The Pacific has long been a space of conquest, exploration, fantasy, and resistance. Pacific Islanders had established civilizations and cultures of travel well before European explorers arrived, initiating centuries of upheaval and transformation. The twentieth century, with its various wars fought in and over the Pacific, is only the most recent era to witness military strife and economic competition. While “Asia Pacific” and “Pacific Rim” were late twentieth-century terms that dealt with the importance of the Pacific to the economic, political, and cultural arrangements that span Asia and the Americas, a new term has arisen—the transpacific. In the twenty-first century, U.S. efforts to dominate the ocean are symbolized not only in the “Pacific pivot” of American policy but also the development of a Transpacific Partnership. This partnership brings together a dozen countries—not including China—in a trade pact whose aim is to cement U.S. influence. That pact signals how the transpacific, up to now an academic term, has reached mass consciousness. Recognizing the increasing importance of the transpacific as a word and concept, this anthology proposes a framework for transpacific studies that examines the flows of culture, capital, ideas, and labor across the Pacific. These flows involve Asia, the Americas, and the Pacific Islands. The introduction to the anthology by its editors, Janet Hoskins and Viet Thanh Nguyen, consider the advantages and limitations of models found in Asian studies, American studies, and Asian American studies for dealing with these flows. The editors argue that transpacific studies can draw from all three in order to provide a critical model for considering the geopolitical struggle over the Pacific, with its attendant possibilities for inequality and exploitation. Transpacific studies also sheds light on the cultural and political movements, artistic works, and ideas that have arisen to contest state, corporate, and military ambitions. In sum, the transpacific as a concept illuminates how flows across the Pacific can be harnessed for purposes of both domination and resistance. The anthology’s contributors include geographers (Brenda S. A. Yeoh, Weiqiang Lin), sociologists (Yen Le Espiritu, Hung Cam Thai), literary critics (John Carlos Rowe, J. Francisco Benitez, Yunte Huang, Viet Thanh Nguyen), and anthropologists (Xiang Biao, Heonik Kwon, Nancy Lutkehaus, Janet Hoskins), as well as a historian (Laurie J. Sears), and a film scholar (Akira Lippit). Together these contributors demonstrate how a transpacific model can be deployed across multiple disciplines and from varied locations, with scholars working from the United States, Singapore, Japan and England. Topics include the Cold War, the Chinese state, U.S. imperialism, diasporic and refugee cultures and economies, national cinemas, transpacific art, and the view of the transpacific from Asia. These varied topics are a result of the anthology’s purpose in bringing scholars into conversation and illuminating how location influences the perception of the transpacific. But regardless of the individual view, what the essays gathered here collectively demonstrate is the energy, excitement, and insight that can be generated from within a transpacific framework.

Foregrounding indigenous and feminist scholarship, this collection analyzes militarization as an extension of colonialism from the late twentieth to the twenty-first century in Asia and the Pacific. The contributors theorize the effects of militarization across former and current territories of Japan and the United States, such as Guam, Okinawa, the Marshall Islands, the Philippines, and Korea, demonstrating that the relationship between militarization and colonial subordination—and their gendered and racialized processes—shapes and produces bodies of memory, knowledge, and resistance. Contributors: Walden Bello, U of the Philippines; Michael Lujan Bevacqua, U of Guam; Patti Duncan, Oregon State U; Vernadette Vicuña Gonzalez, U of Hawai‘i, M noa; Insook Kwon, Myongji U; Laurel A. Monnig, U of Illinois, Urbana–Champaign; Katharine H. S. Moon, Wellesley College; Jon Kamakawiwo‘ole Osorio, U of Hawai‘i, M noa; Naoki Sakai, Cornell U; Fumika Sato, Hitotsubashi U; Theresa Cenidoza Suarez, California State U, San Marcos; Teresia K. Teaiwa, Victoria U, Wellington; Wesley Iwao Ueunten, San Francisco State U.

Having undergone significant change during the last 20 years, Vietnam is poised to become a 21st century startup nation. Capturing the challenges, efforts, and successes of Vietnam's youth, local startups, and foreign entrepreneurs throughout its transition from tradition to modernity, Startup Vietnam presents the spirit and potential of the nation in clear, informative strokes. An essential primer on modern-day Vietnam and its place on the international business stage.