8+1: A Symposium, Voices from the Asian American Literary Review

When: May 7, 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Where: Japanese American National Museum, 369 E. First St., Los Angeles

Renowned and emerging Asian American and Asian Canadian writers will converge at the Japanese American National Museum on May 7 for a day-long celebration of contemporary literature. ACWW's Ray Hsu will be joining fellow Canadian Joy Kogawa in Los Angeles.

8+1: A Symposium, Voices from the Asian American Literary Review will feature Joy Kogawa (Obasan), Kip Fulbeck (Part Asian, 100% Hapa), Rishi Reddi (Karma and Other Stories), R. Zamora Linmark (Leche, Rolling the R’s), Reese Okyong Kwon (short fiction writer, recently named one of Narrative’s “30 Below 30” writers), Viet Nguyen (Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America), Hiromi Ito (Killing Kanoko) with award-winning translator Jeffrey Angles, and Los Angeles native Brian Ascalon Roley (American Son).

These writers reflect the richness and complexity of the Asian American literary landscape. With family roots in Japan, India, the Philippines, Korea, China, and Viet Nam, these writers touch upon fluid identities and communities, erased histories, and linguistic and cultural alienation. Their work ranges from delicate to expressive, experimental to moral.

The symposium will include paired readings, Q&A sessions and book signings. The public may attend any or all of the readings.

Event sponsors include: Japanese American National Museum, UCI Center for Writing and Translation, USC Asian American Studies Program, UCLA Asian American Studies Center, UCLA English Department and UCLA Friends of English, Vietnamese American Arts & Letters Association, Coffee House Press, Hyphen Magazine, Philippine Expressions Bookshop, Kaya Press, Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network, Giant Robot, Asian American Journalists Association—Los Angeles Chapter, Audrey Magazine, Asian Arts Initiative, Calypso Press, Asian Pacific American Studies at Loyola Marymount University, Asian Pacific American Librarians Association, and Japan America Society of Southern California. This event is supported by Poets and Writers, Inc. through a grant it has received from The James Irvine Foundation.

For a symposium schedule and full author bios, visit http://www.aalrmag.org/symposium

ACWW's Ray Hsu will read as part of 125 Readings: "4 poets, 10 hours, 13 kilometers, 125 readings!" The readings will start in downtown Vancouver at 9am, on Thursday, April 21, with a finish line reading at the Vancouver Public Library (350 W. Georgia Street) from 7pm to 8:30pm, in the Level 3 Meeting Room. The other participating poets are Kim Fu, Andrea Bennett, and Kevin Spenst. Free Admission. Limited Seating.

Thursday April 21, 7:00 p.m.
Meeting Room, Level 3
Central Library, 350 W. Georgia St.
Admission is free. Seating is limited.

To combat the image of poets as sedentary word-hermits, these writers -- Ray Hsu, Kim Fu, Kevin Spenst and Andrea Bennett -- are going to jog through 125 different reading venues in one day on April 21st. This athletic aesthetics will combine some of the best of their poetry with a unique list of venues such as coffee shops, book stores, and pizza joints. The day will end with a longer reading of their work at the VPL.

World Poetry Month

ACWW's very own Ray Hsu will be performing at World Poetry Celebrates National Poetry Month. Come join us on Monday April 18th, 2011 at the Vancouver Public Library's Central Library, 350 W. Georgia St., Alma VanDusen & Peter Kaye Rooms, Lower Level.

The evening will be a wonderful multilingual, multicultural, "Poetathon!" featuring readings by Anita Aguirre Nieveras, Timothy Shay, Bong Ja Ahn, Bernice Lever, and Ray. Iranian Daf music by Karim Kokehi and Taher Kokehi. World Poetry hosts: Ariadne Sawyer and Alejandro Mujica-Olea.

World Poetry boasts a strong Canadian component. In the Lower Mainland alone, it is connected with over 500 poets, musicians, and writers from 64 countries of origin. It also hosts the popular monthly World Poetry Reading Series at the Vancouver Public Library, where it presents events featuring multicultural and multilingual poets, writers, and musicians for enjoyment, enlightenment, and edification.

The World Poetry Café Radio Show airs every Tuesday night from 9-10 PM on Vancouver Co-op Radio (CFRO 102.7 FM), with Ariadne Sawyer and Alejandro Mujica-Olea. Guest hosts are Lucia Gorea and Angelo Moroni. You can find the latest shows on this site.

At the last World Poetry Night reading, Gung Haggis co-hosted along with World Poetry Reading Series, a special blend of contemporary Scottish-Canadian and Chinese-Canadian poets, mixed with ancient Scottish and Chinese traditions of Robbie Burns Day and Chinese New Year.

ACWW board of directors Tetsuro Shigematsu and Ray Hsu is part of UBC Dialoges: Vancouver about the nature of higher education in a culturally diverse society on May 9th, 2011.

. One third of UBC Vancouver’s student population is of Chinese descent, with another third made up of students descended from families from other Asian nations. Do these statistics define UBC? Should we even be talking about this?

A recent Maclean’s article titled, “Too Asian,” provoked a storm of responses (some outraged, some humourous), but may have hit upon a small grain of truth. Does UBC’s ethnic makeup reflect the ethnic makeup of the Lower Mainland? Does the predominance of Asian-related students make it more difficult for non-Asians to gain admission? Is “tiger parenting” exclusive to the Asian cultures?

Is a conversation about race at UBC even relevant? Can we explore this topic without offending each other?

ACWW Presents Book Club with SKY Lee's Disappearing Moon Cafe

TEDxTerrytalks 2010 - Tetsuro Shigematsu - The Awesomeness of Your Contradictions

Tetsuro Shigematsu offered an amazing session at UBC's TEDxTerry Talk called, The Awesomeness of Your Contradictions. As Tetsuro puts it, Stick out your thumb. That's the thickness of my press package. If you flip through it, fanning past you would be clippings from all manner of periodicals; from monthly community bulletins, to national newspapers. This is the one thing I do well; getting love from the media.

I'm a writer/performer. And garnering coverage is very helpful in getting everything from publicly funded arts grants to international work visas. Nothing establishes credibility quite like a stack of newspaper and magazine profiles.

Ever since I was a teenager writing my first play, to making my first feature film, I've never had to send out press releases. I have always had reporters coming to me. I always assumed this was the way it worked, until I noticed fellow artists counting themselves lucky to get a two line blurb from the local arts weekly.

Which begs the question; why do some people get noticed and others get ignored? Before returning to school, I worked as a national TV and radio broadcaster for the CBC, and I noticed my colleagues in the newsroom always seemed to be endlessly fascinated with one particular kind of person; walking oxymorons. People who embody contradictions, and whose charisma flows from our inability to reconcile their seemingly paradoxical characteristics.

Eminem, white rapper. Tiger Woods, black golfer. Madonna, sex-object feminist. Moby, rock star geek. Jonas Brothers, heart throb virgins. Barack Obama, black president. Terry Fox, crippled marathoner.

Everyone possesses paradoxical traits. But we usually try to suppress them out of fear of appearing inconsistent. But rather than obfuscate our contradictions, we should allow them to define us. I'll show you how to instantly identify your dominant characteristic, how to foreground the one hidden trait that belies it, and illustrate how the media sought out my own evolving contradictions throughout the years, and rewarded me for it.

Gung Haggis Poetry Night at VPL

On January 24th, 2011 -- Robbie Burns Eve -- at the Vancouver Public Library Central Branch, Todd Wong organized a poetry night which featured Michael Morris, James Mullen, Cara Kauhane, Steve Duncan (host of Co-Op Radio Wax Poetic), and Ray Hsu (author of Anthropy, Cold Sleep Permanent Afternoon). And Novus TV was on hand to video tape the whole event. As Todd puts it, Gung Haggis Fat Choy, his brainchild, is a "special blend of contemporary Scottish-Canadian and Chinese-Canadian poets, mixed with ancient Scottish and Chinese traditions of Robbie Burns Day and Chinese New Year."

The Enrollment Controversy Response

The MacLean's article Too Asian (now redubbed, The Enrollment Controversy), certainly drew a firestorm of responses from the public and especially academia. In response, Ray Hsu's Creative Writing class (with Tetsuro Shigematsu) embarked on a creative video project as a response. If you're interested in the original article, it can be viewed in its entirety here.

This original and creative film was brought to life by Asian Canadian Writing class protesting the Maclean article about the university being too Asian. People involved are Tetsuro and Bahareh Shigematsu, Matt Lyons, Mika, Taizo, Caleb, Libby, Mattea, Danielle Thien, Anna Kaye, Cara Kauhane, David Mount, Happy and Hart Kreter, Haruka Sakaguchi, Indra Pramit, Reena Yu, Ray Hsu, Krissy Darch, , Heidi Loos, Joomi Seo, Kuei-ming Lin, and the UBC Creative Writing Program.