First, I had lots of trouble with the names.  After reading for about 30 pages, I decided to write down all the names on a piece of paper.  And, at that time, I discovered that at the front and at…

When I was in high school, at a school with a sizable Vietnamese-American population, my world history teacher assigned an essay on a post-colonial conflict of our choosing. He advised that, while many students may be interested in taking on…

I woke up this morning to Victoria’s comment, now read Sandy’s response, and feel like, “What else is there to say?” Thanks to you both! This was a gorgeous example of the form I love. The art and the use…

Vietnamerica: A Family’s Journey is the first example of this writing genre that I have ever “read,” or better, experienced. My reflection will largely reflect on the use of images because this is the aspect that struck me most strongly…

This one was hard. Perhaps that’s why I’ve procrastinated and posted this so late. I remember Selena’s death vividly in my Junior year of High School. I cannot say I was a mega fan, but I was first exposed to…

Listening to this podcast, I was interested in the subject. By the life of Selena. She was killed when I was only two years old so her fame was before my time. Because the genre of her music is not…

I went in as cold as you could be: the podcast started and I heard the story of Maria Garcia—then the other shoe dropped. Selena: oh yeah, that sounds familiar. I was learning who Selena was: but this podcast isn’t…

Maria Garcia lets us know this is her story. She uses the border as a symbol of the separations of herself as well as the countries. As with Jesus on a Tortilla we hear about hardship and prejudice Mexican immigrants…

Confession: I still have Tribe Called Quest in my head, days later, now remixed with Selena (and Dilson Hernandez and Ben Grosscup’s No More Sacrifice Zones, but that’s…off-topic).    What is the relationship between music and memory? Reading Go Ahead…

After listening to more, (nearly all) of the podcast episodes in this series (and re-listening over the past couple of months,) I have to concede that I had judged much of its tone unfairly. I had dismissed these podcasts entirely…