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Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations (UNAVSA) was live.

July 25th, 5:03 pm

The Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network (DVAN) co-presents UNAVSÁCCENTED | "Storytelling Across Diaspora" with the Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations (UNAVSA).

We've brought together storytellers, community organizers, and advocates for our Vietnamese and Southeast Asian diasporic communities to share their experiences, insights, and strategies for cultural preservation and multigenerational storytelling. This live panel conversation features Tracey Nguyen Mang from the Vietnamese Boat People Podcast, Julia Ha from Project Yellow Dress, Jimmy Vu Patel-Nguyen from the REFUGENE Project, and will be moderated by Philip Nguyen.

ABOUT THE GUESTS

Tracey Nguyen Mang is the Creator and Host of the Vietnamese Boat People Podcast and nonprofit organization.
She is the youngest of seven children, a first-generation Vietnamese refugee, who came to America in 1981 at the age of three. In 2018, she began the journey to document her family’s stories to preserve them for her young children. In that journey, she discovered that there are others in the community trying to reconnect and understand their family's diaspora stories. She started the Podcast to create a platform that would help capture these stories in first person and make them accessible for listeners all over the world. In addition to starting her own nonprofit, Tracey has over 20 years of business and digital strategy, management consulting experience and corporate social responsibility.
The Vietnamese Boat People (VBP) podcast is a curated collection available on major podcast platforms such as Apple Podcast, Spotify, and Stitcher and currently reaches listeners globally. In partnership with New York University (NYU), the collection is being archived at The Tamiment Library and is NYU's first Vietnamese collection within the Asian/Pacific/American Institute. It has been featured in Forbes and NPR local affiliate shows and received The Lion Awards 2021 Podcast of the Year, 2020 Silver ‘Best Mission Driven’ by Asian Podcast Network and selected for the 2020 PRX / Google Podcast Creators Program. In addition to the podcast, the organization publishes a community blog, hosts storytelling events and is the creator of the Mỹ Việt Story Slam.

Julia Hà (she/her) is a Chinese-Vietnamese American from the San Francisco Bay Area, the child of Vietnamese Boat People refugees who immigrated to the U.S. in the early 1980s. She is the co-founder of Project Yellow Dress, a storytelling platform dedicated to sharing and highlighting the histories, experiences, and voices of the Southeast Asian diaspora. She currently works as an Academic Advisor for the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) at San Francisco State University.
She earned her B.A. from UC San Diego in History: War, Revolution, and Social Change with a special emphasis in Genocide Studies, and a M.A. Ed from San Francisco State University in Equity and Social Justice in Education.

Jimmy Patel-Nguyen is the founder of the REFUGENE project, a child of Vietnamese refugees, and recently became a father.
After graduating from North Carolina State University with a BS in Civil Engineering and a Master of Global Innovation Management, he began his marketing career as the voice of Under Armour on social media. During that time, Jimmy’s father suffered a heart attack, which motivated him to move closer to his parents in North Carolina and record meaningful conversations with them about their lives.
In 2018, Jimmy established REFUGENE: a two-part project that houses a storytelling platform and a cultural apparel brand. His goal is to honor refugees and to leave a legacy that allows his son and future generations to connect with their cultural identity. Jimmy screen prints every shirt by hand, and each design is intended to spark conversations about heritage. Most recently, REFUGENE has partnered with UNAVSA to publish a book of stories told by the Vietnamese diaspora.

For more information about UNAVSA - The Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations please visit unavsa.org or follow UNAVSA on Facebook and Instagram (@unavsa)

For more information about the Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network (DVAN) please visit our website at dvan.org or follow us on Instagram (@weare_dvan) ... See MoreSee Less