By Emily Kim/For The Diamondback
Junior Katie Landry spoke out Friday about how her mixed race caused her to feel like an outsider at a Korean church retreat.
“To the young girls I sacrificed my integrity for to notice me, you took advantage of me,” the community health major said during a poem performance. “Nothing is more isolating than Korean solidarity.”
Landry, along with 14 other performers of different races and ethnicities, set up in the Stamp Gallery for Asian Monologues in front of about 60 people Friday. Asian Monologues was a collaboration between organizers for Asian American Pacific Heritage Month and the Celebrating Asian American Pacific Islander Women initiative.
The event was the last part of the initiative, which has organized meetings for women of color solidarity and volunteered with the Domestic Violence Resource Project. YLan Nguyen, a senior psychology major and a student leader for the initiative, said they wanted to focus on using art as healing and resistance toward the systemic oppression the Asian Pacific American community can face.
Several common themes were brought up throughout the performances, such as the struggles and challenges of being biracial, having to adopt an English birth name and Asian solidarity in general.
Intergenerational trauma was often mentioned, referring to how war tragedies affect future generations. For many Asians, specifically Southeast Asians, the term applies to the suffering of war refugees and its effect on their families, Nguyen said.
“Asian Monologues is the epitome of that, in putting words to our suffering,” Nguyen said. “It was really great how everyone’s experiences are different, that everyone’s performance at least resonated with a couple people.”
Kai Kai Mascareñas, graduate coordinator for Asian Pacific American and Pacific Islander student involvement and community advocacy at the Office of Multicultural Involvement & Community Advocacy and co-emcee of the event, openly shared with the audience about her recent cataract surgery and eczema. When she encountered a shaman in the Philippines, he told her that her bodily condition was the manifestation of her great-great-grandfather’s past life. She cited this as an example of intergenerational trauma.
Kevin Chen, an alumnus who now works as an algebra teacher, performed a poem about the implications of adopting an English name in place of his Chinese name.
“When I was four, I already knew my name had been dropped on the ground like a pair of chopsticks swapped out for a fork. I promised myself it’s all in the name of convenience,” he said during the performance.
Asian Monologues also provided an opportunity for students to perform spoken word for the first time. Alex Pryor, a senior American studies major, said he was inspired by Multiracial Heritage Month in March and decided to try out poetry for himself.
“I normally don’t do spoken word, I’m more of a behind the scenes guy,” he said to the audience.
