Harvesting Pa Chay's Wheat

Harvesting Pa Chay's Wheat
Author: Keith Quincy
Publisher:
Total Pages: 652
Release: 2000
Genre: History
ISBN:

Keith Quincy's landmark work shows us the how and why of this terrible outcome, lest we forget that when the fighting stops the devastations of war go on."--BOOK JACKET.

Harvesting Pa Chay's Wheat

Harvesting Pa Chay's Wheat
Author: Keith Quincy
Publisher:
Total Pages: 656
Release: 2000
Genre: History
ISBN:

Keith Quincy's landmark work shows us the how and why of this terrible outcome, lest we forget that when the fighting stops the devastations of war go on."--BOOK JACKET.

A Great Place to Have a War

A Great Place to Have a War
Author: Joshua Kurlantzick
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2017-01-24
Genre: History
ISBN: 1451667868

1960. President Eisenhower was focused on Laos, a tiny Southeast Asian nation. Washington feared the country would fall to communism, triggering a domino effect in the rest of Southeast Asia. In January 1961, Eisenhower approved the CIA's Operation Momentum, a plan to create a proxy army of ethnic Hmong to fight communist forces in Laos. Kurlantzick shows how the brutal war lasted nearly two decades, killed one-tenth of Laos's total population, and changed the nature of the CIA forever.

Hmong and American

Hmong and American
Author: Vincent K. Her
Publisher: Minnesota Historical Society Press
Total Pages: 334
Release: 2012
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0873518551

Farmers in Laos, U.S. allies during the Vietnam War, refugees in Thailand, citizens of the Western world, the stories of the Hmong who now live in America have been told in detail through books and articles and oral histories over the past several decades. Like any immigrant group, members of the first generation may yearn for the past as they watch their children and grandchildren find their way in the dominant culture of their new home. For Hmong people born and educated in the United States, a definition of self often includes traditional practices and tight-knit family groups but also a distinctly Americanized point of view. How do Hmong Americans negotiate the expectations of these two very different cultures? This book contains a series of essays featuring a range of writing styles, leading scholars, educators, artists, and community activists who explore themes of history, culture, gender, class, family, and sexual orientation, weaving their own stories into depictions of a Hmong American community where people continue to develop complex identities that are collectively shared but deeply personal as they help to redefine the multicultural America of today.

Hmong America

Hmong America
Author: Chia Youyee Vang
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Total Pages: 234
Release: 2010
Genre: History
ISBN: 0252077598

An unprecedented inside view of the Hmong experience in America.

Follow the New Way

Follow the New Way
Author: Melissa May Borja
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2023-02-21
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 067429002X

An incisive look at Hmong religion in the United States, where resettled refugees found creative ways to maintain their traditions, even as Christian organizations deputized by the government were granted an outsized influence on the refugees’ new lives. Every year, members of the Hmong Christian Church of God in Minneapolis gather for a cherished Thanksgiving celebration. But this Thanksgiving takes place in the spring, in remembrance of the turbulent days in May 1975 when thousands of Laotians were evacuated for resettlement in the United States. For many Hmong, passage to America was also a spiritual crossing. As they found novel approaches to living, they also embraced Christianity—called kev cai tshiab, “the new way”—as a means of navigating their complex spiritual landscapes. Melissa May Borja explores how this religious change happened and what it has meant for Hmong culture. American resettlement policies unintentionally deprived Hmong of the resources necessary for their time-honored rituals, in part because these practices, blending animism, ancestor worship, and shamanism, challenged many Christian-centric definitions of religion. At the same time, because the government delegated much of the resettlement work to Christian organizations, refugees developed close and dependent relationships with Christian groups. Ultimately the Hmong embraced Christianity on their own terms, adjusting to American spiritual life while finding opportunities to preserve their customs. Follow the New Way illustrates America’s wavering commitments to pluralism and secularism, offering a much-needed investigation into the public work done by religious institutions with the blessing of the state. But in the creation of a Christian-inflected Hmong American animism we see the resilience of tradition—how it deepens under transformative conditions.

Hmong Americans in Michigan

Hmong Americans in Michigan
Author: Martha Aladjem Bloomfield
Publisher: MSU Press
Total Pages: 169
Release: 2014-09-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1628950064

The Hmong people, originating from the mountainous regions of China, Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos, are unique among American immigrants because of their extraordinary history of migration; loyalty to one another; prolonged abuse, trauma, and suffering at the hands of those who dominated them; profound loss; and independence, as well as their amazing capacity to adapt and remain resilient over centuries. This introduction to their experience in Michigan discusses Hmong American history, culture, and more specifically how they left homelands filled with brutality and warfare to come to the United States since the mid-1970s. More than five thousand Hmong Americans live in Michigan, and many of them have faced numerous challenges as they have settled in the Midwest. How did these brave and innovative people adapt to strange new lives thousands of miles away from their homelands? How have they preserved their past through time and place, advanced their goals, and cultivated plans for their children and education? What are their lives like in the diaspora? As this book documents via personal interviews and extensive research, despite the tremendous losses they have suffered for many years, the Hmong people in Michigan continue to demonstrate courage and profound resilience.

A History of the Seventies: The political, cultural, social and economic developments that shaped the modern world

A History of the Seventies: The political, cultural, social and economic developments that shaped the modern world
Author: Bas Dianda
Publisher: Vernon Press
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2019-03-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1622735293

Relegated to the back bench, the Seventies are often considered as no more than a bridge between the more momentous decades of the Sixties and Eighties. However, delving into this historical period, this book asks; how significant were the Seventies in terms of political, economic and cultural developments? And, to what extent did this decade change the course of the second half of the twentieth century? Seeking to uncover the extraordinary transformative capacity of this era, this book reveals how important events from this decade marked history for many years to come. Grounded in a ‘history of developments,’ this book investigates connections of causality or concomitant causality with events that were yet to come. The first part of this volume traces the economic, political and cultural trends that prevailed during this decade, before turning its attention to the legacies of the Seventies and the events that changed the course of history and that are still having repercussions to this day. From the oil crisis to microwaves, this book offers an in-depth and complete look at the Seventies that will not only be of interest to historians and economists, but also sociologists and those intrigued by the evolution of political, economic and cultural developments.

The Making of Asian America

The Making of Asian America
Author: Erika Lee
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 528
Release: 2015
Genre: History
ISBN: 1476739412

Published to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the passage of the United States' Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 that has remade our "nation of immigrants," this is a new and definitive history of Asian Americans, written by one of the nation's preeminent scholars on the subject. But more than that, this book presents a new way of understanding America itself, its complicated histories of race and immigration, and its place in the world today.--Provided by publisher.

Diversity in Diaspora

Diversity in Diaspora
Author: Mark Edward Pfeifer
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2013-01-31
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0824837770

This anthology wrestles with Hmong Americans’ inclusion into and contributions to Asian American studies, as well as to American history and culture and refugee, immigrant, and diasporic trajectories. It negotiates both Hmong American political and cultural citizenship, meticulously rewriting the established view of the Hmong as “new” Asian neighbors—an approach articulated, Hollywood style, in Clint Eastwood’s film Gran Torino. The collection boldly moves Hmong American studies away from its usual groove of refugee recapitulation that entrenches Hmong Americans points-of-origin and acculturation studies rather than propelling the field into other exciting academic avenues. Following a summary of more than three decades’ of Hmong American experience and a demographic overview, chapters investigate the causes of and solutions to socioeconomic immobility in the Hmong American community and political and civic activism, including Hmong American electoral participation and its affects on policymaking. The influence of Hmong culture on young men is examined, followed by profiles of female Hmong leaders who discuss the challenges they face and interviews with aging Hmong Americans. A section on arts and literature looks at the continuing relevance of oral tradition to Hmong Americans’ successful navigation in the diaspora, similarities between rap and kwv txhiaj (unrehearsed, sung poetry), and Kao Kalia Yang’s memoir, The Latehomecomer. The final chapter addresses the lay of the land in Hmong American studies, constituting a comprehensive literature review. Diversity in Diaspora showcases the desire to shape new contours of Hmong American studies as Hmong American scholars themselves address new issues. It represents an essential step in carving out space for Hmong Americans as primary actors in their own right and in placing Hmong American studies within the purview of Asian American studies.