2019-2020 IDAAS Signature Event Speaker Series: Yen Le Espiritu

Monday, February 24 @ 4:30pm
Hahn Hall 108, Pomona College

Title: Critical Refugee Studies and Indigenous Studies: A Transpacific Critique

Lecture Description: This talk re-conceptualizes the Vietnam War–and the subsequent U.S.-led refugee rescue operation in Guam and in the Philippines–as a transpacific phenomenon that inflicted collateral damage not only on the Vietnamese but also on indigenous and (formerly) colonized subjects in the circuits of U.S. empire. This reconceptualization of the Vietnam War advances a transpacific critique that knits together diverse memories of historical violence—settler colonialism, military expansion and refugee displacement—into a layered story of U.S. empire in the Asia Pacific region.

Bio: Yen Le Espiritu is Distinguished Professor of Ethnic Studies. An award-winning author, she has published extensively on Asian American panethnicity, gender and migration, and U.S. colonialism and wars in Asia. Her most recent book, Body Counts: The Vietnam War and Militarized Refuge(es), is widely credited for charting the interdisciplinary field of Critical Refugee Studies. She is also a Founding Member of the Critical Refugee Studies Collective (criticalrefugeestudies.com).