Program
The VIA-1 Programming Team, led by Thai Nguyen, is in the process of planning this year’s workshops. If you have ideas for speakers or workshops, Facebook Thai!
Programming updated 2/22/2010
Keynote Speakers
Lac Su
By Lac Su |
 |
About the book
As a young child Lac Su made a harrowing escape from the Communists in Vietnam. With a price on his father’s head, Lac with his family, was forced to immigrate in 1979 to seedy West Los Angeles where squalid living conditions and a cultural fabric that refused to thread them in effectively squashed their American Dream. Lac’s search for love and acceptance amid poverty- not to mention the psychological turmoil created by a harsh and unrelenting father- turned his young life into a comedy of errors and led him to a dangerous gang experience that threatened to tear his life apart.
Heart-wrenching, irreverent, and ultimately uplifting, I Love Yous are for White People is memoir at its most affecting, depicting the struggles that countless individuals have faced in their quest to belong and that even more have endured in pursuit of a father’s fleeting affection.
About Lac Su
Lac Su received a master’s degree and Ph.D. A.B.D., in industrial organizational psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology. He is a senior executive for TalentSmart – global think tank and management consulting firm, and he lives in San Diego. His professional work has been featured in BusinessWeek, Fortune, The Tribune, Globe and Mail, and various online and academic journals. I Love Yous Are for White People is his first book.
Beau Sia
Performing onstage
Mr. Beau Sia has a chip on his shoulder the size of 25 years of being underrepresented and he is very vocal about it. He voices his views, hopes, and dreams in the form of spoken word. Using a mix of humor and bluntness, he sends a very serious message in his Poems. He has the ability to make the audience feel a luscious mix of emotions in his performance and poetry. He’s Beau Sia, give him a chance and he can change your world.
Beau Sia was one of the original cast members in Russell Simmon’s Def Poetry Jam, on Broadway, a 2003 Tony Award winner. He also appeared in It’s Showtime at the Apollo, HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, the film Slam and has two spoken-word CD’s Attack! Attack! Go! and Dope and Wack and the book of poetry A Night Without Armor II: The Revenge
(Excerpt taken from slamnation.com) Find his bio on Wikipedia!
Workshops
Social Issues Facing Vietnamese Americans
Me Love You Long Time:
Politics of Sexuality for Vietnamese and Asian Americans
From Madame Butterfly to rice queens, this workshop addresses the issues that you may encounter in the realm of sex no topic is off limits here. Questions about sexuality as they relate to and impact the lives of not only Vietnamese and Vietnamese Americans but also Asian Americans as a whole will be proposed and thoughts and answers provoked. From cultural stereotypes to personal biases, this forum will have you pondering the intricacies of sexuality, as you never have before.
Revisiting the Model Minority Myth
August 31st 1987 on the cover of TIME magazine was a picture of six young Asian American students in front of a blackboard, computer, and schoolbooks. “Those Asian American Whiz Kids” was the caption on the cover. The article was about how Asian Americans were seen as the ideal minority, surpassing all other minority groups in the US. Although this may seem like a positive stereotype, it creates quotas in which one must meet. Come and learn about the Model Minority Myth and discuss the issue with your peers! Learn why this title of success is actually a race-relations failure and what we can do about it.
“Badger Answers Hawkeye: Can Vietnamese Americans be Midwesterners? The Midwest “Already” in Vietnamese American History.”
This talk will explore how the “pre 1975″ history of Vietnamese America already had a Midwestern component, as early as 1955 to 1962. It was not as large as the 1975-1980 migrations, but it built Vietnamese presences in the U.S. Midwest and established a network that continued into the 1970s and beyond. Knowing this makes for a “useable history” that rebuts what afflicts all Asian American communities: the suspicion (and accusation) of being in America “only recently” — an idea that leaves Asian Americans forever locked into a conditional Americanness. This talk says, Nope to that.
BRIEF BIO
Victor Jew teaches history-related courses for the Asian American Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has taught undergraduate lectures courses on “Classic Hollywood and Asian American Representations,” ”Asian Americans and Politics,” and “Asian Americans and the Law.” He is very interested in recovering a new Midwestern Asian American History (and Studies) and to that end he’s done research in Chicago, Ann Arbor, Madison, Milwaukee, and some Midwestern place near you to find and retell this lost history.
Professional Development
A Decision That Can Make You or Break You
A Workshop on Ethical Decision Making
Let’s face it. Decisions can be tough, but when you factor in ethics, that decision can get sophisticated real quickly. It can get you fired or get you promoted, but it doesn’t only happen in the work force. Ethical decision making is everywhere. What are the conditions of the workers who made your shoes? What are you wearing today? How was that food you ate grown? How about cloning? Just because it’s possible doesn’t make it ethical! Get the facts and test your decisions in this workshop about ethical decision making.
Ask Lac
This is your chance to get to know Lac Su! Lac Su will break down his journey, from leaving Vietnam to growing up in West Los Angeles and how he became successful. Lac Su’s professional work has been featured in BusinessWeek, Fortune, The Tribune, Globe and Mail, and various online and academic journals. After that, Lac Su will open it up to the audience for a discussion where you can ask him questions. This is a can’t-miss workshop!
You’re So Irrational
A Workshop on Debate
Ever have trouble convincing others? We all take sides in certain things. But when we believe in something so strongly, we have to be able to communicate and debate those ideas rationally and effectively. Whether it’s why your sports team is better or why your employer should hire you, being able to debate is essential in the professional world. Learn the process of an effective debate in this workshop.