“Vietnamese in Orange County” Book Event—Free

A collection of photos from UC Irvine’s Southeast Asian Archive Center inspired Vietgone playwright Qui Nguyen.

Photos from the center are featured in a new book, Images of America: Vietnamese in Orange County, and are included in the current exhibit, “Vietnamese Focus: Generations of Stories.” The book’s authors and exhibit creators will discuss both projects following the Saturday matinee of Vietgone, Oct. 10. They also will sign copies of the books immediately following the afternoon presentation and again between 6:45-7:45 p.m. These are free events.

Meet the Authors

Thuy Vo Dang is the archivist for the Southeast Asian Archive and Regional History, leading the UCI Libraries’ new Orange County and Southeast Asian Archive Center (OC & SEAA). She received her Ph.D. and M.A. in ethnic studies from the University of California, San Diego. Vo Dang was previously an Institute of American Cultures postdoctoral fellow for UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center. She has taught at UCI, UCLA, UCSD and Loyola Marymount University. She serves on the board of directors for the Vietnamese American Arts and Letters Association (VAALA). Her non-profit community work also includes serving on the Horizon Cross-Cultural Center board of directors and the policy committee for the Orange County Asian Pacific Islander Community Alliance (OCAPICA). In 2013 Dr. Vo Dang was featured in the OC Weekly’s Inaugural People Issue as the “Studs Terkel of Little Saigon” and honored with the “Community Heroes” Award by Senator Lou Correa and OCAPICA. In 2015, she received the “Public Image” Award from Asian Americans Advancing Justice, Los Angeles.

Linda Trinh Võ is an professor and former chair of the Department of Asian American Studies at the University of California, Irvine and is affiliated with the Department of Sociology; Department of Planning, Policy & Design; and Dept of Gender and Sexuality Studies. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego, and received a Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellowship from the University of California, Berkeley. She is author of Mobilizing an Asian American Community and co-editor of four books: Keywords for Asian American Studies; Labor Versus Empire: Race, Gender, and Migration; Asian American Women: the “Frontiers” Reader; and Contemporary Asian American Communities: Intersection and Divergences. She is a series editor for the Asian American History & Culture series published by Temple University Press, which includes more than sixty-five books. Võ is director of the Vietnamese American Oral History Project at UC Irvine and is an ambassador for UCI Libraries Southeast Asian Archive. She is president of the national Association for Asian American Studies and served in advisory positions for the Vietnamese American Arts & Letters Association, Project MotiVATe; Orange County Asian Pacific Islander Community Alliance; Viet Film Fest; Diasporic Vietnamese Arts Network, and Vietnamese American Heritage Foundation.

Tram Le is the associate director for the Vietnamese American Oral History Project at UC Irvine. She previously served as the interim director of the Center for Asian Pacific American Students at Pitzer College and worked as the Community Bridges Program Manager for the Ford Theatres/Ford Theatre Foundation. She received her B.A. in business administration-marketing from California State University, Northridge and has an M.A. from the Department of Asian American Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her master’s thesis, Finding Home, investigates the journey of first-generation Vietnamese in Orange County through oral history and performance art. She co-founded Club O’ Noodles, a pioneering Vietnamese American theatre troupe, and as a board member of the American Arts and Letters Association, she has curated multi-art exhibitions. In 2003, she was the founding Co-Director of the biennial Vietnamese International Film Festival, now the annual Viet Film Fest, which has been hosted at UC Irvine and UCLA and showcases films from around the world.