Issue 02 of diaCRITICS is here! diaCRITICS 02 explores the theme of alienation—the profound sense of isolation, estrangement, or disconnection from society. Read it here: diacritics.org/issue/diacri...
diaCRITICS
@diacritics-dvan.bsky.social
magazine of the diasporic vietnamese artists network
“The Young Die Old” is a feat in experimental storytelling diacritics.org/2026/07/book...
Magical Realism in a Vietnamese Village - diaCRITICS
On the back of a buffalo-drawn wagon, guided by a silent driver, travel three strangers, one of whom is the unnamed protagonist known as the Man. The wagon bumps its way through the mountainous forest...
diacritics.org
In "Hà Tri Lão Nhân," Huy Diệp reflects on his relationship with his grandfather. diacritics.org/2026/07/ha-t...
Hà Tri Lão Nhân - diaCRITICS
Every night after dinner, my grandfather and I played Chinese Chess on the floor, laughing loudly. His wooden chess set was an uneven assembly of chipped and cracked round pieces with carved Chinese c...
diacritics.org
Experimenting with Vietlish is the project of “Timber & Lụa.” diacritics.org/2026/07/book...
Fun with Vietlish - diaCRITICS
Speaking in Vietlish can be fun, especially when my Viet-American friends and I drop a Vietnamese word into our English conversations to better capture or describe something that there’s no perfect En...
diacritics.org
Sydney Van To speaks with “Anam” author André Dao. diacritics.org/2026/07/in-c...
In Conversation with André Dao - diaCRITICS
This interview was adapted from an event during André Dao’s visit to the University of California—Berkeley on October 23, 2025. André Dao is the author of Anam. ~ Sydney Van To: How did you come to wr...
diacritics.org
“Bibliotactics” by @cindyanguyen.bsky.social (and published by @ucpress.bsky.social) details the fascinating history of colonial libraries in Vietnam. diacritics.org/2026/07/book...
The Everyday Politics of Libraries - diaCRITICS
In her recently published book Bibliotactics: Libraries and the Colonial Public in Vietnam, Cindy Anh Nguyen details the fascinating history of colonial libraries in Vietnam. The central claim of her ...
diacritics.org
Since 2019, Zach Ramon Fitzpatrick has been creating more visibility for Asian Germans through his Instagram account Asian German Updates. diacritics.org/2026/06/in-c...
In Conversation with Asian German Updates, aka Zach Ramon Fitzpatrick - diaCRITICS
Zach Ramon Fitzpatrick also known as Asian German Updates is Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he teaches courses like “Asian America / Asian Germany: History, Identity...
diacritics.org
Read "You Dream It and We’ll Make it", a new poem by Xuân Tran. diacritics.org/2026/06/you-...
You Dream It and We’ll Make it - diaCRITICS
My mother swayed in a rocking ship from a refugee camp in Malaysia to the US, huddled behind the backs of wise elders with rotten-peach wrinkled faces, hiding from pirates hounding fresh flesh. In ESL...
diacritics.org
In a new essay, Vina Vo imagines her mother's life before the War, visiting Vietnam later in life to see where her mother danced. diacritics.org/2026/05/danc...
Dancing in the Rain - diaCRITICS
Two little girls danced outside, trading their afternoon baths for a Saigon shower. Slick warm droplets slithered down their bodies. They wore nothing but their cotton panties. Their bodies, blooming,...
diacritics.org
"i feel guilty because in this timeline i am living someone else’s dream and/or/but wasn’t it my dream, too?" Read a new poem by @bluenguyen.bsky.social diacritics.org/2026/05/para...
Parallel Universe Theory - diaCRITICS
i feel guilty because in thistimeline i am living someone else’sdream and/or/but wasn’t it my dream, too? wasn’t it my dream first, lungs fillingwith water and/or/but air, there’s a point in the ocean...
diacritics.org
new poem out now with diaCRITICS (@diacritics-dvan.bsky.social) thank you diaCRITICS for giving my poem a home! you can read the full poem here: diacritics.org/2026/05/para...
Parallel Universe Theory - diaCRITICS
i feel guilty because in thistimeline i am living someone else’sdream and/or/but wasn’t it my dream, too? wasn’t it my dream first, lungs fillingwith water and/or/but air, there’s a point in the ocean...
diacritics.org
"Neither debt nor duty, I learned that day, could be made up by wads of cash, nor adolescent good will. How swiftly I had mistaken dignity as something to be calculated and exchanged." diacritics.org/2026/04/mi-g...
Mì gói lá bồ đề - diaCRITICS
On a humid morning in 1997 in the small town of Hồng Ngự on the border of southern Vietnam and Cambodia, a band of smiling children in red handkerchiefs walked around a frenzied school yard with empty...
diacritics.org
Read "Tri Nhan 004: One of the Lucky Ones," a new science fiction poem by Mylo Lam. diacritics.org/2026/04/tri-...
Tri Nhan 004: One of the Lucky Ones - diaCRITICS
Editor's note: This poem is best viewed on desktop. One of the Lucky Ones - Mylo Lam Mylo Lam was born in Vietnam and currently lives in Los Angeles. He and his family are refugees from Cambodia. Mylo...
diacritics.org
Read a new poem by Victoria Thuylinh Pham. diacritics.org/2026/04/jack...
Jackfruit - diaCRITICS
Jackfruit sizzle like fleshcarried through thecurves of your mouth / Mẹ's voice wrapped in bare hands_______spilling seeds / an extension - from one land_______and an accent mark to another_______about our names giving way and thenreceding_______from Thuylinh to Thuy_______and the nước that never quenches thirstbecause it's never enough and only separates_______this line between_______what I know of
diacritics.org
"I was 11 when cancer took my mother and never gave her back." diacritics.org/2026/03/canc...
Cancer Took My Mother & Food Was Her Love Language - diaCRITICS
Paired With: Bún Bò Huế & the Taste of EnoughFor When You Need to Feed a VillagePlay Song: “Heal the World” by Michael Jackson Amuse-Bouche: The Hunger That Never Leaves Hunger isn’t just about food.I...
diacritics.org
just updated @diacritics-dvan.bsky.social's books to review list! am i missing anything? want to review something? docs.google.com/document/d/1...
diaCRITICS Books to Review
diaCRITICS Book Review Wishlist Thank you for your interest in reviewing books for diaCRITICS. Below are the books we would love to be reviewed! If you’re interested in reviewing any of these titles ...
docs.google.com
In "Mothernoia", a daughter measures the distance between what her mother wants her to be and who she sees herself as. diacritics.org/2026/03/moth...
Mothernoia - diaCRITICS
I am haunted by the quiet suspicion that the woman before me is devising my murder. At the moment, we’ve resorted to a game of silence. But she is cunning, calculated, waiting with the prowess of a sn...
diacritics.org
We are deeply saddened to announce the passing of poet Theo LeGro. To honor their work and writing we are highlighting their poem ‘All There Is.’ theoffingmag.com/poetry/kundi...
Ngọc Đại and the Vietnamese Avant-garde diacritics.org/2026/03/a-br...
A Broker in Madness - diaCRITICS
In order to find a new musical language and new forms for songs, I had to deny the official environment of the Vietnamese Government. My goals are: Break the prejudices about musical aesthetic; Mock t...
diacritics.org
"Singlish is how Singaporeans speak when not watched by the colonial other. Or sometimes, defiantly, when they are." diacritics.org/2026/03/on-s...
On Singlish - diaCRITICS
Simi[1] Salah[2] English? There is a particular unease to writing about Singlish in English. Not because the two are incompatible, far from it, but because to write about Singlish in the formal regist...
diacritics.org
"The sun should have set when the bullet grazed by like a stray bird singing its morning song, a sharp metallic note" Read Lê Sông Văn's "I Am Not Mad," translated by Đặng Thơ Thơ. diacritics.org/2026/02/i-am...
I Am Not Mad - diaCRITICS
“I Am Not Mad” is a translation of the Vietnamese poem, “Tôi Không Giận” by poet Lê Sông Văn, poignantly inspired by the life of Renée Nicole Good, an award-winning poet and mother who was fatally sho...
diacritics.org
Read a new poem by Brandon Vu. diacritics.org/2026/02/what...
what was that? you’re talking too quickly - diaCRITICS
when you were youngyou were living the sameday in the refugee campuntil you found yourself carryingbaggage from saigon to california you hung on to words toprotect yourselfand i flinched every timeyou...
diacritics.org
Chúc mừng năm mới! Read a new Lunar New Year poem by Võ Đức Quang. diacritics.org/2026/02/i-ca...
I carry you through chinatown - diaCRITICS
Alief, Houston TX I carry you through chinatownon lunar new year's eve— softly the karaoke bars dieas hostess girls fly to their nests. Andsoju buddies stumble in a line back to their sports carsexhau...
diacritics.org
Read a new poem by attic moon. diacritics.org/2026/01/poet...
Bà Nội’s Ghost - diaCRITICS
mother and father thoughtthey escaped the whistling missilesbut found it hitched a ridea parasiteclawing out of their stomachs and into their throatsbursting through their mouthsto roar at each other ...
diacritics.org
Đenise Hạnh Huỳnh offers a brief history of ICE, in poems.
Letter From Minnesota: A Brief History of ICE in Poems
The following poems were written over the last decade, up until and including ICE’s occupation of the Twin Cities. * ________________________________________________________ ________________…
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“On Healing Land, Birds Perch” investigates the afterlife of an infamous photo. diacritics.org/2026/01/viet...
Viet Film Fest 2025: On Healing Land, Birds Perch - diaCRITICS
During my freshman year of high school, while working on a history assignment, I came across a photograph of the self-immolation of Thích Quảng Đức, a Buddhist monk protesting South Vietnam’s regime i...
diacritics.org
"I think of memory as finite. It’s personal. Once you’re gone, that memory goes with you. Myth, by contrast, lives beyond you." Today in PEN Transmissions, Vaddey Ratner on memory, narrative history, and storytelling as a means of survival. #writing #literature #art
Knowing Is a Kind of Pain: An Interview with Vaddey Ratner
Vaddey Ratner on memory, narrative history, and storytelling as a means of survival.
pentransmissions.com
"I want to tell them, and all Minnesotans: hold on to each other. No turning back." lithub.com/letter-from-...
Letter From Minnesota: “There’s Some Good in This World…”
I bought my tickets for the theatrical re-release of The Lord of the Rings movies last year. This was before I knew that life on the weekends would be: clean your house, feed your cat, scoop litter…
lithub.com
‘I think of memory as finite. It’s personal. Once you’re gone, that memory goes with you. Myth, by contrast, lives beyond you.’ Today in #PENTransmissions, Vaddey Ratner on memory, narrative history, and storytelling as a means of survival. pentransmissions.com/2026/01/29/k...
Knowing Is a Kind of Pain: An Interview with Vaddey Ratner
Vaddey Ratner on memory, narrative history, and storytelling as a means of survival.
pentransmissions.com