I thought
it was very interesting that the presenting group chose to present this particular
topic because not only did they touch light on the fact that the Iu-Mien
population in America is highly marginalized, they also connected it in terms
of gender concepts. I thought it was
smart to bring those two topics together because it gave us new information and
brought us a sense of awareness to particular Southeast Asian conflicts.
For me
personally, I thought the topic was ironically intriguing because I have been
constantly thinking about how much the Iu-Mien population in America is
marginalized since the topic was briefly brought up in the first week of
class. This topic affects me on a
personal level because I have quite a bit of Iu-Mien friends and I also
volunteer for S.A.F.E., a Southeast Asian Furthering Education program here at
UC Davis, and I physically witness these particular issues. There is a very little Iu-Mien participation
in the S.A.F.E program, and I think that has a lot to do with the
marginalization of Iu-Miens.
Although
this article was attempt to address the conflicts that Iu-Mien refugee women face
during their migration to the United States after the Vietnam War, I found the
it to be a bit generic in terms of information.
I think the stated information in the article concerning Iu-Mien women
is a huge umbrella concept that commonly affects many Southeast Asian ethnics
that were greatly affected by the Vietnam War and had to reside in refugee
camps or migrate to the United States for a better life. I think the idea of solely focusing on
Iu-Mien women who migrated in America is a great idea, but I do not think that
article did the best job of presenting new topics or new research. Instead, the article touched topics on common
Southeast Asian American issues that still reside today and somehow connected
those issues to solely Iu-Mien women. I
also think that the number of participants that help contribute to the basis of
the article was not enough to draw conclusions on the Iu-Mien women population
within America. Ten contributing
participants are not enough to make any board statements that represent the
Iu-Mien women here in America. I also
think that the article contained a lot of bias that did not generally help the
validity of the paper.
I think
that this topic is important to pursue because I think it is important that we get
more acknowledged about certain marginalized Southeast Asian ethnicities such
as the Iu-Mien. I also think it was a
good idea on the presenters’ part that they tried to focus on Iu-Mien gender
wise because they were able to give knowledge about the Iu-Mien cultural aspects
and touch on gender issues of Southeast Asian women in general. The only fault to this presentation is the
article. I think it is a better idea to
find a better creditable article and more resources to fully back up these
ideas. The given article consisted of
too many biased ideas and very little participants and evidence to work with.
The
presentation over all was mediocre because it was organized and gave the class
a clear understanding of the article. I
liked how the presenters showed a video of an Iu-Mien family in America because
it gave us a glimpse of how an Iu-Mien family was like and some of the
conflicts that remained in the families.
I would of liked to see more topics about the male gender and sexuality
overall. What are other ways can we
address the concepts of gender and sexuality?
-Mimi Dao
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