Joy, Community and Resilience in Vietnamese Portland

18th Annual Ray Warren Symposium on Race and Ethnic Studies

Curated by Mei Bailey '22 and Ben Warner '22

This exhibit, both in its physical and digital forms, grows out of the Vietnamese Portland oral history project created and house by Watzek Library Archives & Special Collections. The oral histories, full transcripts, and various digital objects collected to accompany them are all publicly available. Explore the Vietnamese Portland Project at their website here.

MAKING SPACE IN THE BROADER PORTLAND COMMUNITY


Thuy Pham

“And it is something that I think many White Americans––it is a privilege that I think many White Americans do not see that they have. That ability to look to your children and to your grandchildren and say, "Hey, you have the opportunity to go to the same school as your family. You have an opportunity to continue building these roots that we built for you." Giving her a sense of history and a sense of legacy and identity… [it] is hard for immigrants to do for their children and in the United States here.”

-Thuy Pham


Benji Vuong

"I do a lot of also what is called 'gig economy.' I also do photography. You have probably seen my photos from Instagram. I work more on community-based photography instead of, you know, a lot of people these days for social media will do wedding photography and stuff like that for commercial publishing or editorial or studio shoots. I tend to work more on community stuff, so for a few years, I have also done commission work for the Oregon Arts Watch, which is like a local publishing newsletter online. I work with different programs that are funded by the Oregon Arts Commission. I work with the Native American kids programs for Beats Lyrics Leaders, Piano Project. So they tend to be more of community-based projects instead of individual company or individual portraits... I want to work on the stuff that I feel like is important or pertinent to our changing climate, our culture, global warming and all that. I want to get into something that I feel will leave a lasting impact on the future."

-Benji Vuong


OLD TRADITIONS, NEW CITY

Thuy Tu

“I’m a Buddhist, so the temple was definitely a very important part of my families’ life, my mom’s life especially. I think that was her connection to Vietnam. An interesting thing with the temples is that there were various and numerous Vietnamese temples that popped up within the communities. Started northeast and then north and then now southeast, more concentrated in southeast Portland. So, [yes] the temples were important. The interesting thing about the churches is that there is only one Vietnamese church. So it is more of a conglomerate whereas a temple is someone's home, and then a shrine, and then it became bigger. In terms of religion those are the two big things. There are many temples you can go to versus there is one church where everyone is there.”

-Thuy Tu


Our Lady of Lavang Parish

Cơ Sở Mới của Giáo Xứ Đức Mẹ Lavang, Happy Valley, Oregon

Our Lady of Lavang Parish's new location in Happy Valley, Oregon

"Because when I came here, I had a community, social activities, and especially went to the Catholic church or Buddhist church. We [were] very welcomed here... I attended the Catholic services at our Lady of LaVang over on Sandy Boulevard. Not only do we have religious services, but we have some cultural activities. Like we have activities during the Lunar New Year and some other activities -- like we have the Freedom March every July fourth here in Portland."

-An Thanh Vũ


REMEMBERING VIETNAM

Julian Saporiti

So, just because, you know, it is too much of a burden to carry that around, to be labeled as an immigrant or refugee, like, as your main thing, because it either villainizes you to some people or it makes you this kind of charity case to other people. And it is like, this is just the historical predicament that we found ourselves in. Shit happened, it sucked in a lot of ways but people made the best of it, or they did not, and this is where we are now. And to me that is the most honest approach to being a historian is just admitting the mess that is history, and then we just sort of sit with it and sort it out.

    -Julian Saporiti

Tell Hanoi I Love Her

"A fool to think that this place could ever be yours

The in between, that’s where we must explore

Tell Hanoi I love her"

Little Saigon

"I heard about a place called Little Saigon 

Everybody’s got my face, so, mine won’t have to grow so long 

Palm trees, a terrace seat, a café where I belong 

Oh, I think I’d like to go to this place, Little Saigon"

THANK YOU

Thank you to all of our Vietnamese Portland contributors and collaborators: Thuy Pham, Hanh (William) Vuong, Hung Si Vuong, Thuy Tu, Julian Saporiti, Benji Vuong, and An Thanh Vu

18th Annual Ray Warren Symposium on Race and Ethnic Studies

Joy, Community, and Resilience in Vietnamese Portland

curated by Ben Warner '22 and Mei Bailey '22

Our Lady of Lavang Parish's new location in Happy Valley, Oregon