Their Journey: Vietnamese in Michigan January 31, 2010

Imagine chaotically and permanently leaving your homeland for another country and a completely different life! This exhibit includes photos from Vietnam and Grand Rapids, MI, along with political, cultural, and personal perspectives of the journey of Vietnamese immigrants to Michigan following the Vietnam War. It augments the Great Michigan Read, the Michigan Humanities Council’s statewide reading program, and provides additional historical context to its book selection, "Stealing Buddha’s Dinner."

"Stealing Buddha’s Dinner" is a memoir chronicling author Bich Minh Nguyen’s migration from Vietnam in 1975 and her coming of age in Grand Rapids in the 1980s. Along the way, she struggles to construct her own cultural identity from a menagerie of uniquely American influences.

The University Library is one of only six sites chosen to host this exhibit. Accessible during library hours, available at http://www.lib.umich.edu/hatcher-graduate-library.