23 Jul 2024
Posted by Catherine Jo Ishino 
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Authors featured in the 12th Annual LiterASIAN Writers Festival. (Left to right): Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio, Joy Kogawa, Angie Wong, Keiko Honda, Ujjal Dosanjh, and Lindsay Wong. Photos by: Catherine Jo Ishino.
VANCOUVER — It was a packed weekend featuring Asian authors of varying ages, ethnic backgrounds, and literary genres at the 12th Annual LiterASIAN Writers Festival from May 4 to 5. Represented were first-time published writers to more seasoned ones. The Pan-Asian diasporic storytellers relayed tales from Southeast Asia, the Philippines, Japan, and China to Canada. The literary genres were just as sweeping, from poetry, novels, creative nonfiction, and memoir to supernatural horror.
The confidence of these authors was palpable. Their books came from a range of publication houses, representing a widening of Canada’s Euro-American literary canon, a hard-fought change beginning in the late 1970s and proliferating 40 years later.
MAY 4
“from the lost and found department with Joy Kogawa”
Soramara Takayama, Joy Kogawa, Ann-Marie Metten, and students during the from the lost and found department poetry reading.
Entering the dark, spacious auditorium, the poet, author, and activist Joy Kogawa sat in the center of a circle, surrounded by nine seated Asian students from the Vancouver Japanese Language School (VJLS) and four adult participants behind her, all garbed in black with only their faces illuminated. As each participant read one of Kogawa’s poems, projected on the wall behind them was a black-and-white video of the proceedings with the words of the recited poems displayed in English and Japanese translations.
Memorably, Kogawa stood to read her poem, What Do I Remember of the Evacuation:
“…And I remember how careful my parents were / Not to bruise us with bitterness / …And I prayed to the God who loves / All the children in his sight/ That I might be white.”
Then, the artistic director, poet Soramara Takayama, with his Samurai hairstyle and Kenzo-style outfit, dramatically recited Kogawa’s poem from memory in Japanese. This pattern of reading in both languages continued throughout the 12 poetry readings.
Thus, the tone for the festival’s theme of (Re)Dress had begun. As historian Laura Saimoto highlighted in her introduction to the poetry readings, “redress means to set right what was wrong.”
Festival Director Allan Cho told Nikkei Voice: “Kogawa used her literary talent to shed light on the past and her activism to push for justice, making her a crucial figure in the fight for redress.”
“Laughing Back at Empire : Asian Canadian activism from The Asianadian to Ricepaper magazine”
Moderator Cheuk Kwan with author Angie Wong and ACWW president Todd Wong during the Laughing Back at Empire panel discussion.
Moderator Cheuk Kwan, a founding member of The Asianadian (1978-1985), “one of Canada’s first anti-racist, anti-sexist, and anti-homophobic magazines,” reflected upon how the publication provided a national platform for Asian diasporic works during a period and climate where it was difficult for “then-emerging Asian Canadian writers, artists, musicians, activists, and scholars” to get published in the Euro-American print world.
Angie Wong spoke about writing her book, Laughing Back at Empire, and why she chose to focus on The Asianadian: its grassroots activism and cross-coalition building created a counter-narrative of what it meant to be both Asian and Canadian. Thus, it reflected a hybrid identity celebrating the contributors’ ethnic artistry while not denying their Canadian citizenry. The Asianadian represented the wave of “global restructuring” after the Second World War and diversification of the historical mainstream narrative by creating a space of inclusivity.
Todd Wong, president of the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop, highlighted historical Pan-Asian predecessors supported by ACWW’s Ricepaper magazine: Chinatown’s community filmmaker Sid Chow Tan; polymath Japanese Canadian writer, producer, and songster Terry Watada; Chinese Canadian historian and writer Paul Yee; Jim Wong-Chu, “the Moses of Asian Canadian literature” and founding member of ACWW and LAWF. Wong also alluded to many more Asian contemporary Pan-Asian creatives as well. He deliberated on these talents to demonstrate how influential The Asianadian and Ricepaper were in launching many Asian creatives’ careers. Indeed, Ricepaper magazine (1995) has become the “longest-running literary magazine… with an Asian Canadian perspective.”
“Between bowls of borrowed rice: Harvesting hope through storytelling”
Moderator Julia Lin with authors Lindsay Wong, Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio, Keiko Honda, and Ujjal Dosanjh during the Between Bowls of Borrowed Rice panel.
The last session of the day, moderated by Julia Lin, author and co-editor of AlliterAsian: Twenty Years of Ricepaper Magazine (2015), featured authors reading passages from their latest books. Each spoke about why they chose to write their stories.
Their answers ranged from wanting to tell their journeys from their homeland to Canada (Ujjal Dosanjh), to being influenced by their grandfather’s painting and poetry (Keiko Honda), to frontline worker experiences (Jennilee Austria-Boniface), to hauntings and family secrets (Lindsay Wong).
Finally, there was a Q&A period by the audience, where the authors divulged more behind-the-scenes motivations on why they wrote, who or what inspired them, and the writers they admired.
MAY 5
“Wine and Words: Dim Sum with authors”
LiterAsian Festival writers and volunteers.
Notable throughout the festival was the camaraderie amongst organizers and volunteers and their reverence for their forbearers who began this Pan-Asian literary movement in the 1970s.
Pat Parungao, president of the Pacific Canada Heritage Centre, paid tribute to one key figure in Vancouver’s Asian writers’ scene, Ada Con. She announced a PCHC memorial fund in Con’s honour to support the creation of migration stories. Then Parungao shared Con’s story.
Next, festival authors read passages from their books. Their stories reflected the global migration and disruption caused by the destabilization of the world’s economy, political shifts, and wars during the past 50 years and how they had found a place in Canada’s literary canon today.
Lastly, as part of the joint fundraiser with Word Vancouver and LAWF, guests mingled with the authors and purchased their books afterward.
When I spoke with festival director Allan Cho, he shared that in future Asian Heritage Months, they intend to hold festivals in every province across the country. In fact, the third annual festival was being hosted at the East Asian Library at the University of Toronto later in May.
When I attended the latter event, I was told by Toronto’s LAWF Director, Hana Kim, that she believed Calgary and Winnipeg were in the works. Certainly, such plans portend a good omen for the future of Pan-Asian prose in Canada’s literary future!
Conclusion: Nikkei relevancy?
What relevance does this 12th Vancouver LiterASIAN Writers Festival have to do with a Nikkei audience?
As we constitute 0.3 per cent of the Canadian population (2021 Census), and Asians in total make up only 19 per cent or 7 million people, it is incumbent upon all of us to band together to have our voices and experiences heard.
The Asian Canadian Writers Workshop reminds Japanese Canadians to reimagine and renew a post-redress community if it will collectively sustain itself over multiple generations. In its June 2024 call for writing submissions, they aim to support a community storytelling tradition by honouring and publishing the histories Nikkei hold dear and discovering “new ways of co-authoring collective futures.”
Clearly, teaming up with other Asian diasporic writers will create a larger literary impact than if Nikkei authors were to go it alone. However, much like The Asianadian, it is also critical to maintain one’s ethnic ties to their origin stories, while integrating their current hybrid narrative of being Japanadian.
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Catherine Jo Ishino has been a researcher, writer, and lecturer about her Nisei parents and relatives’ incarceration experiences in the U.S. during the Second World War. She also worked at York University and the University of Minnesota, teaching the need for social responsibility in design. Before her academic career, she worked in broadcast news as the Art Director of PBS’ MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour, Creative Director and Consultant for independent NYC video productions, and Lead Artist at Atlanta’s CNN.
