Pedagogical Value of Southeast Asian Refugee Children’s Literature in Critical Teaching of War and Migration

• In Event: Storying Just Futures: Emancipatory Analyses of Representations of People Who Sought Refuge

Abstract

In the U.S. collective memory, the Vietnam War and Southeast Asian migration are often decoupled (Espiritu, 2014). Mainstream media and textbooks on the Vietnam War center American experiences of the war, while ignoring war’s effects on Southeast Asians (Marciano, 2011). When it comes to Southeast Asian migration, popular accounts tend to present the United States as a safe refuge for desperate Southeast Asians fleeing from communism, while neglecting the United States’ role in inducing the refugee exodus in the first place through war (Author, 2022).

This study investigated a pedagogical value of Southeast Asian refugee children’s literature to move away from such decoupling of war and forced migration. By centering refugee experiences of war, the Southeast Asian refugee children’s literature may help students acquire a more nuanced understanding of the Vietnam War, which includes (a) the war as a main driver of the refugee exodus (Palumbo-Liu, 1999), (b) the war not only as an American tragedy but also as a Southeast Asian one (Pelaud, 2011), (c) the United States not just as a benevolent rescuer but also as a violent aggressor (Sahara, 2012); and (d) Southeast Asians not as helpless victim but as people with complex personhood (Schlund-Vials, 2012). Yet not every Southeast Asian refugee children’s books might offer such value, and they may have other shortcomings.

Guided by critical refugee studies, I conducted a critical content analysis of Southeast Asian refugee children’s literature. Charted by Yến Lê Espiritu (2014), critical refugee studies 1) conceptualizes refugees not as helpless objects of rescue but as knowledge producers and 2) centers refugee voices in identifying and challenging larger structural forces behind a refugee crisis, such as war, militarism, imperialism, racism, and colonialism. The books analyzed in this study were 21 books that met the selection criteria: books that (a) addressed Southeast Asian refugee experiences of the Vietnam War, (b) have been published in the United States since 2000, (c) were written for elementary students, and (d) were in a picture book or chapter book format with a narrative element.

The study findings include that first, the children’s books focused on what happened to Southeast Asians, presenting the war as a Southeast Asian tragedy. Second, while poignantly describing the tragic results of the war on Southeast Asians, most books remained silent on who was responsible for the tragedy. According to the books, the war just happened, and why it happened was left unsaid. Third, the United States, when it appears, was portrayed almost exclusively as a benevolent rescuer or a good refuge for the displaced people. Fourth, while highlighting agency and resilience of Southeast Asian refugees, most books did not address critical or mixed feelings of the refugees toward the United States as well as their struggles with poverty and racism in the US. An implication from the study is then a critical selection and use of the children’s literature with its values and limitations in mind.

Author

• Sohyun An, Kennesaw State University