Overview
Welcome! This is my second semester as Chair of the Asian American Studies department. If you have any questions about the AAS department or about my classes and research, please email me.
The purpose of this website is two-fold: (1) For students to find out more about me and my classes, and (2) For me to efficiently update students about class assignments, advertise of new classes I want/plan to teach, and to list projects, events, issues and resources that interest me.
Students who want to add to AAS 201 sections, please show up to class and put your name on the wait list. If there are seatings, I may add a few more students with priority given to graduating seniors and AAS majors/minors. You will need to print out the AAS 201 syllabus and bring it to class.
Peace! GM, Jan 14, 2013
Recent Publication(s)
- I contributed to a piece authored by Sandra Stanley (Tracy Buenavista and Laura Uba are also contributors) on an article called "Enabling Conversations: Critical Pedagogy and the Intersections of Race and Disability Studies." Amerasia Journal 39(1): 75-82.
Projects
Currently, I'm working on four projects:
- Consulting with Dr. Ho on his project on factors influencing pilots' acceptance of automation.
- Survey research on Asian Pacific American (APA) attitudes toward LGBT matters. Please go to www.csun.edu/~gm61310/survey/ to fill out the survey if you are of APA background.
- Rethinking teaching and preparing first-year students, and experimenting on how to incorporate Buddhist psychology insights into teaching.
Past Projects
- I co-founded the CSUN Positive Space Program and the CSUN Ally Project, which contributed to the curriculum and information for Ally training workshops. I am happy to say that we now have a paid staff and student volunteers to run our Pride Center to support lgbtiqq students.
- I finished volunteering for 3 different humanitarian organizations in Vietnam from Spring 2008 to Summer 2008, approximately 5 months.
- The anthology Embodiments of Asian/American Sexualities that Sean Metzger (Duke University) and I co-edited was published by Lexington Books. This work was originally inspired by a conference I co-organized with Dr. Teresa Williams-Leon on November 16, 2002, called "CrossTalk II: Embodiments of API Sexuality."
- I had helped to co-edit and contribute to the publication of a queer Vietnamese bilingual (Vietnamese and English) homemade magazine called "O-Moi Zine". Its first issue, "Awakening/Tinh Thuc" is about coming out experiences of lesbians, bisexual women and female-to-male transgender of Vietnamese-descent. The zine has poems, short stories, a cartoon, articles, and resources on coming out. The issue came out in February 2005 to celebrate the lunar new year of the rooster! Although it's a while back, it is still significant and the 2nd publication about queer Vietnamese women and transmen.
Biography
I was born in Sai Gon Hospital in Viet Nam and grew up in a small town northeast of Sai Gon called Bien Hoa. A year after the communist "liberated" South Viet Nam, my immediate family (mom, dad, 3 sisters and 3 brothers, paternal grandma, and 4th aunt) and I migrated to France. We lived in Valence, France over a year and left for the United States in late 1977. I stayed one year in Venice, California and then spent the next chunk of my life in the San Fernando Valley. My family moved around "the Valley" including to Sepulveda, Pacoima, Northridge, and North Hills.
I went to Pomona College, Claremont for my undergraduate study where I wrote a senior thesis on Little Saigon. After that, I worked for about a year and a half, at the Asian American Drug Abuse Program, Inc. (AADAP). I then went back to graduate school at UCLA to obtain a doctoral degree in Sociology. My areas of interest are in the intersection of race, class, gender, sexuality and ability. I filed my dissertation, "Becoming Queer and Vietnamese American: Negotiating Multiple Identities in an Ethnic Support Group of Lesbians, Bisexual Women and Female-to-Male Transgenders," in January 2001 and received my Ph.D. in Sociology at UCLA.
This is my 11th year at CSUN, where I was hired as a Southeast Asian Specialist but I also do research and teach on gender and sexuality. I now have tenure and was promoted to Full Professor.
From Spring 2004 to Fall 2006, I served as the Asian American Studies Academic Advisement Coordinator. I am also on the Queer Studies Minor Advisory Board.
My current interest is on healing at the personal and collective levels. I have been exploring Vietnamese Zen Buddhism as taught by Zen Buddhist master Thich Nhat Hanh. Particularly the mindfulness trainings as a way for me and my community to heal from the different forms of violence and oppression. A book that waters my seeds of compassion and understanding is called Learning True Love (published by Parallax Press) by Sister Chan Khong, who is an amazing Vietnamese woman role model. I am now reading The Wise Heart by Jack Kornfield.