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BLUNT-FORCE ETHNIC CREDIBILITY
This is a lengthy mfkr. But a great read all the same. It raises many questions on issues of translation, exoticization, and claiming a, perhaps unearned, authority on a language or a set of “shared cultural experiences.” If you can swing with a little academic language — you’ll find the author is doing some excellent work here. They take some mild shots at figures like Ocean Vuong, who despite best intentions, can find themselves as cultural and ethnic ambassadors while making generalizing statements that betray that title.
“A friend recently shared a reminder from her mother: Vietnamese doesn’t need you. We get so embroiled in our diasporic angst, writing heartfelt, tortured essays about not being able to impart cultural knowledge to any children we might have, but we’re lucky for what is not the case for everyone who has lost a language or had it taken from them. Vietnamese is not endangered, and its literature is not honored by translation toward English — it is English-using society that benefits from gaining access to literature produced in other languages, even if The Poetry Review misspells Nguyễn Du’s surname in all ten instances in its review from the Autumn 2019 issue.”
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