Suchergebnisse

Introduction to Chinese refugee law -- China's building of a refugee legal system and international cooperation in refugee protection and settlement -- Principles of treatment and legal status of foreigners -- Rights of refugees in China -- Life assistance for refugees in China -- Protection and settlement of returned persecuted overseas Chinese, Indochinese refugees and Laotian refugees -- Protection and settlement of Burmese border residents in large-scale influx situations -- Protection and settlement of urban refugees -- Feasibility of China's refugee legislation -- Relationships that need to be properly addressed in China's refugee legislation -- The experience of building the international refugee legal system and China's refugee legislation -- Conception of a Chinese refugee law -- Regulations on refugees (proposal by scholars) and its explanation.

At various times and in a range of contexts, second-generation Laotian women in the United States are portrayed as a model minority, as refugees and perpetual foreigners, as "problems," and at-risk of becoming single mothers. In this article, I demonstrate the ways in which teenage second-generation Laotian girls challenge these discursive delineations through their participation in a leadership development and community-organizing program established by the Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN) in Contra Costa County, Northern California. I draw on qualitative data from my doctoral research to provide a detailed discussion of the young women's involvement in a campaign to improve academic counseling services in their high school. I also analyze the strategies and practices that arise from such struggles for social justice, and document the generation of new social capital, networks, trust, information channels, and norms that encourage and facilitate greater community involvement in collectively solving the social problems young Laotians face. In so doing, I make visible the community activism of young Asian Pacific American women, but also argue that through their participation in an environmental justice organization, which links grass-roots activism concerning environmental protection to issues of economic development, racial and social equality, and community empowerment, they demonstrate a struggle to "win' a sense of citizenship from below" (Mac an Ghaill, 1999: 98) rather than that which is conferred by the state. Adapted from the source document.

This research evaluated a stress management, coping skills model of adjustment in the analysis of depression in a sample of Laotian refugees living in the southeastern United States. Stressful events and experiences during emigration and a lack of English proficiency were associated with depressive symptoms, while demographic variables and social support were not. English proficiency also significantly reduced the impact of acculturative stressors on depression, suggesting that language skill may act as a stress buffer in the new cultural environment.

Displaced histories name Hmong racial subjection as a project of displacing them from both the nation and history through war and knowledge production. This racial formation is constitutive of the United States so-called "secret war" in Laos (1961-1975) that was quietly and publicly known yet not made much of. Laos has been viewed as a Cold War "pawn" to the superpowers of the US and Soviet Union, and it constituted a crucial yet marginal position in relation to the Vietnam War. This dissertation investigates how the war as a historical period is also a project of knowledge production. Thus the war's secrecy not only hid US violence against Hmong and Laos but also produced racial knowledge to configure Hmong as gendered racial subjects who are primitive and exist outside of historical time. Furthermore, secrecy is a gendered racial configuration because it involved the twin projects of militarism and rescue. Secrecy's production of Hmong outside of history is how they have been configured as racial subjects because historical absence is a product of racial formation. Therefore, Hmong racial subjection highlights how history is a nation-state project and a signifier of one's emergence in modernity. This dissertation excavates history as it relates to nation and belonging because the war was not a secret for Hmong who were recruited by the CIA to fight as proxy US soldiers and bore the brunt of the violence. I argue that Hmong refugees/Americans contend with the forgetting of their history as part of a process to formulate histories and belonging in displacement. Hmong maintain that they saved US American lives in Laos yet their experiences in the US do not reflect the sacrifices they made to the US government. An estimated 35,000 Hmong died in battle while disease and starvation caused the death of almost one- third of Hmong in Laos when forced to flee from their homes. The soldiers, their families, and Hmong civilians fleeing from this invisible war in 1975 and years afterwards were targets of political persecution due to their collaboration with the US. Thus I foreground the refugee figure as a site to unravel the structure of secrecy as a fundamental function of state-making, particularly US democracy since World War II. It also opens up the questions about nation, race, US empire, belonging, and knowledge production. Yet the Hmong refugee also constitutes an embodied category that activates nuanced responses to US historical amnesia and convoluted treatment. My analysis employs the "refugee archive" to emphasize Hmong displaced histories as a perspective to doing historical analysis that understands the past in relation to the present

An incisive look at Hmong religion in the United States, where resettled refugees found creative ways to maintain their traditions, even as Christian organizations deputized by the government were granted an outsized influence on the refugees' new lives.Every year, members of the Hmong Christian Church of God in Minneapolis gather for a cherished Thanksgiving celebration. But this Thanksgiving takes place in the spring, in remembrance of the turbulent days in May 1975 when thousands of Laotians were evacuated for resettlement in the United States. For many Hmong, passage to America was also a spiritual crossing. As they found novel approaches to living, they also embraced Christianity-called kev cai tshiab, "the new way"-as a means of navigating their complex spiritual landscapes.Melissa May Borja explores how this religious change happened and what it has meant for Hmong culture. American resettlement policies unintentionally deprived Hmong of the resources necessary for their time-honored rituals, in part because these practices, blending animism, ancestor worship, and shamanism, challenged many Christian-centric definitions of religion. At the same time, because the government delegated much of the resettlement work to Christian organizations, refugees developed close and dependent relationships with Christian groups. Ultimately the Hmong embraced Christianity on their own terms, adjusting to American spiritual life while finding opportunities to preserve their customs.Follow the New Way illustrates America's wavering commitments to pluralism and secularism, offering a much-needed investigation into the public work done by religious institutions with the blessing of the state. But in the creation of a Christian-inflected Hmong American animism we see the resilience of tradition-how it deepens under transformative conditions

An incisive look at Hmong religion in the United States, where resettled refugees found creative ways to maintain their traditions, even as Christian organizations deputized by the government were granted an outsized influence on the refugees' new lives.Every year, members of the Hmong Christian Church of God in Minneapolis gather for a cherished Thanksgiving celebration. But this Thanksgiving takes place in the spring, in remembrance of the turbulent days in May 1975 when thousands of Laotians were evacuated for resettlement in the United States. For many Hmong, passage to America was also a spiritual crossing. As they found novel approaches to living, they also embraced Christianity—called kev cai tshiab, "the new way"—as a means of navigating their complex spiritual landscapes.Melissa May Borja explores how this religious change happened and what it has meant for Hmong culture. American resettlement policies unintentionally deprived Hmong of the resources necessary for their time-honored rituals, in part because these practices, blending animism, ancestor worship, and shamanism, challenged many Christian-centric definitions of religion. At the same time, because the government delegated much of the resettlement work to Christian organizations, refugees developed close and dependent relationships with Christian groups. Ultimately the Hmong embraced Christianity on their own terms, adjusting to American spiritual life while finding opportunities to preserve their customs.Follow the New Way illustrates America's wavering commitments to pluralism and secularism, offering a much-needed investigation into the public work done by religious institutions with the blessing of the state. But in the creation of a Christian-inflected Hmong American animism we see the resilience of tradition—how it deepens under transformative conditions

I return from Southeast Asia profoundly moved by the plight of the refugees with whom I helped members of the Citizens' Commission on lndochinese Refugees communicate. As Americans, and as human beings, we must take positive actions to reflect our common humanity with the Vietnamese "boat people," Cambodians, and Laotians and help nitigate their suffering. Members of the Citizens' Commission, despite their divergent views on the war in Indochina, have concluded that U.S. Government policjrton opening America's doors to the refugees must reflect the urgency of the problem. I heartily concur.

Eddy Zheng emigrated to the U.S. from China with his family in early 1980s. His parents bear the hope of providing a better education for the kids. Four years later, he committed armed robbery and was sent to San Quentin. He was only 16. Now he works with troubled youth in the Chinatown area of San Francisco. He encourages young Asian Americans to be more involved in community affairs. "This is your country," he says. "And you should be proud." President Johnson signed the Immigration Act in 1965, leading to a rapid growth in the Asian immigrant population in the U.S. Between 1971 and 2002, more than seven million people arrived from Vietnam, China, Laos, Thailand, and others. Steeped in their own cultural and political traditions, Asians are generally reluctant to voice their opinions to take action to safeguard their rights. "Immigrants are more concerned about survival, getting a job, economic security," says Harvey Dong, who teaches Asian American studies at U.C. Berkeley. "They can be targeted and scapegoated." To become fully participating American citizens, they must undergo great personal change. In recent years, an increasing number of Asian immigrants have become active in community affairs. This is closely related to the efforts of Asian American community leaders, who have committed themselves to helping immigrants deal with both hardships and opportunities they might not have faced in their home countries. This series of stories profiles three such leaders. Ming Ho arrived in Oakland from Hong Kong in early 1980s. He was born in southern China but smuggled himself into Hong Kong in 1976 to escape from the Cultural Revolution. He was a businessman before he retired in 2003, paying no attention to community affairs. But now he has become a dedicated volunteer in Oakland's Chinatown, helping with all sorts of issues, small and large. Torm Nompraseurt fled from Laos in 1975 to avoid political prosecution due to his role in the Laotian Civil War, arriving in Richmond as a war refugee. Having noticed that a lot of Laotian immigrants neither understood their rights nor knew how to stand up for them, he started educating them regarding local social and environmental issues and training them in how to made their voices heard in the local government. Eddy Zheng, Ming Ho, and Torm Nompraseurt: Three immigrants from very different backgrounds who all ended up serving the Asian community after they settled in the U.S. This series of profiles explore their journeys from Laos and China to the Bay Area, where they created new lives.

Resumen: Entre 1979 y 1981 arribaron 293 familias de refugiados de la Guerra Civil de Laos a Argentina en una estrategia organizada por las Naciones Unidas ante la crisis del Sudeste Asiático que derivó en migraciones insospechadas. El seguimiento de la diáspora laosiana fue opacado por el imponente imaginario del 'Vietnam' y por diferentes procesos que buscaron cuestionar el relato oficial de la historia y la memoria social posterior al Proceso de Reorganización Nacional. Esta reflexión propone una revisión de algunas imágenes laosianas a modo de imaginario-archivo para situar dicha migración como una presencia no advertida, pero persistente. Contribuye también para ampliar otras reflexiones sobre la Guerra Fría; entre Argentina y el Sudeste Asiático como alteridades extremas, por ejemplo. Un 'archivo nuevo', planteado sobre la huella de una comunidad sin aparente rastro, exige un ejercicio crítico frente a las formas de imaginar una organización para el vestigio de presencias encubiertas que no tuvieron mayor protagonismo en la Argentina de dictadura y la posterior.Palabras clave: Refugiados laosianos. Memoria argentina. Archivo-nuevo. Imagen –imaginario. Guerra Fría. FOOTPRINTS THAT PASS, IMAGES THAT WEIGH. THE IMAGINARY-ARCHIVE OF THE LAOTIAN DIASPORA IN ARGENTINA Abstract: Between 1979 and 1981, 293 families of refugees from the Laos Civil War arrived in Argentina in a strategy organized by the United Nations due to the crisis in Southeast Asia that led to unsuspected migrations. The monitoring of the Laotian diaspora was overshadowed by the imposing imagery of 'Vietnam' and by different processes of legitimation about official account of history and social memory after the National Reorganization Process in Argentina. This reflection proposes a revision about some Laotian images as an imaginary-archive to locate this migration as an unannounced, but persistent presence. It also contributes to broaden other reflections on the Cold War; between Argentina and Southeast Asia as extreme alterities, for example. A "new archive", raised on the footprint of a community with no apparent trace, requires a critical exercise against the ways of imagining an organization for the vestige of covert presences that did not play a major role in dictatorship Argentina and the subsequent one.Keywords: Laotian refugees. Social memory in Argentina. New-archive. Image and imaginary. Cold War

ObjectiveThis article examines the distinct processes of accommodation to immigrants in two similar small towns in Iowa. Ethnic conflict and contact theories predict that the processes would be similar in these towns, but their experiences demonstrate otherwise.MethodsThe study traces the histories of these towns and uses surveys, focus groups, and interviews to detail the process of accommodation in these communities.ResultsIn both towns, white/Anglo residents came to accommodate their new neighbors and accept immigrants as full members of their communities, but the processes were unique in each place. In one community, earlier exposure to a small group of Laotian refugees gave residents and officials valuable experience with diversity. Further, this town was pushed toward acceptance when an outside group spread falsehoods.ConclusionsThis study demonstrates that adjusting to ethnic diversity is a long‐term process that is unique to a community's experience with diversity.

The Hmong are an ethnic group from Southeast Asia who has lived as forced political refugees for the past several hundred years. In the 1960s, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) recruited the Hmong to assist them with the Vietnam War. After the United States withdrew from the war, the Hmong were left behind and became the target to the Laotian and Vietnamese communists. This led to them experiencing traumatic events as they walked from Laos to Thailand to escape ethnic cleansing. From the refugee camps in Thailand to arriving in the United States, the Hmong have encountered various mental-health related issues. The purpose of this literature is to explore the mental-health seeking behaviors among the Hmong population and identify the common mental-health issues they encountered. Using a systematic review, a total of 27 articles were picked from PubMed and Hmong Studies Journal to be examined. This literature review found that the Hmong people have a low rate of seeking Western treatments because their community has always consulted a Hmong shaman, herbs or family members when they experience an illness. Findings also revealed common mental problems: depression, anxiety, adjustments issues, and other health concerns related to the work environment in a new country.

"Traces the unique route through which Hmong in Vietnam discovered Christianity and appropriated it for themselves. Although a significant proportion of Vietnam's population has been Catholic since the days of French colonialism, the Hmong continued animistic spiritual practices shared across Hmong populations throughout Southeast Asia in the remote highland areas where most of them lived. After the Vietnam War, the Far East Broadcasting Company started an evangelical program in Hmong language targeting war refugees in Laos. In the mid-1980s this radio signal was accidentally received by listeners in Vietnam's Northern Highland, who related the content to their traditional expectation of salvation by a Hmong messiah-king who would lead them out of subjugation. Actual missionaries, mostly Laotian Hmong refugees in the US, eventually arrived to help them routinize their new Protestant faith. Today, this New Way (Kev Cai Tshiab) is the claimed religion of roughly one third of a million Hmong in Vietnam. This ethngraphic study describes what happened when some Hmong decided to become Protestants while many of their kin kept their traditional religion, how the communist state views their religious activities, and the global dimensions of Hmong Protestant life. Hmong conversion serves as a lens for viewing the complex politics of religion and ethnic relations in contemporary Vietnam and illuminates larger issues such as the dynamic interplay between local and global forces, socialist and post-socialist state-building, Cold War and post-Cold War antagonisms, Hmong transnationalism, and US-led evangelical expansionism"--

Hongsa Chanthavong was born on October 1, 1934, in Laos to Laotian parents who were born in the early 1900s. Because he comes from Laos, he self-identifies as Lao. Chanthavong attended school in Laos, in Vientiane, until coming to the United States in 1959 to study at the University of Miami. He came by himself to study in the School of Government of Political Science on a scholarship granted by the U.S. government. After his graduation in 1964, he began working for the State Department as an escort interpreter, but after three months, he returned to Laos. There, he worked for the government when in 1975 he was captured by communists and came as a refugee to the United States in 1983 with his wife and children. He began his career at IRCO in 1984 as a business specialist with the Economic Development Project. He moved from that position to resource specialist to director of the International Language Bank, and then he set up the Asian Family Center, becoming the center coordinator in 1994. He now works as the community organizer of the Diversity and Civic Leadership Project and as a business development specialist.