Clarice Wong - Week 3

Clarice Wong

Section A01

Week 3

After reading “Hmong Does not Mean Free: The Miseducation of Hmong Americans”, I realized that there are * - Americans which are very neglected within the context of American education. Before, I considered groups such as Chinese-American and Chicanx-American as minorities; however, it is evident now that there are other minorities which are even more brushed aside; subsets of Asian-Americans which have no representation. In my experience I have actually met one Hmong-American student at UC Davis. He told me about Animism, the belief of spirits being inherent to every object and being. Additionally, my father the history buff reaffirmed the strong influence of Animism in Hmong culture, instead interpreting it as "witchcraft" in which "high-ranking witches" in Hmong tribes are able to summon spirits to cast harm or protective "spells" upon other members in the community (this interpretation is anecdotal and may not be completely accurate). He also mentioned that Hmong people populated Canton provinces many years ago before migrating to Vietnam; however, upon searching for Hmong in the "Animism" and "Guangdong (Canton)" Wikipedia articles, there was no mention of them. This definitely aligns with the point that the writer of the thesis made about the lack of education about the Hmong community within America. This is baffling, since the amount of Hmong-Americans is around 270,000 yet there is little to no information about them. Question: What are some criteria/ what is the "threshold" for a minority group in America to be able to achieve some recognition? Works Cited: 1. Mouavangsou, Kaozong N. Hmong Does Not Mean Free: The Miseducation of Hmong Americans. Retrieved October 8, 2017

2. [Hmong language, culture, and food: What most people don’t know.]. (2015, March 3). Retrieved October 8, 2017, from https://languages.oberlin.edu/hmong-language-culture-and-food-what-most-people-dont-know/