Nikkei Uncovered IV: a poetry reading | Feat. Christine Kitano, Mia Ayumi Malhotra & Matthew Mejia
On August 22, 2024, Discover Nikkei held our fourth virtual poetry reading, with a powerful lineup of poets previously featured in Discover Nikkei’s “Nikkei Uncovered: a poetry column.” Hosted by traci kato-kiriyama, author of “Navigating With(out) Instruments,” this year’s reading featured Christine Kitano, Mia Ayumi Malholtra, and Matthew Mejia.
Find poems by Kitano, Malhotra, Mejia, and many more wonderful Nikkei poets in our Nikkei Uncovered poetry column. New poems published monthly on the third Thursday! https://discovernikkei.org/en/journal...
CHRISTINE KITANO is a poet, associate professor of creative writing and literature at Stony Brook University, and author of “Sky Country” and “Birds of Paradise.” Her father was incarcerated at Topaz concentration camp and helped found UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center. Her mother immigrated from Korea as a teenager. Kitano’s poetry and scholarship explore these familial legacies.
MATTHEW MEJIA is an American poet and an award-winning professor. He is driven and inspired by his Japanese, Mexican, and Indigenous ancestry. Through art, he heals generations of violence and abuse to unify his communities. In the classroom, he advocates for student success and believes that students are the foundation on which academia stands.
MIA AYUMI MALHOTRA is the author of “Mothersalt” and “Isako Isako,” a California Book Award finalist and winner of the Nautilus Gold Award, Alice James Award, National Indie Excellence Award, and Maine Literary Award. Her work has been recognized internationally with the Hawker Prize for Southeast Asian Poetry and the Singapore Poetry Prize. She is a founding member of The Ruby SF, a gathering space for women and nonbinary artists.
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ABOUT DISCOVER NIKKEI
Beyond just a website, Discover Nikkei is an international network that celebrates cultural diversity and explores both global and local identities. The project connects generations and communities by sharing stories and perspectives of the Nikkei, people of Japanese descent who have migrated and settled throughout the world.
Support Discover Nikkei: https://discovernikkei.org/about/support
Discover Nikkei is a project of the Japanese American National Museum (https://janm.org), with major funding from The Nippon Foundation.
https://DiscoverNikkei.org
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