Cathy Park Hong in Conversation with Ijeoma Oluo: In-Person & Online

Beowulf Sheehan

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Ijeoma Oluo Presents: Our Existence Beyond Trauma

Cathy Park Hong in Conversation with Ijeoma Oluo: In-Person & Online

Past Event: Friday, January 28, 2022

At Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute

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In Person & Online

Co-Presented by Langston Seattle

Although this event has passed, you can still purchase tickets now through Friday, February 4, at 7:30 p.m. (PT). The event will be viewable until 11:59 p.m. on Friday, February 4.

Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong fearlessly and provocatively blends memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose fresh truths about racialized consciousness in America. Minor Feelings is a vulnerable, humorous, and provocative essay collection, whose relentless pursuit of vital questions around family and friendship, art and politics, identity and individuality, will change the way you think about our world.

Hong will be in conversation with Our Existence Beyond Trauma Series curator, Ijeoma Oluo, for this event, which is co-presented by Langston Seattle.

Binding the essay of her most recent collection together is Hong’s theory of “minor feelings.” As the daughter of Korean immigrants, Cathy Park Hong grew up steeped in shame, suspicion, and melancholy. She would later understand that these “minor feelings” occur when American optimism contradicts your own reality—when you believe the lies you’re told about your own racial identity. Minor feelings are not small, they’re dissonant—and in their tension Hong finds the key to the questions that haunt her.

With sly humor and a poet’s searching mind, Hong uses her own story as a portal into a deeper examination of racial consciousness in America today. This intimate and devastating book traces her relationship to the English language, to shame and depression, to poetry and female friendship. A radically honest work of art, Minor Feelings forms a portrait of one Asian American psyche—and of a writer’s search to both uncover and speak the truth.

Cathy Park Hong’s first book, Translating Mo’um was published in 2002 by Hanging Loose Press. Her second collection, Dance Dance Revolution, was chosen for the Barnard Women Poets Prize and was published in 2007 by W.W. Norton. Her third book of poems, Engine Empire, was published in Spring 2012 by W.W. Norton.

Hong is also the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, and the New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship. Her poems have been published in A Public SpacePoetryParis ReviewConjunctionsMcSweeney’sAPRHarvard ReviewBoston ReviewThe Nation, and other journals. She is an Associate Professor at Sarah Lawrence College and is regular faculty at the Queens MFA program in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Ijeoma Oluo is a writer, speaker and internet yeller. She is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller So You Want to Talk About Race and most recently, Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America. Her work on race has been featured in the Guardian, the New York Times and the Washington Post, among many other publications. She was named to the 2021 TIME 100 Next list and has twice been named to the Root 100. She received the 2018 Feminist Humanist Award and the 2020 Harvard Humanist of the Year Award from the American Humanist Association. She lives in Seattle, Washington.

Event Details

Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute

104 17th Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144

View directions.

Know Before You Go

COVID-19

Seattle Arts & Lectures requires attendees to provide proof of vaccination for our in-person events this season. See our FAQ for details. Masks are required for all attendees, regardless of vaccination status. Likewise, our staff and volunteers will be vaccinated and masked.

These policies are subject to revision as health and safety guidelines change. You will receive a pre-event email two days prior to each event to confirm our most up-to-date policies.

Can't find your tickets? Need access to the digital event?

All tickets have been emailed for Hong’s event, so be sure to check your inbox for an email from [email protected]. Call us at 206-621-2230 x10 if you can’t find them.

For in-person attendance: Your e-tickets come attached in a PDF with your ticket order confirmation email. Present on your mobile device or bring your printed ticket to the venue the night of the event. Check your pre-event email for details on COVID safety precautions.

For online attendance: Your e-tickets, which come attached in a PDF with your ticket order confirmation email, contain your digital access instructions. The night of your event, return to lectures.org/event/cathy-park-hong and enter the password where prompted. The program begins at 7:30 p.m. (PT) and will be available for viewing for a week after the event.

SAL will also send an email the day of the event, containing the same information. If you have opted out of receiving SAL emails, you will miss this important information—please email us at [email protected] and we will assist you.

Have a question for the speaker?

Want to ask Cathy Park Hong something? Send your question to SAL at [email protected]—it might be asked onstage!

Books

Our partner bookstore will have copies of Cathy Park Hong’s work available for purchase at their table in the lobby and on their website.

Patrons & Grand Patrons, you're invited to Happy Hour!

Patron & Grand Patron seating includes a pre-event happy hour, as is possible due to COVID-19 restrictions. Check your pre-event email for details.

Transportation & Parking

This event will be held in the theatre at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute.

LHPAI is conveniently located on the Southeast Corner of East Yesler Way and 17th Avenue South. The entrance of the building is located on the east side of 17th Avenue South.

By Car

 

  • From Northbound I-5
    Take the Dearborn Street exit to Rainier Avenue South. Go north on Rainier Avenue, which turns into Boren Avenue. Turn right on Yesler Way. Turn right on 17th Avenue South. Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute will be on your left.
  • From Southbound I-5
    Take James Street exit. Continue south through James Street. Use right lane to proceed to Yesler Way. Turn left on Yesler Way. Turn right on 17th Avenue South. Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute will be on your left.

By Bus

LHPAI can be accessed at the East Yesler Way and 17th Avenue South bus stop for bus route #27. For details and trip planning tools, call Metro Rider Information at 206.553.3000 (voice) or 206.684.1739 (TDD), or visit Metro online.

Parking

LHPAI offers a variety of options for parking free of charge. Street parking is available along with parking lots on the northeast corner of East Yesler Way and 17th Avenue South. There is additional parking behind the building in the southeast parking lot.

Accessibility

Open Captioning is an option for people who have hearing losses, where a captioning screen displaying the words that are spoken or sung is placed on stage. To make a request for open captioning, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10. Please note: for in-person captioning at Langston, we appreciate a two-week advance notice to allow us time to secure captioning services. 

Closed Captioning is an option for people who have hearing loss, where captioning displays the words that are spoken or sung at the bottom of the video during an online event. Captioning is available for all online events; click the “CC” button to view captions during the event.

Sign Language Interpretation is available upon request for Deaf, DeafBlind, and hard of hearing individuals at all in-person and online events. To make a request for interpretation, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10, or select “Sign Language Interpretation” from the Accessibility section during your ticket checkout process and we will contact you to confirm details. Please note: we appreciate a two-week advance notice to allow us time to secure interpretation

Assistive Listening Devices (ALDs) are devices that people with hearing loss use in conjunction with their hearing device (hearing aids or cochlear implants). To pick up a headset, check in with any Langston usher when you arrive.

Wheelchair Accessible Seating and Accessible Restrooms are available in the theatre, which complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act. To reserve seating for a specific mobility concern, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10, or select “Wheelchair Accessible or Alternative Seating Options” during ticket checkout, and we will contact you to confirm details.

Guide and service dogs are welcome.

We are pleased to offer these accessibility services at our venues, and they are provided at no additional cost to ticket holders. Please contact us with any questions and feedback about how we can be more accessible and inclusive. Our Patron Services Manager is available at [email protected], or Monday-Friday from 10:00am – 5:00pm at 206.621.2230×10.

For more accessibility information, please head to lectures.org/accessibility. If you would like to make accessibility arrangements you do not see listed here, please contact our box office or select “Other Accommodations” from the Accessibility section during your ticket checkout process, and we will contact you to confirm details.