The Reaches of Literacy: Hmong Americans Reading and Writing

In this talk, John Duffy argues that, far from being a preliterate culture, the Hmong have a rich, diverse and complex history of literacy. More, Duffy argues that the literacy experiences of Hmong-Americans -- in public schools, Christian churches, Hmong community organizations, and elsewhere -- are the result not of contacts with institutions in the United States but have their roots in Laos and in China, in the cultures where the Hmong were commonly regarded as “preliterate.”