Organizer: Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU; NYSEAN; Espacio de Culturas at NYU; Yu & Me Books
Type/Location: In Person / New York, NY
Description:
Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU, in collaboration with the New York Southeast Asia Network (NYSEAN), NYU Espacio de Culturas, and Yu & Me Books, invites you to a talk by Dr. Adrian De Leon, Assistant Professor of History at NYU. Dr. De Leon will discuss Notes from a Wayward Son: A Memoir (Penguin Random House Canada, 2026). Dr. Martha Hodes, Professor of History and author of My Hijacking: A Personal History of Forgetting and Remembering, will moderate the discussion.
Limited copies of the book will be available for purchase.
This event is free and open to the public. Registration is required.
About the Book:
A searing memoir of migration, masculinity, and the volatile love between a father and son.
In his first memory of his father, Adrian De Leon is four years old. Sitting in front of his family home high above the street in Manila, Philippines, he sees Tatay, a stern man, ascend the stairs before him. Despite Tatay’s pedigree as a college-educated military officer, the best place of employment for a Filipino man trying to support his family is abroad.
A year later, Tatay uproots his family to Canada, where they start a new life in Toronto’s eastern district of Scarborough. While Tatay struggles to find steady full-time work, Adrian learns English, makes friends at school, and begins to drift from the Filipino world his father is fighting to preserve. In an effort to reclaim purpose and pride, Tatay opens a dojo where he teaches a little-known Filipino martial art called kuntaw. The dojo becomes both sanctuary and battleground, a gathering place for the Filipino diaspora and the place where a father attempts to train and discipline his son. As Adrian grows into a restless, defiant young man grappling with masculinity, faith, and the weight of expectations, the tension between father and son sharpens into open conflict.
Set against the backdrop of imperialism and revolution, Notes from a Wayward Son delivers a fierce meditation on inheritance and rebellion, asking what sons owe their fathers—and what it costs to forgive them.
About the Author:
Adrian De Leon is an Assistant Professor of U.S. History at New York University, and the co-chair of Sulo: The Philippine Studies Initiative at NYU. Across historical periods and literary genres (especially poetry and narrative nonfiction), his work explores the breadth of Filipino diasporic experience and its fraught relationship with modern nation-states and global imperialism, especially (but not exclusively) the United States empire.
He is the author and editor of six books. His most recent publications include: Bundok: A Hinterland History of Filipino America (University of North Carolina Press, 2023), which was awarded the Sally and Ken Owens Award from the Western History Association, and numerous other honors; Balikbayan: A Revenant History of the Filipino Homeland (University of Washington Press, 2026); and Notes from a Wayward Son: A Memoir (Bond Street Books/Great Circle Books, 2026).
Registration:
To attend this event in person, please register here by August 8 at 5:00 PM.