Join the Columbia University Weatherhead East Asian Institute for a talk by Luna Nga Thị Howard, Amerasian activist and entrepreneur, and writer Anna El-Eini. Luna will discuss her experience growing up in Vietnam following the war as a woman born of a Vietnamese mother and a Black US serviceman father. Anna will discuss how she and Luna were forced to face existential questions about the Vietnam War head on, including the suffering on both sides, forgiveness versus justice, loyalty through political division, and national identity as a catalyst for war.

Join Vietnamese Boat People at Think!Chinatown Studio for their 7th Annual Story Slam, an evening of live storytelling, community, and connection. This year's Story Slam theme is about living between two languages — the mistranslations, the code-switching, the words that don't survive the crossing, and get lost or found somewhere in between.

Join the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI) for a panel exploring how Southeast Asia can navigate intensifying U.S.–China competition while advancing its own economic and strategic priorities. Speakers include Gita Wirjawan, former Indonesian Minister of Trade and Honorary Senior Fellow at the Center for China Analysis (CCA), and Amb. Craig Allen, former U.S. Ambassador to Brunei Darussalam and Non-Resident Senior Fellow at CCA. Kevin Zongzhe Li, Fellow at CCA, will moderate the discussion.

Join the Brooklyn-based music nonprofit FourOneOne for a ca trù concert by Anh Vo, a Vietnamese choreographer and writer whose work is inspired by their experiences with Downtown New York experimental performance, Hanoi performance art, and Vietnamese folk ritual practices. Vo will give an unabridged performance of Tỳ Bà Hành (琵琶行 Pipa Song) by the Chinese poet Bai Juyi, a Tang dynasty poem that probes the parallel feelings of exile and loss of status experienced by a demoted government official and an aging female musician.

Join the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a special presentation of A Life in Cinema, a cine-concert by Sundance Award-winning filmmaker Tony Bui, featuring the Hanoi Philharmonic Orchestra in a rare New York appearance. Bringing together scenes from decades of Vietnamese cinema, A Life in Cinema tells the story of Viet Nam through the lives, memories, and experiences captured on screen.

Join the High Line and the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art for an in-depth conversation between Tuan Andrew Nguyen, the artist behind The Light That Shines Through the Universe, and Cecilia Alemani, Donald R. Mullen, Jr. Director and Chief Curator of High Line Art. This program will focus on Nguyen’s practice, the inspiration for his Plinth commission, and the sculpture’s symbolic rebirth, followed by a guided meditation focused on transformation.

Join the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Northern Illinois University for a talk by Dr. Mai Truong, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Marquette University. Dr. Truong’s research examines the interaction between movements, states, and publics in authoritarian regimes, namely in Vietnam and Malaysia.

Join the Center for Khmer Studies (CKS) for a talk by Haydon Cherry, CKS Senior Fellow and Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Vietnam. Dr. Cherry’s talk offers a new explanation of the rural uprisings in Cambodia and Cochin-China (modern-day Vietnam) from 1915 to 1916.

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a talk by Dang Nguyen, a Bellwether Postdoctoral Scholar at the School of Information, University of California, Berkeley. By situating Vietnam’s AI strategy within broader debates about technological sovereignty and dependency, this webinar reconsiders how smaller states exercise agency in a landscape increasingly defined by competing technological superpowers.

Join the Henry Luce Foundation to learn more about the Luce Scholars Program, a 12-month leadership development program that provides immersive, professional experiences in Asia. Designed to deepen mutual understanding and strengthen relationships across borders, the Luce Scholars Program emphasizes experiential learning rather than academic study.

Join Asian CineVision for the screenings of i saw you in the flood, Before You, Huong, The Boy with the Dinosaur Head, Whereabouts, and Yu & Me as part of the Asian American International Film Festival. These shorts show how filmmakers find the light in tragedies and overcome heartbreak through the help of their families and communities. This screening will be followed by a Q&A.

Join Asian CineVision for the NYC premiere of the Southeast Asian American Journeys documentary series featuring different refugee communities across the United States. This film is part of an in-person shorts-feature combination screening and will be preceded by the short film, Sea Song.

Join Asian CineVision for a screening of Sea Song directed by An-Phuong Ly. This film is part of an in-person shorts-feature combination screening and will be followed by the documentary series, Southeast Asian American Stories.

Join Asian CineVision for the screenings of Rice Run, Grandma’s Four Color Cards, Sonia Honey, Milk & Honey, Enough, and The Sale as part of the Asian American International Film Festival. These shorts examine the sacrifices that parents make for the sake of their children’s futures. The insecurities and tears are often unseen by those enjoying the care and comforts of the hard-won sacrifices. The screenings will be followed by a filmmaker Q&A.

Join the Southeast Asia Digital Library to celebrate the launch of their newest collection, Hanoi Grapevine's Finest, with a discussion on Audience-led Archives and Contemporary Vietnamese Art. Speakers include Nguyễn Tú Hằng, Director of Hanoi Grapevine; Emily Zinger, Southeast Asia Digital Librarian, and Đỗ Tường Linh, Director of the Nguyen Wahed Gallery and Art Curator Vincom Center for Contemporary Art.

Join the Asia Society New York for a film screening of Boat People (1981) by Ann Hui, which captures the experiences of postwar Vietnamese society.

Join the Australia National University (ANU) Southeast Asia Institute for a talk by Tommy Chai, a PhD Candidate at ANU’s Strategic and Defence Studies Centre. This webinar examines continental Southeast Asia as a strategic space structured by two distinct but interacting sets of constraints: the current borders of Southeast Asia and a historically constituted strategic space centered on the mainland river basins of the Irrawaddy, Chao Phraya, Mekong, and Red River systems, but extending into adjoining upland and frontier zones such as Yunnan.

Join the Asia Society Museum and HBO for a special screening of The A List: 15 Stories from Asian and Pacific Diasporas. This film brings together a tableau of voices to explore the themes of representation, belonging, and what it means to be Asian American or Pacific Islander in America. Through intimate reflections, participants explore the relationship between national identity and solidarity, individual and community, home country and home.

Join the ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for a webinar by Alex-Thái Đình Võ, Research Assistant Professor at the Vietnam Center, Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive at Texas Tech University, and Phan Xuân Dũng, Senior Research Officer at ISEAS and PhD candidate at the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, Australian National University. They will explore U.S. government–supported initiatives that are part of the process of Vietnam–U.S. reconciliation: the Vietnam Wartime Accounting Initiative, which supports the search for Vietnamese wartime missing persons, and programs assisting people with disabilities linked to Agent Orange/dioxin exposure.

Join NYSEAN for a roundtable discussion featuring Cindy Anh Nguyễn, Assistant Professor of Information Studies at UCLA; Shaoling Ma, Associate Professor of Asian Studies at Cornell University, and Rianne Subijanto, Associate Professor of Communication Studies at Baruch College and the Graduate Center, CUNY. They will discuss how their work makes important interventions in the fields of media, communication, and information studies and reflect on how Southeast Asian studies invigorates these fields, and vice versa. Cindy Kaiying Lin, Assistant Professor of Interactive Computing at Georgia Tech, will moderate the discussion.

Join NYSEAN and the CUNY Academy for the Humanities and Sciences for a symposium bringing together scholars and conservationists from across disciplines—including history, anthropology, conservation biology, and psychology—to explore new interdisciplinary approaches to promoting coexistence between humans and the endangered Asian elephant. This symposium is organized by Dr. Joshua Plotnik, Associate Professor of Psychology at Hunter College and CUNY Graduate Center, and Dr. Bradley Camp Davis, Professor of History at Eastern Connecticut State University.

Join PEN America’s World Voices Festival for a discussion exploring the craft of writing comedy that stings and how humor can illuminate betrayal, grief, and the messiness of life. Speakers include Benedict Nguyễn, author of Hot Girls with Balls and a USA Today national bestseller, and Katie Yee, author of Maggie; or A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar. Writer and arts administrator Jared Jackson will moderate the conversation.

Join the Asian American / Asian Research Institute at CUNY for a talk by Dr. Khánh Lê, Assistant Professor of Multilingualism and English Education in the Department of Linguistics and Communication Disorders at Queens College/CUNY, and Dr. Alisha Nguyen, Assistant Professor of TESOL, Bilingual Education and Special Education at Lesley University. They will present their research on the history, development, and impact of Vietnamese dual language bilingual education programs in five U.S. states with significant Vietnamese populations.

Join the Southeast Asia Program at Cornell University for a talk by Dr. Bradley Camp Davis, Professor of History at Eastern Connecticut State University, who will discuss reforms to the administration of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and its parallels with the imperial Vietnamese state.

Join the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a conference unveiling the full release of the Digitizing Vietnam multi-functional Digital Humanities Hub and AI platform, and hosting workshops that gauge the need, efficacy, and limits of Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence in the field of Vietnamese Studies. Speakers include Peter Bol, Đinh Điền, Albert Errickson, Judith Henchy, Tuấn Hoàng, Lê Hoàng Phúc, Lê Nguyễn Tường Vân, Jeremiah Mercurio, Nagasaki Kiyonori, Cindy Nguyễn, Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm, Nguyễn Tuấn Cường, John Phan, Virginia Shih, Shimizu Masaaki, Kwok-Leong Tang, Ann Thornton, Trương Minh Hoà, Vũ Minh Hoàng, Hilde De Weerdt, Lou Vargas, and Emily Zinger.

Join the Harvard University Asia Center for a talk by Michitake Aso, Associate Professor of History at the University at Albany, SUNY. Dr. Aso’s talk examines how Vietnamese scientists and medical doctors built the evidentiary case against Agent Orange and its contaminant TCDD dioxin during the 1990s and early 2000s.

Join the UCLA Center for Southeast Asian Studies for a book talk by Richard Quang-Anh Tran, indepedent scholar. Queer Vietnam recovers the forgotten stories of variant genders and sexualities in early twentieth-century Vietnam.

Join the Asia Society Museum and the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a special dialogue between acclaimed French-Vietnamese filmmaker Tran Anh Hung and filmmaker and professor Tony Bui. The evening explores Tran’s distinctive cinematic language and creative evolution, featuring carefully selected scenes from across his celebrated body of work.

Join the ASEAN Studies Center at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute for the e-launch of The State of Southeast Asia: 2026 Survey Report on the prevailing attitudes of Southeast Asian opinion leaders on regional strategic developments and issues affecting ASEAN and its member states. Joanne Lin, Senior Fellow and Coordinator of the ASEAN Studies Center, will present the key findings of the survey. The following speakers will discuss the survey’s major findings: Scot Marciel, Senior Advisor of BowerGroupAsia; Dr. Saya Kiba, Associate Professor at Kobe City University of Foreign Studies; Dr. Huiyao Wang, Founder and President of the Center for China and Globalization, and Herman Kraft, Professor of Political Science at the University of the Philippines at Diliman.

Join the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia University for a book talk by Andrew L. Oros, Professor of Political Science and International Studies, Washington College, Maryland. Whereas the populations of China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and Russia are aging and shrinking, the populations of India, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Australia continue to grow. Oros will discuss how striking demographic changes affect regional security dynamics and the United States–led alliance structure in the Indo-Pacific.