In May, we celebrate Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, a time to "join in paying tribute to the generations of Asian and Pacific Islanders who have enriched America's history and are instrumental in its future success." We think every month is a time to remember and honor the rich traditions of Asian/Pacific America, so we're showing some love to the literary journals that celebrate Asian Pacific America year-round. These publications help us to discover emerging writers, recall the histories undergirding our present, and take pleasure in beautifully crafted writing. Whether you're looking for the next Gish Jen, interested in exploring adoptee culture, or want to attend to challenges of representation, these literary journals have got you covered.

Hyphen Magazine

About:

"In 2002, spurred by the shuttering of a.Magazine, a small group of 20-and-30-something journalists and artists got together to fill the void by envisioning the kind of magazine we always wanted to read: a publication that would go beyond celebrity interviews and essays about discovering our roots, which we found a long time ago, thank-you-very-much... Hyphen issue 1, which paid tribute to Asian American activism, was published in June 2003. The cover depicted a woman sitting on a stack of suitcases by the side of a road, just under a sign that read, 'Welcome to Asian America, Population 11 Million.' Since then, our numbers have grown to 15.5 million. And in tackling issues of culture and community with substance and sass, Hyphen has also flourished, becoming a media must for savvy Asian Americans."

A taste of the magazine: 

"How much can you tell about me by just looking?... [T]here are the multitude of labels I place upon myself. I am a cartoonist, a writer, a costume player, a software enginee, married, turbaned, bearded, American, Sikh -- just to name a few. While all of these identifications are true, they don’t contain the essence of who I am. What defines me are not the identifications -- be they social, cultural, national, religious, or professional -- but the neverending transitions that breathe life into my existence."
 

- from "Where are you from?" by Vishavjit Singh

The Asian American Literary Review

About: 

"The Asian American Literary Review is a space for writers who consider the designation 'Asian American' a fruitful starting point for artistic vision and community. In showcasing the work of established and emerging writers, the journal aims to incubate dialogues and, just as importantly, open those dialogues to regional, national, and international audiences of all constituencies. We select work that is, as Marianne Moore once put it, 'an expression of our needs…[and] feeling, modified by the writer's moral and technical insights.' Published biannually, AALR features fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, translations, comic art, interviews, and book reviews."

A taste of the magazine:

"Over the years, I have taught (and continue to teach) Rolling the R's in creative writing classes for the same reason I assign As I Lay Dying. As with all of my favorite books, when I share it what I actually want to share with people is that initial reading experience—the excitement, the enchantment, the exhilaration—which I hope will be sparked in them too. I wish I could share with them my jolt of recognition that came from seeing Filipino objects, family life, religious artifacts, and people in an American setting. Normally I can’t; but there are other fruits to this manuscript and its parts. I remember, the first time I read Rolling, being blown away by the bravery of an author being willing to put himself into a narrator's thoughts, to capture them so truly and honestly and to express them without fear that people would mistake them for his own." - from "Taking Them to Our Lady of Kalihi" by Brian Ascalon Roley

The Margins

About:

"The Margins, the flagship editorial platform of the Asian American Writers' Workshop, is a bold new online magazine dedicated to inventing the Asian American creative culture of tomorrow. In an age when Asian Americans are relegated to sidekicks, whether in sitcoms or the corridors of power, we believe it's time to bring Asian Americans into the conversations that matter. We're thinking about Asian American identity in a way totally different from anyone else for a pan-racial, trans-cultural, truly world-spanning audience."

A taste of the magazine:

"When I was a teenager, my mother, mostly unprompted, would share snippets of her life with me. We would be listening to Khmer music on loop on our multi-disc CD player—classical wedding songs by the famous Sinn Sisamouth or Ros Serey Sothea, Khmer rock legends, or 90s synth versions of their classics—and she had associations for each of them, like the day she married my father in a weekend-long ceremony, or 'Chnam Oun 16' ('I'm Sixteen') for the nights she snuck out of the house to go dancing. There was rarely a Khmer song that she didn't know. This was her connection. And so it became mine, through the nostalgia it evoked of a time when I didn’t exist, when my mother was a relatively free young woman. My parents' wedding photos were destroyed during the regime so I have no images to refer to of their younger selves. This is why I fawn over old photos of my friends’ relatives, because they have versions of themselves in other decades; they can imagine themselves placed in a different period in time. At times I feel like my parents didn't even exist in that time." - from "Our War is on My Mind" by Sokunthary Svay

Kartika Review

About:

"Kartika Review is an Asian Pacific Islander American literary arts journal that publishes fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, commentary on the writing and publishing, and author interviews. The journal launched in 2007 under Founding Editor Sunny Woan's guidance."

A taste of the magazine:

"In every woman's diary, the only month is May.
She rings the buzzers of the beautiful
until her fingers are blue.
She locks god out of her mother's
house, calls it a museum.
She bleeds her father's mistresses,
calls it perfume." - from "Fable" by Michelle Chan Brown

Bamboo Ridge

About:

"Bamboo Ridge Press was founded in 1978 to publish literature by and about Hawaii's people. It currently publishes two volumes a year: a literary journal of poetry and fiction featuring work by both emerging and established writers and a book by a single author or an anthology focused on a special theme. Both the journal and book are available singly or by subscription. While special attention is given to literature that reflects an island sensibility, Bamboo Ridge is broad in scope and embraces a variety of work from writers across the nation. Some of our books have received recognition for literary excellence and for their contribution to the understanding and appreciation of Hawaii's cultures and people. Bamboo Ridge publications have been adopted as texts or recommended reading in high school and college classrooms and have found a diverse audience across the country. Work from Bamboo Ridge has been adapted for speech and storytelling performances, plays, and readings. Bamboo Ridge Press continues to nurture the voices of Hawai'i and celebrate our literary tradition."
 

 

A taste of the magazine:

"Just enough hope for me 
to think that yes we can 
do this 
and do that 
with all we have 
or don't have 

Just enough time for finish my poem 
For da dis of da dat 

Just enough space to write 
All these thirty years 
We did this 
We did that " - from "Just Enough Shave Ice" by Jean Toyama

Jaggery

About:

"For the relaunch of DesiLit Magazine, we wanted to choose a new, more evocative, name — a name that evoked South Asia, but also the shared colonial history of South Asian nations and the contribution that South Asian languages have made to English, the primary language of our journal... Perhaps Jaggery will offer a path of connection between diaspora writers and homeland writers; we also welcome non-South Asians with a deep and thoughtful connection to South Asian countries, who bring their own intersecting perspectives to the conversation. Our hope with Jaggery is to create a journal that offers the best writing by and about South Asians and their diaspora. Dark, complex, intense — and hopefully delicious."

A taste of the magazine:

"1981 was a bad year for a Parsi to come to America. The Iran hostage crisis had left Americans with a smoldering resentment of foreigners. 'Go home!' Viraf was told.

Not to his South Bombay stomping grounds: Marine Drive, Churchgate, Mahatma Gandhi Road, Cuffe Parade, Eros, CCI, Colaba. Not to Seth Building and his loved ones: Mum, Dad, Mamaiji—best not to even think of Maya.

No. Go home to Iran. To a place he'd never seen.

Go back a thousand years.

Reverse his ancestors' voyage into the unknown, after the Arab invasion put Zoroastrianism to the sword. In wooden dhows, half a millennium before Columbus embarked for India, they’d sailed the Arabian Sea. Iran to India, Pars to Gujarat, migration in his blood.

There would be no going home, no going back ever for the Parsis. Centuries of settling and moving and starting up again. Sanjan to Navsari, Navsari to Udvada, Udvada to Bombay. And now, after hundreds of years, India to America. Old World to New." - from "Hood," an excerpt of Go Home by Sohrab Homi Fracis

Eastlit

About:

"Eastlit is a site for:

• Local Asian writers born and brought up in the region whose literature tell the stories of the region past and present. Asian writers who expose the culture, the people and the changes.
• Writers who have moved to the region whose writing is either about East and South East Asia, or whose writing has been influenced by living in the region. Those who make a significant contribution to Asian literature or who are influenced by Asia and Asian literature.
• Asian writers with ethnic roots in the region who have moved to or been born in other locations. Asian writers who want to explore or even reengage.
• Writers from outside East and South East Asia who wish to connect with the region in a meaningful way.
• Readers with an interest in the Asian literature of East and South East Asia that is written in English.
• Publishers seeking new writers and works. Especially Asian writers or writers of Asian poetry, Asian fiction, Asian novels and creators of Asian art."

A taste of the magazine:

"The children love the stories of the most gruesome and always ask to hear about Pret, the giant, emaciated, insatiable spirits who feed on human excrement through pin hole mouths which immediately burns the inside of their throats or Krasue, the floating woman’s head with attached viscera that feed on sleeping men in the night. There is no shortage of specters. One legged vampires who roam the forest, eyeless children who extend their arms infinitely to search for lost mothers. There are banana and coconut tree ghosts, water ghosts, jumping Chinese ghosts; even the termites and buffaloes leave spirits behind in her stories." - from "Honeymonsters" by John McMahon

Mizna

About:

"Mizna is an organization devoted to promoting Arab-American culture, providing a forum for its expression. We value diversity in our community and are committed to giving voice to Arab Americans through literature and art... Mizna continues to be the only journal of Arab American literature in the United States, and is currently in libraries, museums, and on coffee tables throughout the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East."

A taste of the magazine:

"Today, many artists are dealing with a crisis of conscience. They are grappling with the idea of using art as a platform to voice social injustices. 'Social art' has become increasingly prevalent in the context of a world experiencing more and more censorship in media. The debate that is happening now is about whether or not artists have the agency to actually promote change, and whether or not that responsibility should be put on the shoulders of the artist in the first place. Can art in fact make a difference and should we be placing that expectation on art? We find ourselves asking these questions within funding structures and an art economy that are also controversial, and at times an extension of the very issues we are addressing in our work. Who is funding and buying our work?" - from an interview with Heba Y. Amin