Performing Vulnerability: A Talk by Emily L. Hue with Linda Luu
Presented by the NYU Department of Social and Cultural Analysis. Co-sponsored by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU.
Professor Emily L. Hue and Dr. Linda Luu discuss Hue’s recent publication Performing Vulnerability: Risking Art and Life in the Burmese Diaspora (University of Washington Press, 2025).
A groundbreaking exploration of how diasporic Burmese artists navigate the intricate intersections of art, politics, and humanitarianism, Performing Vulnerability delves into the complexities of vulnerability as both a personal and a performative act. These diasporic artists, exiled due to state repression and political turmoil, find themselves in a precarious balance between expressing their traumas and engaging with the international art market’s expectations. They use their bodies as canvases to communicate the scars of surveillance, imprisonment, and censorship inflicted by their home state while simultaneously confronting the commodification of their suffering by global humanitarian industries.
Emily Hue, associate professor of Ethnic studies and core faculty in SEATRiP, is an interdisciplinary scholar who specializes in studies of humanitarianism, Asian American Studies, visual art, performance, queer studies, Southeast Asia, and diaspora. She earned her PhD at New York University in Social and Cultural Analysis in the field of American Studies and BA in Women’s Studies from Vassar College. She has previously held a UC Chancellor’s Postdoctoral Fellowship in Comparative Literature and Languages at UC Riverside. She sits on the editorial board of the Critical Ethnic Studies Journal and is a US Area Editor at the Journal of Asian Diasporic Visual Culture in the Americas.
Linda Luu is an interdisciplinary scholar of US empire, race, and therapeutic culture. Luu’s research looks at the role of psychological expertise in US liberal counterinsurgency both abroad and at home through the lens of the Vietnam War. Luu holds a PhD in American Studies.
NYU campus access guidelines: This is an in-person event open to the public. Registration is required. Non-NYU guests may be asked to present a government-issued photo ID. NYU guests must present their NYU ID.
Accessibility note: This venue has an elevator and is accessible for wheelchair users. There are all gender restrooms available. If you have any access needs, please email mwb9975@nyu.edu.