With these feelings reflected among other observations, many of them hilarious, the former Yagoona Public School student has written her first book, ‘Funny Ethnics’.
The inaugural recipient of the Affirm Press Mentorship for Sweatshop Writers, Shirley is also a creative producer with Sweatshop: Western Sydney Literacy Movement.
Her work has been published in SBS Voices, Overland, The Guardian, Meanjin and the 2022 anthology ‘Another Australia’.
Her debut novel is a darkly funny, unique coming-of-age novel about Sylvia, a young Vietnamese-Australian woman from Western Sydney searching for her place in the world in the face of racism and xenophobia in the early 2000s.
With blunt humour, ‘Funny Ethnics’ punctures harmful stereotypes about Asian-Australians such as them being compliant high-achievers and, for Asian-Australian women in particular, naturally petite and ageless, yet Shirley’s story is rarely heard.
“Growing up, stories about Vietnam that I encountered often focused on the Vietnam War and its aftermath,” she said.
“The magnitude of my parents’ experiences as refugees and survivors of war overwhelmed me, and my own experiences as someone from the next generation felt less worthy.
“While the Vietnam War plays a defining role in why I am here in Australia today, these days I am focused on exploring what it means to exist in that hyphen between Vietnamese and Australian.
“My book is for anyone who wants to understand more about Australian life from the perspective of the Vietnamese-Australian; there is definitely a comical side.”
‘Funny Ethnics’ is out now in all good book stores, affirmpress.com.au, Booktopia and Amazon.
