Blog #2..A little history on Iu Mien people

(To the left is a picture of the Mien women in their traditional cultural clothing)


Hey y'all!! Welcome to my second week of blogging. So the topic I was going to do was Asian American immigration, but I've decided to narrow it down and try to tackle the topic about the Mien race. This would give me a chance to tell you guys a little history about my people and also allow me to learn more about my culture as well.



I'm fortunate enough to have been raised by a hard working family who literally worked from the bottom up at their home country. That was especially the case when they immigrated here to California. I can honestly say that growing up, this generation of kids don't put forward the efforts to learn about the Mien Culture with me included. Some of the factors contributing to this problem has to do with cultural assimilation and some has to do with simply not wanting to know about their families past history. Everybody knows the saying "It's better late then never", well that's what I'm trying to do right now.



My uncle is a board member for a non-profit community organization called Lao Iu Mien Association, Inc. (LIMCA) which was formed in March 1982. As described in their website their mission is "to preserve the culture heritage of the Iu Mien who came from the highland Lao tribal community, and to develop social and cultural programs to facilitate the Iu Mien integration into the economic and cultural life of the United States." I think this is a perfect starting point to starting my research because this organization wants us to remember who we are and where we came from which is exactly what I'm striving for.



Here are some basic background information about the Iu Mien people. The Iu Mien people consist of the 12 clans. I'll go into detail about the origins of the 12 clans later on in my research, but for now I'll briefly explain it through this website I found that looks like it was created by one person. The 12 clans meant that Mien people can be named one of these 12 last names; 1.Saeteurn (Saetern), 2.Saechao, 3.Saephan, 4.Saelee, 5.Saefong, 6.Saedoh, 7.Saechin, 8.Saeyang, 9.Saesao, 10.Saelaw, 11.Saedorngh,12.Saeyongh. Mien people are highly religious and believe in Taoism. In our culture, the most well respected people are the elders and in most cases they go on to live with their eldest son. We celebrate New Years at the same time as the Chinese and even write our language in Chinese letters. We do not have our own country as we've been known to originate from Laos, Thailand and China. This is one of the reasons why most people do not know of our ethnicity.





In the LIMCA website, it has a link to a Refugee report. That report was dated November 30, 1984. I think either 1982 or 1984 can be a good starting point for my timeline because that's around the time LIMCA was formed, and where the reports of Mien people's immigration to the United States was documented. This is the information I've come up with thus far, and I hope to find out much more as the course progresses on. Please feel free to give me feedback!!