Stories Hold the Cure.
We each carry untapped potential for joy, love, resilience, and grit—powerful forces that have been buried beneath the layers of our pain. And we each have wounds that resist healing—hurts that have calcified into scars and can trap us into narrow narratives of who we are.
What if we reclaim agency over our own narratives and rewrite the stories that have either been imposed upon us or that we have been telling ourselves? What if writing is the medicine and stories hold the cure?
In this generative writing workshop, award-winning memoirist Putsata Reang will guide you on a journey of self-exploration and self-discovery as we write toward the intersection of past, present and future. Using a combination of writing prompts, group sharing, and sensory exercises, Putsata offers a path for transforming past and present pain into purposeful prose.
Free and open to Asian immigrants/refugees and Asian American identifying community members, no writing skills necessary! Donations are encouraged for those who have the financial capacity to contribute so we can continue making our programs accessible.
This event is brought to you by ACL Spokane’s Chai Culture Club, Auntie’s Bookstore, Better Health Together, KH Consulting, YWCA Spokane, Teas Company, KSPS PBS, and KYRS.
***
About the Author
Putsata Reang is an author and journalist whose debut memoir, Ma and Me (MCD/FSG May 2022) was a recipient of the 2023 Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association award for nonfiction and finalist for a 2023 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, Washington State Book Award and Lambda Literary Award. Her writing has appeared in national and international publications including the New York Times, Ms magazine, the San Jose Mercury News, Politico, and the Guardian. She has lived and worked in more than a dozen countries including Cambodia, Afghanistan and Thailand. Putsata is an alum of Hedgebrook, Mineral School and Kimmel Harding Nelson residencies, and was a fellow of the Jack Straw writers program. In 2005, she was awarded an Alicia Patterson Journalism Fellowship that took her back to her homeland, Cambodia, to report on landless farmers. She is a public speaker and memoir teacher with Seattle Arts & Lectures’ Writers in the Schools program.
About Chai Culture Club
ACL Spokane’s Chai Culture Club aims to communally experience complex Asian and Asian American narratives through divergent cultural media (such as film/visual arts, literary, music/podcast, and theater/performance). We help create spaces of belonging where club members can celebrate our community stories and critically discuss their impact. Club membership is free and open to any Asians/Asian Americans in the Spokane area. Occasionally, we will have events open to the public. Sign up at bit.ly/chaicultureclub. For questions, please contact Frances at fmortel@aclspokane.org.