As a young woman she attended the University of Saigon in southern Vietnam. She was arrested for her political stand against the Diem regime in 1962 and spent 6 months in gaol without trial. She married an American diplomat and left Vietnam for the United States in 1964. She migrated to Australia in 1970. Her 1987 autobiography, Child of Vietnam, explores her experiences as a child and young woman during tumultuous times in Vietnam’s history. Her prose and poetry explore power relationships between ‘mainstream’ Australians and refugees, and women’s experience of traditional families and social …show more content…
The poem has a regular rhythm. This makes the teenagers think what the poem is about. The poem doesn’t have a rhyming pattern. So, it doesn’t flow off when you read the poem aloud. This also affects how the teens view and read the poem. Enjambment of lines is used in the poem. But, it doesn’t affect the flow of emotions being expressed.Poetic devices that UyenLoewald has used are assonance, contrast, symbolism, repetition. Assonance is used as a poetic technique in this poem to symbolise the relationship between migrants and Australians. It’s used in order to keep a flow to exhibit the emotion in particular part of the poem that they are used in. in the phrase ‘Learn English to distinguish’ (Line 2 stanza 5), it shows the demand for this language change. The poet has used symbolism to symbolize job expectancy and what Australians expect migrants to do while they are in Australia. This is to prove the main point of the poem. “Be good little migrants” is repeated numerous times in this poem to create guilt and to make people understand the discrimination in Australian society. It conveys that the US forced the migrants to obey American laws. Contrast is used in “We saved you from starvation….but don’t be heard” to show the futile efforts for the migrants to be accepted.
The poet has used “little” which is reflecting the migrants then symbolises that they are little and less in Australian society.