With the Oscars coming up, there’s sure to be much attention given to Ken Burns epic 10-part documentary series entitled, “The Vietnam War”, which was released in the fall of 2017. The series encapsulates on film one of the most consequential, divisive, and controversial events in American history.
Within the documentary, key individuals of the War recount their personal experiences. For example, a GI describes his fear of land mines, and the courage it took to walk in Vietnam many years later. This type of storytelling not only serves as a visual encyclopedia of the tragic war and gives us new pieces of information, but it also provides people with what is increasingly being recognized by the medical profession as therapy.
Storytelling as Therapy
We’ve long known that even the simple act of talking about a past incident can be healing. And for the past 20 years, the medical community has begun to implement this as treatment for PTSD; some are labeling it as “narrative medicine”. The Huffington Post has a great article entitled, “Can the simple Act of Storytelling Help Them Heal?”
As I mentioned in my first blog post, I’ll be using this platform to discuss social issues and how myself and other artist I work with at the DIAL (Data-driven Initiatives through Artists Leadership) leverage the arts and culture to address these issues.
For the past two years, we have been operating a program called MAAP (Media Arts Apprenticeship Program), which offers emerging media arts of color an opportunity to work with industry professionals on a professional project. Our program is in collaboration with Special Guerrilla Unit Veterans and Families – A nonprofit that serves Hmong Vietnam War veterans and their families.
The Hmong served as a “secret army” contracted by the American CIA to stop the communists from running arms through Laos, which was a neutral country, and to rescue U.S. and allied soldiers. We believe that the Hmong’s Vietnam War experience was arguably the worst based on outcomes: they paid the ultimate sacrifice of having to flee their homeland and become refugees.
Together, we have been collecting the stories of Hmong veterans to produce our own documentary series, currently titled, “Special Guerrilla Unit: A Secret Army for a Secret War”. (We had started this program and work, before we had known about Ken Burns’ documentary.) Our goals, like Ken Burns, is to shed light onto one of the most disastrous periods in history, as well as present an opportunity for Hmong Vietnam War veterans to heal through the act of storytelling. You can see a trailer for our documentary series here. I’d love to hear your thoughts about our project and/or program.
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