Fay Chiang (January 27, 1952 – October 20, 2017) was an American poet, writer, visual artist and activist based in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

Personal life

Chiang was born in

The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New ...

in 1952. She grew up in Jackson Heights, Queens and later lived in

in the East Village. She died due to complications of cancer on October 20, 2017.

Career

Chiang was the director of the Chinatown-based Asian American arts organization, Basement Workshop, in

from 1975 to 1986. Later, Chiang was active at the

Henry Street Settlement The Henry Street Settlement is a not-for-profit social service agency in the Lower East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City that provides social services, arts programs and health care services to New Yorkers of all ages. It was founde ...

in the

Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Traditionally ...

, Project Reach, a program working with youth in New York City's Chinatown, and Poets and Writers. She was also involved in student-led protests advocating for better Asian American Studies courses at New York colleges. Chiang's books of poetry include ''In The City of Contradictions,'' ''Miwa’s Song,'' and ''7 Continents, 9 Lives,'' published by Bowery Press. Her poetry focused on her identity as a Chinese-American, and explored the discrimination she faced through a lens of

intersectionality Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how aspects of a person's social and political identities combine to create different modes of discrimination and privilege. Intersectionality identifies multiple factors of adva ...

References

1952 births 2017 deaths American women poets 20th-century American poets 21st-century American poets American poets American writers of Chinese descent American women writers of Chinese descent Writers from New York City Hunter College alumni 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women writers {{US-activist-stub