Juliana Pegues is an American writer, performer and community activist living in

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

Biography

Born in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

and raised in

Alaska Alaska ( ) is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is also considered to be the north ...

, Pegues has been a member of both the women of color theater group Mama Mosaic and Mango Tribe, a national Asian Pacific Islander American women's performance collective. Her one-woman shows: ''Made In Taiwan'', ''First the Forest'', and ''Fifteen'' were presented respectively by the

Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill, Minneapolis, Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in ...

, the Jerome Foundation Performance Art Commission, and

Intermedia Arts Twin Cities hip hop, also referred to as Minneapolis hip hop, is sub-genre of rap music that originates from the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Minnesota. History Hip hop culture in the Twin Cities can be traced ...

. Her work has also been presented at the Pillsbury House Theater, and

The Southern Theater The Southern Theater is located in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Built in 1910 as a cultural center and legitimate theater for the burgeoning Scandinavian community centered on Cedar Avenue ("Snoose Boulevard"), the ...

. David Mura directed her play "Q and A" at Mixed Blood Theatre. Her poetry has been published in several anthologies and in the Asian American Renaissance Journal, Mizna, and Lodestar Quarterly. Her writings also include ''White Rice: A Search for Identity'' and pieces for the Fab Feminist Zine. Her poetry has been featured at numerous open mics and cabarets across the country. She has worked for such groups as Asian Immigrant Women Advocates, Women Against Military Madness, Asian American Renaissance, APLB (Asian Pacific Lesbians and Bisexuals)- Twin Cities, and the Women's Prison Book Project. She is the author of the chapbook ''Immigrant Dictionary''. Pegues is the recipient of many awards and honors including a Playwright's Center Many Voices fellow, and hosted AARGH, the Asian American Cabaret with Sandy Agustin. In 1993, she and performance artist Ken Choy were arrested for protesting a performance of Madame Butterfly at the Minnesota Opera. Both were charged with disorderly conduct and paid a $25 fine. In 2021, she joined Cornell University's English Department as an associate Professor. Her research areas include Asian American studies, Native and Indigenous studies, women of color feminism, and queer of color critique. Pegues is the author of “Space-Time Colonialism: Alaska’s Indigenous and Asian Entanglements,” published with University of North Carolina Press in June 2021. The book received the 2022 Lora Romero First Book Publication Prize and the 2022 Sally and Ken Owens Award.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pegues, Juliana American activists American women poets American LGBTQ poets Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Taiwanese emigrants to the United States Poets from Alaska LGBTQ people from Alaska LGBTQ people from Minnesota 21st-century American women