Events

CHAIRPERSON

Asst Prof Matthew Reeder, Yale-NUS College

ABSTRACT

Libraries in French colonial Vietnam functioned as symbols of Western modernity and infrastructures of colonial knowledge. Yet Vietnamese readers pursued alternative uses of the library that exceeded imperial intentions. Bibliotactics: Libraries and the Colonial Public in Vietnam (University of California Press, 2026) examines the Hanoi and Saigon state libraries from colonial to postcolonial Vietnam, uncovering the emergence of a colonial public who reimagined the political meaning and social space of the library through public critique and day-to-day practice. Comprising government bureaucrats, library personnel, journalists, and everyday library readers, this colonial public debated the role of libraries as educational resource, civilizing instrument, and literary heritage. Moving beyond procolonial or anticolonial nationalism framings, this research advances a relational theory of power that centers public reading culture contextualized within the library infrastructure of the colonial information order. As the first comprehensive history of the colonial and national library in Asia, this book contributes new insights into publicity, colonial and postcolonial studies, and the histories of Southeast Asia, libraries, and information. It undertakes a transnational approach to understand how library sciences, literacy, and publishing initiatives in the United States, France, Cambodia, and colonial Indonesia shaped library developments and literary heritage in colonial and postcolonial Vietnam.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Cindy Anh Nguyen is Assistant Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles with appointments in Information Studies, Digital Humanities Program, and Asian Languages & Culture. Her forthcoming book, Bibliotactics: Libraries and the Colonial Public in Vietnam (University of California Press, 2026) uncovers how libraries functioned as both instruments of colonial dominance and an experimental space of public critique. Her transdisciplinary research examines the historical and socio-technical production of knowledge in Southeast Asia through libraries, encyclopedia, visual media, and language through feminist, decolonial, and critical approaches. Her work has appeared in Journal of Vietnamese Studies, Verge: Studies in Global Asia, Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy, the Vietnamese American Refugee Experience Model Curriculum, and numerous edited volumes on history and digital humanities. She is also a public scholar and community artist. For more information, follow her work at cindyanguyen.com.

REGISTRATION

Registration is closed, and instructions on how to participate in this hybrid talk has been sent out to registered attendees. Please write to ziqi@nus.edu.sg if you would like to attend the event.