Ka Vang

Who is Ka Vang?

Ka Vang is a Hmong American writer in the United States. Vang was born in Long Cheng, Laos, at the end of the Vietnam War, and immigrated to America in 1980. A fiction writer, poet, playwright, and former journalist, Vang has devoted much of her professional life to capturing Hmong folktales on paper. She is a recipient of the Archibald Bush Artist Fellowship and several other artistic and leadership awards.

The daughter of a major in the Royal Lao Army and a shaman, Vang grew up in her early years in Thai refugee camps before resettling in the United States Midwest, with the majority of her formative years spent in the Twin Cities and the Frogtown quarter of St. Paul, Minnesota. She briefly attended the St. Agnes parochial school in the late 1980s before attending the local public high school.

Vang was the oldest of seven children in her family. At an early age, she was known for her intense curiosity and intelligence and a tendency to challenge established norms of American and Hmong society.

Bi-culturalism was a significant issue in Vang's experience as she sought ways to succeed in both Hmong and American society, and this experience is frequently reflected in her later writing.