LiterASIAN 2026 -- New Asian Canadian Writing with Wiley Wei-Chiun Ho and Jinwoo Park

This panel brings together writers whose early manuscripts were recognized by the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award and who have since transformed those works into published books that have achieved critical acclaim. These writers represent a new generation of Asian Canadian literature: bold in voice, formally inventive, and deeply attuned to questions of language, identity, migration, and belonging. The panel explores what it means to write between languages, cultures, and literary traditions, and how an emerging work can evolve from manuscript to book. The authors reflect on the role of mentorship, community recognition, and literary validation in sustaining their creative journeys, as well as the challenges and possibilities of writing Asian diasporic stories in the contemporary literary landscape. Rooted in the legacy of Jim Wong-Chu, whose lifelong commitment to nurturing new voices helped shape Asian Canadian literature, this conversation celebrates both artistic achievement and literary lineage and invites audiences to witness how stories first written in the margins come to occupy the centre as they continue to reshape Canadian literature. Wiley Wei-Chiun Ho is an author, mother, and community champion. Born in Taiwan, Wiley immigrated to Canada with her family when she was 9 years old. Identifying as Generation 1.5, Wiley’s writing explores the liminal spaces between countries, languages, cultures, and identities. Her short stories and essays have been published in PRISM international, Ricepaper magazine, River Teeth, Room and several anthologies. Wiley was a finalist for the 2021 Jim Wong-Chu Award for Emerging Writers. She is a member of the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop, North Shore Writers’ Association, and Federation of BC Writers. The Astronaut Children of Dunbar Street is her first book. Jinwoo Park is a Korean Canadian writer based in Montreal. Born and raised in Seoul, he has lived in various parts of North America and the UK since the age of 11. He obtained his master’s in creative writing at the University of Oxford in 2015. In 2021 he won the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers’ Award from the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop. He has also been actively working as a literary translator after winning the Emerging Translator Award from the Literature Translation Institute of Korea in late 2023. Oxford Soju Club, published by Dundurn Press, is his first novel. Chinese Cultural Centre Museum, 555 Columbia St, Vancouver, BC V6A 4H5 We would like to acknowledge that our festival takes place on the unceded traditional territories of the Skwxwú7mesh, Səl̓ílwətaɬ and xʷməθkwəy̓əm First Nations.