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Updated: October 18, 2021, 7:25 A.M.
Ontario
Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award for 2020
Charmaine Rodriguez Kara
Filipina Canadian writer Jennilee Austria emerged as second runner-up in the prestigious Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award for 2020 and is set to become a published author of a collection of short stories inspired by an experience that has impacted so many Filipinos in the Canadian diaspora: family reunification.
“Reunification Stories for Caregivers and the Ones Who Love Them” is a collection of linked short stories that examine reunification through various Filipinx lenses: the Canadian-born Filipina who clumsily helps her cousins assimilate in Sarnia’s Chemical Valley; the sea-faring Filipino husband in Osoyoos who vows to make his wife love him after a decade apart; the kundiman-loving grandfather left behind in a Batangas village to mourn his family legacy; the Quezon City sister battling for custody before her nieces join their estranged mother in Nunavut; the non-binary Filipinx teen who finds belonging in Toronto’s Little Manila; and lastly, a chapter from the little caregiver’s son himself, who finally shares everything that he had struggled to say all along, Austria said of her work.
Austria shares the honour of joining the ranks of Scarborough author Catherine Hernandez, who won the award in 2015.
In 2017, LiterAsian awarded the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award for Poetry to Karla Lenina Comanda.
“I am most grateful for the thousands of newcomer Filipino families whose experiences inspired so much of this linked short story collection. Just like I always said, your stories still keep me up at night,” she wrote in a Facebook post.
Created in 1999 as the Emerging Writers Award and renamed in 2017 to the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award, the annual competition is being done in honour of Asian Canadian writing pioneer and mentor Jim Wong-Chu. The award continues Jim’s lifelong passion to discover and encourage writers to develop quality manuscripts and promote their work to established publishing houses. Previous award winners include Rita Wong, Madeleine Thien, Philip Huynh, Hernandez, Comanda, and Jamie Liew.
Montreal-based writer Jinwoo Park was declared the winner of the 2020 Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award for his manuscript The Oxford Soju Club. The jury consisted of Dr. Trevor Carolan, an award-winning poet, biographer, editor, and professor emerita of English and Creative Writing; Edwin Lee, author of Sum Yung Guys; and Marlene Enns, former Asian Canadian Writers Workshop board director and spouse of the late Jim Wong-Chu, according to the award body’s website.
Austria credits www.philippinecanadiannews.com Editor Ted Alcuitas for putting the contest on her radar and to Hernandez for her warm encouragement.
“I’m also very thankful that my husband kept me fed while I spent a few frantic days writing and editing before the submission deadline, even if his cooking was mostly silogs,” she added. She and her husband both have extended family across Batangas, Manila and Bulacan.
Born in Sarnia, Ontario, Austria took inspiration from her older sister in starting her writing career. “She was always bringing home books for me after her shifts at the public library, but she also advocated for my parents to buy me the chapter books I wanted instead of the science books they wanted,” she added.
She grew up in a very strong Filipino community with 200 families.
Austria, who has a BA in International Studies and an MA in Immigration and Settlement Studies, had always loved learning about global affairs through multicultural literature. Her first job as a School Settlement Worker placed her in the frontline of dealing with reunification issues: kids lashing out, parents needing support, and teachers dealing with student disengagement.
Her work is a collection of stories that “are rooted in so many truths about the lasting impacts of forced family separation and reunification in our community that I have been witnessing throughout my career.”
“As the monolith of the happily reunited Filipino-Canadian family is disassembled, different voices come to the forefront– voices that are rarely or never featured in Canadian literature. And a very special five-year-old caregiver’s son will reappear again and again, but in different ways: an angry boy at the mall, a shy babysitter’s charge, a neighbourhood legend, and more,” she added.
Austria does not only pursue her passion through writing fiction but also touches so many lives with a foundation that acts as a bridge-builder between school boards and Filipino families, helping students and teachers with various issues they are dealing with.
Filipino Talks, which she founded in 2016, has helped numerous students find career mentors, develop community programs, and take on leadership roles in their schools. She also helped teachers form action committees for Filipino newcomers and book Filipino guest speakers for everything from spoken word to cooking classes.
“I’m so grateful that even during the pandemic, teachers were still booking me for online trainings so they could serve their Filipino students better. In the future, I’d love to reach schools outside of the Greater Toronto Area and deliver trainings for educators across Canada,” she said of her foundation.
She is a co-founding member of the Filipino-Canadian Writers and Journalists Network and Pluma, a collective of Filipino-Canadian authors and poets.