Across the Pacific and Back to Vietnam: Transnational Legacies and Memories of the Vietnam War

Abstract

The Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial in Washington, D.C. is one of the most famous and most moving war memorials in the world. As millions of visitors to “the Wall” can attest, its emotional power derives partly from the simplicity of its form. Eschewing the monumentalism of traditional war memorials, designer Maya Lin crafted a simple, low, black wall of reflective granite, etched with the names of all of the U.S. military personnel who died in the war. The result is a profoundly personal memorial, one that allows visitors to conduct their own acts of commemoration, often with an individual name in mind. Intended by Lin to be “non-political,” the focus is simply and overwhelmingly on the U.S. soldiers who went to Vietnam and did not come home.