2018 Year in Review

daikon has had a busy year! We wanted to highlight some of our favourite moments of 2018:

In January, the kind people at gal-dem featured us in this article: This zine is all about East and Southeast Asian Identity.

In February, we spoke about our motivations for starting up daikon and our thoughts about zine history and culture with Alex Wong at The Hundreds in this piece: 7 Modern Day Zine Makers on Empowerment, Resistance, and the Post-Internet Zine Renaissance. We also tabled at DIY Art Market in Dalston and St. Hilda's Zine Fair in Oxford, and held a social at Bun House and Tea Room.

In March, we launched Issue 4: Food at the Peckham Pelican! Our launch event featured readings and a party.

At the launch, we extended our solidarity to people detained at Yarls Wood who were striking in protest of their continued incarceration.

The issue is available to read online for free here, and available to order too.

Later in the month, we joined Hackney East Asian Community Heritage at An Viet centre for an exhibition on the history of Vietnamese community in Hackney. Kay spoke with Ha Vu of Indigo magazine about zines, community and solidarity.

We also did an interview with Grace Wang at Stack Magazines, available to read here: Daikon zine celebrates Southeast and East Asian voices.

In April, we held our second social at Regent's Park. In May and June, we tabled at Northwest Zine Fest in Manchester and at the London Radical Bookfair, Goldsmiths University.

We had an extremely busy August! Bella spoke on the panel "The Power of Being a QTIPOC in the Creative Industry" at Alternative Pride Leeds. We tabled at Queercore: A Celebration of Outsider Pride and Jade spoke on a panel about "People of Colour and DIY Publishing" at FEM Festival, Raw Labs, both in London. Later in the month, Bella spoke on a panel about social media spaces and identity at the National Theatre, exploring how to utilise social media and institutional access to create political change.

Also in August, we launched Issue 5: Migration. Over the weekend of 10th-11th August, we hosted a screening, talks, workshops, readings, and an art market. gal-dem kindly covered the launch here.

For the issue, we created a brief guide explaining aspects of the UK border regime and how to resist it, which is available alongside a list of resources here.

Kay led a panel discussion on "creativity/strategy: navigating institutions as people of colour" with photographer Bernice Mulenga, curator Amrita Dhallu, and climate change communicator Angela Chan (Worm). Listen to the recording here.

We also were grateful to host workshops led by SOAS Detainee Support and by Haringey Anti-Raids.

The issue is available online here, and to order here. Audio versions of some pieces from the issue are available on our Instagram, including here, here, and here.

In September, we tabled at the launch event for Deport Deprive Extradite (a book by Nisha Kapoor on the security state), at Books Peckham x DIY Space for London, and at Diaspora Disco, Hackney.

In October, we made our way up to Manchester for the Strange Perfume book fair and Over Here Zine Fest. We also ran a zine-making workshop as part of Asia Triennial Manchester. We're hoping to do more workshops of this kind in the future, and to extend our geographic reach, so if you have any ideas, please feel free to contact us!

In November, we were grateful to speak to folks at Asian American Writers' Workshop about making zines and finding community, available to read here: Folds and Staples: When DIY Publishing Makes a Community. We also shouted out some of our favourite creators!

We also held our third social of the year at The Brixton Pound, and sold zines at the launch of Contesting British Chinese Culture, edited by Ashley Thorpe and Diana Yeh.

On our blog this year, we wrote a statement on the open letter from 83 BAME and migrant organisations against the proposed adoption of IHRA guidelines by the Labour Party and other public bodies, featured a film piece by Qigemu, and published explorations on gender and sexuality from our Queer/Trans issue. We also posted a personal retelling of a mother's migration story from a daughter's perspective, compiled bystander resources against border and state policing, published a roundtable on the film Crazy Rich Asians and a reflection on relocation, self-discovery, and a process of questioning one's gender and racial identity, and collected resources on cultural appropriation.

As the year winds down, we want to say a big thank you to everyone who has kept up with us as we have grown throughout the years. As a team of volunteers, we have learned so much from being a part of the growing UK DIY/zine-making community, as well as participating in migrant solidarity events and actions. We are also grateful to have been able to table at various events around the country, and to speak to different publications about the work that we do and why we do it.

We are excited to keep producing content that is critical, anti-racist, and productive of radical possibility, hope, and community. If you have ideas on collaborations, please do reach out via our email daikon.media@gmail.com. Stay tuned for more zines, launch events, and workshops in 2019 and beyond!

With love and in solidarity,
Jess, Jade, Jun, Kay, Hanna, Bella, Jemma