Michelle
Michelle Aung Thin was born in Rangoon, Burma (now Yangon, Myanmar) in the year of the military coup (1962). She left with her parents when she was a baby, and her family settled in Ottawa, Canada, where she grew up as the eldest of four siblings. She worked as a copywriter in London advertising agencies and now teaches writing at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, where she lives with her husband, son and dog, Oliver.
Burma has always fascinated Michelle. For decades, Burmese expatriates were not allowed to return. Her knowledge of the country came via her parents stories, as well as the letters sent by her grandparents, Valerie and George, who remained behind. She first saw the land of her birth in 2013 and returned for an extended period in 2014 to research Rangoon’s cosmopolitan history.
Her first book, The Monsoon Bride, is set in colonial Rangoon. As an unpublished manuscript, it was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards and received a Readings Foundation/Wheeler Centre Fellowship.
Hasina: Through My Eyes (Canadian edition: Crossing the Farak River), Michelle’s first young adult novel, is a gripping story of one child’s experience of the refugee crisis in Myanmar. Hasina is part of the Through My Eyes young adult series highlighting the courage and resilience of refugee children in contemporary war zones.
Michelle has a PhD from the University of Adelaide. Her academic work explores authenticity, intimacy and belonging in mixed-race representation; creative narrative; postcolonial theory; mobility; mobile phones; and Burma/Myanmar. Her essays and other creative work have been published in Overland, SBS Life, Double Dialogues, New Scholar, International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, and elsewhere.
Michelle is Anglo-Burmese, of mixed European and Asian ancestry. She counts Bengalis, Sri Lankans, and Burmese among her forbears, as well as a Dutch pirate, Irish soldiers and German Catholics. Her current book project, Love, Loss and the Last Days of Rangoon, asks the question: do we belong in the homes we are born into or the homes we make for ourselves?
Social media
Twitter: @michelleaungthi
Facebook: Michelle Aung Thin
Research
Michelle Aung Thin is an academic at RMIT University.
You can also find Michelle’s research on ResearchGate and Academia.edu.