Chanida Phaengdara Potter is a Lao American writer, community development strategist, and narrative-change leader based between Minneapolis and Vientiane. Born in 1984 in a labor camp in Viengxai, Laos, she arrived in the United States as a young refugee and has spent more than a decade and a half working at the intersection of storytelling, community organizing, and Southeast Asian diaspora advocacy.

She is best known as the co-founder and chief editor of Little Laos on the Prairie, an internationally recognized online publication that amplifies the voice and visibility of the Lao diaspora experience, which she launched in 2011. She also served for a decade as the founding executive director of The SEAD Project (Southeast Asian Diaspora Development), an organization spanning Minneapolis and Vientiane that builds culturally specific spaces and tools for diaspora communities through cultural arts, language, and organizing. Her broader career spans strategic communications and philanthropy, including a role as vice president of strategic communications and narrative change at the Women’s Foundation of Minnesota, alongside earlier work with organizations such as Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity, the Lao Assistance Center of Minnesota, The Advocates for Human Rights, and Asian Economic Development Associates.

She holds a BA in Global Studies and Communications from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and an MPA from Hamline University, and is co-author of Planting SEADS: Southeast Asian Diaspora Stories, Minnesota’s first collection of Hmong, Khmer, Lao, and Vietnamese Minnesotan stories, poetry, and art. Her work and commentary have appeared in outlets including Minnesota Public Radio, Star Tribune, Pioneer Press, and Voice of America. She has also organized major cultural convenings, including the National Lao American Writers Summit and the 2015 “Refuge of the InvisibLao” exhibit marking the 40th anniversary of the Laotian diaspora.

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