Focusing on San Diego in the post-Civil Rights era, Linda Trinh Vo examines the ways Asian Americans drew together - despite many differences within the group - to construct a community that supports a variety of social, economic, political, and cultural organizations. Using historical materials, ethnographic fieldwork, and interviews, Vo traces the political strategies that enable Asian Americans to bridge ethnicity, generation, gender, language, and class differences, among others. She demonstrates that mobilization is not a smooth, linear process and shows how the struggle over ideologies, political strategies, and resources affects the development of community organizations. Vo also analyzes how Asian Americans construct their relationship with Asia and how they forge relationships with other racialized communities of color. Vo argues that the situation in San Diego illuminates other localities across the country where Asians face challenges trying to organize, find sufficient resources, create leaders, and define strategies.
San Francisco's International Hotel is part history and part memoir. It presents the struggle to save the International Hotel in the San Francisco neighborhood known as Manilatown, which culminated in 1977 with the eviction of elderly tenant activists. In telling this compelling story, Estella Habal features her own memories of the antieviction movement, focusing on the roles of Filipino Americans and their participation in both the anti-eviction protests and the nascent Asian American movement. Book jacket.
Although it is one of the least-known social movements of the 1960s and 1970s, the Asian American movement drew upon some of the most powerful currents of the era, and had a wide-ranging impact on the political landscape of Asian America, and more generally, the United States. Using the racial discourse of the black power and other movements, as well as antiwar activist and the global decolonization movements, the Asian American movement succeeded in creating a multi-ethnic alliance of Asians in the United States and gave them a voice in their own destinies. Rethinking the Asian American Movement provides a short, accessible overview of this important social and political movement, highlighting key events and key figures, the movement's strengths and weaknesses, how it intersected with other social and political movements of the time, and its lasting effect on the country. It is perfect for anyone wanting to obtain an introduction to the Asian American movement of the twentieth century.
Asian Americans and the Media provides a concise, thoughtful, critical and cultural studies analysis of U.S. media representations of Asian Americans. The book also explores ways Asian Americans have resisted, responded to, and conceptualized the terrain of challenge and resistance to those representations, often through their own media productions. In this engaging and accessible book, Ono and Pham summarize key scholarship on Asian American media, as well as lay theoretical groundwork to help students, scholars and other interested readers understand historical and contemporary media representations of Asian Americans in traditional media, including print, film, music, radio, and television, as well as in newer media, primarily internet-situated. Since Asian Americans had little control over their representation in early U.S. media, historically dominant white society largely constructed Asian American media representations. In this context, the book draws attention to recurring patterns in media representation, as well as responses by Asian America. Today, Asian Americans are creating complex, sophisticated, and imaginative self-portraits within U.S. media, often equipped with powerful information and education about Asian Americans. Throughout, the book suggests media representations are best understood within historical, cultural, political, and social contexts, and envisions an even more active role in media for Asian Americans in the future. Asian Americans and the Media will be an ideal text for all students taking courses on Asian American Studies, Minorities and the Media and Race and Ethic Studies.
From 1999 to 2009, The Northern Manhattan Community Voices Collaborative put Columbia University and its Medical Center in touch with surrounding community organizations and churches to facilitate access to primary care, nutritional improvement, and smoking cessation, and to broker innovative ways to access healthcare and other social services. This unlikely partnership and the relationships it forged reaffirms the wisdom of joining "town and gown" to improve a community's well-being. Staff members of participating organizations have coauthored this volume, which shares the successes, failures, and obstacles of implementing a vast community health program. A representative of Alianza Dominicana, for example, one of the country's largest groups settling new immigrants, speaks to the value of community-based organizations in ridding a neighborhood of crime, facilitating access to health insurance, and navigating the healthcare system. The editors outline the beginnings and infrastructure of the collaboration and the relationship between leaders that fueled positive outcomes. Their portrait demonstrates how grassroots solutions can create productive dialogues that help resolve difficult issues.
For immigrants to America, from Europeans in the early twentieth century through later Latinos, Asians, and Caribbeans, gaining social and political ground has generally been considered an exercise in ethnic and racial solidarity. The experience of South Asian Americans, one of the fastest-growing immigrant populations in recent years, tells a different story of inclusion—one in which distinctions within a group play a significant role. Focusing on Indian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi American communities, Sangay K. Mishra analyzes features such as class, religion, nation of origin, language, caste, gender, and sexuality in mobilization. He shows how these internal characteristics lead to multiple paths of political inclusion, defying a unified group experience. How, for instance, has religion shaped the fractured political response to intensified discrimination against South Asians—Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs—in the post-9/11 period? How have class and home country concerns played into various strategies for achieving political power? And how do the political engagements of professional and entrepreneurial segments of the community challenge the idea of a unified diaspora? Pursuing answers, Mishra argues that, while ethnoracial mobilization remains an important component of South Asian American experience, ethnoracial identity is deployed differently by particular sectors of the South Asian population to produce very specific kinds of mobilizing and organizational infrastructures. And exploring these distinctions is critical to understanding the changing nature of the politics of immigrant inclusion—and difference itself—in America.
"Mobilizing Resentment provides a wealth of information for anyone interested in how to refocus the energy and idealism of the progressive movement on the building of institutions that are relevant to the lives of most Americans.' --Wilma Mankiller, from the Foreword Jean Hardisty, draws a map of the political battles now being fought in America and offers lessons for progressives confronting, combating and constructively engaging the Right in more productive ways. In this provocative book, Jean Hardisty details the formation of right-wing movements in opposition to the struggle for expansion of rights for women, people of color, and lesbians and gays. Her own experiences spanning three decades as both an activist and observer undergird her analysis in riveting ways. We see her in a stadium filled with Promise Keepers, watching thousands of men pledge in unison to take control of their families, with a mixture of awe, fear, and a lucid understanding of what draws people to such charismatic events.
With rich description and insightful interviews, Russell Jeung uncovers why and how Chinese and Japanese American Christians are building new, pan-Asian organizations. Detailed surveys of over fifty Chinese and Japanese American congregations in the San Francisco Bay area show how symbolic racial identities structure Asian American congregations. Evangelical ministers differ from mainline Christian ministers in their construction of Asian American identity. Mobilizing around these distinct identities, evangelicals and mainline Christians have developed unique pan-Asian styles of worship, ministries, and church activities. Portraits of two churches further illustrate how symbolic racial identities affect congregational life and ministries. The book concludes with a look at Asian American-led multiethnic churches.
An innovative anthology showcasing Asian American and Pacific Islander women’s histories Our Voices, Our Histories brings together thirty-five Asian American and Pacific Islander authors in a single volume to explore the historical experiences, perspectives, and actions of Asian American and Pacific Islander women in the United States and beyond. This volume is unique in exploring Asian American and Pacific Islander women’s lives along local, transnational, and global dimensions. The contributions present new research on diverse aspects of Asian American and Pacific Islander women’s history, from the politics of language, to the role of food, to experiences as adoptees, mixed race, and second generation, while acknowledging shared experiences as women of color in the United States. Our Voices, Our Histories showcases how new approaches in US history, Asian American and Pacific Islander studies, and Women’s and Gender studies inform research on Asian American and Pacific Islander women. Attending to the collective voices of the women themselves, the volume seeks to transform current understandings of Asian American and Pacific Islander women’s histories.
Asian Americans are a small percentage of the U.S. population, but their numbers are steadily rising—from less than a million in 1960 to more than 15 million today. They are also a remarkably diverse population—representing several ethnicities, religions, and languages—and they enjoy higher levels of education and income than any other U.S. racial group. Historically, socioeconomic status has been a reliable predictor of political behavior. So why has this fast-growing American population, which is doing so well economically, been so little engaged in the U.S. political system? Asian American Political Participation is the most comprehensive study to date of Asian American political behavior, including such key measures as voting, political donations, community organizing, and political protests. The book examines why some groups participate while others do not, why certain civic activities are deemed preferable to others, and why Asian socioeconomic advantage has so far not led to increased political clout. Asian American Political Participation is based on data from the authors’ groundbreaking 2008 National Asian American Survey of more than 5,000 Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese, Korean, Filipino, and Japanese Americans. The book shows that the motivations for and impediments to political participation are as diverse as the Asian American population. For example, native-born Asians have higher rates of political participation than their immigrant counterparts, particularly recent adult arrivals who were socialized outside of the United States. Protest activity is the exception, which tends to be higher among immigrants who maintain connections abroad and who engaged in such activity in their country of origin. Surprisingly, factors such as living in a new immigrant destination or in a city with an Asian American elected official do not seem to motivate political behavior—neither does ethnic group solidarity. Instead, hate crimes and racial victimization are the factors that most motivate Asian Americans to participate politically. Involvement in non-political activities such as civic and religious groups also bolsters political participation. Even among Asian groups, socioeconomic advantage does not necessarily translate into high levels of political participation. Chinese Americans, for example, have significantly higher levels of educational attainment than Japanese Americans, but Japanese Americans are far more likely to vote and make political contributions. And Vietnamese Americans, with the lowest levels of education and income, vote and engage in protest politics more than any other group. Lawmakers tend to favor the interests of groups who actively engage the political system, and groups who do not participate at high levels are likely to suffer political consequences in the future. Asian American Political Participation demonstrates that understanding Asian political behavior today can have significant repercussions for Asian American political influence tomorrow.
