Comparative Studies 241: Introduction to Asian American Studies

Prof. J. Wu and Steve Yao

Lecture 2 Outline

The Asian American Movement

  1. Historical Context
    1. Cold War

      2. 1. external political repression

      2. internal political repression

    2. Demographic and Social Changes in AA communities

1. increasing American-born population

2. creation of multi-group communities

C. Social Movements of the 1950s and 1960s

1. domestic race relations

2. international relations

3. women’s movement

 

II. Sights of Activism

A. Urban Ghettos

"Serve the People"

"Self-Determination"

B. International Politics

Anti-Colonialism, Anti-Capitalism

Domestic Racism and International Politics

C. Universities

"Democratic Education"

Affirmative Action

Ethnic Studies

 

III. Asian American Identity: What’s in a Word?

1. pan-ethnicity

2. activist

3. theories of ethnicity

a. assimilation

b. primoridialism

c. instrumentalism

d. panethnicity ethnicity

i. voluntary or "symbolic" versus imposed ethnicity or "racial lumping" (p. 6)

ii. multiple levels of ethnicity

iii. construction of culture or emergent ethnicity

 

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