Asian Americans Archives - Public Seminar

Literature

Rabbit Heart

An excerpt from Gina Chung’s short story collection, Green Frog

May 13, 2025 • by Gina Chung

When I am eight years old, I am a girl who would rather hide than seek, a girl who fears bullies and teachers and loud noises and speaking in public and God. I am overweight for my age group, friendless, and known for thick glasses and dark overalls, which I ...

Podcast

Picturing Asian America

Episode 58: Historian Mae Ngai on Corky Lee’s photographs of Asian American life

September 6, 2024 • by Claire Potter

On July 23, 2024, Vice President Kamala Harris reached the threshold of Democratic National Convention delegates that she needed to become the party’s de facto presidential nominee. In the two days since President Joe Biden had ceded the nomination, a diverse party had become re-energized around the 2024 race and ...

Activism

Can a Walking Tour Rescue a Lost History?

As the pandemic hit and anti-Asian violence surged, Anna Huang and Chloe Chan started Mott Street Girls, a walking tour company, to make Chinese American history more accessible to the public

June 12, 2023 • by Mette Kierstein

In the future, Mott Street Girls hope to have visited every Chinatown in the country. But hearing people’s feedback is what keeps them going. They believe that history can be a form of social activism....

Can a Walking Tour Rescue a Lost History?

The Arts

The Invisible Labor of Asian Americans in New York Fashion

On the complexity of curating a fashion exhibit around identity

May 9, 2022 • by Shweta Nandakumar

To make plain the fact that there exists no singular Asian American aesthetic, the student organizers of this FIT exhibit made the unusual choice not to make reference to the specific heritages of the featured creatives: “We want viewers to focus on the craftsmanship that goes into the work the ...

The Invisible Labor of Asian Americans in New York Fashion

Politics

How Donald Trump Facilitated the Current Racist Attacks on Asian Americans

The long history of America’s hostility toward immigrants from China, Japan, and Korea

March 18, 2021 • by Nadia Y. Kim

_____ EDITORS NOTE: Last summer, in the midst of the Black Lives Matter uprisings around the country, Public Seminar published a prescient piece by Nadia Kim, a professor of sociology and the author of several books, including Imperial Citizens: Koreans and Race from Seoul to LA, and Refusing Death: Immigrant Women ...

How Donald Trump Facilitated the Current Racist Attacks on Asian Americans

Race

Asian Americans Suffer From Trump’s Racist Attacks Too

The long history of America’s hostility toward immigrants from China, Japan, and Korea

July 23, 2020 • by Nadia Y. Kim

We are all familiar with the racist tactics that vaulted Donald Trump into the Oval Office. He demonized Mexicans, he denounced Muslims, and he cozied up on Twitter to ardent White supremacists. In recent weeks, he’s relentlessly attacked the Black Lives Matter protests. Amid all the vitriol, it’s easy to overlook ...

Asian Americans Suffer From Trump’s Racist Attacks Too

Feature

A Tale Of Two Communities Dispels Model Minority Myths

Asian Americans as the ‘Model Minority’

November 10, 2018 • by Kristen Lewis and Sarah Burd-Sharps

The comparative success of Asian Americans on earnings and educational indicators has given rise to the “model minority” myth, which proposes that, through hard work and studiousness, Asians across the board have achieved economic success. One of the troublesome assumptions of this myth is that it overlooks the great diversity of ...

A Tale Of Two Communities Dispels Model Minority Myths

Feature

Alt-Right Asian Fetish, Temporary Protected Status, and Raw Water

Past Present Episode 114

January 21, 2018 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

In this episode, Niki, Natalia, and Neil debate the Asian fetish of some alt-right white nationalists, President Trump’s plan to revoke protections for Salvadorans, and the raw water craze.

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