This is the full "Connecting the Dots" segment from the Conscious Citizens Dispatch #19. To read the rest of the Dispatch, click here!
In the United States, each May is known as Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month - a time when Americans around the country are encouraged to celebrate Asian diaspora who have made the country home. There’s certainly plenty to celebrate but we think (being Asian-American ourselves) this should be a time of reflection too.
What we’ve noticed is that while many in the West are eager to celebrate Asian culture, there’s a lot less willingness to talk about Asian struggle. We will clap for Chinese Lion Dances, Hawaiian Hula performances, or Japanese anime but the Asian-American story is a lot more than that. If we aren’t careful, the aesthetics of our culture can become separated from the substance of our history. What does it really mean to be Asian-American? What is the role that Asian Americans play within the American capital system? And on a larger scale, how are Asians viewed in the West, and how does that affect our ability to organize as a people? As with diaspora anywhere, the struggle for our identity is real and if we do not define it for ourselves, it will be defined for us.
From Oriental to Asian-American
Even getting to the point of being known as “Asian-American” was the product of generations of struggle and reclamation. For hundreds of years, Asians around the world were known by a different term - “Oriental.”
