Welcome
This guide offers a small selection of the books and films available at Booth Library on Asian-Pacific American culture, literature, and history. Links are provided to take you into the catalog for further searching. Explore more in the resources provided on the pages for intersectionality, race and ethnicity, and oral histories.
Books
Asian and Pacific Islander Americans by Call Number: E184.A75 A85 2013Asian and Pacific Islander Americans 3 volume set features 485 essays about people from the late eighteenth through the early twenty-first centuries. The vast majority of the figures included in this set have never been covered in any Great Lives series before. Many of them are household names, famous for their work in such fields as entertainment, sports, civil rights, politics, and literature. Others have received less attention but made important contributions in such fields as education, journalism, business, and science. The subjects of the essays are Asian and Pacific Islander Americans who have undertaken a wide range of endeavors from late colonial times into the twenty-first century.
The Making of Asian America by Call Number: E184.A75 L43 2015The definitive history of Asian Americans by one of the nation's preeminent scholars on the subject. In the past fifty years, Asian Americans have helped change the face of America and are now the fastest growing group in the United States. But as award-winning historian Erika Lee reminds us, Asian Americans also have deep roots in the country.
The Snake Dance of Asian American Activism by Call Number: E184.A75 L58 2008ISBN: 9780739127193Publication Date: 2008-09-08This text reinterprets a misunderstood and overlooked epoch of the Asian American experience, the Asian American Movement (AAM). The authors argue that, contrary to the common view of the movement as a passing phase limited to college youth, the Asian American Movement spanned diverse political viewpoints and became increasingly sophisticated and effective.
The Oxford Handbook of Asian American History by Call Number: E184.A75 O94 2016After emerging from the tumult of social movements of the 1960s and 1970s, the field of Asian American studies has enjoyed rapid and extraordinary growth. Nonetheless, many aspects of Asian American history still remain open to debate. The Oxford Handbook of Asian American History offers the first comprehensive commentary on the state of the field, simultaneously assessing where Asian American studies came from and what the future holds.
Whiter: Asian American Women on Skin Color and Colorism by Call Number: E184.A75 W45 2020xHow does skin color impact the lives of Asian American women? In Whiter, thirty Asian American women provide first-hand accounts of their experiences with colorism in this collection of powerful, accessible, and brutally honest essays.
The Souls of Yellow Folk: Essays by Call Number: E184.A75 Y38 2018xThe National Magazine Award-winning writer's debut collection of incisive, stylish essays on race and gender. One of the most acclaimed essayists of his generation, Wesley Yang writes about race and sex without the jargon, formulas, and polite lies that bore us all.
Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Call Number: E184.O6 H64 2020 and ebookA ruthlessly honest, emotionally charged, and utterly original exploration of Asian American consciousness and the struggle to be human. Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. Poet and essayist Cathy Park Hong fearlessly and provocatively blends memoir, cultural criticism, and history to expose fresh truths about racialized consciousness in America.
The Oxford Encyclopedia of Asian American Literature and Culture by Call Number: ebookThis project offers the largest and most comprehensive collection of scholarship on Asian American literature and culture to date.
Muncie, India(na) by Call Number: ebookThis work is a study of South Asian Americans in Muncie, Indiana - the author's hometown. Muncie is the small Midwestern city made famous for being 'typical America' through the Middletown studies. As meditative as it is insightful, Muncie, India(na) invites readers to feel the truth of the fascinating stories behind one woman's revised portrait of an American community.
The Cultural Capital of Asian American Studies by Call Number: ebookThis work articulates a new and innovative model of cultural and academic politics which illuminates the postition of ethnic studies within the American university.
Drawing New Color Lines: Transnational Asian American Graphic Narratives by Call Number: ebookDrawing New Color Lines explores the culture, production, and history of contemporary graphic narratives that depict Asian Americans and Asians.
The Racial Mundane by Call Number: ebookWinner, Lois P. Rudnick Book Prize. In The Racial Mundane, Ju Yon Kim argues that the ambiguous relationship between behavioral tendencies and the body has sustained paradoxical characterizations of Asian Americans as ideal and impossible Americans. Integrating studies of race, performance, and the everyday, the book invites readers to reflect on how and to what effect perfunctory behaviors become objects of public scrutiny.
Stuck: Why Asian Americans Don't Reach the Top of the Corporate Ladder by Call Number: HM1263 .C45 2020Winner, 2021 PROSE Award in the Business, Finance & Management Category. In the classroom, Asian Americans, often singled out as so-called "model minorities," are expected to be top of the class. Often they are, getting straight As and gaining admission to elite colleges and universities. But the corporate world is a different story.
Fight the Tower: Asian American Women Scholars' Resistance and Renewal in the Academy by Call Number: LC2633.6 .F54 2020Asian American women scholars experience shockingly low rates of tenure and promotion because of the particular ways they are marginalized by the intersectionalities of race and gender in academia. Fight the Tower is a continuation of the Fight the Tower movement, which supports women standing up for their rights to claim their earned place in academia and to work for positive change for all within academic institutions.
Straight A's: Asian American College Students in Their Own Words by Call Number: LC2633.6 .S77 2018In Straight A's Asian American students at Harvard reflect on their common experiences with discrimination, immigrant communities, their relationships to their Asian heritage, and their place in the university. They also explore the difficulties of living up to family expectations and the real-world effects of the "model minority" stereotype.
Asian American Media Activism by Call Number: P94.5.A752 U656 2016Among the most well-known YouTubers are a cadre of talented Asian American performers, including comedian Ryan Higa and makeup artist Michelle Phan. Yet beneath the sheen of these online success stories lies a problem--Asian Americans remain sorely underrepresented in mainstream film and television.
Writing Against Racial Injury by Call Number: PE1130.A2 H63 2015Writing against Racial Injury recalls the story of Asian American student rhetoric at the site of language and literacy education in post-1960s California. What emerged in the Asian American movement was a recurrent theme in U.S. history: conflicts over language and literacy difference masked wider racial tensions. This project, more broadly, seeks to offer educators a new perspective on racial accountability in language and literacy education.
Screening Asian Americans by Call Number: PN1995.9.A77 S79 2002This innovative essay collection explores Asian American cinematic representations historically and socially, on and off screen, as they contribute to the definition of American character. The history of Asian Americans on movie screens, as outlined in Peter X Feng's introduction, provides a context for the individual readings that follow. Asian American cinema is charted in its diversity, ranging across activist, documentary, experimental, and fictional modes, and encompassing a wide range of ethnicities (Filipino, Vietnamese, Indian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, and Taiwanese).
Asian American Literature: an Encyclopedia for Students by Call Number: PS153 .A84 Available online through Gale EBooksISBN: 1440872899Publication Date: 2021-08-25This volume collects, in one place, a breadth of information about Asian American literary and cultural history as well as the authors and texts that best define it. A dozen contextual essays introduce fundamental elements or subcategories of Asian American literature, expanding on social and literary concerns or tensions that are familiar and relevant. Essays include the origins and development of the term "Asian American"; overviews of Asian American and Asian Canadian social and literary histories; essays on Asian American identity, gender issues, and sexuality; and discussions of Asian American rhetoric and children's literature.
Racial Ambiguity in Asian American Culture by Call Number: PS153.A84 H585 2015In Racial Ambiguity in Asian American Culture, Jennifer Ann Ho shines a light on the hybrid and indeterminate aspects of race, revealing ambiguity to be paramount to a more nuanced understanding both of race and of what it means to be Asian American.
The Family Chao by Call Number: PS3553.H2724 F36 2022ISBN: 9780393868074Publication Date: 2022-02-01The residents of Haven, Wisconsin, have dined on the Fine Chao restaurant's delicious Americanized Chinese food for thirty-five years, content to ignore any unsavory whispers about the family owners. Whether or not Big Leo Chao is honest, or his wife, Winnie, is happy, their food tastes good and their three sons earned scholarships to respectable colleges. But when the brothers reunite in Haven, the Chao family's secrets and simmering resentments erupt at last. Before long, brash, charismatic, and tyrannical patriarch Leo is found dead--presumed murdered--and his sons find they've drawn the exacting gaze of the entire town.
Thousand Star Hotel by Call Number: PS3566.H467 A6 2017Thousand Star Hotel confronts the silence around racism, police brutality, and the invisibility of the Asian American urban poor. Bao Phi is a National Poetry Slam finalist.
Reel Inequality: Hollywood actors and racism by Call Number: PN1995.9.M56 Y83 2017ISBN: 9780813586304Publication Date: 2017When the 2016 Oscar acting nominations all went to whites for the second consecutive year, #OscarsSoWhite became a trending topic. Yet these enduring racial biases afflict not only the Academy Awards, but also Hollywood as a whole. Why do actors of color, despite exhibiting talent and bankability, continue to lag behind white actors in presence and prominence? Reel Inequality examines the structural barriers minority actors face in Hollywood, while shedding light on how they survive in a racist industry.
Further Reading
- "Asian American Literature"EIU Library catalog search for "Asian American Literature" returning over 80 collections of stories, poems, criticism and biographical information.
For further reading, try these subject heading searches in the library catalog:
American literature -- Asian American authors
American poetry -- Asian American authors
Asian American women
Asian Americans
Asian Americans -- Education
Asian Americans -- Ethnic identity
Asian Americans -- History
Asian Americans -- Politics and government
Asian Americans -- Race identity
Asian Americans -- Study and teaching (Higher)
Pacific Islander Americans
South Asia -- emigration and immigration
Also search on individual national identities, e.g.: Chinese Americans, East Indian Americans, Filipino Americans, Japanese Americans, Korean Americans, Vietnamese Americans.
Films and streaming media
- Films on Demand Asian American Pacific Islander heritage seriesA selection of 23 streaming videos from Films On Demand related to Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage.
Breaking Ground by Access streaming media.
In an era of U.S. expansion, new immigrants arrive from China, India, Japan, the Philippines and beyond. Eventually barred by anti-Asian laws, they become America’s first “undocumented immigrants.” View all five episodes in the series: Asian Americans.
- Series, Asian Americans
5 episode PBS series traces the story of Asian Americans, spanning 150 years of immigration, racial politics, and cultural innovation. It is a timely look at the role that Asian Americans have played in defining who we are as a nation. episodes include: Breaking Ground; A Question of Loyalty; Good Americans; Generation Rising and Breaking Through
Chinese in America by Access streaming media.
Lisa Ling explores the massive and economically diverse movement of immigration from China to the United States – and traces her own family roots, to find out what it means to be Chinese in America.
Island of Warriors by Call Number: StreamingPart of the PBS, "America by the Numbers" series.
Pacific Islanders serve in the U.S. military in disproportionally high numbers and have suffered the highest casualty rates in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The men and women of Guam, a U.S. territory in the Pacific, are American citizens and serve in our country’s military at a rate three times higher than the rest of the country. Learn why the island’s returning veterans say they can’t get the healthcare they need.
Good for Her by Call Number: DVDs HQ1220.K6 G66 2004xPublication Date: 2004Examines the factors creating the cosmetic surgery boom in Seoul today through a montage of personal narration, contemporary news clips, film footage from the 1960s to the present day, street advertisement copy, and interviews that break down culturally-specific concepts of power within Korea's patriarchal society.
Long Story Short by Call Number: StreamingPublication Date: 2009Combining a poignant family story with the stigma of racism, this film gives insight into the Asian-American experience, including the trauma of internment. The latest film from Academy Award-nominated director Christine Choy (Who Killed Vincent Chin?) tells the fascinating story of Larry and Trudie Long, a popular husband-and-wife nightclub act of the '40s and '50s. Narrated by their daughter, actress Jodi Long, the film traces the couple's rise from the Chinatown nightclub circuit to a coveted appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Known as "The Leungs," (a more Chinese-sounding name), they performed a mix of tap dancing, witty repartee and "Chinaman" caricatures that both played to and undermined the racist attitudes of the day.The Slanted Screen: Asian men in film and television by
Call Number: StreamingPublication Date: 2006, 2010This award-winning documentary explores portrayals of Asian men in American cinema, chronicling the experience of actors who have struggled against Hollywood’s ethnic stereotyping and discriminatory practices. The Slanted Screen covers the practice of using Caucasian actors in yellowface makeup, drawing upon a wealth of materials, including 50 rare film clips spanning a century. The program, which was broadcast nationally on PBS, features voice-over narration by Daniel Dae Kim as well as interviews with actors Mako, James Shigeta, Jason Scott Lee, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Will Yun Lee, and Tzi Ma; producer Terence Chang; director Justin Lin; and casting director Heidi Levitt.
The Wedding Banquet by Call Number: PN1997 .W428x .DVDPublication Date: 1993A Taiwanese gay man living in Manhattan agrees to a marriage of convenience with a mainland Chinese woman in need of a green card. His parents are thrilled, and fly to the States to help him plan a lavish wedding banquet.
Crazy Rich Asians by Call Number: PN1997 .C78581x .DVDPublication Date: 2018A native New Yorker Rachel Chu accompanies her longtime boyfriend, Nick Young, to his best friend's wedding in Singapore. Excited about visiting Asia for the first time but nervous about meeting Nick's family, Rachel is unprepared to learn that Nick has neglected to mention a few key details about his life. It turns out that he is not only the scion of one of the country's wealthiest families but also one of its most sought-after bachelors.
Cho Revolution by Call Number: PN1969.C65 M368 2004x .DVDPublication Date: 2004A stand-up comedy performance by comedian Margaret Cho.
What is revolution? -- Bruce Daniels -- Flashcards for the president -- Whose is oilier? -- Taking it off -- Monogamy is weird -- Pity sex -- Double dutch -- Explosion -- Not a breeder -- Bangkok -- Immigrant family -- Sticky rice -- Ambitious actor -- Hello kitty -- Can't tell you apart -- North Korea & chicken salad -- Anna Nicole Smith -- All persimmon diet -- Accident -- Fresh cadaver -- The "f--- it" diet -- Plastic surgery -- Eye work -- Problem dinner guest -- Incredible Asian hulk -- Chew chow ching chong lady -- SARS -- Expressing love -- Gay children -- Don't ask don't tell -- Revolution is change.
This list represents a small selection of the many educational, documentary, and feature films available in Booth Library.
Find more films in the library catalog. Try search terms like:
"Asian American"
Pacific Islander Americans
[Country of ancestry]--United States, such as Taiwanese--United States
[Country of ancestry] Americans, such as Taiwanese Americans
... and then limit your results to videos.
- Explore titles related to "Asian American" film or cinemaBooth Library catalog search for titles related to Asian American film or video.
- Films related to BollywoodEIU Library Catalog Search for film and video related to Bollywood, a term loosely identifying the large film industry centered in Mumbai, India.
- Films related to Korean AmericansEIU Library catalog search for film and video related to Korean Americans. Contains over 100 titles
Databases
Find scholarly and news articles related to Asian American heritage. Try search terms like:
Asian Americans
Pacific Islander Americans
[Country of ancestry]--United States, such as Thais--United States
[Country of ancestry] Americans, such as Thai Americans
Cultural identity
Economic history
Emigration and immigration
Ethnicity
History
Immigration
Model minority stereotype
Multiculturalism
Politics
Race relations
Racism
Social conditions of Asian Americans
Social mobility
Academic Search Complete
Full-text article database with broad subject coverage
America: History and Life
Topics: United States History | Pre-Colonial Era to Present | Canadian History
Global Newsstream
Newspapers | US, Canadian, and International News | Current New York Times & Wall Street Journal | Newswires and News Blogs | Business, Political, Social, Entertainment Topics | 1980 to present
South Asia Open Archives (SAOA) on JSTOR
Scholarship and research for the study of South Asia | Primary and secondary sources | Collections on caste & social structure, literature, social & economic history, women & gender | Nearly 350,000 page images in 13 languages | Materials from 25 partner libraries, administered by the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) in partnership with JSTOR
