New York residents, don't miss this one. The Museum of Chinese in America and the Asian American Writers' Workshop present a panel discussion, "Are Asians Black?" happening Wednesday, March 21. This event comes twenty years after the Los Angeles riots, and assesses the many ways in which Blacks and Asians have been pitted against one another in discussions about race in the United States. Chef Eddie Huang, Princeton University's Annie Cheng, and many others will be there to weigh in. More information:
Are Asians Black?For more information about MOCA NYC, visit their website. It looks like you can register here.
La Riot, Model Minorities, and Affirmative Action
Date:
Wednesday, March 21
Time:
7:00pm
Location:
Museum of Chinese in America
215 Centre Street, New York, NY
Who:
LISA ARRASTIA (principal at United Nations International School)
PAUL BEATTY (White Boy Shuffle, Tuff)
ANNE CHENG (African American Studies, Princeton University)
EDDIE HUANG (Cooking Channel)
NICHOLAS LEMANN (The Big Test)
KAI MA (KoreAm)
WESLEY YANG (New York Magazine)
Exhibits: "Those Asian American Whiz Kids," "Meritocracy," "The Chinese Take-Out Joint"
This panel--titled after Janine Young Kim's seminal essay, itself a '90s product--discusses how Asians and Blacks have been positioned as not just different, but set against each other, whether in the L.A. Riots or college admissions.
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the LA Riots/LA Uprising/Sa-i-gu, but what's often unremarked upon is how quickly a Black-White conflict (the LAPD vs King) transformed into a multiracial one, enfolding Latino residents and Korean shop owners. Novelist Paul Beatty (White Boy Shuffle) and AAWW's Kai Ma (former editor of Koream Journal) present about the Riots, as we show video footage from Visual Communications.
Blacks and Asians were also pitted against each other during the '90s debates over college admissions, consisting of attacks on affirmative action (Prop. 209) and right-wing tracts (The Bell Curve and The End of Racism) that set blacks against an Asian American model minority stereotype. These will be discussed by educator Lisa Arrastia (author of Starting Up: Critical Lessons from 10 New Schools), Columbia Journalism school dean Nicholas Lemann (The Big Test: The Secret History of American Meritocracy) and Wesley Yang (New York Magazine).
Admission: $5. This event is co-presented by the Asian American Writers' Workshop.