Today is the "Day of Remembrance" of FDR's (U.S. President during WW II) Executive Order 9066 authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII, signed Feb. 19, 1942.
“As a nation, we must face the wrongs of our past in order to build a more just and equitable future. The Interior Department has the tremendous honor of stewarding America’s public lands and natural and cultural resources to tell a complete and honest story of our nation’s history,” Secretary Deb Haaland said in a statement.
"In hindsight, I wish my father had instilled a deeper appreciation of Tet and our Vietnamese culture within our family. Yet, I comprehend his rationale. Perhaps he thought the beauty of this Vietnamese holiday – and the depth of our collective history and story – would be lost on us in the small predominantly white towns we resided in.
Only through returning to Vietnam...could I truly understand and experience the essence of Tet."
"That night, the local spinoff of the “Big Brother” franchise aired the premiere of its latest season. Argentine television watchers were processing their surprise: For the first time in the hit show’s 11-season run, the cast of houseguests included an Asian contestant in the form of 24-year-old Martín Ku, the son of Chinese and Taiwanese immigrants.
It was a seminal moment for Asian Argentine representation in mainstream media."
"A beloved Asian American-owned bookstore in Manhattan’s Chinatown has reopened months after a fire gutted the small independent shop last summer.
On July 4, a residential unit above the bookshop caught fire, killing one of the building’s residents. The resulting smoke and water damage also devastated Yu & Me Books, destroying almost all of its inventory and equipment..."
"Little Saigon, a business corridor established 20 years ago to highlight the vibrant Vietnamese and wider Southeast Asian American community in the heart of the city, is now fighting to survive.
Late last year, the closure of Turtle Tower, a famed pho restaurant on Larkin Street, was a major blow to the area. The storefront joined more than a dozen vacancies on a two-block stretch of Larkin Street between Eddy and O’Farrell."
“What we’re hearing from some teachers is that they often struggle with getting students to understand the standards because the materials they’re using, the texts that they’re using, are either abstract, or have a different relevance, and so there’s an added sort of translational work that needs to happen in the classroom to talk about how to get to the standards and learning objectives,” Chang said.
"The nonprofit will continue to operate it as an affordable neighborhood market. There are no big grocery store chains in the area, and few corner stores offer fresh produce and ready-to-eat packaged meals like the People’s Market. And after receiving public input, the nonprofit will add new community services at the market."
"Expanded teachings of Asian American and Pacific Islander history may be coming to Sacramento K-12 classrooms. The state’s Instructional Quality Commission, which is responsible for developing and recommending curriculum for schools throughout California, will consider adding content highlighting Asian American, Pacific Islander and Native Hawaiian communities in its next revision of the statewide history-social science curriculum."
"Asian Americans are among the fastest growing racial or ethnic group in the country. But Asian Americans have historically been "invisible" in society, Norman Chen, CEO of The Asian American Foundation, a national nonprofit with offices in New York and San Francisco, told Axios."
"...the impact of Cantopop and Mandopop on shaping cultural narratives and empowering the queer Asian community might not be as widely recognized in the United States...Yet, the genre has quietly revolutionized the lyrical and thematic landscapes in the music industry. Mandopop and Cantopop artists have managed to attract a dedicated following among the Chinese diaspora in the United States with their innovative approach to music and storytelling..."
President Joe Biden commemorated the 80th anniversary of the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act, which barred Chinese laborers from entering the country.
In a White House official statement released Sunday, Biden said the legislation, enacted in 1882, was a measure that 'weaponized our immigration system to discriminate against an entire ethnic group.'
It was the first major law restricting immigration into the United States; it was repealed in 1943.
"The Metropolitan Museum of Art says it will return 16 ancient artifacts back to Cambodia and Thailand. The works, mostly sculptures, had been looted from those countries years ago during decades of civil war and unrest.
Among the works are a large head of Buddha made of stone in the seventh century, and a tenth century sandstone goddess statue from the Koh Ker archaeological site."
"Asian Americans, in particular Vietnamese Americans, often feel left out of civic discussions because of language and cultural differences. Nguyen says those of Vietnamese heritage often will support one another in a crisis, but otherwise remain to themselves, and those feelings of isolation are enhanced when people immigrate to the United States."
"Chu says Chinatown is notorious for being Boston’s hottest neighborhood. Looking at her research group’s initial map of open-air spaces, it’s not hard to see why. Many of the area’s public spaces are fully paved and bake in the sun, while shade-filled green spaces tend to be at the outer edges of Chinatown."
"In recent decades, candidates for political office in San Francisco have developed a tradition of finding an “authentic” Chinese name to put on ballots. In the past, the process was somewhat freewheeling, in which non-Chinese candidates were more or less allowed to call themselves whatever they wanted. But the rules are tightening."
"Cinematically, Manhattan is still a place where pretty blond women can traipse through the West Village in Manolo Blahniks. But now it’s also a place where Korean Canadian creative types can fall in love, lose their shit on the sidewalk, and hold real power over the men in their lives. Past Lives is the kind of bilingual hit that, just a few years ago, probably wouldn’t have been possible."
"A Texas woman is accusing her sons’ school district of failing to condemn racism after she says they were subjected to anti-Asian American taunts on the bus, and her older boy had a swastika drawn on his shirt last year.
Hai Au Huynh, 45, told NBC News that she feels she has no choice but to speak out publicly after the incidents at Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District, just outside Houston."
"Now research evidence demonstrates that they face racial isolation simply by entering the classroom. A recent study of wealthy California suburbs finds that white families drift away from public schools as more Asian students enroll in them — and fears over academic competition, rather than outright racism, may play the biggest role in driving the departures."
"[Ashish] Prashar, 40, was wearing a Palestinian kaffiyeh when he took his 18-month-old son to his favorite Fort Greene park on Nov. 7. There, he said, a woman approached the two of them and asked Prashar whether he supported Hamas. He said that when he tried to de-escalate the situation, she called them 'terrorists' and 'dogs' and told them they didn’t belong there."
"At the same time, Asian Americans have often been upheld as a model for how other racial and ethnic minorities should behave – especially in comparison with Black Americans and Latinos.3 Despite the socioeconomic diversity among U.S. Asians, they are commonly portrayed as educationally and economically successful, hardworking, deferential to authority, unemotional and lacking in creativity.4"
"...there’s another iteration of Thanksgiving to be celebrated. Forget the cable-knit cardigan wrapped around your shoulders, forget tossing a football around outside, forget the dry-ass white turkey meat, and forget the boring, bland mashed potatoes. Think instead of abalone, sticky rice, glass noodles with cabbage and pork, crispy duck, fish head tofu soup.
"Asianness has a newfound currency, and Asian men especially can feel it in the way they live online. Current Asian masculinity is no longer fused to unf*ckability, but an idealistic fever dream of a respectful boyfriend, who showers and brings you Instagrammable bouquets. Content creators have capitalized on the Asianness of their romantic relationships, emphasizing it in the titles of their videos."
"Nonvegetarian sides get reimagined with tofu or impossible meat, she said, with some staples such as mashed potatoes and mac and cheese being yearly staples on the table. Without Turkey as the centerpiece, Kaur’s family opts for something they’re all more accustomed to in the South.
'In terms of the main dish, it often just ends up being tacos,' she said."
“I didn’t think I was going to be a YouTube newscaster at the age of 67. But these days you will often see me at my daughter’s house, holding my grandchild while translating articles from Politico or The Atlantic into Vietnamese that I then broadcast on a news channel on YouTube...This is not how I imagined spending my retirement.”