Asian American Studies (ASAM) 1

Asian American Studies (ASAM) 1

ASAM 100 Introduction to Asian American Studies ASIAN AMERICAN STUDIES According to the U.S. Census, there are approximately 21 million Asian residents in the U.S. that comprise almost 6 percent of the (ASAM) total population. This relatively small number disguises the critical experiences Asian American communities face in both the local and ASAM 001 Asian Americans in Contemporary Society transnational context. Yet, Asian Americans constitute one of the most This class will introduce you to sociological research of Asian Americans heterogeneous racial groups within the U.S. Over the course of this and engage in the "model minority" stereotype. We begin by a brief semester we will read about and actively discuss the history of Asian introduction to U.S. immigration history and sociological theories about immigration to the U.S., the social construction and experience of race in assimilation and racial stratification. The class will also cover research the U.S., and the political, economic, and cultural contributions of Asian on racial and ethnic identity, educational stratification, mass media Americans. We will also examine how Asian Americans negotiate/deploy images, interracial marriage, multiracials, transracial adoption, and the their culture and ethnicity to achieve recognition in multicultural America viability of an Asian American panethnic identity. We will also examine and how the construction of Asian American identity intersects with the similarities and differences of Asian Americans relative to other class, gender, and sexuality. minority groups. Taught by: Pillai For BA Students: Society Sector Course usually offered in fall term One-term course offered either term Activity: Lecture Also Offered As: SOCI 103 1.0 Course Unit Activity: Lecture ASAM 104 Asian American Communities 1.0 Course Unit Who is Asian American and how and where do we recognize Asian ASAM 002 Asian American Literature America? This interdisciplinary course explores the multiple factors that An overview of Asian American literature from its beginnings at the define Asian American identity and community. In order to provide a turn of the twentieth century to the present. This course covers a wide sketch of the multifacted experience of this growing minority group, we range of Asian American novels, plays, and poems, situating them in will discuss a wide variety of texts from scholarly, artistic, and popular the contexts of Asian American history and minority communities and (film, cinematic) sources that mark key moments in the cultural history considering the variety of formal strategies these different texts take. of Asia America. The course will address major themes of community For BA Students: Arts and Letters Sector life including migration history, Asian American as model minority, race, Course not offered every year class, and transnational scope of Asian America. In combination with the Also Offered As: ENGL 072 readings, this class will foster and promote independent research based Activity: Lecture on site visits to various Asian American communities in Philadelphia and 1.0 Course Unit will host community leaders as guest lecturers. ASAM 003 Introduction to Asian American History Taught by: Khan This course provides an introduction to the history of Asian/Pacific One-term course offered either term Americans, focusing on the wide diversity of migrant experiences, as well Also Offered As: SAST 113, URBS 207 as the continuing legacies of Orientalism on American-born APA's. Issues Activity: Lecture of race, class, gender, and sexuality will also be examined. 1.0 Course Unit For BA Students: History and Tradition Sector ASAM 110 Asian American Activism Taught by: Azuma Please see our website for more current information: One-term course offered either term asam.sas.upenn.edu Also Offered As: HIST 155 One-term course offered either term Activity: Lecture Activity: Seminar 1.0 Course Unit 1.0 Course Unit ASAM 006 Race and Ethnic Relations This course will focus on race and ethnicty in the United States. We begin with a brief history of racial categorization and immigration to the U.S. The course continues by examining a number of topics including racial and ethnic identity, interracial and interethnic friendships and marriage, racial attitudes, mass media iages, residential segregation, educational stritification, and labot market outcomes. The course will inlcude discussions of African Americans, Whites, Hispanics, Asian Ameriacns, and multiracials. One-term course offered either term Also Offered As: AFRC 006, SOCI 006, URBS 160 Activity: Lecture 1.0 Course Unit

2021-22 Catalog | Generated 08/18/21 2 Asian American Studies (ASAM)

ASAM 115 American Race: A Philadelphia Story (SNF Paideia Program ASAM 130 Sonic Reverberations of Asia America Course) This is a course about music as sonic cultural practices of intercultural This course proposes an examination of race with a two-pronged communication and as lived experience in which racial, ethnic, approach: one that broadly links the study of race in the United States diasporic, religious, gendered, sexual, national identities are formed with a multi-disciplinary approach and also simultaneously situates and transformed. This course specifically examines how various ideas specific conversations within the immediate location of Philadelphia, and meanings of Asia America are enacted and embodied through home to the University. The broad historical examination advances music performances and other sonic practices. The course also key concepts of race and racialization, explores key theoretical considers how the production and consumption of Asian American methodologies, and highlights major scholarly works. For example, as cultural difference through music and sound impacts the making students will engage with the study of race through Africana Studies, and unmaking of multiculturalism and the American self. Topics will Asian American Studies, and through Latin American & Latinx Studies. include questions about how music and sound is mobilized within the Readings and methodologies will introduce students to critical issues history and stories of Asian immigration and migration to the U.S.; the in education, in literature, in sociology, and with methods in oral history, impact of the transnational circulation of Asian and Asian American archival work, and ethnography. Most importantly, this extensive music; representations of AAPs in popular culture; the potentials and approach highlights the impact of race across multiple communities limits of music to mitigate social and political problems encountered by including Black Americans, immigrant populations, and communities Asian American communities; and community building through sonic that are marginalized to emphasize connections, relationships, and encounters of Afro-Asian, Asian-Latinx and Caribbean, East Asian/South shared solidarity. Students are intellectually pushed to see the linkages Asian American solidarities. Critical and reflexive theoretical approaches and the impacts of racism across and among all Americans historically from ethnomusicology, anthropology, and performance studies, among and presently. As each theme is introduced a direct example from other related disciplines, will be used to examine a range of styles and Philadelphia will be discussed. The combination of the national discourse genres through close listening to assigned sound recordings and music on race, with an intimate perspective from the City of Philadelphia, ethnographies. No previous musical training is required for this course. engages students both intellectually and civically. The course will be led Taught by: George by Fariha Khan but guest instructors with varied disciplinary backgrounds Course usually offered in spring term and guest speakers from local community organizations. Each instructor Activity: Seminar not only brings specific disciplinary expertise, but also varied community 1.0 Course Unit engagement experience. ASAM 160 South Asians in the United States Taught by: Khan This course investigates the everyday practices and customs of South Course usually offered in spring term Asians in America. Every immigrant group has its own history, customs, Also Offered As: LALS 115, SAST 115, SOCI 115, URBS 115 beliefs and values, making each unique while simultaneously a part of Activity: Lecture the "melting pot" or salad bowl" of American society. Yet how do people 1.0 Course Unit define themselves and their ethnicities living in a diasporic context? By ASAM 120 Asian American Popular Culture taking into account the burgeoning South Asian American population This course will examine the ways in which Asian Americans have as our model, this course will explore the basic themes surrounding the constituted and positioned their identities through various mediums of lives that immigrants are living in America, and more specifically the popular culture, community building and activism. First, students will identity which the second generation, born and/or raised in American, is become familiar with major concepts relating to Popular Culture, Cultural developing. South Asians in the U.S. will be divided thematically covering Studies, and Asian American Cultural Studies. Second, students will have the topics of ethnicity, marriage, gender, religion, and pop culture. Reading a deeper understanding of the Asian American Movement. Third, students and assignments will discuss a variety of issues and viewpoints that are will make connections between representations and dominant images of a part of the fabric of South Asia, but will focus on the interpretation of Asian Americans within various mediums. such expressive culture in the United States. Taught by: Van Do Taught by: Khan Course usually offered in spring term Course usually offered in fall term Activity: Seminar Also Offered As: SAST 290 1.0 Course Unit Activity: Seminar 1.0 Course Unit

2021-22 Catalog | Generated 08/18/21 Asian American Studies (ASAM) 3

ASAM 165 The Asian Caribbean ASAM 180 Asian American Food This course complicates prevailing understandings of the Caribbean You are what you eat. Asian American Food explores the history, politics, and extends the boundaries of Asian America by exploring the histories, and ethnic identity of food through a cultural lens. Growing food, eating, experiences, and contributions of Asians in the Caribbean. In particular, and sharing meals serve as intimate expressions of self and community. we will focus on the migrations of Chinese and Indian individuals to Cuba, By examining the production and consumption of food, the course Trinidad, Jamaica, and Guyana as well as how their descendants are investigates the ways that Asian Americans navigate traditions, gender immigrating to the United States. We will examine the legal and social norms, religious dietary laws, food habits, and employment as they create debates surrounding their labor in the 19th century, how they participated lives in the United States. The course overviews the history of Asian in the decolonization of the region, and how their migration to the American foodways, but has a particular focus on Philadelphia's Asian United States complicates our understandings of ethnicity and race. American communities. Ultimately, through our comparative race approach, we will appreciate Taught by: Khan, F that the Caribbean is more than the Black Caribbean, it is also the Asian Course usually offered in spring term Caribbean. Also Offered As: SAST 180, URBS 180 Taught by: Pillai Activity: Seminar Course usually offered in spring term 1.0 Course Unit Also Offered As: GSWS 165, LALS 165, SAST 166 ASAM 185 Asian Americans and Higher Education Activity: Lecture Course will explore issues in higher education with an Asian American 1.0 Course Unit focus. ASAM 170 Psych of Asian Americans Taught by: Accapadi Using a cultural perspective, this course is intended to provide knowledge Course usually offered in spring term of Asian American personality, identity, and its relationship to mental Activity: Seminar well being; analyze psycho-social research pertinent to Asian Americans; 1.0 Course Unit and develop critical thinking skills on Asian American issues through ASAM 201 Topics in Asian American Sociology experential learning/discussions. Topics vary. Please see our website for more current information: Course usually offered in spring term asam.sas.upenn.edu Also Offered As: SAST 170 One-term course offered either term Activity: Seminar Also Offered As: SOCI 150, URBS 215 1.0 Course Unit Activity: Lecture ASAM 175 Asian American Race Relations: Comparative Case Studies 1.0 Course Unit and Theories ASAM 202 Topics In Asian American Literature This course provides an introduction to comparative racial frameworks Topics vary. Please see our website for more current information: and case studies in Asian American Studies. In line with an emergent asam.sas.upenn.edu body of work that considers the relational nature of racializations, One-term course offered either term we will examine how Asian American racial constructions are not Also Offered As: CIMS 272, ENGL 272 only formed in relation to whiteness but also to other groups of color. Activity: Seminar Starting from the premise that the US is dynamically multiracial, we 1.0 Course Unit will consider how Asian Americans have been both "lumped together" with and "counterpointed" to other racially marginalized communities ASAM 203 Topics in Asian American History across historical time. Moreover, we will explore how Asian Americans Topics vary. Please see our website for more current information: themselves have articulated racial positions both in solidarity with and asam.sas.upenn.edu opposition to other people of color. Lastly, we will survey the different One-term course offered either term comparative racial frameworks Asian American Studies scholars have Also Offered As: AFRC 229, HIST 231 developed to understand the shifting terrain of race relations. The Activity: Seminar course places a particular emphasis on Asian-Black relations and 1.0 Course Unit Afro Asian political theory, given the unique juxtaposition of these groups in US racial discourse, the significance of "Blackness" to Asian American political and cultural identities, and the seminal place of these discussions in Comparative Ethnic Studies. Course materials include primary and scholarly readings, media, and material collaboratively gathered by members of the class. We will focus on developing diverse research methods for understanding the relational nature of Asian American racialization and community formation, culminating in individual research projects on case studies chosen by students in consultation with the instructor. Taught by: Daniel Woo Course usually offered in spring term Activity: Seminar 1.0 Course Unit

2021-22 Catalog | Generated 08/18/21 4 Asian American Studies (ASAM)

ASAM 208 Asian American Cinema Movement: Fighting For ASAM 220 Asian American Women: Nation, Self and Identity Representation This course examines the literary constructions of Asian American Providing a broad introduction to the history of persons of Asian descent Womens' identity in relation to the U.S. nation state. How have the living in the United States, this course will specifically examine the Asian figures of the tiger mother, the Asian nerd, the rice queen, the trafficked American & Pacific Islander American experience as told through the woman, the geisha, the war bride, emerged to represent Asian American cinematic lens. Equal parts socio-political history and media studies, this women, and how have Asian American feminists responded to these course will comprehensively assess factors contributing to the historical problematic racial stereotypes? How does the scholarship on such under representation of AAPIs in mainstream American media. By racialized representations illuminate historical and contemporary contrast, the media texts that we study will reveal a cinematic history that configurations of gender, sexuality, race, class, nation, citizenship, runs parallel to the mainstream, consisting of independently produced migration, empire, war, neoliberalism and globalization as they relate films created by and/or starring AAPIs that feature authentic portrayals to the lives of Asian American women? In exploring these questions, of the community they represent. Topics will include economics of film this course examines Asian American histories, bodies, identities, production, broadcast television ratings, film festivals as a mechanism diasporic communities, representations, and politics through multi- and of distribution, negative stereotyping, Hollywood whitewashing, cultural interdisciplinary approaches, including social science research, literature, appropriation, and media activism. The course will take place once popular representations, film, poetry and art. a week and will consist of a brief discussion of the previous week's Taught by: Roy readings, followed by a lecture, and ending with a full or partial film Course usually offered in spring term screening relating to the current week's topic. Additional out of class Also Offered As: GSWS 220, SAST 221 assignments will be given that involve attending the Philadelphia Asian Activity: Seminar American Film Festival, tentatively scheduled November 8-18, 2018. 1.0 Course Unit Students will have the opportunity to engage with and learn from AAPI ASAM 230 Asian Human Rights / Asian American Civil Rights filmmakers in attendance at the festival, with additional volunteer The last few decades have seen mass migration and movement of opportunities available for extra credit. people from one place to another: from South, East, and Southeast Taught by: Buscher Asia in the 1970s and 1980s, from Central America in the 1990s, from Course usually offered in fall term Africa in 2000s, and in this decade from the Middle East. In Asia, as Activity: Lecture a result of human rights violations, North Koreans have fled to China, 1.0 Course Unit Tibetans to India, and over 3 million individuals fled Southeast Asia ASAM 210 Asian Am Religions in the 1980s. More than one million refugees from Cambodia, Laos, This course examines the changing religious landscape of the United and Vietnam, fled temporarily to Hong Kong, China, the Philippines, States through a focus on the religious life of Asian Americans. Through Thailand, Malaysia, before resettling in the United States. Philadelphia interdisciplinary texts and ethnographic field assignments, students is host to all of these communities. Some of our own students at Penn will consider how religion and race intersect to inform notions of are 1st or 2nd generation South and Southeast Asian Americans. This cultural and political citizenship, community, and culture. Topics to be course provides a comparative overview of the history, ethnicity, religion, explored include the impact of 9/11, religious political activism, and the and cultures of Southeast Asia (and the deep connections with South appropriation and commodification of "Asian" religious practices. Asia and East Asia), and their human rights, temporary settlement, and Taught by: Rupa Pillai treatment in host countries in the region. The first part of the course Course usually offered in fall term will use an international human rights framework to explore the human Activity: Seminar rights issues that forced people to flee from their countries of origin. 1.0 Course Unit The course will challenge and expand students' understandings of ASAM 215 Asian American Gender and Sexualities international human rights in the past and in the present with a focus This course explores the intersection of gender, sexuality, and race in on human rights violations such as: A. Vietnamese fleeing the war in Asian America. Through interdisciplinary and cultural texts, students will Southeast Asia. B. North Koreans seeking refuge in China and in South consider how Asian American gender and sexualities are constructed Korea. C. Tibetans hoping for protection by crossing the border into India. in relation to racism while learning theories on and methods to study Given the deep diplomatic and economic relations between Vietnam and gender, sex, and race. We will discuss masculinities, femininities, race- India, this international portion of the course will highlight how the two conscious feminisms, LGBTQ+ identities, interracial and intraracial countries in the region, an Asian communist country, and the other, an relationships, and kinship structures. Asian democratic country handle human rights in similar and different Taught by: Rupa Pillai ways. The second part of the course will pivot to the US and explore the Course usually offered in spring term civil rights of Asian Americans in the US such as the right to migrate, Also Offered As: GSWS 215, SAST 215 seek and enjoy asylum, education, housing, employment and health. The Activity: Seminar course will feature Penn professors as guest speakers so as to expose 1.0 Course Unit students to our own in-house experts, their fields and their departments. In addition, As part of a Asian American Studies, South Asia Center, Netter Center ABCS course, students will visit neighborhoods where Asian Americans live, work and play: South Asian neighborhoods in Jersey City, New Jersey; Korean neighborhoods in Olney; Vietnamese and Cambodian neighborhoods in South and West Philly. Students will also intern in host organizations to learn about community needs and strengths. Taught by: Van Do Activity: Seminar 1.0 Course Unit

2021-22 Catalog | Generated 08/18/21 Asian American Studies (ASAM) 5

ASAM 294 Facing America This course explores the visual history of race in the United States as both self-fashioning and cultural mythology by examining the ways that conceptions of Native American, Latino, and Asian identity, alongside ideas of Blackness and Whiteness, have combined to create the various cultural ideologies of class, gender, and sexuality that remain evident in historical visual and material culture. We also investigate the ways that these creations have subsequently helped to launch new visual entertainments, including museum spectacles, blackface minstrelsy, and early film, from the colonial period through the 1940s. Taught by: Shaw, Staff Course not offered every year Also Offered As: AFRC 294, ARTH 274, ARTH 674, CIMS 293, LALS 274 Activity: Lecture 1.0 Course Unit ASAM 313 The Chinese Body and Spatial Consumption in Chinatown This course looks at representations of the Chinese (and Asian body) since the Limehouse district in East London and the advent of Chinese contract laborers to the Americas in the 19th century. The localization of the Chinese throughout the Americas within Chinatown precincts were also subject to representational imaginings that were negotiated through the lens of civic planning, literature and later in cinema. Chinatowns are ultimately a product of racism. They were created as a political and social support system for newly arrived Chinese immigrants. While Chinese laborers arrived into the United States in 1840 and in significant numbers into Canada about 1860, Chinese contract workers were encouraged to immigrate to the Americas as an inexpensive source of labor, especially after the end of the American Civil War. Industrial leaders in America, Canada and elsewhere in the Americas (Mexico, Cuba, Peru, etc) saw the arrival of Chinese workers as a victory for commercial interests. However, the celebration was short-lived, as anti-Chinese sentiment quickly transformed into anti-Chinese hysteria. Rather than attacking the vested interests that exploit foreign labor as embodied by the Chinese worker, racist unions with the cooperation of civic leaders and the police deemed it safer to burn Chinatowns than capitalist property. Deeply under-studied to this day is the number of mass murders of Chinese workers in the 19th century by anti-Chinese thugs. This seminar will focus in on how the body of the Chinese (and Asian) was imagined and reimagined multiple times from the middle of the 19th century to today. Taught by: Lum/Yang Also Offered As: ENGL 273, FNAR 313, FNAR 613 Activity: Seminar 1.0 Course Unit ASAM 354 American Expansion in the Pacific This class will focus on America's expansion into the Pacific around the turn of the century with the acquisition of Hawaii and the Phillipines. It can deal with various issues, including the meaning of "frontier," colonialism, development of capitalist economies in the region, diplomacy, racism, migration, an American brand of Orientalism in encountering the "natives" and "heathens,"and histories of the West and the Pacific Islands in general. Taught by: Azuma One-term course offered either term Also Offered As: HIST 354 Activity: Lecture 1.0 Course Unit

2021-22 Catalog | Generated 08/18/21