EMPOWERING OUR COMMUNITIES Asian American Story

Chinese miners in Auburn Ravine, in early 1850s.

A ‘Chinatown’ in Virginia City, Nevada in late 1870s.

Source: Lee, Josephine. Early Asian America, 2002. Asian American Story

Filipino plantation laborers Sikh immigrants working on the arriving in Honolulu. A Korean rice farmer in California in 1920. farm fields near Fresno, California.

Source: Takaki. Strangers from a Different Shore, 1989. Past Challenges

• Economic freedom • Political freedom • Establishing community & family • Native rights or citizenship • Empowerment & Civil Rights

ANYTHING DIFFERENT TODAY? Seeking Equal Status

• Gaining citizenship - 1943 Magnuson Act, repealed the ; Chinese now eligible for naturalization.

- 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act; Asians and persons of all races eligible to immigration and naturalization. Organizing for Workers’ Rights

• Empowerment & Civil Rights - 1933, Cannery Workers’ and Farm Laborer’ Union formed in Seattle.

Cannery workers in 1926. Filipino salmon processing workers in , known Union pioneers Virgil Duyungan, as the "Alaskeros." Tony Rodrigo, CB Mislang, Espiritu in 1933.

Source: http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/cwflu.htm Breaking the Silence

• Empowerment & Civil Rights – 1989, President George Bush (Sr.) signs into law Redress Entitlement Program.

Source: Takaki. Strangers from a Different Source: Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress Shore, 1989. http://www.ncrr-la.org/ Increasing Visibility

• Economic Justice

Southeast Asian community members protesting 1996 welfare ‘reform’. 1946 Sugar Laborers’ Strike in Hawaii. Source: Foo. Asian American Women, 2003. Source: Takaki. Strangers from a Different Shore, 1989. Using the Law

• Economic Justice

Vietnamese Fishermen's Association v. Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, 518 F. Supp. 993, 1010 (S.D. Texas 1981).

Source: www.olemiss.edu

http://www.olemiss.edu/

Source: www.nytimes.com Reconcile Community & Self

SELF COMMUNITY

ACTION Challenges are endless…

• Immigration policies – divide and conquer citizens vs. green card vs. undocumented

• Affirmative Action under attack as ‘racial quotas’. • California’s Proposition 209 • Michigan Proposition 2 • state’s I-200 • Same strategies planned for 8 new states in 2008. Challenges (cont’d)

• English only movement

• Post 9/11 syndrome

Just selected examples of twists on barriers that marginalize Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders Mobilizing for the Future

• Strengthen API coalitions • Moving API toward citizenship • Anticipate the needs of new immigrants • Dialogue with other communities of colors • Participate in Health Care and Community Health Reform Taking the Power

• Passion for justice • Personal journey • Create and build community • Personal and collective responsibility