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  | Asian American Dreams : The Emergence of an American People
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Average user rating:  | |
 A MUST read | |
| I would give it more then 5 stars if I could. It should be a part of our school curriculum. | |
| Where are you from? | |
| I remember as a young child, other kids would ask me, "Where are you from?" Even though I was a native U.S. citizen, I would answer "Korea" without even thinking about it. Their response would be a blank stare and a "Where?" They all knew China, and even Japan, but rarely Korea. I grew up thinking that I was from a place that no one knew existed. Now when people ask me, "Where are you from?" I answer "Los Angeles," and I receive the response, "You know what I mean. Really, where are you from?" This question has plagued me throughout my life. People assume I cannot simply be an American - I must be a foreigner. What Helen Zia has done is taken this universal experience among Asian Americans and transformed it into a quest to learn what it means to be Asian and American. She examines pivotal points in Asian American history and acknowledges racism, but also examines what Asian Americans must do as a whole to become seen as "American" and not as a "gook" or a "chink." As a college student who's done a little bit of research on Asian Americans, it enlightened me on my responsibilites to make my voice heard and also educated me on the history of the Asian American Civil Rights Movement - something that didn't even exist 60 years ago. | |
 a very readable history | |
| Zia's accout of Asian American history is highly readable, panning a long stretch of time and focusing in on a series of major events (that are detailed in other reviews, which I will not reiterate). And, as many of the reviewers already stated, she provides more than an introduction to these events. Unfortunately, Zia's journalistic background---which I see as the simplification of complex issues and the lack of historical depth---surfaces often when she attempts to provide historical context. That is, she often paints in broad strokes (in an effort to state her case, no doubt), especially when dealing with other ethnic groups. A case in point is her discussion of 1921 and 1924 immigration quotas acts. Instead of simply dealing with the implication of these acts on immigration from Asia, she decides to insert statistics on immigration from Italy at the time, leaving the reader to conclude that immigration from Italy was not restricted. Why she does this, one can only wonder. In fact, the quotas acts did reduce immigration from Italy to a mere trickle, and the language that was used to reduce this immigration was most certainly racialized, since Italians were seen as a dark skinned, uneducated, crime-prone people. Zia would have been better advised to leave reference to Italians out, especially if she is not willing to do them historical justice. After all, they too are an ethnic minority with their own distinct history in America Aside from this slip (visable in other places in her text), Zia still writes a very informed and accessible text. | |
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