Documenting Anti-Asian Violence: Continuities and Crisis

It took the mass murder of six Asian women in Atlanta last week to draw national attention to what Asian Americans have been warning about since the wake of the pandemic: anti-Asian violence. The incident reflects an under-recognized history of anti-Asian violence and discrimination in this country that dates back more than 150 years. This needs to change. Asian Americans must become central to the discourse on race in America. For the country to “care” about the outcry by Asian Americans, the public needs to understand how America got to this point.

This article focuses on the role of modern-day culture centers in higher education. An interview of 26 staff members from campuses across the country found that culture centers took on a significant role in coalition building between Asian American and Black communities during the COVID-19 pandemic and the current time of racial reckoning. The leadership role of these centers during this time highlights expansion of their original basic mission. Beyond serving as “home away from home” and retention spaces for historically excluded communities, the centers became educational spaces that promote cross racial understanding and affirm multiracial identity. This article reveals the racial narrative about Asian Americans, including the dangers of the model minority myth. The article further provides key historical references to Black and Asian American coalition building in the 20th century, which influenced how culture centers evolved in increasing cross racial understanding on their campuses. With expertise in diversity, inclusion, and equity, the current centers’ staff members have the opportunity to serve as thought leaders for their campuses and enhance their role and the centers’ role in campus administrative policy development for racial and social justice.

Cervical cancer disparities in stage at presentation for disaggregated Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders

Tables and Figures Preface 1. Ethnicity and Panethnicity 2. Coming Together: The Asian American Movement 3. Electoral Politics 4. The Politics of Social Service Funding 5. Census Classification: The Politics of Ethnic Enumeration 6. Reactive Solidarity: Anti-Asian Violence 7. Pan-Asian American Ethnicity: Retrospect and Prospect Notes References Interviews Index

Background: Asian American and Pacific Islander races are two distinct groups that continue to be aggregated in many large, national mortality statistics in the United States (US), which leads to structural biases encoded into databases and inaccurate health implications that may deprive Pacific Islander individuals from opportunities for interventions aimed at reducing health disparities. Examining mortality rates for disaggregated Asian American and Pacific Islander populations across all 50 states was not possible until 2018. We compared the leading causes of death between Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals in the US during 2018-2020, stratified by sex and age. Methods: Cause of death among non-Hispanic Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals aged ≥20 years who died during 2018-2020 were obtained from the US National Center for Health Statistics. Age-standardized all-cause mortality rates (MRs) and the 5 leading causes of death were reported per 100,000 person-years separately for Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals, by sex (female/male) and age (20-54/55-64/65-74/75- 84 years). MR ratios (MRRs) were calculated by comparing MRs among Pacific Islander with Asian American individuals (reference group), by sex and age. Results: During 2018-2020, 63,338 female and 85,601 male deaths occurred among Asian American adults, and 4,116 female and 5,512 male deaths occurred among Pacific Islander adults. Compared to Asian American individuals, all-cause mortality was higher for Pacific Islander females (MRR=2.50,95%CI=2.43-2.59) and males (MRR=2.10,95%CI=2.04-2.16). Cancer was the leading cause of death for Asian American (MR=93.8) and Pacific Islander females (MR=181.6) and second for Asian American (MR=100.4) and Pacific Islander males (MR=185.2) after heart disease. Death rates for leading causes were substantially higher for Pacific Islander compared to Asian American females: cancer (MRR=1.93,95%CI=1.82-2.06), heart disease (MRR=3.18,95%CI=2.95-3.42), stroke (MRR=2.41,95%CI=2.13-2.73), diabetes (MRR=4.03,95%CI=3.55-4.56), and COVID-19 (MRR=2.60,95%CI=2.25-3.01) and for Pacific Islander compared to Asian American males: heart disease (MRR=2.56,95%CI=2.42-2.71), cancer (MRR=1.52,95%CI=1.42-1.62, diabetes (MRR=3.14,95%CI=2.81-3.50), accidental death (MRR=2.60,95%CI=2.33-2.88), and COVID-19 (MRR=2.04,95%CI=1.82-2.27). The largest relative cancer mortality rate disparity occurred in those aged 20-54 years and declined with older age among women (MRR range=1.37-2.67) and men (MRR range=1.16-2.26). Conclusion: Cancer was among the leading cause of death for both Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals, but cancer mortality rates were twice as high among Pacific Islander women and men compared to Asian American women and men. These disparities persisted among Pacific Islander individuals for nearly all leading causes of death, regardless of sex and age, underscoring the need to disaggregate Pacific Islander from Asian American race data to improve tailored health equity-focused interventions. Citation Format: Jacqueline B. Vo, Jazmyn L Bess, Kekoa Taparra, Paloma R. Mitra, Amy Berrington de Gonzalez, Neal D. Freedman, Meredith S. Shiels, Jaimie Z. Shing. Leading causes of death among Asian American individuals compared with Pacific Islander individuals in the United States, 2018-2020 [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 17th AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2024 Sep 21-24; Los Angeles, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2024;33(9 Suppl):Abstract nr A069.

(Sponsored by SIG-Research on the Education of Asian and Pacific Americans of the American Educational Research Association and National Association for Asian and Pacific American Education)This research anthology is the fifth volume in a series sponsored by the Special Interest Group - Research on the Education of Asian and Pacific Americans (SIG - REAPA) of the American Educational Research Association and National Association for Asian and Pacific American Education. This series explores and examines the patterns of Asian parents’ involvement in the education of their children, as well as the direct and indirect effects on children’s academic achievement; Asian American children’s literacy development and learning strategies; Asian American teachers’ motivation to enter teaching profession, and strategies to recruit and retain them; the “model minority stereotype” of Asian American students and their socio-emotional development; campus climate and perceived racism toward Asian American college students, etc. This series blends the work of well established Asian American scholars with the voices of emerging researchers and examines in close detail important issues in Asian American education, parental involvement, and teacher recruitment. Scholars and educational practitioners will find this book to be an invaluable and enlightening resource.

2012 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival (May 10-20 2012) Patty Ahn (bio) In May of 2012, Visual Communications hosted its 28th annual Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival (LAAPFF), offering ten days filled with feature-length films, short programs, panels, and social events that formed a cross-section of the current state of Asian American media. Visual Communications (VC), a Los Angeles-based media collective founded in 1970 by four UCLA EthnoCommunications students, launched the festival in 1983 to promote Asian and Asian American cinema in the U.S. Initially offering a program of twenty films, LAAPFF now features more than 150 and has grown into a cultural and intellectual forum where filmmakers, producers, audiences, and critics discuss what they see dramatized on-screen: the challenges and potential futures for a minority media struggling to survive at the margins of a risk-adverse Hollywood. Strikingly, even though the modern studio system is based in Los Angeles, a city that houses one of the country's largest and most diverse populations of diasporic Asians we have yet to see a significant increase in Asian and Asian American industry workers. LAAPFF thus aims to showcase the work of filmmakers emerging from the local L.A. communities as well within the international arena. LAAPFF 2012 seemed to portend progress as the West Hollywood-based Directors Guild of America (DGA) and Koreatown's CGV cinema complex spilled over with excited moviegoers. At the same time, it animated, for this attendee at least, a number of uncertainties and contradictions that inevitably accompany a media environment in the midst of a major transformation around how content is produced and distributed. Abraham Ferrer, who has served as VC's curatorial director since 1987, notes in an interview that across its name changes-"Asian American International Film Festival" (1983), "The Los Angeles Asian Pacific American International Film Festival" (1987), "VC FilmFest" (2000)—the festival has always aimed to facilitate a variety of production models and cater to multiple audiences.1 He identified three major, sometimes intersecting, trajectories in the festival's history: one driven by independent artists, a second steered by a steadily-increasing number of filmmakers aspiring to break into the mainstream industries, and a third which emerged in the 1990s when practitioners began to experiment with online digital technologies (Ferrer). Throughout its history, LAAPFF has carefully navigated Southern California and the Asian-Pacific region's cultural geographies while facing a shrinking pool of state resources, an increasingly cutthroat media marketplace, the differing tastes of the international art cinema circuit and global Hollywood, and the ascendance of affordable digital productions. While these pressures have been present since the festival's inception, this year's event highlighted some of the anxieties the neoliberal marketplace has activated within the Asian American media landscape. I offer here a critical review of LAAPFF 2012 that teases out some of these tensions and shares insights offered by VC's veritable living archive, Abraham Ferrer, about the historical trajectories of VC and its festival. LAAPFF's unwavering support of independent filmmakers grows out of the political groundwork paved by its founding organization. VC began in 1970 with the explicit aim of empowering members of the Asian American community to re-represent their own history and experiences. This media collective aligned with the decolonization and Third Cinema movements taking place in Africa, Asia, and especially Latin American throughout the 1960s. The term "Third Cinema," coined by Argentine filmmakers Fernando Solanas and Octavio Gettino, encompassed a growing international commitment to creating films that would lead to the radical liberation from a U.S.-led first world capitalism, epitomized by Hollywood's corporatized, hierarchical studio system (Mimura 30). Thus, VC built educational programs aimed at transforming filmmaking into an accessible, self-sustainable, and collaborative process (Mimura 37). These foundational commitments continue to inform curatorial choices made by LAAPFF's programmers today, such as the decision to spotlight Musa Sayeed's feature film debut, Valley of Saints (2012, India), at an opening night screening. Shot on location on a shoestring budget, using only DSLR cameras, no script, and non-professional actors, Valley belongs to a filmmaking tradition once embraced by VC and Third Cinema...

The conclusion discusses the relevance of abolition feminisms, critiques of “victim” in contemporary debates on anti-Asian violence, the model-minority myth, legal frameworks of hate crimes, and critiques of Asian American contemporary political frameworks.

Cancer is the leading cause of death among Asian American individuals and the second leading cause of death among Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander people. To evaluate longitudinal cancer mortality trends from 1999 to 2020 among Asian American and Pacific Islander populations in the US by demographic characteristics. This cross-sectional study used the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Wide-Ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research database to obtain age-adjusted cancer death rates among Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals of all ages between January 1, 1999, and December 31, 2020. Data were analyzed from January 12 to March 19, 2024. Age, sex, cancer type, and US census regions. Trends and average annual percent changes (AAPCs) in age-adjusted cancer-specific mortality (CSM) rates for non-Hispanic Asian American and Pacific Islander populations were estimated by cancer type, age, sex, and region using Joinpoint regression. Between 1999 and 2020, 305 386 Asian American and Pacific Islander individuals (median [IQR] age, 69.5 [58.5-79.2] years; 51.1% male) died of cancer in the US. Overall, the CSM rate decreased by 1.5% annually. Men experienced a greater CSM rate decrease (AAPC, -1.8%; 95% CI, -2.2% to -1.3%) compared with women (AAPC, -1.1%; 95% CI: -1.2% to -1.0%). For women, death rates decreased for most cancer types but increased for uterine (AAPC, 2.5%; 95% CI, 2.0%-3.0%) and brain and central nervous system (AAPC, 1.4%; 95% CI: 0.7%-2.1%) cancers. Colorectal cancer mortality rates increased among men aged 45 to 54 years (AAPC, 1.3%; 95% CI, 0.5%-2.1%). Liver and intrahepatic bile duct cancer mortality increased for both men and women in all US census regions, uterine cancer mortality increased in all regions for women, and pancreatic cancer mortality increased in the Midwest for both men and women. Although these findings show an overall decrease in CSM among Asian American and Pacific Islander populations, specific cancer types exhibited increased mortality rates, with further disparities by sex and age. Targeted, culturally adapted clinical and public health interventions are needed to narrow disparities in cancer mortality.

Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) are often invisible to others. AAPI children are even more ignored in schools. They comprise many different groups with diverse cultures, languages, values, geographical roots, and ethnicities. This is why we have chosen to write about AAPI young people and not to limit our discussions to Asian Americans. We believe in inclusivity and so use the pan-Asian term of AAPIs. Some children may be Guamanian American, Thai American, Taiwanese American, Samoan American, Hawaiian American, Fijian American, Filipinx American, or a combination of several ethnic or racial backgrounds. Not all AAPI youth are the same. This is a major AAPI issue that teachers need to understand. Often teachers hold the misconception that most AAPIs are Chinese American. This is not true. One of the reasons that teachers and the general public are not aware of the educational, social, or psychological needs of AAPI children is because of the model minority myth. Not all AAPI students do well in school. Research has shown that young people have different academic strengths and vulnerabilities. These distinctions may be due to many variables such as ethnic membership, class status, parent education, and language proficiency in English. The model minority stereotype hurts and conceals the hardships that many AAPIs face, from low self-esteem to academic limitations. In addition, there are AAPI students who must deal with trauma from microaggressions that young people face because they are bullied due to accents, differences in physical appearance, and cultural conflicts. Others have come to the United States experiencing trauma as refugees who fled civil persecution or war. In addition, students who are LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning) and AAPI may have to deal with the trauma of homophobia. Teachers must be able to identify ways to reduce trauma in schools like using culturally relevant/responsive strategies to help lessen student depression and anxieties. There are numerous approaches that teachers can take to develop compassionate classrooms in a democracy where all students are accepted and respected. They can teach compassion and kindness. Educators can teach about the contributions of various AAPI civil rights role models such as Grace Lee Boggs, Larry Itliong, Kiyoshi Kuromiya, Philip Vera Cruz, Patsy Mink, and Yuri Kochiyama in the curriculum. Teaching about civil rights activists demonstrates to children and adults that AAPIs have been actively fighting for the rights of all. In addition, teachers can integrate AAPI children’s literature so students are aware of cultural values, experiences, and knowledge that has arisen from AAPI communities. All students should have the opportunity to see photos and drawings of various AAPI people in picturebooks and other texts. AAPI students are not super students; they are not math whiz kids. They are Americans like anyone else, with strengths and limitations.

As a group, Asian Americans in particular have been portrayed by American society as incapable or uninterested in American sporting practices and traditions. When individuals have realized public acclaim for athletic prowess, their achievements have been characterized in media and elsewhere as an exception to the Asian American experience, even when their success also represents its common collective narratives. NBA (National Basketball Association) basketball player Jeremy Lin’s meteoric rise in 2012 was often defined through the trope of the model minority. Conversely, Pacific Islanders, in particular males, have been represented as possessing innate athletic prowess but with limited intellect. These tropes of Asian American and Pacific Islander identity in American society have long obscured their relation to sports and recreation, and there has been little scholarship in either sports studies or Asian American studies on the unique sporting cultures of these groups and their relations to American sporting practices and institutions. Asian American and Pacific Islander relations to American sport are best understood as a unique history defined by their relation to American colonialism, racism, global capitalism, and the transnational nature of modern sport.

Willingness to get the COVID-19 vaccine is crucial to reduce the current strain on healthcare systems and increase herd immunity, but only 71% of the U.S. public said they would get the vaccine. It remains unclear whether Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI), a population with existing inequalities in COVID-19 infection and mortality, are willing to get the vaccine, and the factors associated with vaccine willingness.Given this imperative, we used data from a national, cross-sectional, community-based survey called COVID-19 Effects on the Mental and Physical Health of AAPI Survey Study (COMPASS), an ongoing survey study that is available in English and Asian languages (i.e., Simplified or Traditional Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese) to examine vaccine willingness among AAPI.A total of 1,646 U.S. adult AAPI participants completed the survey. Self-reported vaccine willingness showed the proportion who were “unsure” or “probably/definitely no” to getting the COVID-19 vaccine was 25.4%. The odds for vaccine willingness were significantly lower for were Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders (vs. Asian Americans), Korean Americans (vs. Chinese and Vietnamese Americans), women (vs. men), heterosexuals (vs. non-heterosexuals), those aged 30–39 and 50–59 (vs. aged < 30), and those who reported having any vaccine concerns (vs. no concerns).AAPIs’ willingness to get COVID-19 vaccine varied by groups, which underscores the need for disaggregated AAPI data. A multi-pronged approach in culturally appropriate and tailored health communication and education with AAPI is critical to achieve the goal of health equity for AAPI as it pertains to COVID-19 mortality and morbidity.

BackgroundHER2-positive (HER2+) invasive breast cancer is more prevalent among Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) women. We evaluated response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) to identify disparities among disaggregated AAPI subgroups.MethodsWomen with HER2+ breast cancer in the 2018-2020 National Cancer Database who received NAC followed by surgical excision were identified. Patients were categorized as White, AAPI, or Non-White Non-Asian (NWNA), followed by analysis of AAPI subgroups. The primary outcome was pathologic complete response (pCR).ResultsOf 14,110 women, 10,603 (75.1%) were White, 964 (6.8%) AAPI, and 2543 (18.0%) NWNA. Asian American and Pacific Islander patients had the highest overall pCR rate at 43.3% compared with 42.5% in White and 36.1% in NWNA patients (P < .001). Disaggregation revealed heterogeneity: Pacific Islander patients had the lowest pCR rate (35.6%), below both White and NWNA cohorts, while Korean patients had the highest pCR rate (54.6%) (both P < .001). Pacific Islander patients were more likely to present with comorbidities, advanced clinical stage, lymphovascular invasion, and experienced the longest time to chemotherapy. Korean patients were least likely to present with advanced disease, nodal involvement, or lymphovascular invasion and had the shortest time to chemotherapy. On multivariable analysis, nodal positivity, lymphovascular invasion, and increasing time to chemotherapy-not race/ethnicity-were independent negative predictors of pCR.DiscussionDisaggregated AAPI data are essential to identify vulnerable subgroups, prioritize timely neoadjuvant therapy, and inform targeted interventions that may reduce disparities in treatment response.

Through a careful analysis of the educational concerns and efforts described by Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) activists in Gidra—the first radical Asian American newspaper described as “the journalistic arm of the [Asian American] Movement” (Wei, 1993, 103)—this article explores ways that current educators, public policy writers, and researchers can learn from the stories of the past to improve the state of K–12 education today. Drawing from five years of monthly Gidra publications, this article illustrates parallels between past and current issues in AAPI K–12 education while offering suggestions for action and change.

This study examines how Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institutions (AANAPISI) build capacity for student success. By contrasting a community college on the West Coast and a regional comprehensive university on the East Coast, new pathways are forged to recognize the critical role that federally-funded AANAPISIs play in supporting Asian American and Pacific Islander students. Implications for policy, practice, and research are also offered to advance the operations and understanding of AANAPISIs.