Twelve Books to Decolonize Your Mind by Next Asian Pacific Islander American Heritage Month
“The first false move in this direction is the easiest: the assumption that race is an observable physical fact, a thing, rather than a notion that is profoundly and in its very essence ideological.”
— From “Ideology and Race in America” by Barbara J. Fields
“Neither imperialism nor colonialism is a simple act of accumulation and acquisition. Both are supported and perhaps even impelled by impressive ideological formations that include notions that certain territories and people require and beseech domination, as well as forms of knowledge affiliated with domination.”
— From “Orientalism” by Edward Said
1. Orientalism by Edward Said
How did the values, norms, language, worldview of 15% of the world come to dominate the remaining 85% of the world? The East is an invention of the West. Orientalism was the basis for invasion and colonialism since Cleopatra’s time, and Orientalism is the basis for continued U.S. military aggression and control across the globe.
2. Ideology and Race in America by Barbara J. Fields
Race is a social construct — as in it constructs our society. This reading breaks down the fallacy and functionality of white supremacy, particularly in Reconstruction South.
3. Not a “Nation of Immigrants”: Settler Colonialism, White Supremacy, and a History of Erasure and Exclusion by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
No, we are not all “immigrants.” How does framing immigrants vs. refugees vs. settlers work on native land, after over a century of continuing U.S. military control in the so-called East?
4. Orientals by Robert Lee
What do “ching chong”, Suzy Wong, Fu Manchu, Blade Runner and the vast majority of representations of the Oriental Other have in common? They have nothing to do with Asians and everything to do with White nationalism.
5. The Making of Asian America: A History by Erika Lee
A relatively recent primer on what, who, how, why and where Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are. While some parts are more along the “positive contributions” vein, this book is more comprehensive in looking at the Americas as a whole.
6. An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
A must read for anyone who wants to dismantle the fundamental myth of manifest destiny, and how this land was settled violently, insidiously and strategically (and continues to be occupied).
7. Unsettled: Cambodian Refugees in the New York City Hyperghetto by Eric Tang
Focusing on the Cambodian American community, this book looks at how refugees were racially triangulated with Black and other people of color after being placed in the Bronx, NY.
8. Screaming Monkeys: Art, fiction, poetry and essays critiquing Asian American images in media, government and popular culture edited by M. Evelina Galang
“Asian American awareness is more than just learning about Asian American people. It is about understanding the global, driving forces that shape Asian America－imperialism, military interventions, trade, resource extraction, environmental degradation, forced and voluntary immigrations. These are the international forces that have created an Asian America; they have brought all of us Asian Americans here today, one way or another. By understanding those forces, by attempting to understand our place in the world, Asian American awareness steps outside the narrow confines of identity politics and becomes something much broader and long lasting. It becomes a path to politicization and to connecting with others, across national, racial, and class boundaries.”
— From Race and Representation: Asian Americans by Sonia Shah
9. Ancestors in the Americas (One and Two) by Loni Ding on PBS
How did tea become something we associate with British people, and the opioid epidemic with Americans? The biggest family fortunes in Britain and the U.S. (like the former president FDR’s Delano side) were made by drug dealers smuggling and pushing opium in China to even the trade imbalance — prompting two wars that turned China into economic and cultural playgrounds for westerners. The other doc in the series talks about the much lesser known history of Punjabi and Chinese coolie laborers in Guayana, Trinidad, Peru and other parts of Americas.
10. Hmong Means Free: Life in Laos and America by Sucheng Chan
“Having accquired all of Vietnam, the French now thought of themselves as heir to the Vietnamese claims in neighboring Laos.”
A look at how European and later U.S. colonialism worked across generations, borders, and strategies to weaken an entire region, create cultural erasure, and displace an entire people.
11. Beyond the Shadow of Camptown: Korean Military Brides in America by Ji-Yeon Yuh
Over half a century into Asian exclusion, Korean women entered the U.S. as so-called war-brides. From USO training programs on how to eat, speak, dress and talk, to changing of names and faces (eyelid surgery was popularized by the U.S miltary in Korea, FYI), assimilation under (double) colonialism can take many forms.
12. Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting: Afro-Asian Connections and the Myth of Cultural Purity by Vijay Prashad
From Bengalis in Harlem to the Nation of Islam, this book takes a refreshing look at Asian American histories that aren’t solely in contrast to White American narratives, and complicates and/or mitigates the relationship between the constructs of Blackness and the Oriental.
