This course provides an introduction to the history and culture of Asians and Pacific Islanders in the United States from the mid-19th century to the beginning of the 21st century. Drawing from a range of interdisciplinary approaches and sources, the course explores the importance of the Asian American and Pacific Island American experience to U.S. history while also giving due consideration to the global and international forces that shaped it. In doing so, it probes the varied experiences of people identified as "Asian Americans," and "Pacific Island Americans," examining what those identities mean and how that had changed over time. The experience of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders will inform the analysis of broader themes including migration, diaspora, return, gender, race and racism, labor, citizenship, community, resistance and self-determination, identity formation, war, anti-colonialism, de-colonialism, and imperialism, and transnationalism. The course introduces the major themes and basic chronology of Asian American and Pacific Island American history while providing a critical perspective on the conventional narrative American history. The course analyzes the Asian American and Pacific Island American past within a context of power relations, especially hierarchies of race, gender, and class and examines the continuities and discontinuities between the past and present. Emphasis is placed on Filipino Americans, Chinese Americans, Japanese Americans, Asian Indian Americans, Korean Americans, Pacific Island Americans, and Southeast Asian Americans. (CSU/UC) (AA/AS-D, CSU-D, IGETC-4)
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