Latina/os in the United States

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Updated: December 1, 2014
News articles reports, analysis, and other statistical/demographic resources on Latina/os in the U.S.:

• Unauthorized Immigrant Totals Rise in 7 States, Fall in 14 (Pew Research, 18 November 2014)
• Panel Highlights Korean-Latino Intersections on Immigration Reform (KoreAm, 7 November 2014)
• A Brief History of Political Collaborations between Latinos and Asians in America (Hyphen, 4 November 2014)
• Hispanics only group to see its poverty rate decline and incomes rise (Pew Research, 19 September 2014)
• 17 Historical Events Every American Should Know About (But Probably Doesn't) (Huffington Post, 19 September 2014)
• 15 Essential Books by Latino Authors in America (Buzzfeed, 17 September 2014) 
• 11 facts for National Hispanic Heritage Month (Pew Research, 16 September 2014)
• Latina/os and the Facade of Whiteness (La Respueta, 11 June 2014)
• The Shifting Religious Identity of Latinos in the United States (Pew Research Religion & Public Life, 7 May 2014)

Christians of Asia (ABC Radio National Encounter)

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Christians of Asia (ABC Radio National Encounter, 29 November 2014)

Abstract:

When people talk about “The Asian Century”, they’re usually referring to the expected economic and political dominance of Asia over the next hundred years. But if the growth of Christianity in the region continues, then the 21st century could also turn out to be the Asian Christian Century. Already, there are more practicing Protestants in China than in the UK, and according to some estimates, Communist China could become the world’s largest Christian nation by 2030. In addition, ethnic Asian churches continue to grow and prosper in countries like Australia and the U.S., despite the continuing overall decline of Christianity in the west. Does the rise of Asian economic might coinciding with the rise of Christianity have the potential to alter the religious profile of our region?

Links:

• Christians of Asia
• Listen Online (streaming audio)
• Download Podcast (mp3)

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Religion in Latin America (Pew Research)

Abstract:

Latin America is home to more than 425 million Catholics – nearly 40% of the world’s total Catholic population – and the Roman Catholic Church now has a Latin American pope for the first time in its history. Yet identification with Catholicism has declined throughout the region, according to a major new Pew Research Center survey that examines religious affiliations, beliefs and practices in 18 countries and one U.S. territory (Puerto Rico) across Latin America and the Caribbean.

Links:

• Religion in Latin America
• Complete Report (PDF)

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Why a leading professor of new media just banned technology use in class

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Why a leading professor of new media just banned technology use in class (Washington Post, 25 September 2014)

Abstract:

Clay Shirky is, as he explains below, a “pretty unlikely candidate for Internet censor.” Shirky is a professor of media studies at New York University, holding a joint appointment as an arts professor at NYU’s graduate Interactive Telecommunications Program in the Tisch School of the Arts, and as a Distinguished Writer in Residence in the journalism institute. He is a leading voice on the effect technology has had on society — and vice versa — and has been writing extensively about the Internet for nearly a decade. For years Shirky has allowed his students to bring laptops, tablets and phones into class and use them at will. But he just told students to put them away. He explains why below in a piece that first appeared on medium.com.

Link: Why a leading professor of new media just banned technology use in class

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5 facts about Indian Americans (Pew)

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5 facts about Indian Americans (Pew Research, 30 September 2014)

Excerpt:

In 2012, the Pew Research Center released a pair of reports on Asian Americans — one focused on demographics and attitudes, the other on religion. The reports, which drew from 2010 census data and 2012 survey results, included much information about the country’s nearly 3.2 million Indian Americans; we’ve selected a sampling of facts from both reports.

Link: 5 facts about Indian Americans

State of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Series

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State of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Series

Abstract:

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, or AAPIs, are a significant factor in the changing demographics in the United States. But the lack of centralized and accessible data has created a large knowledge gap about this fast-growing and influential group. Data about this group have often not been available or presented in a way that is accessible to policymakers, journalists, and community-based organizations.

The Center for American Progress in conjunction with AAPI Data, a project at the University of California, Riverside, have launched a series of reports on the state of the Asian American and Pacific Islanders communities, featuring the most comprehensive research and analysis of its kind for the AAPI population in the United States. The report series will provide an unprecedented look at this community and provide new insight and analysis along various issue areas including: demographics, public opinion, immigration, education, language access and use, civic and political participation, income and poverty, labor market, consumer market and entrepreneurship, civil rights, health care, and health outcomes.

Full Report (PDF)

Links:

• State of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Series
• Full Report (PDF)

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National Congregations Study: 2012 NCS-III Data

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National Congregations Study: 2012 NCS-III Data

Abstract:

The National Congregations Study surveys a representative sample of America's churches, synagogues, mosques and other local places of worship. Initiated in 1998, the NCS gathers information about a wide range of characteristics and activities of congregations. With 1331 participating congregations across the United States, the 2012 National Congregations Study is a nationally representative survey of regularly gathering religious groups. The congregations who participated in Wave III of the NCS survey represent over 70 Christian denominations as well as Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and other religious groups. Based on an in-depth interview of congregational leaders, the survey documents the worship, programs, staffing, and other characteristics of American congregations. The 2012 NCS is the third wave of the study since 1998, and therefore also helps us document change and continuity over time.

Link: National Congregations Study: 2012 NCS-III Data

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Five thousand years of Chinese art now on the Google Cultural Institute

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Five thousand years of Chinese art now on the Google Cultural Institute (Google Asia Pacific Blog, 4 September 2014)

Excerpts:

The phrase “Chinese art” may conjure up images of everything from ornate porcelain vases to provocative contemporary art. But many who live outside the Middle Kingdom may find it daunting to explore China’s five thousand years of rich history and culture.

Today, we hope to have made it a little easier by unveiling 1,400 new items and 48 online exhibitions from nine Chinese partners on the Google Cultural Institute. This is one of the largest collections we've made available online in Asia, and the second major addition since Chinese museums first came on board in 2012. We’re happy to help Chinese arts and culture institutions find a global audience, just as Chinese museum directors have welcomed digital media to find new audiences for traditional works of art.

The new collections contain works from the dawn of civilization up to the experimental art of modern China. Starting from the ancient: Sanxingdui Museum in China’s Sichuan province holds a vast collection of precious Bronze Age artifacts excavated from Shang period’s ancient burial pits, dating all the way back to the 12th-11th centuries BC. Today you can see nearly 100 of these pieces on the Cultural Institute, as well as the museum’s archaeologically significant interiors in 360-degree panoramas.

Link: Five thousand years of Chinese art now on the Google Cultural Institute

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Politics of American churches & religions in one graph

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Politics of American churches & religions in one graph (Religious News Service, 27 August 2014)

Abstract:

What are the political positions of religions and churches in America? This new graph maps the ideologies of 44 different religious groups using data comes from Pew’s Religious Landscape survey. This survey included 32,000 respondents. It asked very specific questions on religion that allow us to find out the precise denomination, church, or religion of each person.

Link: Politics of American churches & religions in one graph

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Many religions heavily concentrated in one or two countries (Pew Research)

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Many religions heavily concentrated in one or two countries (Pew Research, 27 August 2014)

Excerpt:

Earlier this summer, on World Population Day, we explained that half of the world’s population lives in just six countries. In many cases, the world’s major religious groups are even more concentrated, with half or more of their followers living in one or a handful of countries. For several years, demographers at the Pew Research Center have been studying the demographic characteristics of eight groups: Buddhists, Christians, adherents of folk religions, Hindus, Jews, Muslims, the religiously unaffiliated and followers of other religions. While Christians and Muslims are more widely distributed around the world, the other groups have a majority of their populations in just one or two nations, according to 2010 estimates from our Global Religious Landscape report.

Link: Many religions heavily concentrated in one or two countries

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News Reports & Analysis: ISIS and its Campaign of Violence Against Iraqi Christians and Other Minorities

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Selected news reports, op eds and analysis on ISIS and its campaign of violence against Iraqi Christians and other minorities:

• How ISIS got its anthem (The Guardian, 9 November 2014)
• 'No' from one Iraq villager triggered Islamic State mass killings, says witness (Sydney Morning Herald, 20 August 2014)
• How ISIS Ended Up Stocked with American Weapons (Alternet, 18 August 2014)
• ISIS Tentacles reach toward China (Asia Times, 15 August 2014)
• In Turkey, a late crackdown on Islamist fighters (Washington Post, 12 August 2014) 
• Anglican Vicar of Baghdad: ‘Child I baptized cut in half by ISIS’ (Episcopal News Service, 8 August 2014)
• Anglican Vicar of Baghdad: “Child I baptised cut in half by ISIS” (Anglican Communion News Service, 8 August 2014)
• Najaf takes in Christians displaced by Islamic State (Al-Monitor, 7 August 2014)
• Airstrikes on ISIS Militants Have Begun, Kurds and Iraqis Say (New York Times, 7 August 2014)
• The Islamic State’s bloody campaign to exterminate minorities: ‘Even Genghis Khan didn’t do this’ (Washington Post, 7 August 2014) 
• 40,000 Iraqis stranded on mountain as Isis jihadists threaten death (The Guardian, 7 August 2014)
• Iraq Christians flee as Islamic State takes Qaraqosh (BBC News, 7 August 2014)
• Isis takes Iraq’s largest Christian town as residents told – 'leave, convert or die' (The Independent, 7 August 2014)
• 100,000 Iraqi Christians have fled their homes and face risk of genocide, warns Patriarch (The Tablet, 7 August 2014)
• Pope asks for international action to help Iraq's persecuted Christians (Catholic News Service, 7 August 2014)
• Iraqi Christians facing risk of genocide, patriarch warns (Catholic News Agency, 7 August 2014)
• A Friend Flees the Horror of ISIS (The New Yorker, 6 August 2014)
• Genocide watch: the Iraqi communities most endangered by the rise of ISIL (Quartz, 6 August 2014)
• Iran Ready to Help Iraq's Displaced Christians (Assyrian International News Agency, 6 August 2014)
• Islamic Militants in Iraq Are Widely Loathed, Yet Action to Curb Them Is Elusive (New York Times, 6 August 2014)
• Sunni Extremists Repel Kurdish Forces in Iraq (New York Times, 6 August 2014)
• Why Sunni Extremists Are Destroying Ancient Religious Sites in Mosul (National Geographic, 2 August 2014)
• August 2014: Updates from the Dominican Sisters in Iraq
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• Tears, and Anger, as Militants Destroy Iraq City’s Relics (New York Times, 30 July 2014)
• Last remaining Christians flee Iraq's Mosul (Al-Jazeera, 22 July 2014)
• ISIS Forces Last Iraqi Christians to Flee Mosul (New York Times, 18 July 2014)
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• For Arab World's Christians, An Uncertain Fate (NPR All Things Considered, 25 August 2013) 

Related -- Background on ISIS:

• Don't Look Now: Virtually the Entire Middle East Is Destabilized by Warring Factions (Alternet, 14 August 2014)
• ISIS: The Birth of a Terrifying New State (Alternet, 13 August 2014) 
• A crisis a century in the making (New York Times, 10 August 2014)
• Iraq crisis: How Saudi Arabia helped Isis take over the north of the country (The Independent, 13 July 2014)
• 'Thank God for the Saudis': ISIS, Iraq, and the Lessons of Blowback (The Atlantic, 23 June 2014)
• Why the Iraq Mess Is So Awkward for Saudi Arabia (Slate, 16 June 2014)
• America's Allies Are Funding ISIS (Daily Beast, 14 June 2014)
• Bandar bin Sultan's Botched Syrian Intervention (Middle East Forum, Winter 2014)

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News Reports & Analysis: Israel's Invasion of Gaza in July 2014

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Selected news reports, op eds and analysis on Israel's invasion of Gaza in July 2014:

• Problems ahead for Israel after Pyrrhic victory in Gaza (The Conversation, 15 August 2014)
• Don't Look Now: Virtually the Entire Middle East Is Destabilized by Warring Factions (Alternet, 14 August 2014)
• Palestinians returning home find Israeli troops left faeces and venomous graffiti (The Guardian, 8 August 2014)
• Claims Israeli soldiers shot fleeing civilians (Sydney Morning Herald, 7 August 2014)
• Full text of deleted Times of Israel's blog post backing genocide in Gaza (Vox, 2 August 2014)  
• Caritas appeals for end to Gaza conflict after first Christian death (Catholic Herald, 31 July 2014)
• The world stands disgraced' - Israeli shelling of school kills at least 15 (The Guardian, 31 July 2014)
• Bombardean la parroquia católica de Gaza (Religión Digital, 30 July 2014)
• Gaza: at least 15 killed and 90 injured as another UN school is hit (The Guardian, 30 July 2014)
• Text said to evacuate, but Gaza parish staff had nowhere to go (Catholic News Service, 30 July 2014)
• It Turns Out Hamas Didn’t Kidnap and Kill the 3 Israeli Teens After All (New York Magazine, 25 July 2014)
• 'Am I Going to Die, Daddy?' The Child in Gaza Asked (Mashable, 23 July 2014) 
• Palestinian boy clings to paramedic - story behind the viral photo (Sydney Morning Herald, 21 July 2014)
  
• Israel using flechette shells in Gaza (The Guardian, 20 July 2014) 
• Juan Cole prints a map and the blogosphere erupts (History News Network, 14 July 2014) 

Related: How Israel helped create Hamas (Washington Post, 30 July 2014) 

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News Reports & Analysis: Buddhist Violence against Minorities in Sri Lanka - 2014

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Selected news reports, op eds and analysis on the Buddhist violence against ethnic and religious minorities (Tamils, Muslims, and Catholics):

Violence against Catholics

• Sri Lankan Buddhists up in arms over papal visit (UCA News, 12 August 2014)
• Buddhist extremists oppose Pope’s visit to Sri Lanka (Vatican Insider/La Stampa 8 August 2014)

Violence against Muslims

• In the dark heart of Sri Lanka's anti-Muslim violence (UCA News, 6 August 2014)
• Sri Lanka moderate monk critical of anti-Muslim violence beaten (BBC News, 19 June 2014)
• Sri Lanka Riots: One killed as Buddhists target Muslims (BBC News, 17 June 2014)
• Sri Lanka Muslims killed in Aluthgama clashes with Buddhists (BBC News, 16 June 2014)
• Sri Lanka imposes curfew after Buddhist-Muslim clashes (BBC News, 15 June 2014)

 Violence against Tamils

• Sri Lankan mob storms meeting of disappeared Tamils' families (UCA News, 5 August 2014)
•  This is the modern axis of Buddhist hate (Foreign Policy, 7 March 2014)
• As Fighting Flares in Civil War, Key Buddhist Shuns Nonviolence (Washington Post, 26 March 2008)

 General

• Sri Lanka's militant monk lambasts Dalai Lama (UCA News, 23 July 2014)

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News Reports & Analysis: Myanmar Buddhist Violence Against Muslim Rohingyas

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Selected news reports, op eds and analysis on Myanmar Buddhist monks and violence against the Muslim Rohingya minority in Myanmar:

• Myanmar's Buddhist Bigots (New York Times, 19 May 2014)
• This is the Modern Axis of Buddhist Hate (Foreign Policy, 7 March 2014)
• Dalai Lama to Buddhist Monks: Enough Anti-Rohingya Violence (AsiaNews, 20 September 2013)
• The Face of Buddhist Terror (Time Magazine, 1 July 2013, republished in Colombo Telegraph, 3 July 2013)
• Dalai Lama Pleads for Myanmar Monks to End Violence Amid Damning Rights Report (ABC News, 22 April 2013)
• The Burmese monks who preach intolerance against Muslim Rohingyas (BBC News, 21 November 2012) 

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Children 12 and under are fastest growing group of unaccompanied minors at U.S. border

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Children 12 and under are fastest growing group of unaccompanied minors at U.S. border (Pew Research Center, 22 July 2014)

Excerpts:

The new data show a 117% increase in the number of unaccompanied children ages 12 and younger caught at the U.S.-Mexico border this fiscal year compared with last fiscal year. By comparison, the number of apprehensions of unaccompanied teenagers ages 13-17 has increased by only 12% over the same time period.

Even though the growth is higher among younger children, the bulk of unaccompanied children caught at the border remain teenagers. In fiscal year 2013, nine-in-ten minors apprehended at the border were teens. This share has dropped as the number of younger children making the dangerous trip has risen dramatically: In the first eight months of fiscal year 2014, 84% were teens.

Link: Children 12 and under are fastest growing group of unaccompanied minors at U.S. border

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Child Migrants Have Been Coming to America Alone Since Ellis Island

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Child Migrants Have Been Coming to America Alone Since Ellis Island (Mother Jones, 18 July 2014)

Excerpt:

An unaccompanied child migrant was the first person in line on opening day of the new immigration station at Ellis Island. Her name was Annie Moore, and that day, January 1, 1892, happened to be her 15th birthday. She had traveled with her two little brothers from Cork County, Ireland, and when they walked off the gangplank, she was awarded a certificate and a $10 gold coin for being the first to register. Today, a statue of Annie stands on the island, a testament to the courage of millions of children who passed through those same doors, often traveling without an older family member to help them along.

Link: Child Migrants Have Been Coming to America Alone Since Ellis Island

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What’s The Real Deal About The Atacama "Alien"?

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What’s The Real Deal About The Atacama "Alien"? (IFLScience! 17 July 2014)

Excerpt:

Researchers made a mysterious discovery in Chile’s Atacama Desert in 2003. This tiny skeleton looked human, but had many features that left scientists scratching their heads. When the images hit the internet, many people assumed the only explanation could be aliens. Thankfully, more reasonable heads prevailed and the remains were subjected to a battery of forensic testing in order to identify how this anomalous skeleton, nicknamed Ata, came to be.

So what made this specimen so peculiar? For starters, the skeleton was only 15 centimeters (6 inches) long. Many initially speculated that the remains were from a premature birth or miscarried fetus, though others disregarded the whole thing as a hoax.

Ata’s size isn’t the only thing that perplexed researchers; a host of physical deformities did not make it entirely clear if the skeleton is human or a non-human primate. Humans have 12 ribs, but this individual only had 10. The skull indicated the organism could have had turricephaly, which gives the head a cone-shaped appearance (which really didn’t help dissuade people from thinking Ata was an alien). Additional deformity of the face and jaw made the head look squished, giving it an appearance that was even further away from a typical human.

Link: What’s The Real Deal About The Atacama "Alien"?

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15 states with the highest share of immigrants in their population

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15 states with the highest share of immigrants in their population (Pew Research Center, 14 May 2014)

Excerpt:

The 15 states where immigrants made up the biggest share of the population in 2012 account for about eight-in-ten (79%) of the nation’s immigrants. Although the rankings have changed over the past few decades, almost all of the states that have the highest immigrant population shares have remained the same.

Link: 15 states with the highest share of immigrants in their population

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Listen to the Oldest Song in the World: A Sumerian Hymn Written 3,400 Years Ago

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 Listen to the Oldest Song in the World: A Sumerian Hymn Written 3,400 Years Ago (Open Culture, 8 July 2014)

Excerpts:

In the early 1950s, archaeologists unearthed several clay tablets from the 14th century B.C.E.. Found, WFMU tells us, “in the ancient Syrian city of Ugarit,” these tablets “contained cuneiform signs in the hurrian language,” which turned out to be the oldest known piece of music ever discovered, a 3,400 year-old cult hymn. Anne Draffkorn Kilmer, professor of Assyriology at the University of California, produced the interpretation above in 1972. (She describes how she arrived at the musical notation—in some technical detail—in this interview.) Since her initial publications in the 60s on the ancient Sumerian tablets and the musical theory found within, other scholars of the ancient world have published their own versions.

The piece, writes Richard Fink in a 1988 Archeologia Musicalis article, confirms a theory that “the 7-note diatonic scale as well as harmony existed 3,400 years ago.” This, Fink tells us, “flies in the face of most musicologist’s views that ancient harmony was virtually non-existent (or even impossible) and the scale only about as old as the Ancient Greeks.” Kilmer’s colleague Richard Crocker claims that the discovery “revolutionized the whole concept of the origin of western music.”

Link: Listen to the Oldest Song in the World: A Sumerian Hymn Written 3,400 Years Ago

Author, N. Va. native Helen Wan on the ‘bamboo ceiling’

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Author, N. Va. native Helen Wan on the ‘bamboo ceiling’ (Washington Post, 13 February 2014)

Excerpts:

Ingrid Yung is a made-up character, but her story seems to resonate with the real-life Asian American lawyers gathered for a book reading in the Washington offices of the corporate law firm Wiley Rein. Ingrid, a minority and a woman, is a “two-fer” in the parlance of her fictional firm, where her impatience with its clumsy approach to diversity threatens her promising career. “We didn’t need [expletive] Dumpling Day in the firm cafeteria,” Ingrid fumes in the new novel “The Partner Track,” published by St. Martin’s Press. “We needed decoder rings for all of the unwritten rules of survival here.”

Ingrid’s creator is lawyer and novelist Helen Wan, who grew up in the Northern Virginia suburb of Burke. Her debut book, a witty yet pointed exploration of the difficulties Asian Americans have advancing in corporate culture, has clearly exposed a nerve. The eager response from readers sent it back for a second printing after an initial run of 50,000 in September, a rare achievement for a first-time author. A Wall Street Journal reviewer called the book engaging and suspenseful and praised Wan’s realistic depiction of law firm culture. Law firms and law schools across the country have invited Wan to speak to groups such as the one at Wiley Rein, organized by the D.C. chapter of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association.

Link: Author, N. Va. native Helen Wan on the ‘bamboo ceiling’

'Bamboo ceiling' blocking Asian Australians, says commissioner

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'Bamboo ceiling' blocking Asian Australians, says commissioner (Sydney Morning Herald, 11 July 2014)

Excerpts:

A ''bamboo ceiling'' is preventing Asian Australians from taking their share of leadership positions, the Race Discrimination Commissioner, Tim Soutphommasane, has suggested. In a speech delivered in Perth on Thursday, Dr Soutphommasane said while children of Australians of migrant backgrounds outperformed the children of Australian-born parents in education and employment, the nation's cultural diversity was not represented in positions of leadership.

''Equality of opportunity isn't enjoyed in equal measure in all spheres,'' Dr Soutphommasane said. ''Our efforts in opening the doors of power to all who knock are more questionable.'' Dr Soutphommasane said while nearly half of all Australians were either born overseas or had a parent who was born overseas, and about one in 10 Australians had an Asian background, only a handful of members of Federal Parliament had non-European ancestry, and less than 2 per cent had Asian ancestry. Of 83 secretaries and deputy secretaries of federal government departments, only three had Asian origins. Asian Australian were also badly underrepresented among the management ranks of business and executive positions at leading universities, he said.

Link: Bamboo ceiling' blocking Asian Australians, says commissioner

You May Not Know About The First Chinese Americans, But You Should

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You May Not Know About The First Chinese Americans, But You Should (Huffington Post, 7 July 2014)

Excerpts:

It wasn't easy being Chinese American in the early days. From exclusionary laws to the racist caricatures that dotted newspaper comic pages, America wasn't exactly laying down the welcome mat. And yet, there were success stories. The Chinese American, a newspaper founded by the activist and journalist Wong Chin Foo, hit stands before the end of the 19th century. The actress Anna May Wong, born in Los Angeles to Chinese parents, beat the odds and wound up starring in silent films a few decades later.

Link: You May Not Know About The First Chinese Americans, But You Should

Related: New York Historical Society Exhibition: Chinese American: Exclusion/Inclusion

Parent-reported measures of child health and wellbeing in same-sex parent families: a cross-sectional survey (BMC Public Health)

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Parent-reported measures of child health and wellbeing in same-sex parent families: a cross-sectional survey (BMC Public Health 2014, 14:635 DOI :10.1186/1471-2458-14-635 Published: 21 June 2014)

Abstract:

Australian children with same-sex attracted parents score higher than population samples on a number of parent-reported measures of child health. Perceived stigma is negatively associated with mental health. Through improved awareness of stigma these findings play an important role in health policy, improving child health outcomes.

Links:

• Abstract
• PDF Fulltext of Article

Selected News Reports on the Study:

• Kids from same-sex families fare as well as peers – or better (The Conversation, 4 July 2014)
• World’s largest study on same-sex parents finds kids are healthier and happier than peers (Salon, 6 July 2014)

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Fascinating graphics show who owns all the major brands in the world

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Fascinating graphics show who owns all the major brands in the world (Gizmodo Sploid, 3 July 2014)

Abstract:

All the biggest product brands in the world are owned by a handful of corporation. Food, cleaning products, banks, airlines, cars, media companies... everything is in the hands of these megacorporations. These graphics show how everything is connected.

Link: Fascinating graphics show who owns all the major brands in the world

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Behind the Civil Rights Act: How it was made and what it means today

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Behind the Civil Rights Act: How it was made and what it means today (NPR, 2 July 2014)

Abstract:

It’s been 50 years since President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. Since then, the country’s demographics have shifted, and the conversations about race and culture have continued. In this project, journalists, lawyers and civil rights activists explore the historic legislation— pulling the language out of history and telling us how it’s relevant today.

Link: Behind the Civil Rights Act: How it was made and what it means today

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How Race-Studies Scholars Can Respond to Their Haters

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How Race-Studies Scholars Can Respond to Their Haters (Chronicle Vitae, 27 June 2014)

Excerpt:

Graduate school prepares students for a range of intellectual and professional endeavors. Unfortunately, responding to scholarly insults and academic shade-throwing isn’t one of them. But for scholars in the fields of race and ethnic studies—including those who work outside the ivory tower—dealing with snide questions, nasty comments, and occasional name-calling is just part of the job description. Over the years, these academics have repeatedly told me that their work is uniquely misunderstood and dismissed by students, fellow faculty, and the general public. The election of Barack Obama, some say, has only made it tougher to defend ethnic studies: Amid declarations of a “post-racial” America, how do you explain why you study and write about racism?

Link: How Race-Studies Scholars Can Respond to Their Haters

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U.S. Hispanic and Asian populations growing, but for different reasons (Pew Research Center)

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U.S. Hispanic and Asian populations growing, but for different reasons (Pew Research Center, 26 June 2014)

Excerpts:

U.S. births have been the primary driving force behind the increase in the Hispanic population since 2000 and that trend continued between 2012 and 2013. The Census Bureau estimates that natural increase (births minus deaths) accounted for 78% of the total change in the U.S. Hispanic population from 2012 to 2013.

By comparison, growth in the Asian American population has been fueled primarily by immigration. Fully 74% of Asian adults in 2012 were foreign born according to Pew Research Center analysis of Census data, and international migration accounted for about 61% of the total change in the Asian American population from 2012 to 2013. (Asian American figures represent the population who reported their race alone or in combination with one or more races, and includes Hispanics. Hispanics are of any race.)

Link: U.S. Hispanic and Asian populations growing, but for different reasons

The Map Of Native American Tribes You've Never Seen Before

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The Map Of Native American Tribes You've Never Seen Before (NPR All Things Considered, 24 June 2014)

Excerpt:

Finding an address on a map can be taken for granted in the age of GPS and smartphones. But centuries of forced relocation, disease and genocide have made it difficult to find where many Native American tribes once lived. Aaron Carapella, a self-taught mapmaker in Warner, Okla., has pinpointed the locations and original names of hundreds of American Indian nations before their first contact with Europeans.

Link: The Map Of Native American Tribes You've Never Seen Before

Asian Americans Growing Faster Than Any Other Group in the U.S.

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Asian Americans Growing Faster Than Any Other Group in the U.S. (NBC News, 26 June 2014)

Excerpt:

ince 2010, Asian Americans have been the fastest-growing racial/ethnic group in the United States. New Census Bureau data confirms that trend continues, with the total Asian-American population in the U.S. at 19.4 million, reflecting a growth rate of 2.9% between 2012 and 2013. That's faster than Hispanics (2.1%), African Americans (1.2%) and Native Hawaiians and Other Pacific Islanders (2.3%). That 2.9% growth represents about 554,000 people, and according to the report, the primary driver of that population growth was immigration, "accounting for 61 percent of the total Asian population change in the last year."

Link: Asian Americans Growing Faster Than Any Other Group in the U.S.

Trends indicate Asian Americans should be turning Republican – but they’re not

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Trends indicate Asian Americans should be turning Republican – but they’re not (Research News at Vanderbilt, 11 June 2014)

Excerpts:

Rising income among other factors indicate that Asian Americans should be a natural fit for the Republican Party, yet they have flocked to the other side at a stunning pace. In the 2012 presidential election, Democratic President Obama garnered 73 percent of the Asian American vote, and Asian Americans have been steadily moving to the Democratic Party over the last two decades, say three academics who are studying the issue.

“It’s puzzling because in political science, it is well-documented that income is positively correlated with the Republican Party,” said Cecilia Mo, assistant professor of political science at Vanderbilt University and one of three authors of the paper, “Why do Asian Americans Identify as Democrats? Testing Theories of Social Exclusion and Intergroup Solidarity.”

“Yet here is this group (Asian Americans) going against this trend that we’ve noticed for decades. Moreover, wealthy Asian Americans are even more likely to vote for Democrats than poorer Asian Americans.”

Link: Trends indicate Asian Americans should be turning Republican – but they’re not

Remembering Yuri Kochiyama (1921-2014)

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Remembering Yuri Kochiyama

• Yuri Kochiyama, Activist And Former World War II Internee, Dies At 93 (NPR All Things Considered, 2 June 2014)
  
• Rest in Power, Yuri Kochiyama: A Civil Rights Leader Who Inspired a Generation (Reappropriate, 1 June 2014)
  
• Not Just A 'Black Thing': An Asian-American's Bond With Malcolm X, by Hansi Lo Wang (NPR Morning Edition, 19 August 2013)
• See also: Wikipedia Entry

Remembering the 25th Anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Protests

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Remembering the 25th Anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Protests:

• 'Tiananmen Square is being cleansed with blood': horror of that night lives on after 25 years (The Conversation, 4 June 2014)
• 'It will be imcomparably more difficult to rule China' (New York Times, 3 June 2014)
  
• 25 Years Ago: The Tiananmen Square Protests (San Francisco Chronicle, 3 June 2014)
• Tiananmen Square at 25 (The Wilson Quarterly)
• Tiananmen Square Leader and Other Experts Describe Growth of Christianity in China (Brookings, 3 June 2014)

Who says there are no AAPI civil rights heroes? 16-part video series profiles AAPI civil rights icons for Heritage Month

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Who says there are no AAPI civil rights heroes? 16-part video series profiles AAPI civil rights icons for Heritage Month (Angry Asian Man, 14 May 2014)

Abstract:

Some history for your Heritage Month... In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Asian Law Caucus is releasing a 16-part series of short videos profiling AAPI civil rights heroes, from Wong Kim Ark to Larry Itliong to Japanese American internment dissenters.

Link: Who says there are no AAPI civil rights heroes? 16-part video series profiles AAPI civil rights icons for Heritage Month

Not Just A 'Black Thing': An Asian-American's Bond With Malcolm X

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Not Just A 'Black Thing': An Asian-American's Bond With Malcolm X, by Hansi Lo Wang (NPR Morning Edition, 19 August 2013)

Excerpt:

The brief friendship of Malcolm X and Yuri Kochiyama began close to 50 years ago with a handshake. Diane Fujino, chairwoman of the Asian-American studies department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, details the moment in her biography Heartbeat of Struggle: The Revolutionary Life of Yuri Kochiyama. Kochiyama and her eldest son, 16-year-old Billy, were arrested along with hundreds of other people, mainly African-Americans, during a protest in Brooklyn, N.Y., in October 1963. "[They were] in this packed courthouse," Fujino says. "[There were] a lot of activists who [were] waiting their hearing on the civil disobedience charges."

Link: Not Just A 'Black Thing': An Asian-American's Bond With Malcolm X

Slate, you are doing it wrong

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Slate, you are doing it wrong, by by Karthick Ramakrishnan (AAPI Voices, 15 May 2014)

Excerpt:

There’s a map that Slate made recently that’s been getting a lot of shares. The map is part of a post on language diversity, and it shows the top language in each state other than English or Spanish. We dug a little deeper, and found a few problems. First, looking at the most recent American Community Survey data,* we find more Asian languages in the top spot than Slate found. Like Chinese in New Jersey and North Carolina. And Hmong in Wisconsin. And Vietnamese in Mississippi.

Link: Slate, you are doing it wrong

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Descendants Of Chinese Laborers Reclaim Railroad's History

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Descendants Of Chinese Laborers Reclaim Railroad's History (NPR All Things Considered, 10 May 2014)

Excerpts:

East finally met West 145 years ago on America's first transcontinental railroad. The symbolic hammering of a golden spike at Promontory Summit, Utah, completed the connection between the country's two coasts and shortened a cross-country trip of more than six months down to a week. Much of the building was done by thousands of laborers brought in from China, but their faces were left out of photographs taken on that momentous day.

Over the years, one photograph in particular from May 10, 1869, has taken root in U.S. history. "It's a black-and-white, very historic-looking photo," says Connie Young Yu, the great-granddaughter of a Chinese laborer on the railroad. The iconic image shows a crowd of men swarmed around two locomotives. "In the middle are the two engineers shaking hands," Yu says. "And above them are workers hoisting champagne bottles." The bubbly marked the long-awaited completion of the Gateway to the American West, nearly 2,000 miles of iron rail that crossed the Rockies and Sierra Nevada.

But the portrait wasn't perfect. "History — at least photographically — says that the Chinese were not present," says photographer Corky Lee.

Link: Descendants Of Chinese Laborers Reclaim Railroad's History

Related Link: A ‘photographic act of justice’ for Chinese laborers at Golden Spike (The Salt Lake Tribune, 10 May 2014)

The Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project at Stanford University

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The Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project at Stanford University

Abstract:

Between 1865 and 1869, thousands of Chinese migrants toiled at a grueling pace and in perilous working conditions to help construct America’s First Transcontinental Railroad. The Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project seeks to give a voice to the Chinese migrants whose labor on the Transcontinental Railroad helped to shape the physical and social landscape of the American West. The Project coordinates research in the United States and Asia in order to create an on-line digital archive available to all. The Project is also organizing major conferences and public events at Stanford and in China in 2015 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the arrival of large numbers of Chinese to work on the railroad.

Link: The Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project at Stanford University

Our Complicity with Excess

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Our Complicity With Excess, by Vijay Iyer (Asian American Writers' Workshop, 7 May 2014)

Abstract:

To succeed in America means that at some level you’ve made peace with its rather ugly past. Vijay Iyer’s speech to Yale’s Asian American alumni.

Link: Our Complicity With Excess

On Diversity, Institutional Whiteness and Its Will for Change

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On Diversity, Institutional Whiteness and Its Will for Change, by W. Anne Joh (Religious Studies News, May 2014)

Excerpt:

Ask doctoral students from underrepresented communities of color how well they are being prepared for becoming theological educators in a rapidly changing climate and most will say “not well at all.” My reflections here revolve around a few questions that seem to emerge quite frequently in doctoral studies, especially from students of racial/ethnic minority communities and what institutional racism does to them during the process of going through a doctoral program. How are the needs of these students met or not met within the predominantly white institutions and programs whose curricula often reflect absence and foreclosure of the historical legacy of systemic racism? How can institutions committed to cultivating institutional diversity transform so that all students might thrive during their studies, become well prepared to enter their profession as educators, and be equipped to integrate into their teaching the quotidian issues that our societies face?

The life of white racism has neither been transformed nor dismantled even as university demographics change. If there has been any transformation of racialized dynamics and institutional racism, one could argue that race has become “a way of organizing and managing populations in order to attain certain societal goals such as . . . social unity.” Race as a technology of management conceals more than it reveals structures of inequality. Commitments to so-called institutional diversity can easily slide to the use of that term, diversity, solely as a form of institutional public relations. This form of diversity “work” changes perceptions of whiteness but does nothing to transform whiteness of institutions. As Sara Ahmed observes, “changing perceptions of whiteness can be how an institution can reproduce whiteness,” rather than dismantle it.

Link: On Diversity, Institutional Whiteness and Its Will for Change

MFA vs. POC

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MFA vs. POC, by Junot Diaz (The New Yorker, 30 April 2014)

Abstract:

This is a condensed version of the introduction to "Dismantle: An Anthology of Writing from the VONA/Voices Writing Workshop."

Link: MFA vs. POC

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, by Peggy McIntosh

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White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, by Peggy McIntosh

Excerpts:

Through work to bring materials from women's studies into the rest of the curriculum, I have often noticed men's unwillingness to grant that they are overprivileged, even though they may grant that women are disadvantaged. They may say they will work to women's statues, in the society, the university, or the curriculum, but they can't or won't support the idea of lessening men's. Denials that amount to taboos surround the subject of advantages that men gain from women's disadvantages. These denials protect male privilege from being fully acknowledged, lessened, or ended.

Thinking through unacknowledged male privilege as a phenomenon, I realized that, since hierarchies in our society are interlocking, there was most likely a phenomenon of while privilege that was similarly denied and protected. As a white person, I realized I had been taught about racism as something that puts others at a disadvantage, but had been taught not to see one of its corollary aspects, white privilege, which puts me at an advantage.

I think whites are carefully taught not to recognize white privilege, as males are taught not to recognize male privilege. So I have begun in an untutored way to ask what it is like to have white privilege. I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was "meant" to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools , and blank checks.

Link: White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack

The Origins of "Privilege"

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The Origins of "Privilege," by Joshua Rothman (The New Yorker, 13 May 2014)

Excerpt:

The idea of “privilege”—that some people benefit from unearned, and largely unacknowledged, advantages, even when those advantages aren’t discriminatory —has a pretty long history. In the nineteen-thirties, W. E. B. Du Bois wrote about the “psychological wage” that enabled poor whites to feel superior to poor blacks; during the civil-rights era, activists talked about “white-skin privilege.” But the concept really came into its own in the late eighties, when Peggy McIntosh, a women’s-studies scholar at Wellesley, started writing about it. In 1988, McIntosh wrote a paper called “White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences Through Work in Women’s Studies,” which contained forty-six examples of white privilege. (No. 21: “I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.” No. 24: “I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to the ‘person in charge,’ I will be facing a person of my race.”) Those examples have since been read by countless schoolkids and college students—including, perhaps, Tal Fortgang, the Princeton freshman whose recent article, “Checking My Privilege,” has been widely debated.

Link: The Origins of "Privilege"

Wharton Study Shows the Shocking Result When Women and Minorities Email Their Professors

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Wharton Study Shows the Shocking Result When Women and Minorities Email Their Professors (PolicyMic, 1 May 2014)

Excerpts:

If you're a woman or minority student looking for a mentor, don't hold your breath. New research has found that university professors exhibit a bias in favor of their white male students, information that, while perhaps not unexpected, is seriously bad news for the nation's aspiring academics.

According to a segment produced by NPR, researchers led by the Wharton School's Katherine Milkman emailed 6,500 professors from 89 disciplines at the top 259 schools, pretending to be students. These emails replicated the same message; the only variable was the sender's name — for example, "Brad Anderson, Meredith Roberts, Lamar Washington, LaToya Brown, Juanita Martinez, Deepak Patel, Sonali Desai, Chang Wong, Mei Chen" — deliberately crafted in order to test the racial and gender bias in professor response. The type of student who garnered the most responses? The white male. As Milkman told NPR, professors "ignored requests from women and minorities at a higher rate than requests from white males. ... We see a 25-percentage-point gap in the response rate to Caucasian males versus women and minorities."

Read the: Original Research Article

Link: Wharton Study Shows the Shocking Result When Women and Minorities Email Their Professors