The views and opinions expressed on this site and blog posts (excluding comments on blog posts left by others) are entirely my own and do not represent those of any employer or organization with whom I am currently or previously have been associated.
Academic Version: Applying my personal experiences and academic research as a professor of Sociology and Asian American Studies to provide a more complete understanding of political, economic, and cultural issues and current events related to American race relations, and Asia/Asian America in particular.
Plain English: Trying to put my Ph.D. to good use.
In the recent 2006 midterm elections, Asian Americans made themselves prominent at the polls and on the ballot. As the Orange County Register reports, that election saw the largest number of Asian American candidates ever in the populous southern California county:
The Nov. 7 election featured the highest number of Asian-American candidates in the county’s history, political observers say. Of the Read More →
Liberals like me have been generally ruthless in lambasting President Bush and his policies these last six years. This time however, I must congratulate him for (finally) doing the right thing by approving funds to preserve ten of the camps in which a large portion of 120,000 Japanese Americans were unjustly and illegally imprisoned during World War II:
I’ve written about slow march of modern American-style capitalist consumer culture into traditional Chinese society on several occasions (click here for the latest such post). As the Christian Science Monitor reports, the latest example of this clash of contemporary vs. traditional is in regard to how Confucian ideals have been reemphasized to young students in Chinese classrooms, and how this Read More →
There is a Chinese proverb that describes the Emperor as the wind and the people as the grass: the grass bends according to the wind. This adage summarizes the traditional Chinese view on matters of government and populace. Ironically, these roles may be reversing as the Chinese government (at municipal level) is beginning to bend to the urgings of Read More →
You might remember several months ago the furor that erupted over CBS’s plan to structure their next Survivor reality TV series based on racial groups. As it turns out, after the dust finally settled, one of the Asian American contestants, Yul Kwon, a management consultant from San Mateo, CA was crowned the million dollar winner:
Kwon, a 31-year-old management consultant who Read More →
For those who don’t know already, Rosie O’Donnell is an actress and talk show host who has seen her fair share of controversy through the years. The latest incident occurred on Dec. 5, 2006 on her talk show The View when she was discussing actor Danny DeVito’s recent drunken run-in with police and how she predicted that the story was Read More →
On Thursday, December 14, 2006, the Guardian Unlimited published a story of immense sadness for members of the scientific community and for those who care about conservation. The Baiji, a rare Chinese dolphin that inhabited the Yangtze River, was declared extinct after a six-week hunt failed to find any living specimen. Even if there are one or two living Read More →
The editor-in-chief at International Figure Skating magazine alerted me to the increasing prominence of several up-and-coming Asian and Asian American figure skaters. For those who are interested to learn more, here are some links:
Asada Leads Ladies Field; US and Japan Each Have Five Entrants
Japanese Men Sweep Podium at NHK
Mao Asada Makes History; Leads Sweep of Ladies at NHK
Yu-Na Kim Makes Read More →
This should come as no surprise to any student who attends one of the nine University of California campuses, but now we have data to show the exact extent to which Asian American students are overrepresented within the U.C. system. Not only that, but at seven of the nine U.C. campuses, Asian Americans are the largest racial/ethnic group (even larger Read More →
Say you’re a Chinese entrepreneur who’s newly rich, single, and looking for a wife. Sure, you can do the usual things and try the usual spots to try to find a wife, but there’s a more (supposedly) convenient alternative now available: matchmaking cruises designed to pair rich Chinese men with beautiful and desirable Chinese women:
One of the topics that I’ve consistently posted about is how Arabs, Muslims, and anybody perceived to be Arab or Muslim continue to be subjected to racial profiling, intolerance, and discrimination. Ultimately, the primary culprit of this has been the U.S. government by not just direct actions against Arabs and Muslims since 9/11 but also because of creating and in Read More →
As I’ve written about before, the effects of affirmative action on Asian Americans is a hotly-debated topic. Adding fuel to the fire is the latest development — an Asian American applicant with seemingly stellar qualifications was rejected at Princeton and has filed a federal complaint against the school for discrimination:
His complaint states that he received 800s on the mathematics, critical Read More →
