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This month, we celebrate and honor Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage. Whoohoo for all our AAPI readers! For me, a Latinx non-Asian person, it’s a time to learn from and listen to the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities around me. Here’s my context: I didn’t really know any Asian people until I attended high school, I think my elementary school didn’t have any Asian students, definitely no one in my class. My only exposure to Asian culture in elementary school was learning about Japanese internment during WWII and reading “Farewell to Manzanar” by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston. Leaving my primarily Latinx elementary school for a diverse high school was an incredible learning experience. My first day I was meeting people from so many cultures for the first time, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, China, Japan, South Korea, Philippines, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan. I was learning from my classmates and friends about their cultures, how their families traveled to the US, trying new food, hearing their languages being spoken. But it wasn’t all fun and gorging on delicious food, I was also being corrected about my assumptions and stereotypes of their cultures. I didn’t know it then but I was getting a crash course on diversity and inclusion, on empathy and allyship. Needless to say it was transformational. I care about the careers of all women of color and listening to the experiences of other women is core to supporting and acknowledging one another. Here’s a few pieces that I’ve read recently illuminating workplace experiences for Asian American and Pacific Islander women: She’s Asian and female. But she’s not me. By Michelle Ye Hee Lee
Stop Calling Asian Women Adorable By R.O. Kwon
Pushing Against The Boundaries Of Koreanness About Hannah Yoo
How to Stop Fetishizing My Chinese Identity By Rae Chen
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