Asian American Studies Commons^™

Women Strength: Using Photovoice To Explore Female Chinese International Students’ Experiences, Yue Cai

Doctoral Dissertations

Female Chinese international students face discrimination and stereotypes in Western academia based on race and gender, yet they possess unique “Women Strength” characterized by agency, resilience, and self-advocacy. This study explores how these students navigate cultural differences and develop their strengths while studying in the U.S. Drawing upon “Women Strength” as a theoretical framework, including Community Cultural Wealth, Critical Feminist Theory- Chinese feminism, decolonial feminism, and transnational feminism, transformative agency, resilience theory, and self-advocacy theory, this research employs a qualitative approach, including Photovoice and autoethnography. Three research questions guide the study: 1) What cultural differences do female Chinese international students …

The Migration Of South Asians From India To Guyana: The Journey, Struggles In A New Land, Reasons For Changes Over Time And Their Cultivation Of A New Culture., Cynthia C. Harry

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Indians from different regions of India arrived in Guyana through indentureship in 1838. They were under a five-year contract and had to work on the sugar plantations for the duration of their indentureship. While they tried to persist their Indian culture, assimilation in their new environments and interaction with people of different cultures, allowed them to develop a culture unique to Indo Guyanese heritage.

This thesis focuses on the history of Indian diaspora in Guyana. It evokes the struggles they faced on the ships, and during and after indentureship. It also touches on the political and racial issues they had …

Parent Strategies For Antiracist Parenting In Families Of Multiracial And Asian Descent, Matlida Tavares

Doctoral Dissertations

The Pew Research Center’s analysis of United States census data depicts and increasing number of individuals identifying as more than one race. From 2010 to 2020, the population had nearly doubled to 13.5 million. This is particularly evident in states with large populations of Asian American communities such as California, where nearly two million people identify as multiracial and people identifying as both White and Asian making up the largest portion of the 61% increase the state saw since 2010 (Henderson, 2022). Despite claims that an increase in multiracial individuals signifies an end of racism, multiracial children, navigating complex ethnic …

Lingua Asia: Decolonizing Heritage Language Education, Collin Absher

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The emergence of APIA programs within higher education has assisted in posing the question of what should be included in the K-12 history curriculum as it is lacking in Asian American history, African American history, and other marginalized groups’ history and information. In tandem, heritage learning Mandarin classes, while they do attempt to bring the students' writing and reading levels up to their speaking levels, instead focus solely on Chinese history, culture, identity, and societal problems. This is valuable; however, what of the Chinese American identity? There has been a surplus of over 200 years of Chinese American history within …

Hagwon: Shadow Education In The Korean American Community, Minkyu Kim

Theses and Dissertations

Asian and Asian American students are achieving academic success at disproportionate rates, even when faced with low social capital (i.e., English is not the primary language spoken at home) and high rates of poverty (especially in urban settings like New York City). A contributing factor to their academic success is shadow education. Shadow education (SE) is defined as systemized learning that occurs outside of compulsory schooling, at private cost, with the objective of guiding students through and providing them with a competitive edge in school admissions—often with a focus on high-stakes standardized academic exams (Bray, 1999, 2013). In Korean, shadow …

Historical Trauma: Literary And Testimonial Responses To Hiroshima, Mariam Ghonim

Theses and Dissertations

The concept of trauma is controversial in literature. While one may be able to come up with ways to describe trauma in fiction, representing historical trauma is a hard task for writers. Some argue that trauma can not be described through those who did not experience it, while others claim that, provided some elements are added, one can represent trauma to the reader. This thesis focuses on twentieth-century historical traumas related to a nuclear catastrophe and explores the different literary and testimonial responses to the catastrophic man-made event of Hiroshima (1945). In this thesis, Kathleen Burkinshaw’s historical fiction The Last …

Moving At The Speed Of Trust, Sun Ho Lee

Masters Theses

Moving at the Speed of Trust is a workbook of strategies — practices, definitions, and techniques — to nurture community-building in support of inbetweeners who live between power structures and cultures and are often left out. Inbetweeners are those individuals whose lives are in transition through recent immigration or forced translocation from Asia to America.

These strategies revolve around threads of trust: kin, giggles, vulnerability, and shared experience. With these threads, we can question power. We can preserve stories, expand the ways we connect, shift perspectives on what is “standard,” and cultivate a community rooted in understanding. To understand each …

Hmong Parents' Perspectives On The Effectiveness Of Hmong Language And Culture Programs, Lia Vang

Doctorate in Education

In this dissertation, I examined Hmong parents' perspectives on the effectiveness of Hmong language and culture (HLC) programs in helping their children maintain the Hmong language and cultural practices. It was guided by three research questions that sought to uncover Hmong parents' experiences with heritage language shifts (HLS), their perceptions of their children's experiences, their perceived effectiveness of Hmong language and culture programs, and the roles they believe home and school play in the language and culture maintenance process. Drawing from a phenomenological research approach, narratives from semi-structured interviews with nine Hmong parents from two Hmong charter schools brought forward …

From The Lens Of (In)Visibility: A Photovoice Inquiry Into How Community Colleges Can Advance Filipino/A/X American Student Resilience, Rangel Velez Zarate

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The dearth of research on Filipino/a/x American (FilAm) community college students perpetuates the narrative that they are regarded as “invisible,” receiving limited academic and social support. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent violence and discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) has exacerbated the already distressing academic and racialized experiences of FilAm students.

In this qualitative study, nine FilAm students who attended a community college in the Western United States participated in an online photovoice project which visualized their personal reflections and specific academic needs through digital photos and written narratives. Findings from this study indicated …

Re-Envisioning Self And Community: The Experiences Of Pilipina American Students With Colonial Mentality And Decolonization, Kristine Angelica Din

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation explores the invisibility of Pilipina American narratives in higher education by investigating colonialism and colonial mentality and how they may shape the experiences of Pilipina American undergraduate students in higher education. This study was framed by Pinayism (Tintiangco-Cubales, 2005; Tintiangco-Cubales & Sacramento, 2009), Strobel’s (2001) decolonization framework, and the Colonial Mentality Scale (CMS) (David & Okazaki, 2006b). Participants reflected upon their life stories to explore and make meaning of the ways their lives have been informed by events that have occurred and the messages they received from their families, peers, teachers, and communities. Participants also engaged with indigenous, …

Professional Identity Development Of Asian American & Pacific Islander Aanapisi Staff, Sara Boxell Hoang

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

In spite of a swiftly growing AAPI undergraduate student population, higher education staff remain predominantly White with AAPIs significantly underrepresented within the field. The underrepresentation of AAPI professional staff is a problem not only because it may represent a lack of a career pipeline for AAPIs entering the workforce, but it also negatively impacts the large population of AAPI students who struggle to access and succeed in higher education. Contrary to prevalent stereotypes and misconceptions, many AAPI undergraduates are first-generation college students, come from low-income backgrounds, and struggle to obtain bachelor’s degrees (Maramba, 2011). Although AAPIs in predominately White fields …

Cùng Với Nhau Chung Tay: A Collaborative Project With Vietnamese American Youth, Khanh Le

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of my research is to document, remember and reflect on the experiences of Vietnamese Americans. To create a space in which Vietnamese American youth can co-labor (García, 2020) and co-produce knowledge to disrupt the silence surrounding their lived experience in the U.S., I drew across methodological traditions for this collaborative project. In doing so, I seek to answer the following questions:

1. How do Vietnamese American youth view/narrate their lives and relationships to the past and the present in the U.S. and Vietnam?
2. What do youths’ narratives communicate about their transtrauma?

This collaborative project drew from translanguaging and …

Interrogating Whiteness In Graduate Education Culture: A Phenomenological Exploration Of Southeast Asian American Graduate Student Experiences, Lesley Nina Sisaket

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study is to understand the role that whiteness has in shaping the graduate education experiences of Southeast Asian American students in the United States. This study explores two research questions. 1) How do Southeast Asian American graduate students describe their graduate education? 2) How do Southeast Asian American graduate students describe concepts of whiteness, if any, throughout their graduate education? According to the experiences from six selfidentifying Southeast Asian American students, their graduate education experiences were described to be racially taxing, unchallenging, and isolating experiences. These findings stemmed from their graduate education experiences, which …

Improving Veteran Access; Status Of Operations Of The United States Department Of Veteran Affairs Work-Study Program, Kirk Allen

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The usage status of The U.S. Department Veterans Affairs Work-Study Program is examined. Beneficiary numbers from the Global, Unites States, State, and Local/County perspective are reviewed. While of essential value, the program suffers from a lack of scholarly research and government oversight, and is further hindered by restrictive administrative rules lived first-hand. Research suggests that the program is operating outside of accountability to the taxpayer, presents as unnecessarily/overly-restrictive in accessibility, and is underutilized. The program appears to not be serving all veterans to full potential.

The Work-Study Program is codified in Veterans Benefits', Title 38 United States Code, Part III, …

Mechanisms Of Biases And Cultural Literacy In International Language Education: One Such Story To Carry, Yukari Birkett

Ed.D. Dissertations in Practice

Despite equity and inclusion initiatives, the English based colonial model has permeated the kindergarten to college systems, teaching/learning, theories and methods, the perception of second language acquisition, multiculturalism, and language education (Knowles et al., 2015; Macedo, 2019; Phillips & Abbot, 2011; Battiste, 2013). Additionally, cognitive neuroscientific discoveries of the complexity of language learning, emotional intelligence, and cultural literacy systematically failed to reach educators. Few studies have focused on what factors impact on cultural biases of foreign language learners, or what factors in learning facilitate the dismantling of durable biases. What are the hidden agendas for teaching and learning foreign languages? …

Exploring Taiwanese Creative Arts Therapists' Professional Identity After Returning Home From Studying Abroad, Rhona Jung Jung Chang

Expressive Therapies Dissertations

This study aimed to document Taiwanese creative arts therapists' career experiences after studying abroad and returning home, and how they perceive their professional identity as creative arts therapists in Taiwan. This qualitative study explores the experience of eight female professional Taiwanese creative arts therapists, including two art therapists, two dance/movement therapists, two drama therapists, and two music therapists. Interviews were conducted, and the participants were asked about their personal experience of art-making, the practice of creative arts therapies in Taiwan, and the understanding and awareness of their professional identity.

Data from this study was gathered by the interviews' transcripts and …

Human Capital Formation And Return Migration Within Mong Communities In Rural/Semi-Rural Northern California, Chong Yang

University of the Pacific Theses and Dissertations

This research uses computational grounded theory to explore the human capital formation and stay/return migration experiences of well-educated Mong adults living in various rural/semi-rural Northern California localities within Butte, Yuba, and Sutter Counties. Rural vitality is dependent on the return of these well-educated rural-raised adults. Out-migration of rurality’s best and brightest contributes towards a brain drain and the hallowing out of rurality’s human capital. Findings of this research is conveyed using two research articles examining two different points on the continuum of rural vitality. The first article examines 19 Mong adults’ educational experiences within their rural communities and college education. …

The Effects Of Racialization On Sikhs In America: An Intersectional Approach, Harsirjan K. Roopra

Senior Theses

Sikhs have been largely ignored in the literature surrounding social justice and religious tolerance. The many pressures Sikhs face, and the social assumptions that lead to them, must be brought into the broader conversation on these issues so that educators and politicians might help support the well-being of the Sikh community. Sikh identity has been misinterpreted and redefined in modern day American society. The lack of cultural and religious literacy of many Americans, coupled with Sikhs’ distinct visible identity, has led to xenophobic violence against Sikhs since their arrival in the U.S. more than a century ago. The root of …

Undocumented Asian Immigrants: Securing Higher Education And Cultural Citizenship, Ka Kui Lee

Master's Theses

This research investigates how undocumented Asian immigrants navigate the obstacles of higher education. It inquires how undocumented Asian immigrant students navigated the higher education process and how institutional actors influenced their college experience, revealing the intimate interactions between undocumented students and the institutional actors. The political economy of their college application process is understood through the frameworks of liminal legality, narratives, cultural citizenship, borders and boundaries, and governmentality of migration, all of which frame the process of the data analysis.

Through the interviews of college-graduated undocumented Asian immigrants and ethnography at a local high school in the San Francisco Bay …

South Asian Americans’ Identity Journeys To Becoming Critically Conscious Educators, Radhika Khandelwal

LMU/LLS Theses and Dissertations

Typical identity stereotypes for South Asian Americans, such as the model minority myth, do not convincingly support a trajectory into K–12 education, as South Asian Americans are not readily seen as agents for social change. This qualitative study explored how South Asian American educators’ understanding of their ethnic and racial identity interplayed with their practice as critically conscious educators for social justice. Eleven participants who self-identified as social-justice-oriented were interviewed to share their experiences as South Asian American educators. Their responses revealed South Asian American educators develop their ethnic identity consciousness in complex ways, demonstrating self-awareness and subsequently draw upon …

Negotiating My Chineseness In College: The Complexities And Uniqueness Of Being Chinese American, Yan Wang

Theses and Dissertations--Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation

Chinese Americans are historically perceived as “perpetual foreigners” in the American political, cultural and racial discourses. People of Chinese descent have long been conceived as sharing a same ancestor as those in China. Situated in the global context of China’s rise in the world, culturally, politically and economically, this research looks at how Chinese American college students negotiate their ethnic identity in the Midwest of the United States. The current Coronavirus outbreak brought new waves of anti-Chinese/Asian sentiment into American political and cultural life. This rhetoric makes the discussion of Chinese American college students’ ethnicity construction crucial.

Using qualitative research …

Untwining Threads: Second Wave Hmong Parents’ Conceptualizations Of Ways To Support Their Adolescent Children’S Education, Mao Sea Lee

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This research identifies the support systems for adolescents’ education within the second wave Hmong refugee family setting. The study examines the parents’ perspectives on their own support systems for their adolescents’ education. The work focuses on studying both the instrumental support and psychological care these parents provide their teenage children and interprets why these parents choose to provide these resources. Studying these parents’ ways of supporting their adolescents provided a more in-depth understanding of why these recent refugee parents choose to invest of their resources to their adolescents’ education and, subsequently, what education means to them. The research also brought …

Southeast Asian American Students’ Perspectives On Influences That Lead To High School Dropout, Elizabeth D. Kuo

CGU Theses & Dissertations

High school dropouts continue to happen in the U.S. without a clear solution. Southeast Asian American (SEAA) is a population with significantly disproportionate high school dropout rates and one of the lowest enrollment rates in higher education. This study seeks to challenge the notion that “all” Asians are high-achieving by analyzing the reasons why a surprising number do not do well, i.e., drop out of school. A better understanding of the perspectives of Southeast Asian American students on the factors and influences that lead to their decision or cause to drop out of high school is the focus of this …

Splinters From The Bamboo Ceiling: Understanding The Experiences Of Asian American Men In Higher Education Leadership, Jerald Adamos

Doctoral Dissertations

Asian Americans continue to confront perceptions connected to the perpetual foreigner and model minority concepts which challenges their acceptance as leaders in mainstream American culture. Asian men have recently been able to attain higher levels of education that opens doors to higher level positions and organizations yet still face barriers to career advancement opportunities. In consideration of the American higher education system, Whites continue to exceed their proportional representation in areas of the institution while Asian Americans do not. The purpose of this study is to understand how the intersection of racial and gender identity has influenced leadership through the …

Asian American Community College Presidents: An Asiancrit Analysis Of Their Approaches To Leadership, Johnny Hu

Ed.D. Dissertations in Practice

This study explores the experiences of five current and former Asian American community college presidents including their career transitions into executive leadership using an AsianCrit analysis for framing their narrative experiences. The literature review situates the experiences of Asian American community college presidents in various contexts by providing a brief summary of several historical moments and political movements that have shaped the realities they currently confront as higher education leaders. This study employed a Critical Race Theory (CRT) approach to counter storytelling to analyze the participants’ narratives both individually and thematically based on their social identities as Asian Americans and …

Dmt And “The Man Box:” Provoking Change And Encouraging Authentic Living, An Arts-Based Project, Steven Reynolds

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This thesis explores the mind-body experience through an arts-based research approach to examine, and redefine the emotional capacity and usefulness of males through societal determinants that limits and hinders men from living their authentic selves. Through the lens of a metaphoric “Man Box” 112 men participated in a workshop recreating their personal narratives of socialization through, style of dress, coping mechanisms, belief systems and who they should be as men through society's standards. In the “Man Box,” male bonding, and emotional feelings are discouraged, while the objectification of women, material property and physical/emotional strength are encouraged. This research investigates the …

Empowering Filipino American Young Adults Through Culturally Relevant Leadership Experiences, Donnaly Y. Atajar

M.A. in Higher Education Leadership: Action Research Projects

The purpose of this study was to explore the leadership development of Filipino American young adults. As an advisor for Lakas Mentorship Program in the Inland Empire, I explored the following question among program staff and mentors: How could I use culturally relevant curriculum to foster personal and professional development for young Filipino American leaders? I evaluated the impact of four cycles centered on leadership training and improving program practices to understand how to deepen engagement and facilitate positive transformation. I found that the following contributed to meaningful engagement: intentional leadership opportunities, institutionalized program structure, and peer mentorship and community …

Subtle Asian Womxn, Long Tran

Global Honors Theses

My involvement with the Global Honors Program culminates with a senior capstone project for T GH 496 Experiential Learning in Global Honors. Over the course of spring quarter, I had the opportunity to produce a documentary film, under the supervision of my faculty advisor, Dr. David Coon, to fulfill the requirements to graduate with a minor in Global Engagement and earn the full distinction from the program. My film actively engages with the intersection of the historical representations of Asian womxn and their lived experiences with dating. As of Wednesday, May 1, 2019, I have been able to interview 14 …

"Name Her Reiko!": The Ikemiya Diaspora, Morgan Ikemiya

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This creative-nonfiction project encapsulates a Japanese family diaspora to America beginning in the late 1880s. Through short stories, poems, and monologues, the author expresses familial struggles such as living in a foreign land and being Japanese in White America. The author reflects on her grandparents' time in the Japanese internment camps where they faced hardship and hegemonic oppression as well as her father's experience of growing up Japanese-American in Los Angeles. The stories weave together history, hardship, and race to create a unique diaspora story.

Racial Microaggressions And Alienation Among Hmong American College Students, Bruce Yang

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Students of color continue to experience racism within institutions of higher education across the United States. These experiences often include racial microaggressions, which are evolved forms of racism that are subtle, difficult to detect, and harmful. Racial microaggressions have been found to be associated with several consequences including mental health, emotional, and physical problems (Dahlia & Lieberman, 2010; Connolly, 2011; Cheng, Tran, Miyake, & Kim, 2017). Furthermore, studies have also alluded to the potential relationship between racial microaggressions and the dimensions of alienation for student populations of color (Fissori, 2010; James, 1988; Lambert, Herman, Bynum, & Ialongo, 2009; Sauceda, 2010; …