06/08/2015
To honor the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act, Lee (Angel Island), University of Minnesota historian and director of the Immigration History Research Center, tackles the sensitive subject of Asian-American assimilation in this ambitious, sweeping, and insightful survey. Charting the immigration story of individual nations rather than employing the “simplistic and monolithic ‘model minority’ lens,” Lee opens with 19th-century indentured servitude as Chinese “coolies” arrived in the Americas, and moves through the subsequent experiences of immigrants from Japan, Korea, and a range of South and Southeast Asian countries. Part two tracks each group’s struggle for acceptance, Part Three covers the impact of WWII, and Part Four addresses the 1.2 million displaced Southeast Asian refugees who settled in the U.S. after 1975. Lee brings her Chinese-American background into the mix, dating her roots to a great-great-great-grandfather who arrived during the California Gold Rush. As the rush wound down, the Chinese provided services such as laundries and restaurants—self-employment offering a solution to the harsh reality of workplace discrimination. Despite assimilation and socio-economic success, Lee reminds readers that “Asian Americans are seen as Asians, not Americans, and come to embody whatever threat the land of their ancestry allegedly poses to the United States.” Agent: Sandra Dijkstra, Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency. (Sept.)
"Epic and eye-opening."
**Winner of the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature**
**A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2015**
**New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice**
"Racism, as Lee shows, was the unifying factor in the Asian-American experience, bringing together twenty-three distinct immigrant groups, from very different parts of the world. . . . In the eyes of some, Asians in America are, Lee writes, 'perpetual foreigners at worst, or probationary Americans at best.' If Asians sometimes remain silent in the face of racism, and if some seem to work unusually hard in the face of this difficult history, it is not because they want to be part of a 'model minority,' but because they have often had no other choice."
"In this fascinating retelling of the American creation story, Lee uses incisive scholarship, a wide historic lens and rich detail to fill in the long missing Asian-American pieces. Starting with ancient Greece and the Age of Exploration, from enslavement to modern day challenges, Lee tracks the epic Asian-American journey to North and South Americas, East Indies to West Indies, and in doing so, she breaks new ground and inverts the master narrative."
In her sweeping, powerful new book, Lee considers the rich, complicated, and sometimes invisible histories of Asians in the United States.
Accessibly written for a wide readership, The Making of Asian America opens important, new perspectives on the relationship of the U.S. and the world.
"Building on the best and newest scholarship, Erika Lee has written a sweeping yet personal and critical history of Asian Americans across centuries, continents, and diverse cultures without losing sight of the global, racial, and historical contexts of Asian migration, exclusion, and resettlement. A definitive and ideal text for college classes and the general public, The Making of Asian America is truly an enjoyable, informative, and insightful read."
Monumental. . . . Lee handles her scholarly materials with grace, never overwhelming the reader with too many facts or incidents. She tells an American story familiar to anyone who has read Walt Whitman, seeking to capture America in all its diversity and difference, while at the same time pleading for America to realize its democratic potential. . . . Powerful Asian American stories . . . are inspiring, and Lee herself does them justice in a book that is long overdue.
Comprehensive, informative, and engaging. . . . The Making of Asian America is full of fascinating stories about immigrants who left a mark on their adopted country.
Accessible yet sweeping. . . . Synthesizing many of the exciting discoveries and arguments that have emerged in the field of Asian American history in the past few decades, The Making of Asian America is a must-read for anyone curious about the U.S. and its history.
"Erika Lee’s new narrative of Asian American history deserves consideration to complement, if not supplant, celebrated earlier syntheses. Incorporating compelling revisionist approaches, Lee peels back several centuries of time to locate the origins of Chinese in America to the founding of the Spanish empire in America in the sixteenth century. . . . She further insists on the mainstreaming of Asian American history in the United States."
"A well-written, panoramic view of Asian America from the colonial era to the present that sheds light on how Asian immigrants have sought to make their place in American society and, at the same time, continually changed it."
A fascinating narrative. . . . Deftly weaving together a masterful synthesis of the existing literature with new information culled from hitherto untapped archival sources and with analytical insights on the global currents that have shaped the last five centuries, Erika Lee has created a richly textured tapestry enlivened by vivid stories of hundreds of individuals and groups who played significant, though often unsung, roles in the making of Asian America.
"A stunning achievement, The Making of Asian America establishes the centrality of Asians to American history, and poses alternatives to US national and immigration histories. Asians, this remarkable text reveals, transformed the face of America, and they locate the US firmly within a hemispheric and global order."
"The Making of Asian America chronicles the past and connects it to the present. . . . an important document of history."
"The Making of Asian America is a path-breaking approach to Asian American history. Professor Lee will challenge and surprise most of her readers. . . . She is clearly now a distinct and important voice in a debate of growing complexity."
"Racism, as Lee shows, was the unifying factor in the Asian-American experience, bringing together twenty-three distinct immigrant groups, from very different parts of the world. . . . In the eyes of some, Asians in America are, Lee writes, 'perpetual foreigners at worst, or probationary Americans at best.' If Asians sometimes remain silent in the face of racism, and if some seem to work unusually hard in the face of this difficult history, it is not because they want to be part of a 'model minority,' but because they have often had no other choice."
★ 06/01/2015
Lee's (history, Univ. of Minnesota; coauthor Angel Island) comprehensive treatise on the experiences of Asians in the United States mostly focuses on the 20th century, but the overall scope is broader in both time and space. Readers will find additional coverage of Asian immigration to Canada and Latin America beginning with the Spanish empire's Philippine-Mexico trade and concluding with an examination of Asian America in the present day. Lee reveals how U.S. policies impacted Asians throughout the hemisphere, for example the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act influenced other countries in the region to adopt similar legislation. This work pokes holes in the "model minority" myth by pointing out that Asians in the United States are overrepresented at both ends of the socioeconomic spectrum, and that before World War II, the group was frequently portrayed as being incompatible with American society. VERDICT An impressive work that details how this diverse population has both swayed and been affected by the United States. Highly recommended for readers interested in this important topic. Another exceptional book on this subject is Shelly Sang-Hee Lee's A New History of Asian America. [See Prepub Alert, 3/23/15.]—Joshua Wallace, Ranger Coll., TX
This audiobook is a comprehensive history of Asians in the New World with a focus on the experiences of people in the United States. It’s full of inspirational stories of a group that has made vital contributions to our nation, but it’s also an American tale filled with racism, mistrust, and xenophobia. Narrator Emily Woo Zeller has a clear voice, and she pronounces every word magnificently, allowing the listener to follow the story and revel in the book’s details. She does, however, read with a rhythm that doesn’t vary much, and her lack of character differentiation and monotone undermine her efforts. The audiobook is definitely worth a listen, but Zeller needs to be more versatile. R.I.G. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
★ 2015-05-16
A sweeping study of the fastest growing group in the United States that underscores the shameful racist regard white Americans have long held for Asian immigrants. A historian of immigration whose ancestors hailed from China, Lee (History/Univ. of Minnesota) delineates the specific history of Asians in America—Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Hmong, and others—while also lending a general sense of what immigrants have endured: discrimination in work, wages, education, and housing, and even incarceration during World War II. The author tells a thorough tale, beginning with the first "chinos" (Filipinos, Chinese, Japanese) who migrated from 16th-century Manila (trade between Spain and Asia first ran through the Philippines) to Acapulco and even proto-California. Colonial trade routes brought goods like tea, porcelain, and fabrics from Asia, and immigrants followed to Mexico and Peru and North America, especially as the need for labor grew. Readers might be surprised to learn of the huge influx of South Asian "coolies," or indentured laborers bound under contract, to the Americas and the West Indies during the 19th century, feeding another form of slavery and fueling discrimination. Due to adverse economic conditions in many Chinese provinces in the mid-1800s, the Chinese migrated in huge numbers; one great attraction was "Gold Mountain" (California), which drew Lee's great-great-great-grandfather. Official U.S. immigration discrimination kicked in by 1875, codified in certain exclusion and immigration acts (1882, 1924) and restricting citizenship. Of course, the irony was that despite the enormous contributions of Asians in building American industry and wealth, they were never considered fully American. But Asians in exile were able to work for revolution and change in their own countries (China, India) while pushing all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to challenge discrimination in housing, work, and other venues. For readers interested in even further study, the author provides a highly useful bibliographic essay. A powerful, timely story told with method and dignity.
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