Rethinking the Asian American Studies Project: Bridging the Divide Between Campus and Community

Asian American studies is both a field of study and an academic program. As a field of study, like women's studies and other ethnic studies, it has been the impetus for new scholarship that is distinctly interdisciplinary. In emphasizing "standpoint" and critical theory, it is decentering how we know and what we know. In recovering, reclaiming, and reconstructing knowledge on Asian Americans over the past thirty years, scholars are informing and challenging traditional disciplines, interpretations, theories, methodologies, and practices. They have moved from descriptive texts that simply add new data to existing male and Eurocentric paradigms to new scholarship and critiques from Asian American viewpoints.

As an academic program, Asian American studies is centered on teaching, faculty, students, courses, and degrees. There has been a steady growth in the number of programs nationwide and an increase in faculty positions over the past thirty years. Asian American studies programs are granting their own minors, bachelor's and master's degrees, as well as Ph.D.s within ethnic studies degrees. Student interest and demands continue to be crucial to the growth of established programs and the stimulus for the creation of new programs. As Asian American studies programs become institutionalized on campuses, many faculty and administrators are finally able to distinguish between Asian American studies and Asian studies.

Asian American studies has its roots in the social movements of the late 1960s and early 1970s with the principle of furthering access and equity and goals of diversifying higher education, transforming research, knowledge and the curriculum, and a commitment to working with Asian and Pacific American communities. In contrast to traditional academic disciplines that emphasize research, teaching, and university service, it has specifically championed student empowerment and community-focused research. ²

A recurring debate in Asian American studies concerns its apparent shift from a political/community agenda to one that is purely academic. Asian American studies is not static, but historically situated and dynamic, however. Or, as Michael Omi once noted in a reassessment of Asian American studies in the late 1980s, "it just ain't the sixties no more." ³ Today, as universities and colleges experience culture wars, a backlash to affirmative action, limited resources to meet the needs of growing enrollment, and even greater demands on faculty to publish or perish, what is the mission of Asian American studies?

It is no longer the sixties, seventies, eighties, or even the nineties anymore, yet some of the important controversies and promises of Asian American studies in the new millenium are rooted in its past. The original goals of Asian American studies cannot remain fixed given the changed terrain, including the increased institutionalization of its programs and the professional demands upon its faculty. What I propose here is to rethink Asian American studies programs and reveal the continuing links between their academic mission and community responsibilities.

In this essay, I draw upon thirty years of participation in Asian American studies. These observations and analyses are informed by roles as a faculty member in both research and comprehensive universities and as founding chair of a thriving undergraduate Asian American studies department. Reflecting on the promise of a new millenium, I continue to view Asian American studies programs in colleges and universities as important community sites for encouraging social justice and community service.

Redefining Community

I draw attention here to the changing definition of community and the multiple sites of practice. Are communities strictly limited to places that are spatially and territorially defined or residentially occupied by Asian Pacific Americans? Are they identified with specific locales, social classes, and historical eras? Are they real, imagined, or socially constructed out of social networks and practices or even memory?

I propose that, in the next millenium, Asian American studies rethinks its notion of communities and community practice. For example, I use the term communities here...