Objects, Methods, and Interpretations: Imperial Trajectories, Haunted Nationalisms, and Medical Archives in Asian American History

Kim's essay reexamines Asian American studies through a critical reading of nineteenth century medical archives against the grain, identifying the rise of modern medicine with US colonial activities in Oceania and the Pacific, and with the construction of indigenous and Asian corporeality in contact zones like Hawaii. By conducting research under what she calls a "critical inter-imperial framework," she illuminates the interfaces between multiple sites and fields of study that traditional disciplinary boundaries have worked to obscure and actively forget.