CSREA Conference Room, Hillel 303
How do historians write about race? Ellen Wu (History, Indiana University) will discuss her research trajectory for "The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model Minority" (Princeton, 2014), including the pitfalls and promises of taking on a ubiquitous topic. The conversation will also consider strategies for emerging race scholars to consider when writing about race for a general audience.
See also:
How Asians Became America's Model Minority
Thursday, April 9, 2015
4:00 - 5:30 pm
Smith-Buonanno 106, 95 Cushing Street
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The issues that animate Professor Wu's research grapple with problems of race, citizenship, migration, and nation through the lens of Asian American history. Her first book, The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model Minority (Princeton, 2014), tells of the astonishing makeover of Asians in the United States from the "yellow peril" to "model minorities" (i.e. culturally wired to "succeed") in the middle decades of the twentieth century. It charts the emergence of the model minority stereotype in the dual contexts of the United States' global rise and the black freedom movement between the 1940s-60s. The Color of Success reveals that this far-reaching, politically charged process continues to have profound implications for how Americans understand race, opportunity, and nationhood. Her current project considers the changing conditions and consequences of race-making and policy-making in the late twentieth century United States. |
Ellen D. Wu