Cross Cultural Center 2007 All People’s Celebration

By Cecelia Lei, Diversity Correspondent

             As part of UCSD’s 1st Annual Asian American and Pacific-Islander Heritage Celebration, the Cross-Cultural Center hosted a panel discussion titled “The State of Asian America at UCSD and Beyond: Re-Visiting the (In)Visibility of Asian Representations.”  The forum, held during the afternoon of May 9th, opened up a community dialogue about the issues facing the Asian community today on the UCSD campus, as well as in the workforce, media, politics and other social and cultural spaces.  Facilitated by Angela Kong, a doctoral student from the Ethnic Studies department, led by a panel of faculty, staff and students, and joined by an audience of about 50 community members, the event brought light to UCSD’s very diverse and complex population.

            Glynda Davis, the Director of Campus Diversity Initiatives from the Chancellor’s Diversity Office gave opening remarks on behalf of Chancellor Fox about the importance of diversity to the purpose and vision of UCSD as an institution.  As one of the student panelists for the forum, I was privileged to join staff members Roxanna Farkas and Christy Nierva from the Career Services Center, Professor Yen-Le Espiritu from the Ethnic Studies department, and Kevin Mann, chair of the SAAC Committee and student organizer.  The panel as whole presented wide-ranging issues related to the Asian Pacific Islander (API) community. 

            I presented first, discussing my own personal experiences as a Chinese-American student at UCSD and as a member of a majority population on campus.  By presenting my thoughts about the low numbers of Asian faculty in the Social Sciences and Humanities, the lack of Southeast Asian students on campus, the issues facing an implementation of an Asian-American studies Minor program, and coalition building between Asian student organizations, my discussion urged for a further dissection of the assumption of an “Asian majority” here on the UCSD campus. 

            Farkas and Nierva continued the discussion about dismantling assumptions made about the API community into the workforce.  Discussing the main points made in the book “Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling” by Jane Hyun, Farkas and Nierva commented on the model minority myth in the professional workplace and career choices.  They discussed the ways in which cultural values instilled in the API community are translated into the academic and professional experiences of Asians.  The two women expressed a need to break from the model minority myth in order to challenge societal norms and standards held against the API community.

            Third to present was Professor Espiritu who continued the discussion of further examination of the API community through the lens of what she called the “hypervisibility” and “hyper-invisibility” of Asian representations.  One of the main points made in her presentation were that the large numbers of Asians on campus must not be equated with a definitive and final representation of diversity.  Instead, Espiritu expressed the importance to acknowledge “the dangerous politics of numbers” in which under-representation within the API community at UCSD can be largely ignored or the de-valuation of other people of color communities may occur.  She also brought up the topic of the recent Virginia Tech shootings as a site of further examination of Asian representations in society today and of the social assumptions that have been made of “foreigners” in relation to the API community.

            Last to present was Mann who described his experience as a student activist on campus, organizing to empower the API community through the SAAC coalition and other organizations.  As an active student leader, he also gave his personal perspectives as a Pilipino-American at UCSD and the negotiation of his many identities in different spaces around campus.  Mann emphasized the importance of students, staff and faculty coming together within the same spaces to discuss crucial issues confronting the API community.

            Being a part of such a vital forum for the UCSD community was both a privileged and eye-opening experience.  The need for a space in which cross-cultural dialogue can occur is essential to both educating and empowering all the diverse communities on campus.  The discussion that began that afternoon will be sure to continue in the future as we seek ways to further examine issues of diversity here at UCSD.