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In her introduction to Global Anti-Asian Racism, editor by Jennifer Ho writes, “If there is an argument that this collection, as a whole, puts forth, it is that anti-Asian racism has occurred and is occurring on every continent, including Asia, and that there is a reality to global anti-Asian racism that can’t be reduced to a matter of global politics, class inequalities, religious bigotry, or ethnic nationalism” (p. 4). She continues, “Together, these diverse essays speak to one another, creating a conversation about the constant of global anti-Asian racism across time and space, illustrating that the topic of global anti-Asian racism is both old and new and, sadly – since the essays engage with people from every continent except Antarctica – an ever-present social phenomenon for humans to grapple with” (p. 8).

In her chapter, Sara Djahim argues of crafting an Asian identity in diaspora, “We have arrived at a critical moment to interrogate who we are as a community, who we want to be, and what that means for organizing our anti-racist work” (p. 33). She cautions, “the term ‘Asian’ has always been unstable, from both the external perspective of authorities, media, and society as well as within the labeled group itself. In this case, however, the self-identification as ‘Asian’ was used strategically in the global anti-colonial struggle” (p. 34). However, “there is an acute awareness of the fraught nature of a blanket term that some people don’t want and others aren’t afforded” (p. 35). Rivi Handley-Spitz examines the push in early twentieth-century China by some leading intellectuals to abolish traditional Chinese script in favor of European alphabetical writing. These intellectuals and politicians argued that the process would modernize China, but they inadvertently reiterated colonial arguments that had denigrated Chinese culture for generations (p. 72-91). In her essay, Xuening Kong argues “that when Chinese migrants were victims of racism overseas, their home country actively denounced the anti-Chinese persecution by the Mexican government and nativists” (p. 94). She concludes, “The anti-Chinese movement [in Mexico] served as common ground for gathering different political views on how to deal with both overseas Sinophobia and the domestic Chinese national crisis” (p. 100).

Examining anti-Asian policies in Turkey, Irmak Yazici links them first to China’s crackdown on its Uyghur population in the post-9/11 era and secondly to Turkey’s efforts to advocate on a Turkic Islamic population based on old ideas linking Turkey to the Ottoman Empire’s place in the umma (p. 107-120). Kimberly D. McKee argues, “The accounts of Asian adoptees [in the U.S.] offer a glimpse into the interiority of the insidiousness of anti-Asian racism. For many, the family is the first site of anti-Asian racism” (p. 129). She concludes, “To claim an Asian American identity is an inherently political act for adoptees – not just because of the activist roots of Asian America – since it may mean acknowledging a racial difference that our own families ignore in our everyday lives” (p. 129). Eileen Chung draws upon her travel experiences as she weaves “in the theoretical frameworks of Orientalism and Orientalization” to “delineate the uncouth microaggressions, lewd stares, and general sense of Sinophobic unease” she encountered on her travels in Cuba and Greece (p. 137). She emphasizes that “Western hegemonic discourse has been internalized by other non-Western cultures; that is, non-Western cultures are susceptible to adopting Western attitudes toward Asian women due to the prevailing influence of Western cultural productions” (p. 138).

The chapters of Global Anti-Asian Racism work well in conversation with each other to examine the phenomenon across time and space, with both historical and personal accounts. The variety in scholarship and scholarly methods will make this volume useful in several academic disciplines while the brevity of each work – part of this book’s place in the Asia Shorts series – makes it possible for teachers to assign a selection of essays for a lesson. A critical work of scholarship, but one that captures a continually evolving subject.… (mehr)