Contributions by Asian Americans Through History – Not Widely Known or Published

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & HeritagePosted on Comments are Disabled

May is Asian American Pacific Islanders Heritage Month Contributions from Asian Americans throughout history are not widely known or published or made to our textbooks.  We want to take time to honor these unsung heroes who made such remarkable contributions to our lives.  This is a reprinted article from the History website.  Originally published on March 31, 2021 by Elizabeth Yuko. We have many resources on our site. Please check out our Asian American Connections or the AAC Journal.  If you are local in Rhode Island, we are having a month-long celebration at the Washington Park Library’s patio (outdoor) in Providence on May 6th, May 13, and May 20, 2023 at 1316 Broad Street, Providence, RI. Please register to enjoy this celebration with us.  FREE admission, FREE food and FREE educational entertainment! Reprinted article by Elizabeth Yuko from the History Website 8 Groundbreaking Contributions by Asian Americans Through History Though the Gold Rush triggered the first major wave of Asian immigrants to the United States in the 1840s, their presence in America predates the country itself. For example, in 1763, facing a life of forced labor and imprisonment during the Spanish galleon trade, a group of Filipinos jumped ship near New Orleans and established the settlement of Saint Malo, forming one of the first documented Asian American communities in North America. While Americans with ancestral ties to Asia have made countless significant contributions throughout the country’s history, most have never made it into textbooks. From atomic science, to labor rights, to YouTube, here are a few examples of some of the major advancements made by Asian Americans. Atomic Science PROFESSOR CHIEN-SHIUNG WU (LEFT), PICTURED WITH DR. Y.K. LEE AND L. W. MO, HER ASSOCIATES, CONDUCTING EXPERIMENTS, MARCH 21, 1963. In the 1940s and 1950s, Chinese-born physicist Chien-Shiung Wu, Ph.D., was instrumental in the developing field of atomic science. This included the Manhattan Project: the code name for research into atomic weapons during World War II. Specifically, she improved existing technology for the detection of radiation and the enrichment of uranium in large quantities. Following the war, Wu’s research focused on beta decay, which occurs when the nucleus of one element changes into another element. In 1956, theoretical physicists Tsung Dao Lee, Ph.D. and Chen Ning Yang, Ph.D. asked Wu to devise an experiment that would prove their theory on beta decay. Wu did exactly that, but did not receive the 1957 Nobel Prize along with Lee and Yang—one of many examples of her work being overlooked. An early advocate for women in STEM, Wu spoke at a symposium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1964, famously telling the audience, “I wonder whether the tiny atoms and nuclei, or the mathematical symbols, or the DNA molecules have any preference for either masculine or feminine treatment.” Farm Workers’ Rights JULIO HERNANDEZ, UFW OFFICER (LEFT) AND LARRY ITLIONG, UFW DIRECTOR (CENTER) PICTURED WITH CESAR CHAVEZ (RIGHT) AT HIS HUELGA DAY MARCH IN SAN FRANCISCO, 1966. Born in the Philippines, Larry Itliong immigrated to the United States in 1929 at the age of 15 and immediately began working as a laborer, up and down America’s West Coast, as well as in Alaska. By 1930, he joined striking lettuce pickers in Washington, and spent the next several decades working as a labor organizer and eventually, a union leader—including forming the Filipino Farm Labor Union in 1956. In 1965, Itliong and some of his union colleagues organized the Delano Grape Strike: a walkout of 1,500 Filipino grape-pickers demanding higher wages and improved working conditions. As the movement gained momentum, Delores Huerta and Cesar Chavez from National Farm Workers Association joined Itliong and the Filipino Farm Labor Union. Eventually, the two groups combined to form the United Farm Workers, and the strike ended in 1970—but not before making major strides for agricultural workers, regardless of ethnicity.  “We got wage increases, a medical plan for farm workers, we set up five clinics, a day care center and a school,” Huerta said in an interview. Civil Rights Though her activism was influenced by the two years she spent in internment camps during World War II, Japanese American Yuri Kochiyama’s civil rights work extended to the causes impacting Black, Latinx, and Indigenous Peoples, as well as Asian American communities. After World War II, Kochiyama and her husband—whom she had met at the Jerome Relocation Center in Arkansas—moved to New York City, where they hosted weekly open houses for civil rights activists in their apartment. “Our house felt like it was the movement 24/7,” her eldest daughter, Audee Kochiyama-Holman told NPR in a 2014 interview. Kochiyama befriended and collaborated with Malcolm X in the 1960s, and continued to work with Black civil rights activists following his death. Then in the 1980s, she, along with her husband, campaigned for reparations and a formal government apology for Japanese American interned during World War II. Their work became a reality in 1988, when President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act into law.  “She was not your typical Japanese-American person, especially a nisei [second-generation Japanese-American],” Tim Toyama, Kochiyama’s second cousin, told NPR. “She was definitely ahead of her time, and we caught up with her.” “She was not your typical Japanese-American person, especially a nisei [second-generation Japanese-American],” Tim Toyama, Kochiyama’s second cousin, told NPR. “She was definitely ahead of her time, and we caught up Ethnic Minority Psychology Two Chinese American brothers originally from Portland, Oregon, Derald W. Sue and Stanley Sue, were influential figures in ethnic minority psychology. “Ethnic minority psychology is a subfield of psychology concerned with the science and practice of psychology with racial and ethnic minority individuals and groups,” says Sumie Okazaki, Ph.D., professor of applied psychology at New York University, and author of the book Korean American Families in Immigrant America: How Teens and Parents Navigate Race. In 1972, the Sue brothers founded the Asian American Psychological Association—one year after writing a seminal paper on Chinese American personality. “Derald W. Sue is best known for his work on multicultural counseling and racial microaggression, and Stanley Sue is best known for his work on cultural competence in psychotherapy with Asian Americans and ethnic minorities,” Okazaki explains. The USB INTEL CHIEF I/O ARCHITECT AJAY BHATT, CO-INVENTOR OF USB AND PCI EXPRESS, …

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Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & HeritagePosted on Comments are Disabled

Honoring all the Asian Pacific Americans who help make America a diverse and great nation, I am posting information from another website which tells you everything you need to know about the Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. National Asian Pacific American Heritage Month recognizes and celebrates the culture, contributions, and heritage of Asian Americans and Pacific Islander Americans. President Jimmy Carter signed a joint resolution declaring May 4-10, 1979, as the first Asian Pacific Heritage Week. In 1990, President George H. W. Bush signed an extension changing Asian Pacific Heritage Week to a month-long observance.The month of May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, and to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869. The majority of the workers who laid those tracks were Chinese American immigrants. Check out more about Asian Pacific American Heritage Month on this website.

Anti-Violence Against Asian American Resources

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & Heritage, ResourcesPosted on Comments are Disabled

The recent incidences against Asian Americans have prompted us to provide a resource page for all those affected by it. We want you to know that we are standing in solidarity with our Asian American brothers and sisters across the nation. Please help pass this information resource page around so people will know where to go relating to these hate crimes. We condemn all violence against the Asian American Pacific Islanders Community and combat it with love and information. (Credit: Nellie Mae Foundation Blog page) Townhall on Anti-Asian Racism, https://bit.ly/3vzAANA Anti-Asian Violence Resources CARRD, https://bit.ly/3qRJS3X Stop AAPI Hate resources, https://bit.ly/3rWhcZ5 Anti-racism resources to support AAPI community, https://nbcnews.to/3bTsnfm Hollaback! Bystander Training https://bit.ly/2P0wMo3 Anti-Asian racism is Taking a Mental and Emotional Toll on Me by Nancy Wang Yuen, PhD. https://bit.ly/30YuXKJ Asian Awareness Project, https://bit.ly/3qVNn9J Anti-Racism College Guide for AAPI Students and Allies

If the Eye is the Window to Our Soul, Culture is the Window to Our Mind

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & HeritagePosted on Comments are Disabled

If the eye is the window to our soul, culture is the window to our mind. I say that not without evidence. After teaching Chinese for almost ten years at this great organization and other institutions, I often get amused and enlightened by my students’ questions.     On a Saturday morning in a private Chinese class, I sat across from my student, who was a recent college graduate. He was reading a relatively advanced passage for someone who had only taken one year of Chinese. When he stumbled onto the word for “panda”, he asked me, “What does the word 熊 mean in  熊猫?” I said without hesitation to this straight question, “It has the sound of the word, 凶 which means ‘fierce’ in English. But the word,熊, which means panda, it’s probably a coined word taken from the sound of 凶. ”  And I gave him a few examples of how the word 凶 is used in Chinese nouns.   He asked again, “But what about the word, 猫?  What does it mean?” I said, “It means ‘cat’. You know that word. It’s one of the most frequently used vocabularies in Chinese lessons. You have learned it too.” I was puzzled as to why he asked me for the meaning of such a simple word. After all, he did have one year of Chinese under his belt and he should know that word. But what followed totally made me look at these two simple words more closely. He came to a very thought-provoking conclusion: “So, the word ‘panda’ is translated to ‘fierce cat’ in English?” I said, “Yes, that’s it if you go by the sound of it.  I think that’s how Chinese people coined the word, ‘panda’ because they think of panda as a ‘fierce cat’.  Pretty good!”  Is ‘panda’ a cat or a bear?  Then all of a sudden, it dawned on me that I never thought of why.  Why do Chinese people put ‘panda’  in the cat category when in English, ‘panda’ is in the bear category? I thought for a moment: wait a minute. Is ‘panda’ a cat or a bear?  All of a sudden his inquiry revealed a new aspect of the Chinese language to me, my native language, which I took for granted.   Why do Chinese people think of pandas as cats and not bears?  As I did some research on Google, there was a debate in the scientific community for ‘panda’ that was dated back over two hundred years ago that panda was either a bear or a raccoon.  Back then, pandas only existed in Asia, mostly in China and the region around China. (I think it still is.  Pandas aren’t found in any other regions outside of captivity.) So, my thoughts were that the word, panda, 熊猫 was coined way before the debate in the scientific community and Chinese people from a long time ago determined that panda was in the category with the “cats”. Wow, what a revelation from just studying Chinese. Studying one’s language reveals a lot about one’s mind.  Another Example – Culture is the Window to our Mind Another piece of evidence for my assertion that culture is the window to our mind is from the American students who took Chinese from me.  There was a pattern in the way they think. One of the very first lessons I teach to all of my beginning students was numbers. Numbers in Chinese are very easy. If you know the first ten numbers, you will know how to count to 100 easily. It can become such a rhyme or “song” that most of my students want to master and are drawn to, because of the way they sound. The numbers are 1, 一 (Yī), 2, 二 (èr), 3, 三  (sān), 4,  四  (Sì), 5,  五 (wǔ), 6,  六 (liù), 7,  七(qī), 8,  八(bā), 9, 九 (jiǔ), 10, 十(shí). After ‘ten’, the number in Chinese would just repeat itself.   For example, number 11, would just be 十一，taking the number ‘ten’ and ‘one’ together to get eleven. The same applies to the numbers from ‘twelve’ (12) to ‘nineteen’ (19). Once it gets to ‘twenty’ (20), the pattern changes. Before I revealed how to get the number ‘twenty’, I often asked my students to guess how to say ‘twenty’. Almost 99% of the time, all of them say “十十”，putting two ‘ten’ (10) together. At the time, I just gave them the answer, which is ：“二十” and taught them how to say it and continued with my lesson.    However, this time I take a step back and wonder how they came up with “十十.” The fact that almost every student consistently made the same guess was very interesting. What happened if I didn’t reveal the answer to them? Would they have continued to guess “十十十” for ‘thirty’? I thought to myself that it’s a very inefficient way of using numbers.   That’s why the word for ‘thirty’ is “三十“ and not  “十十十”, which will become very cumbersome as we string higher numbers together for ‘forty’(40), ‘fifty’ (50), ‘sixty’ (60), ‘seventy’ (70), ‘eighty’ (80)….etc.  We would run out of space to put the “十”  there, that we might as well coin a different word for each of the 10’s, right?  So, are there different words for bigger numbers? Yes, there are! Simply put, Chinese people’s way of thinking and looking at things are different from westerners’ way of thinking.   For example: the number 10,000 is written as 一万 [Chinese people will use “万” as the new unit of measurement when it gets to 10,000 now.  Chinese people wouldn’t call this number, 10,000  “十千“  literal translation means “ten thousand” because once it has reached 10 in this unit, which is in ten thousand’s, there is a different measure word, it is called 万 (pronounced wan in the fourth tone).  That’s why it is called 一万 and no longer called 十千. [The correct translation for 10,000 is 一万 and not 十千. If you do translate it and …

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Why Cultural Awareness is the Cornerstone of Our Teaching?

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & Heritage, LearningPosted on Comments are Disabled

Knowing each vocabulary word doesn’t mean you always know what each Chinese expression means. Perhaps this expression goes back to the feudalistic foundation of Chinese culture that big families are the common characteristic, so “big family” is equivalent to calling everybody. We can make a further inference from this expression.

A Chinese Poem To Share Alongside Amanda Gorman’s “The Hill We Climb”

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Culture & HeritagePosted on Comments are Disabled

Amanda Gorman’s poem, “The Hill We Climb” brought me back to my childhood’s favorite poem of a Chinese poet,He Zhizhang from the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.)  Coincidentally, a lot of poetry written in the Tang Dynasty was about the state of affairs at the time.  This one particularly brought me nostalgia, especially when I went to visit my birthplace of Hong Kong, which I left when I was a little girl.  Perhaps I could identify with the poet’s sentimentality; how he was greeted and thought of as a guest by the little children he encountered.  I like to share this poem on this blog for you to read.  English translation is on the top.   The first line of the Chinese is in the traditional characters, the second line is the simplified characters and the third line is the pinyin of the characters, which helps English speakers to pronounce the characters (words) so they could read it.  Because Chinese is a tonal language and is composed of characters, not of alphabets.  The Pinyin, which resembles the English alphabet will help English speakers to pronounce the words (characters) easier, but it has marks on top.  The marks on top of the alphabets (pinyin) indicate the tone that you say it in.  Remember Chinese is a tonal language.  If you say the same sound in different tones, they will mean different things.  It is very important to say it in the proper tone; otherwise, your meaning will be mistaken.   A lot of jokes or puns have come out from people saying it in the wrong tone of the word.    Hopefully, this will pique your interest to learn this interesting language.   I also post Amanda Gorman’s poem on the bottom for those of you who want to see the transcript of it.  Perhaps you can understand why her poem reminds me of my favorite poem from my childhood.  Enjoy the poems! Home Coming 回鄉偶書      By He Zhizhang 賀 知 章 Leaving home young, I now return old,  少小離家老大回 少小离家老大回 Shǎo* xiǎo lí jiā lǎodà huí   My accent has not changed, but my temple hair has grayed. 鄉音無改鬢毛衰  乡音无改鬓毛衰 Xiāngyīn wú gǎi bìn máo shuāi   Little village children greet me without recognizing me,  兒童相見不相識 儿童相见不相识 Értóng xiāng jiàn bù xiāngshí   And smiling, ask “where are you from, guest?”   笑問客從何處來 笑问客从何处来 Xiào wèn kè Cóng hé chù lái   *When two third-tone together, we change the first third-tone to the second-tone when speaking.  But in writing out the tone, we still write it as a third tone.  The third tone is very difficult for Westerners to say because it takes a long time for the tone to dip down and then go back up again.  For more about tones, please ask your Chinese teacher.  And for more on translation and interpretation of Chinese Ancient poems, you can check out this website.   Amanda Gorman’s Poem on 2021’s Inauguration Day  Amanda’s poem was well-positioned between Lady Gaga’s National Anthem and Jennifer Lopez’s “This Land is Your Land”, here’s the poem that has been talked about so much.  The Hill We Climb     By Amanda Gorman When day comes we ask ourselves, where can we find light in this never-ending shade? The loss we carry, a sea we must wade We’ve braved the belly of the beast We’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace And the norms and notions of what just is Isn’t always just-ice And yet the dawn is ours before we knew it Somehow we do it Somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken but simply unfinished We the successors of a country and a time Where a skinny Black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president only to find herself reciting for one And yes we are far from polished far from pristine but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect We are striving to forge a union with purpose To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and conditions of man And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us but what stands before us We close the divide because we know, to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another We seek harm to none and harmony for all Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true: That even as we grieved, we grew That even as we hurt, we hoped That even as we tired, we tried That we’ll forever be tied together, victorious Not because we will never again know defeat but because we will never again sow division Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree And no one shall make them afraid If we’re to live up to our own time Then victory won’t lie in the blade But in all the bridges we’ve made That is the promised glade The hill we climb If only we dare It’s because being American is more than a pride we inherit, it’s the past we step into and how we repair it We’ve seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy And this effort very nearly succeeded But while democracy can be periodically delayed it can never be permanently defeated In this truth in this faith we trust For while we have our eyes on the future history has its eyes on us This is the era of just redemption We feared at its inception We did not feel prepared to be the heirs of such a terrifying hour but within it we found the power to author a new chapter To offer hope and laughter to ourselves So while once we asked, how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe? …

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It’s 2021!

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Health & WellnessPosted on No Comments

It is very easy for our nervous system to be disrupted because we have gone through a lot in 2020 with the pandemic. I’ve heard of increased cases of anxiety, depression and other mental disorders. This is where I can put my training as a yoga teacher and yoga therapist student into good use.

Do You Need to Hit Your Reset Button?

by Jeannie SalomonAll Posts, Health & WellnessPosted on Comments are Disabled

The pandemic has been here longer than anyone has expected.  You might think by now we are used to being isolated in our home, wearing masks, setting a routine with whatever we have adjusted our lives to.  Right? Not really.  In a way, we will never get used to this new “normal” because part of us is still longing for the old to come back.  Another part of us is never going to settle for this kind of life.  Why should we?  The answer to this question can go in many different directions.   For this blog and our Health and Wellness audience, let me take the answer in the direction of self-care and wellness.   Hitting the reset button during the pandemic requires special discipline and determination because we can’t just pack our bags and book a flight to fly off to an exotic place for a weekend, or take a short trip out of town to stay at a  rented cottage until we restore our inspiration.   Anything that requires getting out of your house requires second thoughts and lots of caution during the pandemic, especially when the weather is getting cooler again and when staying indoors is becoming more suitable.   So, “resetting our button” takes creativity and it is probably better to be done at home, where it is safest without a lot of sanitizing and cleaning and being cautious. Hitting the reset button can be learning a new skill to practice at home. For example: learning how to meditate is a skill that takes consciousness on our part.  You have to spend some time concentrating before you can get to meditate.  Often, when we just sit down and quiet our mind to get ready for meditation, we are not quite there yet.  Very often, that’s when we notice certain aches, pain, or discomfort in our body when we are sitting down quietly.  Perhaps you find it uncomfortable in a certain sitting position or can’t even get to a comfortable sitting position.  That’s when it breaks your concentration.  Take heart!  I have a few tips for you. Personal tips on how to settle into a meditation position: Prepare a nook in your house where you could put a chair, a sitting mat, or a yoga mat for sitting. It will be ideal if you can easily find a nook that is free from noises (whether from the rest of your family or from your neighborhood if you live in a city).  But if that is not accessible, make do with your internal focus and “block out” the noises as they come. Close your eyes and turn your focus internally.  Perhaps start with your breath.  Notice how you breathe.  Put one hand on your heart and one hand on your belly.  Notice the rise and fall of your belly and chest as you inhale and exhale. This is how you “block out” the noises that come to you:  If you hear a noise, let it pass you.  Just come back to your breath and notice once again on the rise and fall of your belly and chest with each inhalation and exhalation. Don’t fight the noise.  Accept it and notice how often you have to consciously turn your attention back to your breath as each sound of the noise comes to you.   Let it go and let it pass.  Use your breath to guide you back to your internal focus. You will develop a rhythm if repeated noises keep happening. Rise above the noise and develop an internal focus using your breath. After you settle into a comfortable position.  Focus on the present moment. Let your thoughts go and accept what your mind wanders to without dwelling on one thought or thing in your thoughts.  At first, it may take some discipline to control yourself from acting out your thoughts if you are a Type A or an action-prone individual.   Let your thoughts go.  Let them pass.   Keep coming back to your breath no matter how many times. Playing Music in the Background helps to Create an Ambient Noise with your Environment  It may be helpful if you can use music in the background to create an ambient for your meditation. The kind of music to play in the background depends on your preference and varies from individual to individual.  For me, I like classical music or meditation music, or just the sound of waterfall to create the ambient.  I also set a timer to give myself a start time and an end time.  But I give myself an allowance of 5 to 7 more minutes to settle into my comfortable sitting position.  If I wanted to meditate for 10 minutes, I would set my timer for 15 or 17 minutes.  I suggest that you start with a shorter time duration when you first start to meditate. It will be more encouraging for you to see your progress over time.  Even as a yoga teacher, meditation doesn’t come easily for me. It is something that I have to learn and consciously to practice.  In the beginning, I started with moving meditations, and only gradually after I have learned from a teacher could I come to sitting meditation.  As the weather is getting cooler in the fall now, I know winter will be here soon. I have mentally to prepare for the cold and snowy days ahead.  My mind easily comes to a quote I used in my term paper during my school days.  It’s the famous quote from Albert Camus.   In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.~Albert Camus~  It’s from my heart to yours.  Happy Meditating!  Namaste!  About the Author: Jeannie is the Founding Director of Cultural Society. You can find meditation courses on CS Website here.