Asian Awareness Month 2016

04/23/2016

04/23/2016

03/12/2016

03/11/2016

Calling all poets, musicians, comedians, and performers!

Asian Awareness Month will close with a coffeehouse on April 1 at 7 p.m. in Harambee House. We'd love to have you perform along with our feature poet, Kay Ulanday Barrett. Please sign up for our open mic here: bit.ly/AAmonthopenmic . It's okay if you don't know what you would perform yet, just sign up to show your interest in performing.

We will be prioritizing students of Asian descent and students of color for performances but all are welcome to sign up for the open mic and come to the event!

- Asian Awareness Month Committee

03/11/2016

Happening TOMORROW!

03/08/2016

"For the end of Black History Month, I decided to showcase two Bay Area activists: Anirvan Chatterjee and Barnali Ghosh. They’ve dedicated their talents to documenting and innovatively teaching the intersections of our community’s history with Black History."

For the end of Black History Month, I decided to showcase two Bay Area activists: Anirvan Chatterjee and Barnali Ghosh. They’ve dedicated their talents to documenting and innovatively teachin…

03/08/2016

"Unfortunately, Jeena is not the only teacher who has been fired for teaching truth. Numerous teachers, specifically women of color, have been targeted. Sireen Hashem, a Muslim American teacher was fired after showing a video about Malala Yousafzai, a young Pakistani activist for girls’ education, three teachers at Howard Middle School were fired after teaching Black history lessons “beyond the curriculum,” and a Black teacher was fired for teaching about the South African apartheid and Trayvon Martin’s murder.

By rallying behind Jeena, we can help spark a larger conversation about the role of social justice in the classroom. After hearing about Jeena Lee-Walker’s story, Yusef Salaam, one of the men wrongly incarcerated in the Central Park Five case, responded that teaching Black students about his horrifying experience is essential to helping them understand “what their rights are...how to stay alive, and how to stay out of the grips of the criminal justice system."

Raise your voice in support of teachers like Jeena Lee-Walker who ."

NYC Public School Teacher Jeena Lee-Walker wanted to discuss the disparities of the criminal justice system with her students, but school administrators demanded to keep the lessons “balanced” in fear that Black students would “riot.” When Jeena chose to not water down the facts, supervisors gave her a series of negative performance reviews, and fired her in May 2015.

Jeena is now pursuing a lawsuit against the NYC Department of Education and school administrators. She expects to hear a response as early as April -- which means we have less than a month to come together to support her case.

Sign this petition: tell the NYC Department of Education that we support Jeena Lee-Walker’s lawsuit and disagree with her termination.

03/05/2016

"The point is not that Duy Ngo’s case is exactly the same as Peter Liang and Akai Gurley’s. Nor is the point that we should only care about police brutality because it also affects our own people. Nor do I argue that Asian Americans and Black people experience racism the exact same way and in the same proportions.

The point is that if we understand history and the transgressions against our own people, we understand that taking the side of the oppressor does not guarantee our protection. No matter how much we are taught to yearn to fully assimilate into American-ness (and implicitly, whiteness), history has shown us that we can never fully become either. We will never be allowed to have the same benefits and entitlements, or the same privileged benefit of the doubt. History reminds us that even when we work for them, they have trouble figuring out which of us is the friend and which is the enemy.

Instead of aspiring to what we will never be allowed to be, perhaps we should stand on the side of those fighting against systemic injustice and oppression. While Asian Americans have and still do participate in white supremacy against Black people, Native American people, and other Asians and immigrant groups, we also have a history of standing with other oppressed communities in the struggle. Standing in solidarity is how we have – and will – help to bring about meaningful change for all people."

http://reappropriate.co/2015/05/unprotected-by-assimilation-lessons-from-the-case-of-duy-ngo/

By Guest Contributor: Bao Phi When I began reading that a White House petition had collected 100,000 signatures — many of them reportedly Chinese names — in defense of Peter Liang, a co…

02/29/2016

JOIN US for our OPENING EVENT this Wednesday!
https://www.facebook.com/events/564355400408855/