1. Introduction to Asian American Studies
ETHN 14:
Introduction to Asian American Studies
Department of Ethnic Studies & Asian American Studies Program
California State University, Sacramento
Week 14 Session 2
Final Exam Preparation Session 2

2. Last Time Go over the format of the final exam.
Examine two final exam topics and practice interpreting the prompt, translating the prompt into a thesis.

3. Today Discuss organization and support.
Look back over the semester’s topic.

4. Skill Areas Evaluated Your work was evaluated in three areas:
Ideas – How well you responded to the topic, how well you interpreted the prompt into an effective thesis.
Organization & Coherence – How well you structure and build your argument, how well you use logic, how well you guide your reader through your reasoning.
Support – How well you convince, how well you select, describe, and analyze evidence to support your argument.

5. Translating the Prompt & Formulating a Thesis
Sample Topic Asian American Studies scholars routinely situate the emergence of the umbrella term Asian and Pacific Islander American, or “API,” within an historical context of national expansion, colonization, and marketplace dominance. As a result, a central dimension of the collective Asian and Pacific Islander American experience is strong similarities in the sociopolitical context of arrival to and settlement in the United States among different national origin groups. Develop and defend a thesis that characterizes this shared experience with regard to U.S. national interest, labor market conditions, and immigration policy.

6. Ideas in the prompt
(1) The term API is linked to U.S. national expansion, colonization, and marketplace dominance.
(2) Individual API groups experienced similar conditions as they immigrated to and settled in the U.S.
(3) These conditions are related to or reflect U.S. national interest, labor conditions, and immigration policy.

7. Thesis: The arrival of early Asian immigrants to the United States coincided with and fueled American political and economic expansion. Three groups—Chinese, Japanese, and Filipinos—illustrate the manner in which inhumane labor conditions, racial discrimination, and exclusionary immigration policies motivated individual ethnic groups to band together under the term “API.”

8. Sample 3 Early Asian and Pacific Islander American groups each experienced harsh labor conditions related to American expansion. Prior to 1965, Asian and Pacific Islander American immigrants worked in some of the most challenging environments in the United States. The Chinese came at the height of Manifest Destiny, a period of westward expansion during which the United States claimed territory west of the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. These early immigrants came as sojourners during the Gold Rush. They intended to come to “Gold Mountain,” strike it rich, and return to China wealthy. Instead, they were forced to work in hard labor situations such as agriculture, laundries, and railroads. Japanese and Filipino immigrants also had to do similar types of work. Together, these and other minority groups helped settle the California land after the nation seized the territory by digging irrigation systems and planting, picking, and packaging produce, and by building railroads. These forms of labor reflect national interest and important similarities between the three API groups. All three groups provided cheap labor, faced exploitation, and saw very little earnings in return. Many Chinese who intended to go back to China could not afford to do so. Also, these types of jobs directly contributed to the growth of the economy. Today, agriculture continues to be a major component of the California and United States economies.

9. (1) Ideas
When you are provided with a prompt that requires you to develop a thesis and make an argument, your thesis should include all of the ideas in the prompt. Incorporating similar vocabulary into your thesis is a good strategy.
Topic: Sociopolitical Context of API Immigration
Asian American Studies scholars routinely situate the emergence of the umbrella term Asian and Pacific Islander American, or “API,” within an historical context of national expansion, colonization, and marketplace dominance. As a result, a central dimension of the collective Asian and Pacific Islander American experience is strong similarities in the sociopolitical context of arrival to and settlement in the United States among different national origin groups. Develop and defend a thesis that characterizes this shared experience with regard to U.S. national interest, labor market conditions, and immigration policy.

10. Topic 1: Media Representations
In the 2008 edition of his book, The Contemporary Asian American Experience, Professor Fong wrote the following: “Today’s images of Asian Americans in popular culture have improved and provide more breadth than in the past. This is a contrast from earlier days when popular images of Asians and Asian Americans were predominantly mediated by non-Asian studio executives and writers. The earlier characterizations were often quite negative and demeaning” (pp ). Since 2008, structural changes to popular media have altered how racialized, gendered, and classed images are funded, produced, transmitted, and debated. Given these changes, does Dr. Fong’s observation still hold true? Develop and defend a thesis that responds to this question and explores the history of API media representations to present day.

11. Essay Topic 2: Politics of Education
On October 8, 2015, California Governor Jerry Brown vetoed Assembly Bill AB-176 (Bonta) to create new state guidelines for collecting disaggregated demographic data on APIs with regard to health and education. Since then, numerous advocate groups in the API community have expressed disappointment noting that the veto reinforces stereotypes and disadvantages among some API groups. Develop and defend a thesis that explains why the panethnic political identity “Asian and Pacific Islander American” can be both helpful and challenging for advocates of API equity in education.

12. Organization & Coherence
Analytical essays require several paragraphs. By organizing your ideas into paragraphs, you are guiding your reader through your thinking.
Well crafted topic sentences are key. Typically, your professor can tell the level of preparation for and sophistication of thinking in your essay by reading just the topic sentences. If you know the essay topics beforehand, it helps to memorize these before heading into your exam.
Let go of the five-paragraph essay format. Often it is important to separate a support topic into multiple paragraphs. For instance, in one paragraph, you might introduce evidence to support your thesis. In another paragraph, you might explain how that evidence supports the thesis.

13. Sample 3 Early Asian and Pacific Islander American groups each experienced harsh labor conditions related to American expansion. Prior to 1965, Asian and Pacific Islander American immigrants worked in some of the most challenging environments in the United States. The Chinese came at the height of Manifest Destiny, a period of westward expansion during which the United States claimed territory west of the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. These early immigrants came as sojourners during the Gold Rush. They intended to come to “Gold Mountain,” strike it rich, and return to China wealthy. Instead, they were forced to work in hard labor situations such as agriculture, laundries, and railroads. Japanese and Filipino immigrants also had to do similar types of work. Together, these and other minority groups helped settle the California land after the nation seized the territory by digging irrigation systems and planting, picking, and packaging produce, and by building railroads. These forms of labor reflect national interest and important similarities between the three API groups. All three groups provided cheap labor, faced exploitation, and saw very little earnings in return. Many Chinese who intended to go back to China could not afford to do so. Also, these types of jobs directly contributed to the growth of the economy. Today, agriculture continues to be a major component of the California and United States economies.

14. Support
Carefully select your evidence. In general, most students could select ideas from class that are relevant to the essay topic. Some struggled to do this well. That’s a red flag to your professors that your engagement in the course is weak and/or your preparation for the exam was rushed or ineffective.
Provide roughly equal amounts summary (discussion of the details of evidence) and analysis (explanation of how the evidence supports the thesis). Why does the idea matter in the argument? What is your reasoning? How does it relate to the reasoning you offer in other places where you’re analyzing evidence? Don’t just regurgitate ideas. Extend them! Show what you think!

15. Provide analysis after each main topic
Provide analysis after each main topic. As best you can, you want to explain significance of the topics and evidence in your essay throughout your essay, not just at the end.
Consider how forms of evidence compare to one another. How do they make different points? How does one topic illuminate some part of the thesis that the other does not?
Don’t be afraid to engage ideas that run counter to your thesis. Simply explain how there are alternative views to your argument and explain how your argument still holds up.

16. Sample 3 Early Asian and Pacific Islander American groups each experienced harsh labor conditions related to American expansion. Prior to 1965, Asian and Pacific Islander American immigrants worked in some of the most challenging environments in the United States. The Chinese came at the height of Manifest Destiny, a period of westward expansion during which the United States claimed territory west of the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean. These early immigrants came as sojourners during the Gold Rush. They intended to come to “Gold Mountain,” strike it rich, and return to China wealthy. Instead, they were forced to work in hard labor situations such as agriculture, laundries, and railroads. Japanese and Filipino immigrants also had to do similar types of work. Together, these and other minority groups helped settle the California land after the nation seized the territory by digging irrigation systems and planting, picking, and packaging produce, and by building railroads. These forms of labor reflect national interest and important similarities between the three API groups. All three groups provided cheap labor, faced exploitation, and saw very little earnings in return. Many Chinese who intended to go back to China could not afford to do so. Also, these types of jobs directly contributed to the growth of the economy. Today, agriculture continues to be a major component of the California and United States economies.

17. Last September
What is the Asian and Pacific Islander American Experience?
How would you describe your experience as a APIA?

18. Course Goals – What will we learn?
Important concepts, themes, and theories in Ethnic Studies and Asian American Studies
Population histories of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans
How race influences politics in the United States (and vice-versa) and how APIAs are positioned in these processes.
About our own experiences and the experiences of others in the context of national and global ethnic diversity
Critical thinking, reading, and writing skills

19. Organization – How will Learn?
Part 1: Important Themes and Concepts (Weeks 1-4)
Goals: To understand the emergence of the field of ethnic studies, nature of its scholarship, and foundational ideas and concepts.
Part 2: Population Histories (Weeks 5-9)
Goals: To compare groups according to crosscutting themes associated with racial and ethnic experiences.
Part 3: Politics of Race and Ethnicity (Weeks 10-15)
Goals: To analyze, using ideas and concepts from Part 1 and histories from Part 2, three contemporary political issues affecting APIAs: media representations, educational opportunity, and immigration.