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
Welcome
Introductions: Rikka (Leadership Organization Advisor, Program coordinator); Danny (Ed.D. student and scholarship coordinator); Paolo Soriano (EOP counselor, program coordinator)
Week 4 Session 2
Research Methods

2. Last Time
Define and discuss power, culture, social structure, and identity

3. Today
Describe research methods in ethnic studies by exploring the arguments of social historians, Howard Zinn and Gary Okihiro and examining an oral history interview transcription.

4. Phenomenology
Phenomenology studies structures of conscious experience from the first-person point of view.
Scholars who work from a phenomenological orientation are concerned with the relevant conditions of “experience,” or what shapes experiences.
How do scholars in ethnic studies create new knowledge from a phenomenological perspective?

5. Zinn’s “Knowledge as a form of power” (1970)
Five rules to challenge in order for history to lead to revolution:
Carry on disinterested scholarship
Be objective
Stick to your discipline
To be “scientific” requires neutrality
A scholar must, in order to be “rational” avoid emotionalism

6. Gary Okihiro, Columbia University
Trained as a historian at UCLA. Professor of International and Public Affairs. Founding Director of Columbia’s Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race
Scholarship focuses on historical methodology
Margins and Mainstreams: Asian American History and Culture (1994)
Okihiro argues that our nation’s values and ideals stem not from the so-called mainstream but from the margins. This includes from among Asian and African Americans, Latinos and American Indians, women, and the gay and lesbian communities. Those groups in their struggles for equality, have helped to preserve and advance the founders’ ideals and have made America a more democratic place for all.

7. Okihiro’s view
“The writing of ethnic history is both necessary and possible. It need neither be justified nor defended. The collective voice of the people, once silenced, has a right to be heard. Oral history is not about only a tool or method for recovering history; it also is a theory of history which maintains that the common folk and the dispossessed have a history and that this history must be written. At the same time, however, this is not to ignore the importance of elitelore and the history of the ruling class, nor does it intend to equate oral history with the working class and written documents with the ruling class. Instead, the point is that there has been an overemphasis on the elite at the expense of the masses and that this imbalance has resulted in the writing of mythical histories.” pp

8. To Prepare for Next Session
Final Online Book Discussion on Fadiman (Ch )
Reading Notes on Kitano and Daniels, Ch. 3-4 and Patel’s “America’s Chinatowns”