Asian American: Encyclopedia II - Asian American - Asian American history

Asian American - Asian American history

Asian American - Early history

A large amount of Chinese and Japanese began immigrating to the U.S. in the mid 19th century. Many of these immigrants worked as laborers on the transcontinental railroad. A surge in Asian immigration in the late 19th century gave rise to a fear from some, referred to as the "yellow peril."

Asian American - Immigration trends

Immigration trends of recent decades have dramatically altered the statistical composition and popular understanding of who is an Asian American. This transformation of Asian America, and of America itself, is the result of legislation such as the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952 and the 1965 immigration reforms. The McCarran-Walter Act repealed the "free white persons" restriction of the Naturalization Act of 1790, but it retained the quota system that effectively banned nearly all immigration from Asia. But Asian immigration increased significantly after the 1965 Immigration Act altered the quota system.

Historically, Asian Americans have largely been perceived as members of the East Asian ethnic groups, specifically Chinese and Japanese, the two largest ethnic groups before 1965, as well as Filipinos who became colonial subjects of the US in 1898 due to the Spanish-American War (also see Philippine-American War). This occurred despite the early presence of Korean and Indian immigrants in the early 1900s as well. The Asian communities in the United States now include many Taiwanese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Filipinos of different classes and educational achievements, and Southeast Asians. Asian America includes people from South Asia — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The term includes Thai, Burmese, Lao, Cambodians, Hmong, Tibetans, Nepalese, and other Southeast Asian immigrants to the US, and sometimes also Pacific Islanders such as Samoans, Tongans, Fijians, Guamanians (Chamorros). Ethnically native Hawai'ians are also sometimes included.

This rapid change in Asian American demographics occurred after enactment of the 1965 Immigration Act. This act replaced exclusionary immigration rules of the Chinese Exclusion Act and its successors, such as the Reed-Johnson Act or 1924 Immigration Act, which effectively excluded "undesirable" immigrants, including Asians. The 1965 rules set across-the-board immigration quotas for each country, opening the borders to immigration from Asia for the first time in nearly half a century.

Two other influences, however, have been equally worthy of attention. First, in the wake of World War II, immigration preferences favored family reunification. This may have helped attract highly skilled workers to meet American workforce deficiencies. Secondly, the end of the Korean War and Vietnam War or so-called "Secret Wars" in Southeast Asia brought a new wave of Asian American immigration as people from Korea, Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia arrived. Some of the new immigrants, as in the case of the Korean War, were war brides, who were soon joined by their families. Others, like the Southeast Asians, were either highly skilled and educated or part of subsequent waves of refugees seeking asylum. Some factors contributing to the growth of sub-groups such as South Asians and mainland Chinese are higher family sizes, higher use of family-reunification visas, and higher numbers of technically skilled workers entering on H-1 and H-1b visas.

Japanese Americans and South Asians are emblematic of the dramatic changes since the immigration reforms of the mid-20th century. Japanese Americans are widely recognized as an Asian American sub-group. In 1970, there were nearly 600,000 Japanese Americans, making it the largest sub-group. Today, Japanese Americans are the sixth-largest group, with relatively low rates of births and immigration. In 2000, there were between 800,000 and 1.2 million Japanese Americans (depending on whether multi-ethnic responses are included). In 1990 there were slightly fewer South Asian in the US than Japanese Americans. By 2000, Indian Americans nearly doubled in population to become the third largest group. High rates of immigration from across Asia will make Asian America increasingly representative of the continent itself.

Asian American - Socioeconomic Trends

As of the later half of the twentieth century, Asian Americans have generally been educationally and financially successful. According to 2000 U.S. Census data, the average Asian American household earns a higher income than other U.S. ethnic groups and achieves higher levels of educational attainment. However, Asian Americans who tend to have larger families, earn per capita less than white populations. Asian Americans have the highest percentage of higher education degrees, such as PhDs, than any other group in the United States. The proportion of Asian Americans at many selective educational institutions far exceeds the 3% national population rate. For example, several University of California campuses and New York City's Stuyvesant High School, J.P. Stevens High School in Edison, NJ, Palisades Park High School in Palisades Park, NJ, and Fort Lee High School in Fort Lee, NJ, Sunny Hills High School in Fullerton, CA, Arcadia High School in Arcadia, CA, Lowell High School in San Francisco, CA, and San Marino High School in San Marino, CA all count Asian Americans as 50% or more of their population. Also, Asian Americans make up about twenty percent of the Ivy League.

However, exceptions to this success story are often found, usually among first-generation immigrants, who sometimes lack documentation, cannot speak English, or have a hard time assimilating into American culture in general. Asian Americans have among the largest discrepencies among poor and wealthy families or any racial group.

Such conditions are common among Asians emigrating to the United States from southeast Asian countries such as Laos, and Cambodia, among others; many of these immigrants can be considered refugees from Communist and totalitarian states and as such, often do not have the educational or socioeconomic advantages of other Asian Americans. Many immigrants are often forced to work in minimum wage or below-minimum wage jobs, including in menial sweatshop or restaurant labor, because they fear that mainstream employers will not hire them or, if they have entered the country illegally, will report them to the government. Due to popular labeling of Asian Americans as model minorities, the critical issues of poverty and low educational attainment among southeast Asian immigrants and their Asian American children do not receive the attention that such issues receive in the African American and Hispanic communities.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Asian American history", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki