Houston Community College – Central
History 1302
Asian American History
CRN# 56132
Fall 2010
Professor Howard Bodner
Office Phone: 718-6232
Office Hours: 2:30-3:45pm, M-Th, (and by appointment) in SJAC 206A
E-Mail: howard.bodner@hccs.edu
*Confucius said to a disciple,”Shall I teach you how to know something? Realize you
know it when you know it, and realize you don’t know it when you don’t.” (2:17)
Required Readings:
Takaki, Ronald. Strangers From A Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans.
Lee, Joann Faung Jean. Asian Americans: Oral Histories of First to Fourth Generation
Americans from China, the Philippines, Japan, India, the Pacific Islands, Vietnam and
Cambodia.
Dudley, William. Asian Americans: Opposing Viewpoints.
Ling, Huping. Surviving on the Gold Mountain.
Course Description:
To examine the Asian American experience involves, among other things, looking at
American history the “wrong way”; that is, from west to east rather than from east to
west. Most American history, quite properly, focuses on the Atlantic migration and its
consequences; the emphasis here will be on the Pacific. Even the question of the frontier
(since the time of Frederick Jackson Turner, a crucial nexus for those concerned with
American Civilization) assumes an entirely different cast when viewed from a Pacific
perspective. The standard approach views the frontier as an internal zone moving
relentlessly from the Cumberland Gap to South Pass and beyond. But among westerners,
particularly Californians, a defensive rather than expansive frontier psychology often
developed. Although Californians dreamed of expansion, territorial and commercial, ever
westward toward Japan, China, and India, they often felt that their rocky coastline should
serve as a bulwark or dike against the human sea of Asian immigration which seemed to
threaten their way of life. This defensive frontier notion (more akin to the attitudes of the
Old World rather than the New) is perhaps one of the factors that has made the twentieth
century West, in many ways, an attitudinal trend setter for much of the rest of the nation.
Californians and other westerners modified the fundamental American attitudes toward
immigration nearly a half-century before the rest of the nation.
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Unfortunately, much of the Asian American experience is what Roger Daniels has called
“negative history”; that is, for a significant part of their history in this country, Asians
have been more celebrated for what has happened to them than for what they have
accomplished. At certain times and places in the past, Asians and their children have been
a pariah group at the very bottom of the ethnic escalator of American society, holding
legal and social status even below that of oppressed American blacks. Today, and for the
last few decades, this is demonstrably no longer the case. This remarkable metamorphosis
in the image and status of the Asian American since World War II offers dramatic
evidence of how rapidly and selectively the supposedly glacial folkways can change.
The treatment of resident Asians has been, in many ways, a barometer of the American
social process. Their exclusion, by national and racial proscription, prefigured an even
broader national and ethnic proscription of most of those Europeans who wished to
emigrate to the United States. Similarly, the removal of the legal stigmatization of Asians
during and after World War II prefigured the end of legal discrimination against the most
numerous “nonwhite” minority.
The significance of the Asian American experience transcends its negative history. The
United States continues to be a nation of immigrants, a polyethnic experiment
unparalleled in human history. In the final analysis, the American experience cannot be
understood without trying to understand its constant counterpoint of individual ethnic
themes. If this course is to have more than marginal utility, it must be studied as part of a
larger entity. The Asian American experience is not just a grace note in the broader
American ethnic symphony; it is a minor motif that is essential to an understanding of the
whole.
Grading Scale:
A (90-100), B (80-89), C (70-79), D (60-69), F (below 60).
All tests and assignments are marked with a numerical grade.
Scholastic Dishonesty:
Students are responsible for conducting themselves with honor and integrity in fulfilling
course requirements. Penalties and/or disciplinary proceedings may be initiated by
College System officials against a student accused of scholastic dishonesty.
“Scholastic dishonesty includes, but is not limited to, cheating on a test, plagiarism, and
collusion.
“Cheating” on a test includes:
 Copying from another student’s test paper;
 Using materials during a test that are not authorized by the person giving the test;
 Collaborating with another student during a test without authority;
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

Knowingly using, buying, selling, stealing, transporting, or soliciting in whole or part
the contents of an unadministered test;
Bribing another person to obtain a test that is to be administered.
“Plagiarism” means the appropriation of another’s work and the unacknowledged
incorporation of that work in one’s own written work offered for credit.
“Collusion” means the unauthorized collaboration with another person in preparing
written work offered for credit.
Exams
50%
There will be two exams (a mid-term and a final). Each exam will consist of a
combination of short answer and essay questions and will count for 25% of your grade.
Each exam will cover material taken from class lecture/discussion and readings
(including those assigned but not specifically discussed in class).
*There will be no makeup exams except under extraordinary circumstances and solely
at the discretion of the Instructor.
Film Summary/Critique
25%
We will be viewing 12 historical films covering significant aspects of Asian American
history.
After viewing a particular film in class, you will write a brief summary/critique
(approximately 350-400 words in length) of what you have just seen.
Each of these summary/critiques will be graded. Your best 10 grades will be averaged to
compute your overall grade for this assignment.
The films must be viewed in class and the summary/critiques must be typed and
turned in at the beginning of the next scheduled class.
There will be no makeups.
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Paper & Oral Presentation
25%
Each student will select a topic (after consultation with the Instructor) and write a paper
of approximately 5 pages in length. Additionally, the student will make a brief oral
presentation on their topic to the class.
The due date for each student will vary based upon the topic selected.
HCC Course Withdrawal Policy
The State of Texas has begun to impose penalties on students who drop courses
excessively. For example, if you repeat the same course more than twice, you have to
pay extra tuition. Beginning in Fall 2007, the Texas Legislature passed a law limiting
first time entering freshmen to no more than SIX total course withdrawals throughout
their educational career in obtaining a certificate and/or degree.
To help students avoid having to drop/withdraw from any class, HCC has instituted an
Early Alert process by which your professor may “alert” you and counselors that you
might fail a class because of excessive absences and/or poor academic performance. It is
your responsibility to visit with a counselor to learn about what, if any, HCC
interventions might be available to assist you – online tutoring, child care, financial aid,
job placement, etc. – to stay in class and improve your academic performance.
If you plan on withdrawing from your class, this MUST be done PRIOR to the
withdrawal deadline to receive a “W” on your transcript. Faculty will no longer have
the ability to withdraw students after the withdrawal deadline. **Final withdrawal
deadlines vary each semester and/or depending on class length, please visit the online
registration calendars, HCC schedule of classes and catalog, any HCC Registration
Office, or any HCC counselor to determine class withdrawal deadlines. If you do not
withdraw before the deadline, you will receive the grade that you earn in the class as your
final grade.
Class Attendance:
Students are expected to attend class regularly and on time. Students are responsible for
material covered during their absences. Class attendance will be checked daily by the
Instructor.
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Note: Withdrawal Policy
All students who wish to withdraw from this course must fill out a course withdrawal
form available at the Registrar’s Office. The last day to withdraw from a course for the
Fall, 2010 semester is November 18 by 4:30pm.
Students who do not officially withdraw from the course will receive a final grade for the
course. However, the Instructor reserves the right to drop students from this course for
excessive absences. Any absence in excess of 6 hours (or 4 classes) may result in a
student being administratively withdrawn.
Ceasing to attend the class does not constitute a withdrawal.
Students will not be considered withdrawn from the course until they submit the official
withdrawal form or have been administratively withdrawn.
Faculty will no longer have the ability to withdraw students after the withdrawal
deadline.
Reasonable Accommodations:
“Any student with a documented disability (e.g., physical, learning, psychiatric, vision,
hearing, etc.) who needs to arrange reasonable accommodations must contact the
Disability Services Office at the respective college at the beginning of each semester.
Faculty are authorized to provide only the accommodations requested by the Disability
Support Services Office.”
Course Schedule:
Week One: Aug. 30 & Sept. 1
Takaki, Chapter 1 “From A Different Shore: Their History Bursts With Telling”
Film – “The Two Coasts of China: Asia and the Challenge of the West”
Week Two: Sept. 8
Takaki, Chapter 2 –
“Overblown With Hope: The First Wave of Asian Immigration”
Ling, Part One - Chapters 1&2
Dudley, Chapter 1 –
#1 Chinese Immigration Must Be Restricted
#2 A Defense of Chinese Immigrants
Film – “Mejii: Asia’s Responses to the West”
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Week Three: Sept. 13 & 15
Takaki, Chapter 3 –
“Gam Saan Haak: The Chinese in Nineteenth-Century America”
Dudley, Chapter 1 –
#3 Chinese Immigrants Are Harming California
#4 The Anti-Chinese Movement Is Harming California
#5 U.S.-Born Children of Chinese Immigrants Are American Citizens
#6 U.S.-Born Children of Chinese Immigrants Are Not Necessarily American Citizens
Film – “Sewing Woman” (14 minute documentary on “one woman’s journey from an
arranged marriage in China to life as a garment factory worker for over 30 years)
Week Four: Sept. 20 & 22
Takaki, Chapter 4 –
“Raising Cane: The World of Plantation Hawaii”
Dudley, Chapter 2 –
#5 Asian Americans Are Accepted in Hawaii
#6 Asian Americans Face Discrimination in Hawaii
Film – “From the Barrel of a Gun”
Week Five: Sept. 27 & 29
Takaki, Chapter 5 –
“Ethnic Solidarity: The Settling of Japanese America”
Dudley, Chapter 2 –
#1 Japanese Residents Can Never Be Assimilated
#2 Japanese Residents Are Assimilating
Film – “Writers and Revolutionaries”
Week Six: Oct. 4 & 6
Takaki, Chapter 6 –
Ling, Part One – Chapter 3
“Ethnic Islands: The Emergence of Urban Chinese America”
Film – “Carved in Silence” (45 minute docudrama about Angel Island, the “Ellis Island
of the West”)
Week Seven: Oct. 11 & 13
Lee, Chapter 1 –
“Growing Up in Mississippi”
“Japanese Barbie Dolls”
“Born and Raised in Hawaii, but not Hawaiian”
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“Where To From Here”
“Recently Arrived”
“To Be More Japanese”
“To Be More American”
“Permanent Sojourner”
Film – “Reinventing Japan”
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Week Eight: Oct. 18 & 20
Mid-Term Exam on Oct. 20
Week Nine: Oct. 25 & 27
Takaki, Chapter 7 –
“Struggling Against Colonialism: Koreans in America”
Dudley, Chapter 4 –
#3 Korean American Entrepreneurship Is an Indication of Economic Success
#4 Korean American Entrepreneurship Is an Indication of Economic Exploitation
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“Koreans and Church”
Film – “Inside Japan, Inc.”
Week Ten: Nov. 1 & 3
Takaki, Chapter 8 “The Tide Of Turbans”: Asian Indians in America
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“Being Indian in Jersey City”
“Racial Hatred”
“Different by Choice”
Lee, Chapter 3 –
“Twenty Five Years”
Film – “Big Business and the Ghost of Confucius”
Week Eleven: Nov. 8 & 10
Takaki, Chapter 9 –
“Dollar A Day, Dime A Dance: The Forgotten Filipinos”
Dudley, Chapter 2#7 A Plea for Filipino Repatriation
#8 Most Filipino Immigrants Do Not Want Repatriation
Film – “The Fight for Democracy”
Week Twelve: Nov. 15 & 17
Takaki, Chapter 10 –
“The Watershed of World War II: Democracy and Race”
Ling, Part Two – Chapter 4
Dudley, Chapter 3 –
#1 All Japanese Americans Should Be Evacuated from the West Coast
#2 Japanese Americans Should Not Be Subject to Mass Evacuation
#3 Japanese Americans Should Cooperate with Government Evacuation Plans
#4 Japanese Americans Should Not Cooperate with Government Evacuation Plans
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Week Thirteen: Nov. 22 & 24
Takaki, Chapter 11 –
“Strangers” At The Gates Again: Post-1965
Ling, Part Three – Chapter 5
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“Out of Communism”
Film – “Sentimental Imperialism: America in Asia”
Week Fourteen: Nov. 29 & Dec. 1
Takaki, Chapter 12 –
“Breaking Silences: Community of Memory”
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“Permanent Sojourner”
“Ancestors”
Week Fifteen: Dec. 6 & 8
Ling, Part Three – Chapter 6
Dudley, Chapter 4 –
#1 Asian Americans No Longer Face Significant Discrimination
#2 Asian Americans Still Face Significant Discrimination
#5 Asian Americans Represent an American Success Story
#6 Asian American Success Is a Myth
Lee, Chapter 2 –
“On Being Asian American”
“Minorities Within”
Film – “The Pacific Century: The Future of the Pacific Basin”
Final Exam on Dec. 13 (at 11am)
Note: The Instructor reserves the right to change various parameters of this syllabus at his
discretion.
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