Crenshaw,
Kimberle; Gotanda, Neil; Peller, Gary & Thomas, Kendall,
eds. Critical
Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement. New
York: New Press,
1995. Return to the AMST 6xx Syllabus or visit the AMST 6xx Wired Bibliography
A few key texts that will inform our course:
Crenshaw,
Kimberle; Gotanda, Neil; Peller, Gary & Thomas, Kendall,
eds. Critical
Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement. New
York: New Press,
1995.
Ancheta,
Angelo N. Race, Rights and the Asian American Experience. New
Brunswick:
Rutgers University Press, 1998.
• Centers on the distinctive experiences of racial discrimination faced by Asian Americans and how the American legal system fails to recognize that discrimination can differ among racial and ethnic groups. Ancheta's text will serve as an introduction to a number of U.S. legal decisions involving Asian Americans. Throughout this course, we will also read the original court documents, examining them for the rhetoric employed by all parties involved.
Chuh, Kandice.
Imagine Otherwise: On Asian Americanist Critique. Durham: Duke
University
Press, 2003.
• Recognizing that the rubric “Asian American” elides crucial differences, Kandice Chuh argues for reframing Asian American studies so that it is defined not by its subjects and objects, but by its critique. An interesting base from which to theorize on the usefulness of Asian American pan-ethnicity. One wonders as to the effectiveness of theorizing a subjectless discourse in a land where so many fight for subjecthood. In any event, we will discuss whether one can truly argue for a subjectless discourse in the legal context given the importance of the subject in the U.S. courts.
Chang,
Robert S. Disoriented: Asian Americans, Law, and the
Nation-State. New
York: New York University Press, 1999.
• Arguing that traditional civil rights work and current critical race scholarship has failed to address the unique issues for Asian Americans, Chang sketches out his version of an Asian American Legal Scholarship. His theory claims a post-structural basis in lieu of the failed rational-empirical mode currently employed by civil rights advocates. We will evaluate his argument and discuss whether it indeed challenges traditional legal doctrine as well as its place within Asian America.
Lowe, Lisa.
Immigrant Acts: On Asian American Cultural
Politics. Durham: Duke University
Press, 1996.
• Lowe argues that distance from the American national culture constitutes Asian American culture as an alternative site that produces cultural forms materially and aesthetically in contradiction with the institutions of citizenship and national identity. I am particularly interested in Lowe’s discussion of the impact of culture – rather than political structures – on the formation of national identity. Given that this is a course on legal discourse, how important is culture to our discussion? I would argue that it is crucially important given how pervasive culture (and especially material culture) is to informing the attitudes that will eventually shape our legal discourse.
Sherene
H. Razack. Race, Space and the Law: Unmapping a White Settler
Society. Between
the Lines: Toronto, 2002.
• This Canadian anthology examines how spaces, and the arrangement of bodies withint them, are created. Rejecting the idea that spaces emerge naturally over time, they look instead at the role of law in shaping and supporting the racial hierarchies that emerge from, and in turn, produce various spatial arrangements. Though not specifically focused on the Asian American or Asian Canadian experience, the theory presented within this collection offers some useful conceptual tools in which to theorize the impact of legal immigration discourse on the bodies of our subjects of study.
Past and Passages: Asian Pacific Americans and Citizenship