The Evolving Landscape of Asian America – 55th Anniversary of the Immigration & Nationality Act
VIEW EVENT DETAILSSaturday, October 3, 2020
- Private Screening - PBS Documentary Clip (Members only - limited spaces): 11:00–11:30 AM HKT
- Public Webcast - Panel Discussion: 11:30 AM – 13:00 PM HKT
In 1965, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the landmark Immigration and Nationality Act, marking a significant change in American immigration policy. The milestone legislation abolished the National Origins Formula, which had set immigration quotas for specific regions, giving preference to Northern and Western Europe over Asia, among others. This historic turning point paved the way for a mass wave of immigration from the Asian continent, resulting in Asian Americans and other diaspora communities becoming the fastest growing population in the United States today. As we commemorate the 55th anniversary of this watershed moment in American history, our offices in Hong Kong, Japan, the Philippines, and Korea are jointly hosting a members-only private viewing of highlights of the PBS recent documentary series, “Asian Americans.” Weaving together powerful personal stories of recognizable and diverse Asian immigrants in America, the series casts a new lens on U.S. history and the ongoing role that Asian Americans have played in shaping the story of America. The members-only private viewing frames the discussion of the subsequent public webcast, during which distinguished Asian American speakers recount their own challenges growing up in their adopted homeland and share fresh perspectives on what it means to belong, in particular as Asian Americans are set to vote in the 2020 U.S. presidential election exactly one month from the date of the webcast.
Professor Viet Thanh Nguyen’s novel The Sympathizer won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and numerous other awards. His other books are a short story collection, The Refugees; Nothing Ever Dies: Vietnam and the Memory of War (a finalist for the National Book Award in nonfiction and the National Book Critics Circle Award in General Nonfiction); and Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America. He is a University Professor, the Aerol Arnold Chair of English, and a Professor of English, American Studies and Ethnicity, and Comparative Literature at the University of Southern California. A recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim and MacArthur Foundations, he is also a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times and the editor of The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives. His most recent publication is Chicken of the Sea, a children’s book written in collaboration with his six-year-old son, Ellison. His next book is the sequel to The Sympathizer, The Committed, forthcoming in March 2021. (Pre-recorded)
Kathy Matsui is vice chair of Goldman Sachs Japan, co-head of Macro Research in Asia and chief Japan equity strategist. She is a member of the Asia Pacific Management Committee and Goldman Sachs Japan Co., Ltd. Executive Committee and also helps oversee Launch With GS, Goldman Sachs’ $500 million commitment to narrow the gender investing gap. Kathy joined Goldman Sachs in 1994 and was named managing director in 1998 and partner in 2000. Kathy has been ranked No. 1 in Japan Equity Strategy by Institutional Investor multiple times. She was chosen by The Wall Street Journal as one of the "10 Women to Watch in Asia" for her work on the "Womenomics" theme and was named to Bloomberg Markets magazine’s “50 Most Influential” list in 2014.
Nayan Shah is Professor of American Studies & Ethnicity and History at University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Shah is a historian who has written extensively about Asian Americans and the intersection of health, law, sexuality, gender and creativity. Shah wrote two award-winning books, Contagious Divides: Epidemics and Race in San Francisco’s Chinatown and Stranger Intimacy: Contesting Race, Sexuality and the Law in the North American West. He has worked with the National Park Service, Angel Island Foundation, PBS, the History Channel, California Historical Society and the New York Historical Society to interpret the Asian American past. His latest book examines a century of hunger strikers voices against prison power across the globe.
Helen Zia is a writer, activist and Fulbright Scholar. Her latest book, Last Boat out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese who Fled Mao's Revolution, was one of NPR's Best Books of 2019 and a finalist for a 2020 PEN prize. President Bill Clinton twice quoted from her first book, Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People, which chronicles the civil rights struggles of Asian Americans in the contemporary U.S.; her book, My Country Versus Me, about Chinese American nuclear physicist Wen Ho Lee, who was falsely accused by the FBI of being a spy for the PRC. Helen Zia is the daughter of immigrants from China and was born and raised in New Jersey. Her role as an activist in the landmark civil rights case of anti-Asian violence is featured in Who Killed Vincent Chin? In 2010, she was a witness in the case for marriage equality that went to the Supreme Court. A graduate of Princeton University’s first coeducational class, Helen has received two honorary doctorates. After attending medical school, she became a community organizer, construction laborer, autoworker, and after which she discovered her life’s work as a writer.
Ramy Inocencio is the Asia correspondent for CBS News, based in Beijing. He joined CBS News in April 2019 and contributes to all broadcasts and platforms. Inocencio has two decades of experience reporting across Asia, America and Europe covering numerous international news stories of our era with live coverage and original reporting of major geopolitical events, natural disasters and emerging technology trends around the globe. Before joining CBS News, Inocencio was a New York-based anchor and correspondent for "Bloomberg Daybreak: Asia." At Bloomberg Television, he covered the first face-to-face summit between President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping from Mar-a-Lago, reported from Paris on the 2016 Bastille Day terror attack and traveled across the United States in 2015 for "Wiring the World," his technology innovation series. He also anchored for Bloomberg Radio and launched two daily podcasts on U.S.-Asia Pacific economic and financial ties. Previously, Inocencio was CNN International's Asia business correspondent based in Hong Kong and CNN's NASDAQ reporter in New York City. (Moderator)
*The private documentary clip screening will be available for ASHK members to watch on Zoom only, free of charge. Register here.
*The public webcast panel discussion will be live-streamed on Facebook & YouTube.
Co-organized with: