Winner, 2013-2014 Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, Adult
Non-Fiction presented by the Asian Pacific American Librarian
Association
During the Cold War, Soviet propaganda highlighted U.S. racism in order
to undermine the credibility of U.S. democracy. In response,
incorporating racial and ethnic minorities in order to affirm that
America worked to ensure the rights of all and was superior to communist
countries became a national imperative. In Citizens of Asian America,
Cindy I-Fen Cheng explores how Asian Americans figured in this effort to
shape the credibility of American democracy, even while the perceived
"foreignness" of Asian Americans cast them as likely alien subversives
whose activities needed monitoring following the communist revolution in
China and the outbreak of the Korean War.
While histories of international politics and U.S. race relations during
the Cold War have largely overlooked the significance of Asian
Americans, Cheng challenges the black-white focus of the existing
historiography. She highlights how Asian Americans made use of the
government's desire to be leader of the "free world" by advocating for
civil rights reforms, such as housing integration, increased
professional opportunities, and freedom from political persecution.
Further, Cheng examines the liberalization of immigration policies,
which worked not only to increase the civil rights of Asian Americans
but also to improve the nation's ties with Asian countries, providing an
opportunity for the U.S. government to broadcast, on a global scale, the
freedom and opportunity that American society could offer.
