The Making of Asian America: A History

by Erika Lee

A “comprehensive…fascinating” (The New York Times Book Review) history of Asian Americans and their role in American life, by one of the nation’s preeminent scholars on the subject, with a new afterword about the recent hate crimes against Asian Americans.In the past fifty years, Asian Americans have helped change the face of America and are now the fastest growing group in the United States. But much of their long history has been forgotten. “In her sweeping, powerful new book, Erika Lee considers the rich, complicated, and sometimes invisible histories of Asians in the United States” (Huffington Post). The Making of Asian America shows how generations of Asian immigrants and their American-born descendants have made and remade Asian American life, from sailors who came on the first trans-Pacific ships in the 1500 to the Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II. Over the past fifty years, a new Asian America has emerged out of community activism and the arrival of new immigrants and refugees. But as Lee shows, Asian Americans have continued to struggle as both “despised minorities” and “model minorities,” revealing all the ways that racism has persisted in their lives and in the life of the country. Published fifty years after the passage of the United States’ Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, these “powerful Asian American stories…are inspiring, and Lee herself does them justice in a book that is long overdue” (Los Angeles Times). But more than that, The Making of Asian America is an “epic and eye-opening” (Minneapolis Star-Tribune) new way of understanding America itself, its complicated histories of race and immigration, and its place in the world today.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Race, Asian American, Politics, Social Justice, Audiobook

560 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 1, 2015

About the author

I’m a writer and professor who loves reading and writing. I finished my fourth book: America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the U.S., which will be published by Basic Books/Hachette on November 26, 2019.

I’m a historian who still does history the old-fashioned way by doing research in the archives. I get excited finding dusty documents, but I’m also fully immersed in the 21st century as a #twitterstorian who is helping to build a digital archive of immigrant digital stories and provide historical commentary to the news.

I write about immigrants, Asian Americans, and race as a way to understand America in the past and present. I write history “from the bottom up,” focusing on everyday people and their role in American life. I fervently believe that there has never been a more important time for strong, fact-based, and accessible history and journalism. In a society that seemingly accepts the erasure and misinterpretation of history as well as the manipulation and denial of facts, we need to understand how we got to where we are today, what is at stake, and what we can do to create change.

I wrote America for Americans in the aftermath of the 2016 presidential elections. My students, many of whom are first-generation immigrants and refugees, kept asking "How could we have elected a president who called Mexicans 'rapists' and 'criminals' and called for a 'complete and total shutdown of Muslims to the US'?" And "how could this have happened today, after two terms of our first African American president?"

I didn't have the answers. And none of the books on my shelves did either. So I decided to write my own. America for Americans is a sobering history. It was hard to write (and it literally made me sick to do so!) But I think it is a necessary wake up call for all of us who seek to live in a humane and welcoming world. I hope that you will enjoy it!

Reviews

[emma]

trying to become the type of person who can read big nonfiction books

[Bookworm · Rating 4 out of 5]

File under "More stuff I didn't learn in school." With the recent news about Asians being in the news (on immigration, in literature, in any number of subject areas), this seemed like an intriguing pickup. I knew a bit about the Japanese internment camps from World War II. Chinese immigrants coming for the gold rush. But what other parts of Asian-American history did I not know?
 
A lot. As this doorstop (I mean that nicely) of a book shows, the history of Asian immigration to the Americas shows a very rich history. From the first Asians brought to Latin America as slave labor to the rise of Asian immigrants in the US and how they are perceived, author Lee takes us through a detailed history. This definitely helped fill in some gaps: ie I didn't know had been brought as slave labor to Latin America. Or that Japanese people in Peru and in other Latin American countries had been rounded up with Japanese in the US to be sent to internment camps. Or how US laws and racism forced Chinese people to try their luck in Canada or Mexico or elsewhere.
 
Despite the title I couldn't help but feel the book is a bit mis-named. It refers to Asian Americans, but it tends to be rather US-centered and tends to focus on certain groups of Asians (Chinese, Japanese, etc.) over say Southeast Asians. Some of it is somewhat understandable (a topic like the internment camps needs a lot of space so it can be adequately covered) but it also makes me think there's information that's missing. I realize this couldn't be comprehensive by *any* means, but I don't think the title is quite right. However, it does cover a broad range of topics: immigration, racism, economic hardships (left behind or faced by the newly arrived), civil rights, etc.
 
I also found the later parts of the book lacking. While I was excited to move closer to more recent times that I knew more about, the history part of the book ends in the 1990's or pre-9-11. I had hoped the author would dedicate some space (and she does talk about it here and there) to the treatment of Pakistanis, Indians or other Asians who happen to be Muslims in the post 9-11 world. Or maybe a broader discussion of the portrayal of Asians (American or not) in the media (movies, books, literature, etc.).
 
I also was somewhat puzzled by the discussions of AAs in civil rights movements. Although the work and participation of AAs in various civil rights movements are discussed, Lee also writes about AA LGBT people feeling excluded from the white mainstream without any mention that they very likely faced exclusion in their own ethnic groups too. This is not to diminish the work they have done to forward civil rights, but again I do not think it is quite as simple as Lee made it out to be.
 
Overall, though, I thought it was a good read. I took my time with it, seeing that it's much more "textbook" like and would require a closer reading. Some of the information is just downright enraging so I could really only handle a chapter or two at a time.  I'd also recommend supplementing it with other sources since this can't be in any way comprehensive. I can easily see this book as popping up on college syllabi on immigration, Asian American history, etc. But as a stand-alone (as in, not read for a class or anything), it worked fine in a non-academic setting.
 
This would probably make a good reference, but shouldn't be crammed in all at once (it's not a "light" read in any sense of the word by weight or information). But if you're like me and want to fill the gaps of your education on Asian American history, I'd recommend it.

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 3 out of 5]

An overview of the history of Asian immigrants and their descendants in the United States, from the colonial era through modern times. It’s a lot to fit into 402 pages of text (the rest being references, endnotes etc.), so it doesn’t talk about everybody: the author covers the history of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, South Asian and Filipino immigrants, as well as the more recent waves of refugees from Southeast Asia. There’s a good balance of high-level discussion of policies and statistics with individual stories to bring events down to a human scale.

However, the author is a history professor and the text comes out about halfway between academic writing and popular nonfiction. On the one hand it’s carefully-written and well-sourced, on the other that careful writing means it can be vague and abstract, as well as sometimes repetitive. The repetition occurs both on the sentence level and in some of its larger narrative choices: Lee relates the 19th and early 20th century history of each of the five groups listed above in its own chapter, but each one seems to follow roughly the same arc: large numbers of impoverished young men immigrate to the U.S. for work, sometimes sending for mail-order brides later; the immigrants find backbreaking labor, poor conditions and discrimination, but slowly improve their conditions through hard work; as their numbers grow, white society begins demanding restrictions on their immigration, which are ultimately legislated, at which point a new group begins immigrating to fill the gap and the cycle begins again. Lee tells this story each time as if it were new, rather than focusing on the similarities and differences between the newest group’s experiences and those we’ve already read. That made it a bit hard to put them in context with each other and into a logical timeline.

Nevertheless, it’s certainly interesting material, and while those well-versed in U.S. history might not be surprised by much of the content, there’s something to be said for having it all in one place where this subject is the focus. While I was generally aware of the pre-WWII laws restricting Asian immigration and of Japanese internment during WWII, for instance, this book contained much more detail than I knew before. I also appreciated the global perspective, including a look at how U.S. immigration policy influenced and responded to Canadian and Latin American policies, and how conditions in Asian countries caused people to immigrate and affected their treatment in the U.S. For instance, in the early 20th century Japan was in a position to make demands regarding treatment of its citizens, while Koreans (colonized by Japan) and Indians (colonized by Great Britain) were on their own, particularly if they rejected the intervention of the colonial power. (However, their advocacy could wind up affecting events back home.) There’s also a look at how immigrants and their descendants relate to their home countries today, with some moving back or maintaining close ties in both.

The author really dislikes generalizations, and makes the point that you can’t admit only the best-educated, STEM-oriented people from a particular country and then conclude that their culture is uniquely suited to math, science, or educational achievement generally. In fact she seems to really dislike any discussion of culture at all, perhaps because people so often generalize based on skewed samples or assume that because something is “cultural” it’s therefore immutable. (I wasn’t entirely on board with the implied criticism of The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, though—sure, not all Hmong families are like that family, but it is important to try to understand cultural differences where they exist, even as we recognize that not everyone from a particular country is the same.) She also makes the point that not all Asian-American groups are doing well and some in fact have noticeably higher poverty rates than the American average.

I do think this book is a bit of an easy target for the conservative “liberals hate America” line. Obviously people of color have often had a very difficult time in the U.S., but in 402 pages I’m hard-pressed to name anything good the author highlights other than contributions of people of color themselves. It’s particularly notable since she discusses immigration policies of other countries, but only where the U.S. influences them for the worse. We do after all have not only more immigrants than any other country on Earth, but more than four times as many as the next contender (not a statistic found in this book), and policies like birthright citizenship are not typical globally, so I am quite confident it is not actually the worst place in the world for immigrants, as reading this book might make you believe! It’s a tricky line to walk and I’m not sure it was intentional—of course history, though to a lesser extent than news, is largely made up of the negative—but it does come across a bit hopeless overall.

At any rate, I did learn from this book and was reasonably engaged with it, though it’s not one I’d be in a rush to recommend. For those who like these big-picture overviews of the history of a minority group, El Norte takes a somewhat similar approach (and was in my judgment a better book) to the relationship between the U.S. and Latin America as well as Latino immigrants and citizens.

[Lucy · Rating 3 out of 5]

First things first: yes, The Making of Asian America is very well researched but not the most well written (at times with unclear and confusing event descriptions, at times a regurgitation of statistics or too many personal stories). Yes, The Making of Asian America, by nature of the undertaken task, necessarily sacrifices depth for breadth. These two points notwithstanding, I really think The Making of Asian America should be mandatory reading--not only for Asian Americans so they can better understand the historical legacies backing their current status as the Perpetual Other, but also for every American so they are aware of their country's sordid past of violent racism and imperialism.

Erika Lee makes two main points: (1) that current day Asian America is not a monolithic group, but that is instead comprised of many disparate national and ethnic diasporas, each with very different histories in America, and that follows a highly bimodal distribution for socioeconomic and education level; (2) that this current bimodal Asian America has its roots in centuries of anti-Asian racism and Asian Exclusion immigration laws in the Americas. In fact, the publication of Making was timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which finally abolished national immigration quotas and, in doing so, paved the way for renewed Asian immigration and an invigoration of Asian America.

In discussing the making of Asian America, Lee details the history of Asian immigration to and exclusion from America. [oops filling this in later]

Finally, Making is, of course, highly relevant in 2015 in light of today's anti-Mexican sentiment, ever growing Islamophobia, and the Syrian refugee crisis. President Obama and the Democratic candidates can speak all they want on how blocking Syrian refugees is "un-American" and "not reflective of our American values," but it is, sadly, the Republican candidates, with all their fear-mongering and racist rhetoric, who come closest to the very American values of racism, xenophobia, and cultural supremacy. All Americans should read Making, be humbled by our nation's history of hate, violence, and marginalization, and subsequently become better, more empathetic, citizens.

[Murtaza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly researched and compellingly well-written history of Asian migration to the United States. Its generally papered-over how much discrimination Asians faced when first arriving, many as either indentured laborers and even slaves to the Americas, and what a hard fought battle it was to establish themselves in these countries. They faced racist laws, violence, denigration as national security threats and "unassimilable foreigners," yet generally proved these allegations wrong. They have also been subject to differing treatment based on the relative power and relationship of their homelands to the United States, something partly reflected in the growing stature of Chinese-Americans with the rise of China in recent decades.

There are many unspoken parallels with the travails of past Asian immigrants and those American Muslims today, something that led me to read this book for research purposes. The book is packed with details and thoroughly sourced. For the most part, it doesn't slow down the narrative, although it did feel a bit disjointed at points. All in all its a great history that is often ignored by many, one of oppression and perseverance on the part of millions of people trying to establish themselves in a new land. Recommended to all students of American history as well as those trying to contextualize the present moment. A moment that may seem fraught but which is neither unprecedented or hopeless.

[Sahitya · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book I didn’t even know about till a week ago but I couldn’t stop once I started listening to the audiobook. It’s a fascinating book about the people who migrated from different countries in Asia to the US from the 17th century till recently, and I think the author did a good job relaying both the political as well as the personal reasons for this migration. Along with the desperation of a people who want a better life, we also see the bigotry and xenophobia towards them and how these perceptions change based on world events, as well as based on what the politicians of US want Americans to feel. The chapters about the Japanese internment camps were particularly difficult to read.

This was very informative and I am glad to get the opportunity to expand my knowledge about this topic. My review is pretty incoherent because I’m just not in a mood to write anything today, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that I would definitely recommend this book if you are interested to learn this part of American history, which is not very well known nor considered very important to be taught.

[laurel [the suspected bibliophile] · Rating 5 out of 5]

A comprehensive overview of being Asian in America, and a solid primer in Asian-American history.

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's crazy how much of this history we don't learn in our k-12 education. What we do learn is like a summary of the Cliff's notes version. I didn't realize the magnitude of numbers involved with the Chinese, South Asian, and South East Asian "indentured servant/laborer force" being brought in. Nor did I know just the scope of their disbursement in the Americas. I had referenced the "endless waltz" of " war, peace and revolution" in another review, but it seems like there's an endless waltz here as well. Perhaps not as succinct, but it's the endless waltz of "forcing and/or allowing in slaves/laborers from other countries to take criminally low-paying jobs, immediate xenophobic and racist backlash, and then passing laws to block immigration from those countries depleting the workforce and then having to start the cycle again with a new set of countries". That seems to be the history of how each group of Asian immigrants originally came into the country and we're seeing it happen again now. We just call the xenophobia and racism "economic anxiety". But the arguments used against the groups, the whole idea of "rapists and murderers", of simultaneously taking all the jobs but also being lazy, of changing the moral values of the country - the same exact arguments used in 1882 for the Chinese Exclusion Act are currently being used in 2020.

Despite the length of the book it still feels like a summary of the "entire" Asian-American experience. For the most part, the focus of the book in terms of "America" is the United States and in terms of "Asia" tends to be East Asia. It does cover South Asians being brought to places like Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago; Chinese in Cuba, Mexico, Canada; or the Japanese in Peru, but it almost seems summarized and trying to get to how it relates to the United States quickly. There's a lot about and about the after effects of Chinese Exclusion, and Japanese internment - understandable because they are both well known and impactful, but it's clear that the author seemed to have a lot to say about both of those events. Aside from the Filipino experience, the rest of Southeast Asia isn't really brought up until the author gets to the 1960's. And their (Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, etc...) experience seems to all get bunched together and rushed. In terms of more "recent" events such as Vincent Chin, LA Riots, 9/11, the current lives that Asian-American lead, the diaspora, and the racism that they experience - it's crammed and rushed at the end of the book. The book obviously never claims to be a complete history of the entirety of the Asian American experience, but I do feel like the foundation is missing a few blocks here and there.

There's a few instances where the book starts following specific people or families at certain parts, it gives the book some relatability or a personal touch, giving names and specificity to what's happening to a group at a certain time. I know some people would rather the book just focus on the broader details of policy or just historical facts, but I think the primary source of hearing what people who lived through it have to say is important. It gives context on how policies impacted real lives, and how people had to adjust their expectations or entire lives just to survive.

I think it's a 4 star book because I would have really liked the book to be less East Asian-centric, but at the same time, I'm giving it 5 stars just because I can. People don't read enough history in general, and certainly don't read enough about Asian-Americans specifically, and I'm not going to drag the review score of this book down giving people more excuses to not read it. I think in the context of the current President, of the racism that has come to the forefront these past few years, of new immigration and visa policies, of the recurring racism that all Asians are facing - this book is an important book to read.

[Soo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Notes:

- Not a fan of Zeller's narration for this one.
- Good intro to the topic but be aware that all historical accounting are biased.
- Title is misleading. It's not a good presentation of all Asian American immigration. That would have made the book 3x as long in length.
- The delivery for Chinese immigration was best. Followed by Japanese. Going by content, I would say the other parts are not as well understood/researched/etc.
- I'd recommend reading the book over the audio. It was obvious that the book was not meant to be read out loud. Word choices, phrasing & placement of snippets of people's lives were crammed into historical summaries.

[Kaitlyn Tsai · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hmm torn between 4 and 5 stars for this one. It definitely took longer to read because it was written like a textbook, which I actually appreciate; it's thoroughly researched and filled in a ton of gaping holes in my understanding of Asian and Asian American history. Reading this book felt like sitting in a classroom and learning about history through an entirely different lens.

My primary issue with this book is that it still felt like Lee glossed over Southeast and South Asian history. Obviously properly covering all of "Asian" history would require volumes and volumes, but the imbalance between the focus given to East Asians vs. South and Southeast Asians here was noticeable enough for me to feel like it didn't entirely do the latter groups justice.

At points, I also felt like she could've done a better job of balancing hard, factual information/stats and personal stories. There were definitely portions of the book that felt like unnecessary number-regurgitation, which made it a little harder to read.

I realize this last point is really petty, but I found the way she used passive voice at certain points a little problematic in that it sort of shielded the U.S. government/Canadian government/European colonizers, e.g., "Chinese Americans were attacked in this city" vs. "White citizens attacked Chinese Americans in this city." Obviously readers can still understand that these are the people and institutions responsible for these crimes, but personally, I didn't appreciate it that much.

Still, this book is one that I would highly recommend! Very informative and much-needed :)

[RuthAnn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recommended

I do NOT have a head for history, so I'm grateful for books like this that can help educate me on topics that are a part of American history and yet are not covered at all in education. The reader of the audio book was excellent, and I tracked along just fine. I loved how the author talked about Asian immigrants to the United States from all kinds of Asian countries, definitely chipping away at the concept of the Asian monolith (ie, that we are all the same). She also did a great job of showing how the "model minority" concept is detrimental to Asian Americans and people in general because, hello, stereotypes and pitting groups against each other. There's also a theme of Asian Americans constantly having to prove how American we are, even if we were born in this country. I learned a lot, and a lot resonated with me! If you like history, definitely put this one on your list.

While I listened to this FASCINATING work of history, I had two main thoughts: 1) I need to buy this for my mom because she would LOVE it, and 2) Is there nobody that white America will not discriminate against?! For the love. Phase after phase of dehumanization, slavery, and humiliation throughout history, no exaggeration.

[Val · Rating 5 out of 5]

ok wow this should be required reading. what a comprehensive, thorough, IMPORTANT text!!!

i really appreciated how this text covered asian diasporic history in north, central, & south america — rather than just in the us. it’s definitely my american lens, but i really was so clueless about asian immigration to latin america & i was amazed at how much i learned

the breadth of communities covered was also so impressive. i learned so much about southeast asian diasporas (hmong & cameo asian especially) & i liked being able to parse out the histories to really understand just how non-monolithic asian america really is

it was so eye-opening to see how far back asian diasporic history goes, then trace those roots all the way through to present day. including over a century of history is no small feat & this book was definitely a lonnnng dense read, but listening to it on audio made it much more manageable for me with a more podcast-y vibe. i definitely felt like i should’ve been taking notes, but i also think that would’ve made it feel too textbook-like for me to fully enjoy. plus i was live-texting my thoughts to my partner so that can count as notes, right??

i did wish that some of the historical events were situated within a larger context. for example, rather than just stating a year or decade, a brief note on what else was happening in the world at the time would’ve helped me better understand the implications or even just understand how long ago or recent those events really were

overall takeaways:
- american history is absolutely incomplete without the inclusion of asian american history & i am so disappointed at how little of this i learned in our public education system
- racist sentiments lead to racist policies & vice versa in the most infuriating & long-lasting & harmful cycle
- our diaspora is so far-reaching & has such deep roots & it’s just so incredible to see yourself in such a rich history wow
- us interference in international affairs & other countries abroad is a fucking global plague that needs to be eradicated

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

will need to reread this ten more times

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I want to give this more stars because there really isn't anything else out there I've found with this breadth about Asian-American history. I understand that because of breadth, depth ultimately has to suffer on a topic of this scope unless you want a multi-volume book, but I was still somewhat disappointed at how repetitive it was within a text that is already having to make sacrifices of depth.

Also (and some could accuse me of personal bias due to my background, which I'll admit up front), though Vietnamese-Americans are the 4th-largest Asian population in the US, this group was barely discussed at all in this text—essentially only a few paragraphs about the close of the Vietnam War and that many came as refugees. This is obvious to anyone with any historical reference to the US, and it fails to follow the history of those refugees following their entrance into America.

I was surprised by this approach, and would be interested to understand the author's POV on not including this group more broadly in the history, especially in the section that was heavily focused on Hmong refugees post–Vietnam War era. I was definitely interested to learn more about the Hmong population in America, but my guess at this group's increased inclusion and the exclusion of Vietnamese Americans would be that Lee is based in Minneapolis, so research on the Hmong in that area would be easier to get given the largest population of Hmong in America are in Minneapolis-St. Paul.

At the end of the day, this was a solid introduction to Asian history in America, and I hope for those who don't know as much about Asian or Asian-American history, this would be a catalyst to read more about specific eras and cultures within the broader Asian sphere.

[Anneke · Rating 5 out of 5]

Erika Lee’s “The Making of Asian America” is THE contemporary Asian American reader. Well researched, written in accessible language, includes a great variety and wealth of source material that spans multiple oceans and hundreds of years, even up to the present in the postscript about COVID. Made me happy to see Corky Lee credited for a lot of the 20th and 21st c. photos :)

It’s so empowering to be educated on your history. For me, reading Erika Lee’s work has totally shaped my perception of myself and the world because for the first time I was really able to see my lineage comprehensively addressed with such care, which has allowed me to contextualize my life within a much more expansive and historically grounded framework.

Reading her essay on coolie labor a few years back was mind blowing and really solidified for me that early Asian American migration was largely born from slavery and the demand to maintain a readily available and just as easily disposed of stream of bodies to fund and support the colonial empire. Also really important for me personally as someone who’s Asian and Hispanic to learn about the history of Asians in Latin America, and even just to know that for centuries there have been people navigating similar borders of race and nationality to ones that I find myself interrogating. I had no idea that there were even Asian people in Latin America. Call me stupid or whatever but that was just not something I ever considered or was exposed to before. I just was so ignorant about all of this and never really thought of my ancestors with such a critical lens before college. I think I mostly understood my history as stereotypes and family member’s anecdotes and picture books. Classic liberal arts story lol and I feel so deeply thankful for the ability to explore my identity at school and to have the privilege to be educated on it in this way. But anyways, Erika Lee has opened my eyes in many ways and is by far my favorite Tufts alum <3

[Divya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a monumental undertaking – heavily researched, blends personal history and mainstream history, and properly disaggregates data while recognizing the strengths and weaknesses of homogenization (which is SO necessary for any good faith understanding of Asian America). Lee begins the book by locating Asia in European collective consciousness – “a Western-held understanding of a masculine, conquering Europe and a feminized Asia ripe for conquest” – which is integral to acknowledging anything East-West and for mapping the reception of the Asian diaspora.

She then spans 700 years of history, dissecting ships at sea and sugar plantations and stateless exiles and supreme court rulings and stereotypes and SO much more. Incredible how she infuses history with sociology, political science, gender theory, anthropology (and many other fields) while maintaining accessibility. Comments that claimed the book was repetitive missed the fact that each chapter stands alone. I do have my critiques: problematic use of “Indian” and “South Asian” synonymously, not enough interethnic alliance narratives, loss of the Latin American and Canadian trails halfway through, nearly nonexistent somatic exploration of the Asian American body, and the need for a full chapter dedicated to Vietnamese Americans.

Still, this is required reading for Asian American Studies and for anyone who just wants to know more.

[Dexter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ok, so I love learning about history and I thought I knew the Asian American story pretty well. And while this book did prove that I knew lots, it also proved that my knowledge was surface level. This book did an awesome job of helping me understand the history from all different Asian perspectives, from Indian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese Hmong, etc, etc. while I get why this book is a bit harsh on American/Canadian government policies, I do wish they would have compared it to the conditions they would have faced in their native countries, since in most cases, it would have been way worse. Still, this was an awesome book that helped me understand racist strategies (and how they’re being reused on people of Muslim faith and Latin backgrounds these days).

[Tricia Sean · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an incredible volume that documents how America failed to live up to its stated principles when it came to people of color unless it benefitted America. It is full of truth and facts that we never learned in school because it didnt fit the narrative schools were trying to teach us. It really broke down how the term Asian American is not a monolithic group and how they so much more than the model minority, the tiger mom or any other steroetype.
Edit: It is well written and well researched and has a nice mix research based and personal narrative.

[Nairobi · Rating 4 out of 5]

great book! i learned a lot. i feel like there were some parts that were super repetitive though.

[Abiman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing book. I learned so much about the history of Asian Americans from this book. Very similar style to Warmth of Other Suns, although this book touches on a greater number of personal stories whereas WoOS goes more in depth with each of its characters. Highly recommend.

[Madi Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

An amazing overview of the Asian Americans journey. It starts with Christopher Columbus “discovering” American and goes all the way into the 2010s. You get to learn about each groups unique and shared struggles when immigrating to America. I learned so much and it inspired me to research more of this history.

[J · Rating 5 out of 5]

Isn't it fun to have to read a book ten years after public education to learn "your" history? I will admit I could and should have done this sooner. For a long time I was disenchanted from reading, from history as I was taught, from thinking that it was important to know. Reasons. Excuses. But I'm here now.

I picked up this actually because the library had an AAPI month display... and it's been a lot of good, difficult emotional work to get through it. I am so glad I followed my whim. I am devastated and inspired and enlightened and so many things. I loved learning more background about the immigration routes that might apply to some former acquaintances who are part of Latinx, Asian, and American cultures. I also needed to know a lot of the lynching history, unattributed contributions and discriminations, and other difficult pains that continue to get looked over and unseen for the current stage of the model minority myth.

I'm hoping to pick up a Chinese copy when available for my mom. Highly recommend.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to this on CD. I became aware that, at times, it sounded like the same story over and over again: the prejudice, the immigration barriers, the legal injustice. It reminded me of the quote that history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes (apparently not a quote by Mark Twain, but worthy of him).
It was interesting to hear the story of other Asian Americans. I was familiar with the Chinese and Japanese and to some degree Southeast Asian stories, but not of Koreans, Philippinos, and Indians. I also liked the discussion of the “model immigrants”.

We are such slow learners. We need to listen to this story and the stories of other immigrants as often as possible.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly all, this is going right up there with Minor Feelings for me. The history here is so rich and expansive. We're talking Asian American history spanning half a century at least and multiple nationalities. I learned so much. I felt so much. Whereas Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong took a pretty intimate yet macro view of the Asian American as a whole, The Making of Asian America zoomed us in and out of the Asian American diaspora to show immigrant histories by country and time frame as well as the reaction in America - and therefore the world - towards the different Asian immigrants.

The social and political factors at play greatly impacted how each round of immigration was recieved, as well as legislative reactions like the Anti-Chinese Immigration Act evolving into the Anti-Asian Immigration Act and how these moves by the American government led to stricter immigration regulations on Asians in Canada, Mexico, Peru and Brazil, etc. Wars played a huge part on Asian American sentiment, obviously we had the World Wars as well as the Korean and Vietnam wars. Lee breaks the down political and social reactions.

There is a lot of anti Asian sentiment in our history - going back, like, forever - and tbh this clouded the early chapters of this book in a hazy red for me considering our current anti-Asian issues here in America. But beneath it there is such a rich immigrant history to behold. I was especially tickled to learn of Asian pockets across other countries because of America's immigration laws, and the boom of Mexican-American/Asian-American marriages also as a response to Asians not being able to become citizens and therefore not own land. There really is a lot in here. Lee also covers internment camps and the "model minority" as a political agenda against other races (but not so much intimately as Minor Feelings does view its affects on Asian Americans).

I absolutely recommend this to anyone interested in American history as a huge gap filler in your public education - read all of the nothing taught in public schools about Asian American history - as well as anyone interested in multicultural, political and/or social reads. You won't be disappointed in this one, and it will be a wonderful and timely read especially now.

[Steph | bookedinsaigon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This should’ve more appropriately been titled THE MAKING OF CHINESE/EAST ASIAN AMERICA (and some occasional information about other Asian ethnicities).

Which is not to say that it’s a bad book. Indeed, MAKING is meticulously well-researched and contains hundreds, if not thousands, of statistics, quotes, anecdotes, and facts. Despite it being a relatively straightforward listing of said factual information, the prose is clear and easy to read, as evidenced by the fact that I inhaled the audiobook narrated by Emily Woo Zeller, even often choosing it above other fiction reads that I was also listening to at the time.

But I would, however, recommend that you keep two things in mind when going into this book. The first is that Lee is a historian, and for the most part, she refrains from making any analysis or commentary on her research. Her two main points are that 1) Asians have been in the Americas for longer than most people have learned about (and appreciably, she discusses their histories beyond that of the US, but also in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Canada), and 2) Asian Americans are not a monolith, and have myriad identities, concerns, and struggles.

It is the second point where I had a bone to pick with the book. Up until the mid-20th century, MAKING is mostly organized by focusing on one Asian ethnic group per chapter: first the Chinese, then the Japanese, then Koreans, Filipinos, and South Asians. However, despite her central thesis being that Asians are not a monolith, each of these chapters is structured pretty similarly, giving the impression that people of these various ethnicities had/have much of the same challenges as one another, then and now.

Post-WWII, MAKING attempts to shift to a more chronological relaying of AA history, but this is where East Asian bias creeps in. Despite having fairly length sections devoted to Vietnamese and Hmong Americans, I felt that the majority of the narrative still focused on Chinese and Japanese Americans. Lee does attempt to right this in her final chapter on contemporary issues facing various AA communities nowadays, but it was a bit too much to cram in at the end, and didn’t succeed in qualifying the previous 500-something pages.

History, I believe, is not objective: no matter how much you stick to the “facts,” the truth is that facts are shaped by the winners and tellers. Which is why I was hoping for a little more from MAKING—some more analysis and commentary, perhaps, on inter-Asian conflicts, or relationships between AAs and other people of color. I feel like MAKING sticks to a fairly well-trod message about the need to increase empathy for and acceptance of the AA community, but not much about how AAs ourselves have benefited from and perpetuate systems of inequality.

Overall, MAKING is a highly informative work of nonfiction about parts of American history that are not well taught in schools, though it does have some limitations to consider when absorbing its impact.

[Courtney Ferriter · Rating 3 out of 5]

** 3.5 stars **

This was a very informative read on Asian American history. Patterns of discrimination and oppression emerged throughout the reading, especially the use of Asian Americans as a scapegoat during a collective trauma or crisis for the nation (e.g. internment camps for Japanese Americans during WWII, attacks on Southeast Asians following 9/11, hate crimes against people of Chinese ancestry during the COVID pandemic).

I listened to the majority of this book on audio, so I'm not sure how much that is influencing my take on the narrative style, but it came across as pretty dry and textbook-like for most of the book. At the end, I switched to the ebook, which was good, since there were pictures included that I hadn't known about listening to the audio. Those enhanced the reading experience for me. The ebook also included a postscript in light of increased hate crimes against Asians in the US during the COVID pandemic and the murder of six Asian American women in Atlanta in March 2021. This was a great addition that really solidified Lee's point about discrimination against Asian Americans being a feature of systemic racism in the U.S.

Overall, I would recommend this book if you are interested in learning more about the Asian American experience and/or as a worthwhile addition to your antiracism reading list.

[Krista | theliterateporcupine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book needs to be required reading in schools! It took me over a year to listen to this, but it was worth every second. It's not an easy read - there are very dense parts, very disturbing testimonies of systematic racism, and very painful first-hand accounts of the immigration experience.

As an immigrant and adoptee, Chinese American history has been something that has always been of interest, and even more so with the rise of hate crimes related to the pandemic. The history of Asians in America is commonly overlooked in public education and discussion, but I was happy to learn that Illinois became the first state in the country to require the inclusion of Asian American history in public school curriculums. However, it took until 2021 for this to become law and it will take even longer for schools to actually incorporate it into the curriculum.

Erika Lee does a exceptional job discussing the Asian experience in America. From the Chinese Exclusion Act to parachute parents and foreign exchange students, she covers almost every major topic. Additionally, she covers smaller ethic Asian groups such as Laos, Filipinos, and Mongols.

Stirring, Enlightening, and Thorough, this needs to be read by every person who calls themselves an American.

[Anshuman Swain · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 rounded up to 5.

A brilliant portrayal of the state of Asians in the Americas, especially the US, from the 1500s to the present. The pain, the challenges and the successes of different communities of Asians, the complexities of their experiences and the differences among the histories of each Asian group is brought out in vivid detail in this book. Densely packed with very well researched information!

[Diana · Rating 4 out of 5]

This reads very much like a textbook in terms of laying out history in a straightforward manner. At first I was disappointed it wasn’t more narrative but I appreciate it in the end because I don’t know of another book on the topic like this. I learned so much about Asian American history and while a lot of it is depressing to hear, it’s important to learn it!

[Vina · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well researched and compilation of Asian American history that is never mentioned through any history books. I recommend this book for others to read and how Asian communities have made an impact throughout history.