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iMMigratitude: Tales of Asian Immigration
immigratitude is an original comics collection featuring the stories of 18 artists who are immigrants and the children of immigrants.
Alex Paro, project lead:
"Last year, I finally managed to resolve a lengthy cold war with my father. It was born out of our experience of moving to Canada when their expectation of how I would turn out and reality greatly differed. Eventually, we were able to bridge that gap.
Around this time, I also became a member of a group called the Asian Creatives Network (ACN). As I shared my story with other members of the ACN, I realized that everyone had similar, but unique tales of intergenerational strain resulting from immigration.
The common portrayals of Asian parents in the media are often clownish and racially-charged with age-old stereotypes. Whereas the stories that we tell ourselves are of human beings who were flawed at times, but are also impossibly generous toward their children.
This book will tell those experiences and humanize our parents.
We also worked hard to put together a roster of diverse voices within the context of Asian. We are artists from Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Filipino backgrounds."
Alex Paro, project lead:
"Last year, I finally managed to resolve a lengthy cold war with my father. It was born out of our experience of moving to Canada when their expectation of how I would turn out and reality greatly differed. Eventually, we were able to bridge that gap.
Around this time, I also became a member of a group called the Asian Creatives Network (ACN). As I shared my story with other members of the ACN, I realized that everyone had similar, but unique tales of intergenerational strain resulting from immigration.
The common portrayals of Asian parents in the media are often clownish and racially-charged with age-old stereotypes. Whereas the stories that we tell ourselves are of human beings who were flawed at times, but are also impossibly generous toward their children.
This book will tell those experiences and humanize our parents.
We also worked hard to put together a roster of diverse voices within the context of Asian. We are artists from Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Filipino backgrounds."
103 pages, Paperback
Published March 1, 2021
2 people are currently reading
244 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 24, 2021
Supported the kickstarter and now my book is here! I really enjoyed these tales of immigration (parents or the artist themselves or both). Some were short, some were longer. There was racism, fear, but also dreams, hopes, and family. I really loved seeing some of my favourite artists pop up in the stories.
March 23, 2021
When I was 12 we moved to southern Sweden for a year. The neighborhoods surrounding my house had an affluent Korean population drawn by Samsung's Nordic headquarters. I quickly made friends with a group of children at my school and spent a blissful year immersed in their home-life: tens of tiny pickled vegetables and rice for breakfast, watching old Bruce Lee movies during sleepovers, them mocking my horrendous attempts at pronouncing Korean phrases and naughty words, and all of us struggling with our Swedish. It was a wonderful year and I was reminded of it reading this collection.
immigratitude would have been a delight to read at any time but with the dislocation of COVID in March 2021 it hits harder than it might have before. It has been a year of being locked down, seeing others only remotely. Many of us haven't seen our families in over 13 months so to read of the misunderstandings between loved ones, the moments of warmth, of searching for one's heritage, even of plane flights is replete with nostalgia for the world of only 12 months ago.
The book is not outside of the pandemic though, in one of the more striking stories Debbie Tung of famed handle *where's my bubble* delivers a stark instance of a racially motivated hate crime whilst walking with her family during 2020. Some of the other stories also recall instances of micro-aggressions or plain-faced hatred that they and/or their families have experienced in the US and the UK. It is impossible not to read this and be swept up in current events, wondering how many others have had experiences like Tung in the last few months - if the news is anything to go by: too many!
Whilst I'm not of Asian descent I am an immigrant (was actually a bit jealous of how streamlined Fumio Obata's residency case seemed compared to my annual agony renewing my visa) having moved around a few different countries as a child and currently unsettled in a place 6,000 miles away from the village of my home. So I could identify a lot with the narratives of dual heritage and displacement. Many of these are stories about trying to connect with your elders and appreciate their lives - something we can all relate to. Kevin Kuramura's "What we don't say" was my favourite of this type of story.
The selection of art styles and narratives is excellent, as is the publishing of the book: colors leaping off the page in a nice glossy finish. My only criticism is that I wanted more from each author, who were allocated between 3-6 pages each. I would have loved for them to have a little more room to develop their narrative. Some, for example Greigori's "The Argentier" or Susan Xu's "In her Corner" were fully-fleshed, beautiful stories. Others could have used some more space to grow.
The kickstarter this is a part of hinted at Book 2 in the future. I look forward to owning the whole series!
immigratitude would have been a delight to read at any time but with the dislocation of COVID in March 2021 it hits harder than it might have before. It has been a year of being locked down, seeing others only remotely. Many of us haven't seen our families in over 13 months so to read of the misunderstandings between loved ones, the moments of warmth, of searching for one's heritage, even of plane flights is replete with nostalgia for the world of only 12 months ago.
The book is not outside of the pandemic though, in one of the more striking stories Debbie Tung of famed handle *where's my bubble* delivers a stark instance of a racially motivated hate crime whilst walking with her family during 2020. Some of the other stories also recall instances of micro-aggressions or plain-faced hatred that they and/or their families have experienced in the US and the UK. It is impossible not to read this and be swept up in current events, wondering how many others have had experiences like Tung in the last few months - if the news is anything to go by: too many!
Whilst I'm not of Asian descent I am an immigrant (was actually a bit jealous of how streamlined Fumio Obata's residency case seemed compared to my annual agony renewing my visa) having moved around a few different countries as a child and currently unsettled in a place 6,000 miles away from the village of my home. So I could identify a lot with the narratives of dual heritage and displacement. Many of these are stories about trying to connect with your elders and appreciate their lives - something we can all relate to. Kevin Kuramura's "What we don't say" was my favourite of this type of story.
The selection of art styles and narratives is excellent, as is the publishing of the book: colors leaping off the page in a nice glossy finish. My only criticism is that I wanted more from each author, who were allocated between 3-6 pages each. I would have loved for them to have a little more room to develop their narrative. Some, for example Greigori's "The Argentier" or Susan Xu's "In her Corner" were fully-fleshed, beautiful stories. Others could have used some more space to grow.
The kickstarter this is a part of hinted at Book 2 in the future. I look forward to owning the whole series!
August 28, 2022
Nice collection of comics of Asian immigration
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May 18, 2024I don't feel like it's fair of me to rate this when the creators were so vulnerable with their stories, but it wasn't really what I was expecting. I think I was subconsciously comparing it to other graphic novels I have read, which have had more consistent themes and messages. So, the disparate and sometimes jarringly short comics were hard for me to process. I would love to read longer pieces by some of the contributors!
May 16, 2021
A collection of little windows into various aspects of immigrant experiences, this book's strength are a few particularly poignant and well-developed stories. I struggled with grasping the significance of some of the stories, which felt like they weren't fully fleshed out, or for which the art didn't advance or deepen the story. However, these were balanced out by some of the others, and the variety of stories served to underline an important point about the diversity of Asian immigration stories. Too often, stories of Asian immigration are narrowed into a couple of tropes, and I was glad for the variety of experiences - hard work, racism, intimacy and distance - which this collection explores.
March 26, 2021
This a book of immigrant stories, full of heart, full of hope, and some full of pain.
The color of our skin, the shape of our eyes, the way we speak doesn't mean that our voices don't matter, that our experiences are somehow less than...
We all want a better life for the next generation.
The color of our skin, the shape of our eyes, the way we speak doesn't mean that our voices don't matter, that our experiences are somehow less than...
We all want a better life for the next generation.
October 15, 2021
I'm a big Debbie Tung fan so backed this on Kickstarter and finally picked it up. It's a lovely, moving collection of stories of Asian immigrants and children of Asian immigrants, with a lot to teach its reader.
March 25, 2021
A wonderful bite-sized view into the immigrant experience in America
April 23, 2021
A beautiful collection of stories and artwork.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews