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1st Chinese American Woman Elected to Congress
On July 14, 2009, Judy Chu became the first Chinese American woman elected to Congress. Ms. Chu won a special election with almost 62% of the vote to succeed Hilda Solis, now U.S. Labor secretary, in the 32nd Congressional District.
Ms. Chu won this election by expanding on her Asian base to win support among Latinos, organized labor, and women. Her years on the Garvey School Board and the Monterey Park City Council and representing a local Assembly district made her a trusted household name among San Gabriel Valley political leaders, many of whom crossed party and ethnic lines to support her.
As reported by Jean Murl of the Los Angeles Times, Judy May Chu was born on July 7, 1953, in Los Angeles, the second of four children of Judson Chu, a native Californian, and his wife, May, whom he brought from China under the War Brides Act.
Judy Chu's paternal grandfather ran a Chinese restaurant in Watts, and the family lived near 62nd Street and Normandie Avenue in South Los Angeles until moving to the Bay Area when Judy was in junior high. Her father worked as an electrical technician for Pacific Bell and her mother was a cannery worker and a member of the Teamsters.
While Ms. Chu was a student at UCLA when she met her future husband, attorney Mike Eng. The couple married in 1978. Ms. Chu, who holds a doctorate in psychology, continued teaching at Los Angeles City College, then at East Los Angeles College, and Mr. Eng practiced immigration law.
By the early 1980s, the couple had settled in Monterey Park, which was experiencing an influx of immigrants from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, sparking a backlash among some longtime residents who sought a ban on Chinese-language storefront signs.
When a divided City Council voted in 1986 to support a resolution endorsing, among other things, English as the nation's official language, Ms. Chu, on the school board, and Mr. Eng helped form the Coalition for Harmony in Monterey Park.
Ms. Chu was elected to the council in 1988 and, in 2001, won an Assembly seat after two unsuccessful attempts. When she ran for the state Board of Equalization after being termed out of the Assembly in 2006, her husband succeeded her to the 49th District seat.
Dennis Liu
Maybe something good came out of that Office movie ad. It was directed by Dennis Liu who has done a lot of commercial work and is really talented. If nothing else, that ostentatious move on Microsoft's part got a little more pub for a rising Asian American director. He can also do funny...
First Meeting for AAHM
I along with Kenji Morimoto will be coordinating Asian/Asian American History Month this coming November at Brown. Yesterday morning we met at Au Bon Pain for a jump start to this seven month process. Here are some of my notes from the meeting:
- collbatoration with South and Southeast Asian Heritage Week programmers
- an opening convocation speaker who is South or Southeast Asian (Kenji's dream is Harold and Kumar)
- a way to expose students to the month outside of events (my personal pet project is a 1001 paper crane folding activity in the dining halls)
- create a strong online presence (we are currently on Facebook and Twitter, and I hope to update this blog as well)
- have a total kick-ass steering committee by building a strong sense of community
An invitation
It has long been my dream that the voices of Brown University's Asian and Asian American community would fill campus with their thoughts and ideas. While I worked as layout editor for our literary magazine, VISIONS, I often meditated on its motto: Envisioning and Building a Stronger Asian/Asian American Community. But how does one envision and build a community?
We have at Brown what the outside world would consider a vibrant and active community of students who organize events around political and social issues and forms of cultural expression. I celebrate this achievement while also hoping to challenge the community to exceed what is already expected of it. Our community is so large and we as individuals are so busy that the
moments for interaction and communication around this idea of how to
envision and build our community are scarce. I am led to wonder what
would happen if these conversations did happen.
Imagine a forum where
individuals could workshop their ideas with student leaders and alumni from across
the spectrum. Imagine a space where any student could share his or her
thoughts without needing to speak through a student group. Imagine a
way for us to communicate without the need to be in the same room.
What events would we create? What would we learn about ourselves? How might we stumble upon better ways to organize and reach out to the rest of the student body? We have in our midst an untapped potential for collaboration and the possibility to unleash a storm of collective creativity. All this could be as simple as an email.
This blog, this space, is perhaps a way to get at this. I invite you to participate in writing this blog with me. I want to hear your voices, and I want to read about your experiences. What you write doesn't have to be long or polished. Posterous is an amazing invention that will allow you to post to this blog simply though email. Just shoot it to post@asianatbrown.posterous.com with a thought, a comment, a criticism, a question, or a reflection, and whatever you write will appear up here. No messy interfaces, no registration. I can't promise what will happen after that, but all possibilities are there.
As one final note, I offer this blog out of humility because I know there is great risk that few will ever read this. Students have so much vying for their attention, and this blog may easily get lost among all the papers, exams, events, and meetings. Even if students make it here, I can't assume that my words will bear any weight. I am one person and my influence will only go so far. There is also a view that will negate this post entirely; not everyone wants or cares about community. If you haven't been inclined toward community, then I challenge you to try something new. But if you already believe as I do in the idea of an Asian/Asian American community at Brown, then write that email and let's build something together right here, right now.
