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Chinese Americans



  • "Generation Connie": A News Anchor and Her First-Generation Namesakes

    The practice of choosing American names for immigrant children coincided with the peak of Connie Chung's career as the national face of CBS News. Adopting her name symbolized mobility and potential for a generation of Asian American women recently come of age. 



  • Looking for the Gold Rush Town of Chinese Camp

    "Sucheng Chan, a retired historian and the author of more than 15 books on Asian American history, notes that this region, called the Southern Mines, was home to almost half of the Chinese in California in 1860," but that history is poorly preserved for visitors today.


  • Recognizing an Unrecognized Chinese American WWII Veteran

    by A.J. Wong

    In December, Congress honored all Chinese American World War II veterans with the Congressional Gold Medal, and some of their families will be eligible to receive a replica medal in their names. Hoy You Lim (林開祐) was killed in action in France in 1944. None of his survivors could complete the paperwork to receive his medal. The granddaughter of another Chinese American veteran wants to recognize his service. 


  • Is the "Yellow Peril" Dead?

    by Ellen D. Wu

    How Asian Americans became the model minority -- and why whites still consider them to be a threat.

  • Two Chinese on a Mountain...

    by Bruce Chadwick

    The Dance and the Railroad Pershing Square Signature Theater 480 W. 42nd Street New York, N.Y.Photo Credit: Signatory Theater. The play The Dance and the Railroad could have been a landmark drama about the role of the Chinese in the historic construction of the Transcontinental Railroad that connected the entire country by rail in 1869, but something went wrong. David Hwang’s play debuted in 1981 and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Price and has been produced hundreds of times since then. Now, thirty-two years later, it has lost whatever punch it had when it opened. The drama is the story of two Chinese workers on the railroad who are killing time on top of a mountain, pretending they are members of a Chinese opera troupe. All of the Chinese laborers are on strike to protest unacceptable conditions on the railroad, from long hours to low pay. The railroad, and strike, are hardly mentioned during the entire length of the play. Towards the finale, there is some discussion about the strike -- management wins -- and the two men now have to return to work.