Asian Pacific month arrives at fitting time
Asian Pacific American Heritage Month is celebrated in May, and it feels more relevant than ever in 2020.
With Mindy Kaling’s internationally successful “Never Have I Ever” Netflix series, playwright David Henry Hwang being a Pulitzer Prize finalist again, and Thao & the Get Down Stay Down’s heralded “Phenom” Zoombased music video, Asian American creators have been enjoying the spotlight. Still, with local shelterinplace orders extended through at least the end of May, APA Heritage Month celebrations have moved online like so many other daily activities.
As harassment and even violence toward Americans of Asian and Pacific Islander descent rises due to unfounded associations with the COVID19 crisis, this monthlong celebration amplifying and saluting Asian and Pacific Islander representation in art and broadcast media is both timely and significant.
What is APA Heritage Month?
In 1977, Jeanie Jew was concerned about the lack of acknowledgment for the contributions of Asian Americans to the country during the previous year’s nationwide bicentennial celebrations. As the president of the Organization of Chinese American Women, Jew partnered with Ruby Moy, New York U.S. Rep. Frank Horton’s chief of staff, to advocate for the inclusion of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans.
Their efforts led Horton and Rep. Norman Mineta of San Jose to jointly introduce a resolution for an Asian Pacific American Heritage Week. President Jimmy Carter signed the Joint Resolution of Congress into law on Oct. 5, 1978.
In 1990, President George H.W. Bush signed a bill that established May as the commemorative month for APA heritage. Two years later, Horton cosponsored legislation officially designating it as APA Heritage Month so that the previous proclamation wouldn’t have to be reauthorized annually.
Why is APA Heritage Month special in San Francisco?
In 2005, thenSan Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom established an APA Heritage Celebration Committee at the suggestion of Claudine Cheng, former national president of the Organization of Chinese Americans, a Washington, D.C., Asian Pacific American civil rights advocacy nonprofit. Five years later, the APA Heritage Foundation was established to coordinate and raise funds for the city’s activities.
The Bay Area’s long history of Asian American social and artistic activism gives the May celebration added significance locally, points out Cheng, who is currently president of the APA Heritage Foundation and committee coordinator of the 2020 APA Heritage Celebration Committee.
“As we are facing the challenges of the pandemic and the antiAsian sentiment, this crisis is bringing the greater community together,” she told The Chronicle in a recent phone interview. “Over 100 community organizations and city officials are engaged as partners this year to promote APAHM awareness, and our 16th year is turning out to be our most robust.”
How to celebrate virtually
Asian Art Museum:
As part of its #MuseumFromHome initiative, author and Kearny Street Workshop artistic director Jason Bayani plans to host “Writing the Storm: Poetry in Upheaval” for 30 participants in a Zoom writing workshop at 4 p.m. on Thursday, May 14.
The Rev. Takfumi Kawakami plans to
Zoom in from Kyoto, Japan, at 7 p.m., May 21, to discuss “Zen and SelfCultivation.” Additionally, writer and artist Chanel Miller; street artist, muralist and Kulture Shop cofounder Jas Charanjiva; and contemporary artist and educator Jenifer K Wofford will participate in a Zoom discussion on “Acting, Healing, Learning” moderated by museum curator Abby Chen at 7 p.m. on May 28. For more information and registration: www.asianart.org
San Francisco Public Library:
The San Francisco Public Library has switched to full “virtual library” mode since shelterinplace orders went into effect.
An author panel on “Overcoming Loss of Identity and Trauma” with Joy Ma (“The Deoliwallahs: The True Story of the 1962 ChineseIndian Internment”), Katya Cengel (“Exiled: From the Killing Fields of Cambodia to California and Back”) and Sieu Sean Do (“A Cloak of Good Fortune: A Cambodian Boy’s Journey From Paradise Through a Kingdom of Terror”) is planned from 6 to 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 14, via Zoom.
The library also has plans for a Hoopla Digital Book Club meeting via Zoom, 78 p.m. on May 21, to discuss “The Mountain Sing” by Nguyê n Phan Quê. He will also participate in an author talk on Zoom from 10 to 11:30 a.m. on May 23. For more information and registration: www.sfpl.org
CAAMFest goes online:
San Francisco’s Center for Asian American Media plans to make the 2020 edition of its annual film festival onlineonly. CAAMFest Online: Heritage at Home will open with writer, director and star Lynn Chen’s “I Will Make You Mine,” which screens from 5 to 7:15 p.m. on Wednesday, May 13. Goh Nakamura and
YeaMing Chen, who acted in the film and whose songs are in the soundtrack, will perform at an online opening night afterparty from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Through May 22. Free with registration. For more information and a complete festival schedule: caamfest.com/2020
What about video streaming and television?
Hulu’s APA Heritage Month Asian Stories collection offers series users can access any time that features Asian American stars, such as “Elementary,” “Fresh Off the Boat,” “Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” and “The Mindy Project,” as well as the talk show “A Little Late Night with Lilly Singh” and the cooking program “Just Jen” with Jen Phanomrat.
PBS also plans to air “Asian Americans,” a fivepart documentary series highlighting the migration, contributions, challenges and achievements of Asian Americans from the 1850s to the present. The series is coproduced by CAAM and WETA, the Washington, D.C., public television station.
“Asian Americans” premieres 8 p.m. Monday, May 11, on PBS. The network also gathered streamable programs online at to.pbs.org/2W8qPGH.