#AAPI rep

[howdidthatbookend]

Pyae Moe Thet War | I DID SOMETHING BAD Spoilers

The Book:  I Did Something Bad by Pyae Moe Thet WarPublished October 8, 2024 by St. Martin’s GriffinDate read: December 1, 2024 Find more October 2024 releases here. I Did Something Bad spoilers can be found below, but they’re hidden under a spoiler tag so you’re safe to keep scrolling if you’d just like to read my review. The Characters:  Khin and Tyler ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 4 out of 5. Buy it…

[the-bi-library]

Here are some upcoming bi Asian books! Make sure to pre-order the ones that interest you! 🩷💜💙 Books listed: Saints of Storm and Sorrow by Gabriella Buba The Dark We Know by Wen-yi Lee The Dark Becomes Her by Judy I. Lin These Deathless Shores by P. H. Low Rani Choudhury Must Die by Adiba Jaigirdar Better Catch Up, Krishna Kumar by Anahita Karthik Mistress of Lies by K. M. Enright Heavenly Tyrant by Xiran Jay Zhao Please do let me know if I missed any books 💖

[gisellelivesunderabook]

Happy Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month!! Here are some AAPI book 📚 recs!! :3

[loveinsomesacredplace]

Hi, show! Jere and show! Belly have been bisexual and Korean-American the whole time we’ve had them yet the fandom acknowledges Jere during Pride month and … during AAPI month for Belly?

[p0pp3t]

i hear it’s a filipino thing!! must be genetics

who wants to get serenaded

shitty little recording of me singing just a man while i peeled an orange

[whenweallvote]

Happy heavenly birthday to Rep. Patsy Mink (1927-2002) of Hawaii! 🎉 Today, we celebrate her glass-breaking legacy as the first woman of color elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and the first Asian American woman to serve in Congress in 1965. 

Rep. Mink helped shape landmark legislation like Title IX — later renamed the Patsy T. Mink Equal Opportunity in Education Act — which prohibits gender discrimination in federally-funded school and sports programs. 

60 years after her election, there are currently 22 AAPI Members of Congress. Thank you for paving the way, Rep. Mink. 🙌🏽

[mariacallous]

Since entering Georgia politics in 2020, state Rep. Michelle Au has been called every name in the book: Chinese spy, foreign plant, “agent of the Chinese Communist Party.”

Au recalled this experience in March as she pushed back against a bill to ban “agents“ of China and other “foreign adversaries“ from purchasing farmland in the state, as well as property near military installations. The bill’s mostly Republican backers argued that it would defend against national security threats; Au and other critics warned that the measure would fuel xenophobia.

“It stokes this suspicion and this sensibility that many of us face in our everyday lives—even before this type of bill was being passed—that Asian Americans and Chinese Americans in particular are perpetually foreign,” said Au, a 46-year-old anesthesiologist and a Democrat in Georgia’s House of Representatives. “We are cast under a light of suspicion that other immigrants are not.”

The bill, which was signed into law in April, reflects how concerns about China’s influence loom large in Georgia, a swing state that proved key in the 2020 U.S. presidential election and that both former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris are desperate to win on Nov. 5. It’s not just land ownership that has raised national security concerns in the state. Georgia Tech, a top public university, recently severed a long-standing partnership with a Chinese university.

At the same time, Chinese American communities are intimately familiar with how rocky U.S.-China relations and inflammatory rhetoric can stoke hostility against Asian Americans, which surged nationwide in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, during Trump’s presidency. In Georgia, fears about hate crimes intensified after a gunman stormed three spas in Atlanta in 2021 and killed eight people, six of whom were Asian women.

“While attention may have moved from [the 2021 shootings], the fear that Asian Americans, Chinese Americans [feel] is still very much there,” said Marvin Lim, another Democratic state representative in Georgia. He added that these communities have long grappled with the question of where they fit in.

Georgia’s Chinese American community, which today consists of more than 80,000 people, accounts for just a slice of the state’s electorate. But it offers a window into how geopolitical pressures weigh on Chinese American voters ahead of an election partly defined by a U.S. hawkishness toward Beijing.

“Asian American voters in Georgia are the fastest-growing voting demographic and voting bloc,” said Murtaza Khwaja, the executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, a legal advocacy group. It’s, he said, “an electorate that wants to see themselves represented and see candidates emerge from those communities.”

Georgia’s Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) population has grown by more than 50 percent since 2010, with many people settling in the Atlanta-area counties of Forsyth and Gwinnett. In 2020, they made their electoral power clear. Voter turnout among the group surged by a staggering 84 percent compared to the 2016 election—an increase that helped Biden win the battleground state and the Democrats take the Senate.

Those trends were also visible nationally, as Asian Americans—a group long overlooked by both politicians and pollsters—increased their turnout by 40 percent, with most of those ballots cast for Biden. The bloc could be even more decisive this time around. Between January and June, Asian Americans logged the sharpest increase in voter registration of any racial group in the United States, compared to the same period in 2020.

“As the fastest-growing racial group in the country and also the fastest-growing electorate in this country, we are stating very clearly that elected officials can no longer take us for granted,” said Cynthia Choi, the co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, a U.S.-based coalition. “We deserve to have our rights protected. We deserve to feel that we can establish roots in this country. We deserve to have protections and to feel safe.”

This political evolution is underway as competition with China has become one of the rare areas of bipartisan agreement in Washington. Trump spent his four years in the White House waging a trade war with China and using inflammatory language that deepened concerns about xenophobia against Chinese and Asian Americans. After taking office in 2021, President Joe Biden expanded on many of Trump’s policies with his own campaign of tariffs and tough restrictions; Harris is expected to take a similarly hawkish approach.

Chinese Americans’ voting preferences remain somewhat hazy, in part because the community is not monolithic, with deep political divisions across generations, professions, proximity to immigration, gender, and education level. Like other Asian American demographic groups, many Chinese Americans also do not have long familial traditions of voting for Republicans or Democrats, resulting in weaker party affiliation.

The AAPI community has “a lot of new American voters. We have a lot of naturalized citizens, people who maybe haven’t voted in the past,” said Au. “If you’re thinking about just the math of it, these are voters who are up for grabs.”

There are some overarching trends. Nationally, the majority of Chinese American voters lean Democratic, according to the Pew Research Center. They also largely favor Harris over Trump; A 2024 voter survey by AAPI Data found that 65 percent of Chinese American respondents backed Harris, compared to 24 percent who preferred Trump. Forty-five percent of respondents believed that Harris would do a better job dealing with China—more than double the percent that supported Trump’s approach.

The outlook is more complicated along individual issue areas. Take economic policy, which remains a top concern for Georgia’s Chinese Americans, according to Khwaja. “Many in the Chinese American community here in Georgia are small-business owners or physicians who own their practice or of the like,” he said. “The economy is an incredibly important issue for them.”

Yet Chinese American voters overall are divided on which party does a better job when it comes to economic policy. According to one survey by AAPI Data, one-third of Chinese American respondents believed Republicans had a better approach to jobs and the economy, which only slightly edged out the 31 percent who favored the Democrats and the 29 percent who felt there was no difference between the parties. One-third of Chinese American respondents also favored Republicans’ record on inflation, compared to the 26 percent who preferred that of the Democrats.

It’s also difficult to tell how U.S.-China relations will sway the vote among the demographic. Among Asian Americans, Chinese Americans are the only group in which the majority does not view their ancestral homeland favorably, according to Pew, underscoring how some voters may prefer a tough-on-China approach in this year’s election.

Fei-Ling Wang, a professor of international affairs at Georgia Tech, said that some Chinese Americans in Georgia may favor Trump because his rhetoric makes him seem tougher on Beijing than Harris—even if that’s not necessarily true in practice. “Many Chinese Americans, in my opinion, they sort of read the rhetoric more than [the] substance,” he said.

On the other hand, some voters may worry about what that kind of tough talk means for them. Nearly two-thirds of Chinese Americans believe that the current U.S.-China relationship negatively affects how they are treated, according to a recent study by the nonprofit Committee of 100 and NORC at the University of Chicago. More than 80 percent of respondents expressed concern about how both presidential candidates’ rhetoric toward China could fuel discrimination in the United States.

“The majority of domestic xenophobia and anti-Asian sentiment is driven by American foreign policy,” Khwaja said. “I think even those that would be supportive of legislation or … rhetoric critical of the Chinese government, there’s a reservation and caution of the form that it’s taken and how they themselves and their families would be targeted.”

These issues could prove pivotal on Nov. 5 in the battleground of Georgia, where polls are pointing to a thin margin between Harris and Trump; as of Oct. 16, polling averages showed Trump in the lead by around one point. Four years after Asian Americans in Georgia showed up at the polls in record numbers, those same voters may now be gearing up for another round.

“I was told as a first-time candidate, ‘Don’t bother talking to Asian voters because Asian people don’t vote,’” Au said. “I think we’re realizing that that is wrong, and people are now actively like, ‘Oh, we were sleeping on the Asian Americans. We’ve got to get them to vote for us.’”

[chanelslibrary]

🌙𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰🌙

Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao

@xiranjayzhao

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Zetian is set on avenging her sister’s death. Which is why she volunteers as a concubine pilot in the Huaxian army with the hopes of pairing up with the male pilot that killed her sister! Fortunate is on her side when they are matched, and Zetian must learn how to operate Chrysalises, giant robots meant to battle aliens, while mentally fighting the psychic link to the male pilot that has decimated so many other girls. She gets her revenge by being the only one to survive the battle—but she is now labeled the Iron Widow—and with that title is paired with the strongest and deadliest male pilot, Li Shimin. Who will survive their next battle, and what happens when Zetian digs deeper into the pilot system and wonders why only females are sacrificed during battles?

This book was such a whirlwind! It was giving Handmaid’s Tale vibes but with a dash of science fiction and a Chinese setting. I loved how Zhao drew on Chinese history to paint the backdrop for this story, and it almost seems like Huaxia could be China hundreds of years from now. The main character Zetian is the epitome of a badass female character—strong physically (even with broken feet!) and mentally, opinionated, fierce, and willing to fight for the underdogs—while acknowledging that she needs help sometimes. I also liked that there was a little love triangle (spoiler alert✨) but it wasn’t cliche and felt very organic. This story showed how men/boys are prioritized over girls/women even when war and safety should be the main concern in this battle ravaged country. I loved listening to the audiobook because getting the hear the authentic pronunciation of each of the characters names and some of the dialogue was great! This was a total 5 star read and I’m anxiously awaiting the sequel

Read if you love:

🤖Science fiction

❤️Love triangle

🏳️‍🌈LGBTQ rep

✊🏼AAPI rep

[5chatzi]

Okay I'm going to send you some partly-solicited recs for queer literature and classics because I have a decent amount of exposure to both~~

My qualifications include a degree in English and now being halfway towards my MLIS lol this is what I was made for

For queer lit, sometimes it depends heavily on your own orientation, like bi people want to read books with bi representation, etc. But those preferences notwithstanding, here are some generally quality titles:

Zenovia July by Lisa Bunker: A trans girl solves a cyber crime. Mystery, YA, contemporary setting, trans rep

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune: a gay man who lives a boring government-worker life travels to an island in order to monitor the family of magical children who live there. Fantasy, found family, adult fiction (it has some kid's book vibes but does contain mild sexual content and mild swearing), gay representation.

Ace by Angela Chen -- nonfiction, part memoir exploration of what it means to be asexual, for the author personally and for society generally.

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo -- a Chinese-American girl in 1950s San Francisco comes to terms with being a lesbian. Historical fiction, adult fiction (or might be YA?? There is what I'd call mild sexual content), lesbian representation, AAPI representation

Jeanette Winterson is a queer author whose work I generally like!(don't have specific title recs though) (I have read The Passion, and she has a couple biographies shelved in the queer library in which I volunteer. The Passion is not very explicitly queer from my memory but it is very good regardless.

For classics, here are titles that I personally Actually Enjoyed Reading and found relatively accessible:

To Kill a Mockingbird (and I also like the film-- I should have added that to my answer to your ask)

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf is my absolute favourite classic novel, but I won't pretend it's for everyone, or that it's especially accessible. It's written in a heavily Modernist style that involves a quite lyrical, non-linear plot. But the prose is breathtakingly gorgeous and it has a really moving anti-war message.

Also, Orlando by Woolf as well, and this one is also queer! Features a genderqueer/trans/otherwise gendernonconforming character.

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins is very long, but it's a mystery, and I found it engaging. The section narrated by the character Marianne is the best, and I headcanon her as asexual or possibly a lesbian.

The Color Purple by Alice Walker is what I would call poignant, and it's fairly short. Be warned that it contains some SA content, racism, and AAVE dialect that could be hard to understand.

Macbeth or Twelfth Night or King Lear are my favourite Shakespeare works to recommend. But with Shakespeare, it's better if you can see a film or live performance, since just reading the script can be difficult to follow.

Little Women!!! God, I love Little Women. Honestly not sure how that wasn't the first one I thought of.

Oh thanks so much for the thorough response!

I’ll admit most of these are wildly outside my normal genre, but I’m always willing to try new things.

I have read Macbeth in school but it’s been ages and I am pretty sure I’ve read Little Women but I can’t remember it would have been a long time ago. Oh and To Kill a Mockingbird. I think everyone has read that in school but don’t think I’ve read it since.

I’m gonna write them down and check them out and see how it goes. I pretty much exclusively read non fiction so should be interesting 😅

[avgfandomguy]

Disclaimer: I am an American White Guy. I do not possess all the information.

One of the reasons I think that racism against Asians is ignored as much as it is is because of the American school system and because of American politics. In school children learn about major events such as The Trail of Tears, Slavery, and the Civil Rights Movements in the 1960s. Through hearing their parents talk, they get exposed to talk about illegal immigrants coming from the south.

Another thing is movies. Some more recent movies gave better AAPI rep, but it's still shockingly small and older representations still use racist stereotypes and are still open to the public to watch, including children.

Things like the Asian Civil Rights Movements of the 1980s are completely ignored and generations of children are never going to be taught it because past the 1960s is "too modern" and schools have to go back to teaching the American Revolution (a class I have taken seven times in my life. I only got to the 1960s through an optional online class).

These stories have to be there to foster empathy at a young age, but yet again, Asian people are left in the dust until their brief (and I mean brief) shining moment during the first few days of AAPI month.

asians: pls care about racism against us

tumblr:

[howdidthatbookend]

Alafair Burke | THE NOTE Spoilers

The Book:  The Note by Alafair BurkePublished January 7, 2025 by KnopfDate read: December 1, 2024 Find more January 2025 releases here. The Note spoilers can be found below, but they’re hidden under a spoiler tag so you’re safe to keep scrolling if you’d just like to read my review. The Characters:  May, Lauren, and Kelsey ⭐⭐⭐ Rating: 3 out of 5. Buy it on Bookshop.org | Amazon This page…

[phyrestartr]

In love of aapi month, I want to say I mf ADORE your depiction of māori sukuna.

Guhh

I feel like there is hardly poly rep and I fw with your work so heavy <3

Anyways, happy aapi from an ecstatic hawaiian

AAAAH THANK YOU BROTHER OMG ASJDKFL;WOEIJF My heart is full and I am flustered :sob: ik I'm late but HAPPY AAPI MY DUDE!! I'M SO DOWN TO WRITE MORE MAORI SUKUNA BC FJHGHGOIHJIH;OI?! It just makes sense I'll be so frfr and, idk, it just is an interesting way to portray him and IDK IT JUST FEELS RIGHT AND I'M GLAD YOU LIKE THE PORTRAYAL TOO GHHHFHGHGH my worst nightmare is to be disrespectful and shite so I'M V STOKED LOL SORRY RAMBLING ASODFJ;OWAEFJ THANK YOU SO MUCH THO!!!

[booknsinbollywood]

In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage I am sharing some of my favorite Desi books

Growing up, I remember going to my local library during the month of May and seeing only books with the typical representation of Asian (which deserved to be heard don't get me wrong). It hurt my little Punjabi girl at heart so in honor of me going to that same local library (that has yet to change its AAPI display), I shall share some of my favorite desi books

Tashie Bhuyian: I have way too many posts dedicated to this woman but please if you want GOOD representation, she is your girl. 'Counting Down With You' and 'Stay With My Heart' are 6 stars (if not 7) (but then again so is 'A Show For Two')(JUST READ HER). I have sobbed to Tashie's books more than ANY book (including Six of Crows and Beth's death scene in Little Women so it SAYS SOMETHING ABOUT HOW GOOD HER REP IS). just the romance in all three books is so die to for AND NOT AT ALL PREDICABLE (unless your smart enough...which I wasn't) and the. FOUND. FUCKING. FAMILY. Found Family is my trope, and trust me when I say she is a GENUIS on writing female friendships and a platonic bond with guys (read Stay With My Heart if this is up your ally but be prepared: it will have you dying of tears and laughter within two minutes). A Show For Two is one for the ambitious girlies who grew up in a passionless households. and well half of my heart is with Counting Down with you. The desi writer in me loves this book but god, it made me sob (and miss my nani (grandma) so much). Her friends in Counting Down With You were amazing they reminded me of my own. JUST READ HER. I PROMISE YOU. WILL. NOT. BE. DISAPPOINTED. (but also if you have family trauma go in with the mindset that YOU WILL BE CHANGED. I had to bring up her brings SEVERAL times in therapy)(not cause they were sad but because THEY WERE WAY TOO RELATBLE)

Arya Khanna's Bollywood Moment: this book WAS my senior year book. It mentions Annabeth Chase and Inez Ghafa and she works in a book shop - literally the perfect escapism book. Arya and her sister relationship is so good and god, dealing with awkward friends. And also I KNOW this is gonna gather attention: it is a rivals-to-friends-to-lovers romance Listen, if you are in high school just read this. TRUST ME. (also it has You Are My Soniya (from KKKG) mentioned like A MILLION TIMES and that may or may not be the reason I knew the song)

Queen Bee: Amelie Howard: now this book may not be for everyone but if you like gossip and felt repersented by season 2 of Bridgeton this is YOUR book.

My So-Called Bollywood Life: I grew up dancing to Bollywood. This book was my love letter back into the world of Salman Khan and Shreya Goshal and just listening to Bollywood music on a daily. The accuracy of the food, and the vibes. I remember her dance preparation and his kindness. I read this five years ago and it stills stands out for me so that should tell you something. (though I will say if this book falls flat on you, 'A Show For Two' by (you guessed it Tashie Bhuyian) has a similar premise])

TJ Powar Has Something to Prove: god, the Punjabi girl in me loves this book. In a world of body image and being a brown girl with a unibrow for most of middle school, this book is my love letter to change. This book challenges image, family and has an incredible romance (again RIVALS TO LOVERS GIRLIES I AM YOUR GIRL). The friendships in this book, and her dynamic with her cousin. I read this book maybe 3 years ago now but the quote of TJ having her fathers nose is so important to me (as someone who has her dads nose). Also her name being TJ and her full name just never being said except at home (for context: Lola is not my name and my typical desi name is one very similar to TJ's). Honesty I just might reread this book again because of how much it stands to me. (if you are a teenage girl is hairy, my soniya, this is your book. read this and remember to love yourself, body and all (trust me, it can be done).

anyway. happy AAPI month to all my fellow desi girls out there. There is representation for us, I promise.

[pocketaltar]

a list of every job/internship ive ever had

1. kumon tutor (age 14-16)

2. local political intern (15-16)

3. zucchini bread bakery cashier (16)

4. jewelry exhibition worker (1 day, 16)

5. aapi commission intern (16-17)

6. bakery worker (17, 1 shift)

7. summer camp counselor (summer i turned 18)

8. call center rep for a health tech company (summer i turned 19)

9. comms intern (summer i thrned 20)

10. radio intern (20)

11. comms intern (different place) (this summer)

12. lgbt center staff (this fall)

[batteryacid111]

found family, hot nerdy potential love interest (male), pacific islander girl, visibly strong independent woman, age gap sister relationship, woman in charge, weird scientist woman, FANFIC MENTION, sexy lady villain, ethnically accurate cast, misunderstood villain origin story, native language in media, morally grey characters, aapi, curly hair rep, real portal of fear/loss, people of color. i love moana 2