Asian Canadian Activism and Culture Across Borders
This course was also previously known as Global Asia in Vancouver.
This course explores the efforts, experiences, and histories of community organizing, social & environmental justice activism, and solidarity-building centering people of Asian descent in Vancouver. In the introductory unit, we lay the theoretical foundation of the course by examining the interconnecting processes of Asian racialization/anti-Asian racism, settler colonialism, and Indigenous dispossession. Then, we examine how these historical processes manifest in the lives of people racialized as Asian in the city now known as Vancouver, specifically in the areas of housing, labour, (im)migration/border crossing, food security, and health. For each site of struggle, students learn about related social movement organization, their history, and their current efforts. This part of the course consists of guest speakers, walking tours, events participations, documentary films, and/or essays (op-eds and academic articles). Students are expected to prepare and conduct interviews, engage in reflective writing, and compose a creative project in relation to place-based strategies, stories, and organizing of a particular group or topic.
Syllabus
Syllabus designed for Global Asia in Vancouver course, Summer 2023. See here.
Syllabus designed for Asian Canadian Activism and Culture Across Border, Fall 2024. See here.
The two syllabus are very similar with just a bit of changes for a few weeks. If you want to reach out to any of the organizations or guest speakers mentioned in the syllabus, please contact me.
Student Projects
For their final assignment, students created projects that will serve as tools or educational resources to either the student community, or a community of their choosing. They explored topics such as temporary foreign worker program, migrant worker organizing, migrant sex worker rights, South Asian international student struggle, Hong Kong immigrant sense of belonging, Asian queer and feminist issues, exploring the model minority myth, SFU activist traditions, redress movements, gentrification, and more.
