Asiantowns Across the Americas

Undergraduate

Asian urban enclaves, or “Asiantowns,” have been crucial for shaping the transnational connections and perceptions between diasporic and local urban communities in Asia and the Americas. This course will challenge students' perceptions of Asian enclaves across the Americas by introducing them to the enclaves’ historical, cultural, and ethnic formations and to the role of urban developments of Asiantowns across major metropolitan areas. The students will navigate a diverse range of ethnic enclaves across the Americas, including Chinatowns (San Francisco, Boston, La Habana, and Lima), Japantowns (Vancouver and São Paulo), and Koreatowns (Los Angeles and Santiago). Using an interdisciplinary approach involving textual analysis of literature, oral histories, and ethnographic fieldwork; visual analysis of comics and paintings; and audiovisual analysis of films and digital media, this course will cover major topics in interethnic dynamics in urban enclaves in the Americas, including migrant labor, grassroots activism, diasporic community organizations, ethnic foodways, multiculturalist tourism, and popular media productions.