WRITING
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Disegno #34: A Love Letter

I was one of six writers who were selected by an international jury to write for Disegno x Het Nieuwe Instituut’s 2022 Design Drafts programme.

“Linear Time” The Syllabus Project, Level Ground

Reconstructing Practice: Towards and Antiracist Art + Design Field

As a co-founder of the Antiracist Classroom, an organization at Art Center College of Design, we created spaces for students, faculty and staff—especially People of Color—to engage in dialogue, community-building, and activism around issues of racism and white supremacy in the classroom and in design practice.

On July 13 & 14, 2018, we convened our first conference—Reconstructing Practice—which drew over 100 participants to Pasadena, CA. Participants contributed to panel discussions, workshops, and a gallery. This book documents, reflects on, and offers proposals about how we might move forward from this event.

Call On Me Not The Cops

Editor, Writer, Designer, Campaign Strategist

Call On Me, Not the Cops was written during the Black Lives Matter uprisings in the summer of 2020 -- the largest racial justice movement in U.S. history. As Asian Americans, we recognized the need for a culturally-specific roadmap to have conversations with our families about finding safety with each other, not the police.

We are re-released Call On Me, Not the Cops this time as a zine because a year later it is still urgent.

In addition to the original 13 letters, you'll find an updated introduction discussing the sharp rise in anti-Asian violence in the Bay Area and across the country in 2021, as well as links to an additional library of abolitionist learning resources, and a digital download.

Love Letters to Movement Leaders

Editor, Writer, Designer, Campaign Strategist

To fight for our collective liberation, we need to know our histories. And not just our histories as Asian Americans, but the histories and shared struggles of communities who paved the way for us. Our identities as Asian Americans and the Asian American movement are rooted in the Black Liberation and the civil rights movements, the Third World Liberation Front, and the fight against imperialism.

Many leaders from these movements have shaped us and our work. What continues to remain the same is our need to be in relationship with the work of those who came before us and with each other.

Love Letters to Movement Leaders is our attempt to deepen that relationship. In addition to this book, the project includes an online library of letters and free workshop materials for classrooms and community settings.

Love Letters to Movement Leaders Book Volume 1 includes essays from Bianca Nozaki-Nasser, Charlene Khoo, Imran Siddiquee, Kevin Nadal, Kifah Shah, Laura Li, Logan Narikawa, Nate Tan, Sally Chen, Sandy Ho, Seng So, Seo Yun Son, Turner Willman, & Yin Q.

Unmasking Yellow Peril

Editor, Designer, Campaign Strategy

With Unmasking Yellow Peril, we seek to move beyond #StopAsianHate to ground ourselves in the long history of Yellow Peril, uncover its main forms, and resist it in the time of COVID-19.

Anti-Asian violence in the United States has risen 1900%. This is happening in the context of decades of racialized class conflict stemming from the Model Minority Myth and an even longer history of Yellow Peril. We are also reminded that these attacks are tied to deep histories of racism and inequity in this country.

The rise in Anti-Asian violence and devastation of Pacific Islanders by the pandemic underscores the urgency of responding with long term commitments to transforming our schools and community safety that disavows anti-Black reactions and supports indigenous sovereignty. Our struggles are connected and our struggles are not the same.

Learning From the Kia’i at Mauna Kea

Writer, photographer

November 2019, 18MR’s Campaigner Laura Li and I were welcomed by the Kia’i at Mauna Kea. As Asian Americans, we were honored to be able to support and lift up the Kānaka Maoli’s fight to protect this sacred place.