Attend 'Anti-Asian Violence Amid COVID-19 Pandemic' on May 24
- Date: Monday, May 24
- Time: 3 p.m.
- Register today
In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the College presents “Anti-Asian Violence Amid COVID-19 Pandemic: New Episode in the Long History of Anti-Asian Violence in the United States and Educational Implications” with Sohyun An, a professor of social studies education at Kennesaw State University.
Since their earliest arrivals in the United States, Asian immigrants have been racialized as “perpetual foreigners" or “yellow peril” who are unassimilable to the dominant society and whose presence is a dangerous threat to the nation. This racialization has been at the core of countless examples of anti-Asian discrimination throughout U.S. history, many of which turned into outright hate crimes and state-sanctioned violence particularly during economic, military, or public health crises. This talk will contextualize the upsurge of anti-Asian violence amid the COVID-19 pandemic within the long history of anti-Asian violence in the United States and discuss educational implications to stop the troubling history.
Dr. An received a B.A. and an M.A. in social studies education from Seoul National University in Korea and her Ph.D. in curriculum and instruction from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. A former high school social studies teacher in South Korea, An is currently a teacher-educator of elementary social studies education. Her research centers on the curriculum and pedagogy of Asian American history and anti-racist social studies education. She is currently conducting a Spencer Foundation-funded research project on racial literacy education at the elementary education level. She has contributed to writing the curriculum guide for PBS’ documentary on Asian Americans. She is also on the advisory board on the Civil Intersections project with the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American and Latino Centers. An’s work has been published in peer-reviewed books and journals, such as Teachers College Press; Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies; Theory and Research in Social Education, as well as featured in numerous media, including Time Magazine, Reuters, CNN, and more.