Director’s Note

Comparative Student Data

FY23 Course Offerings & Enrollment

Program Highlights

AAST Welcome | september 7, 2023

The program kicked off the fall semester by connecting with AAST minors and having a meet-and-greet with our new Calvin J. Li Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr. Joan Hong. Dr. Hong serves as the program’s 4th Fellow and teaches AAST394 (Growing Up Asian American: The Asian Immigrant Family and the Second Generation).

From AAST to Where You Wanna Be: Taking What You Learn to Your Industry with Juju Wong, M.Ed. | october 12, 2023

This program was made possible with the support from MICA, the Graduate School, and the College of Education.

This interactive workshop helped students explore how to align AAST frameworks with their professional interests. Students learned strategies to frame their academic experiences as transferable skill sets for life after graduation. We reflected on our own educational journeys and engaged in a community discussion with fellow AAST students, staff, faculty, and alumni!

AAST Sponsored Event: FAHNS DMV Chapter - Telling Our Story | October 28, 2023

AAST supported the Filipino American National Historical Society (FAHNS) DMV Chapter in their celebration of Filipino American History Month and Archives Month. Attendees took a tour of the Filipino American Community Archives held in UMD’s Special Collections and University Archives. Additionally, Nicole Dungca, KC Schaper, and Theo Gonzalves engaged in conversation around The Washington Post story “Searching for Maura” and the 1989 Treaty of Paris.

Open class series | Spring 2024

Grace Shimizu | February 12, 2024

AAST421 (Asian American Public Policy) hosted Grace Shimizu, the director of the Japanese Peruvian Oral History Project and coordinator of Campaign For Justice: Redress Now for Japanese Latin Americans! Her parents were Japanese Latin Americans interned during World War II by the U.S. Government. Campaign for Justice: Redress Now For Japanese Latin Americans! is an organization that was formed to secure proper redress for former Japanese Latin American internees and educate the public about the wartime and redress experiences of the Japanese Latin Americans.

Jaime Sunwoo | March 7, 2024

AAST298G (Asian American Foodways) hosted Jaime Sunwoo, a Korean American multidisciplinary artist from Brooklyn, New York working in visual art, theater, film, and public art. Her works connect personal narratives to global histories through surreal storytelling. She studied art at Yale University, and was a fellow for Ping Chong and Company and The Laundromat Project. Sunwoo visited UMD for a screening of Specially Processed American Me, an autobiographical and historical performance film centered around the significance of Spam, the canned meat, in Asian America.

Curtis Chin | March 26, 2024

AAST298G (Asian American Foodways) hosted a virtual Q&A with producer, director, activist, and writer, Curtis Chin. A co-founder of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop in New York City, Curtis Chin served as the non-profits’ first Executive Director. He went on to write for network and cable television before transitioning to social justice documentaries. Chin has screened his films at over 600 venues in twenty countries. As an organizer, Chin co-founded the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, the premiere non-profit dedicated to promoting Asian American writers. Chin's memoir, "Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant" was published in October by Little, Brown and Company. The book is about growing up Asian American in the Black and white city of Detroit and coming out in his working-class immigrant community, as well as being a first-generation college student at the University of Michigan.

AAST Sponsored Event: First Gen & Imposter Syndrome with Laura Bohórquez García | November 10, 2023

This program was in collaboration with the Office of Immigrant and Undocumented Student Life, MICA and the Division of Student Affairs.

Laura Bohórquez García, a first gen UndocuEducator, and entrepreneur led an intimate workshop for students to reflect on their first-generation identities and navigating life, leadership, and work with and without work authorization.

Chandni kumar annual lecture with wei ming dariotis | february 15, 2024

During our 7th CKAL, Dr. Wei Ming Dariotis (Assistant Vice President of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion at the University of Maryland, Baltimore) provided a lecture on how value-driven data can lead to meaningful action within institutions. Dr. Jennifer Cho (AAST Lecturer) moderated a panel with AAST minor students, Sacha Llanto and Ava Lamberty.

Tara Davoodi was awarded the 2024 Student Impact Award.

Short film screening and performance/technology workshop | April 3, 2024

Dr. Van Tran Nguyen (Visiting Professor, Theatre Scholarship and Performance Studies) screened her short film, ERIE COUNTY SMILE (PBS, 2021), a production made with green-screen processing. There was an engaging Q&A that followed and Dr. Tran Nguyen led a hands-on video editing and green-screen workshop showcasing green-screen as a digital narrative form. She discussed her own video practice, highlighting her use of green-screen as a medium for diasporic folklore.

AAST Sponsored event: a long march film screening | april 9, 2024

This program was co-hosted by the Center for Global Migration Studies for a screening of A Long March, a documentary which “follows Filipino-American veterans as they emotionally trace their paths from war to erasure by the U.S. Government, marching from an obscured history to the Federal courts, right up to the steps of Congress in search of promises denied.” (Los Angeles Pacific Film Festival). After the film, students and community were able to have a Q&A session with US Army Major General Antonio Taguba led feature a

Pathways to Public Service: Federal Careers for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Students | April 19, 2024

AAST hosted the Mid-Atlantic Region for the White House Initiative on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders (WHIAAHNPI) to hear from agency representatives about how to make an impact through a career in government. There was a panel of federal employees describing their path to federal service, followed by federal agency tables providing resources for college students, and an interactive activity to elicit feedback from AANHPI college students about their experience. Additionally, faculty and staff across the DMV engaged in a listening session to share their experiences on their campuses.

Hand and Hearth: Seeding APIDA Futures (A Gardening Workshop) | April 23, 2024

Hosted by Dr. Cho and AAST298G (Asian American Foodways), the workshop honored APIDA agricultural workers whose laboring hands and histories are often forgotten. As acts of care and memorialization, guests were invited to plant Asian vegetable and herb seeds.

Creative Highlights

Student Recognition

• Lahiruni Dias Amarawardena (‘25) was selected as a Summer 2024 intern for the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in the Education Track.

• Tara Davoodi (‘26) was awarded the 2024 Student Impact Award during AAST’s Annual Chandni Kumar Annual Lecture. Tara also served as a Congressional Intern at the Office of Congressman Jamie Raskin as part of UMD’s Federal Fellows Program.

• Lei Danielle Escobal (‘24) served as a Spring 2024 intern at the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in the Education Track. Lei Danielle was also recognized in the 43rd Annual University Student Leadership Awards as a member of the Maryland Medallion Society, the recipient of the Col. J. Logan Schutz ODK Leader of the Year Award, as well as the winner of the The Spirit of Maryland Award. Additionally, Lei Danielle was selected as one of the 2023-2024 Philip Merrill Presidential Scholars and was recognized with the Dean's Senior Scholar Award under UMD’s College of Arts and Humanities.

• Kaia Lee-Espiritu (‘25) was accepted into the Plus 1 Management Studies Program at UMD’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. Kaia was also selected as the Prince Frederick Hall’s Residential Assistant Team Lead for the 2024-2025 school year.

• Ela Jalil (‘26) served as Assistant Engagement Editor at The Diamondback, as well as an intern with the Federal Trade Commission as part of UMD’s Federal Fellows Program.

• Abbie Jin (‘24) was accepted into [Yonsei University] to study abroad in Seoul, Korea for the summer 2024 term.

• Nyrene Monforte (‘23) published an article for The Yappie with Isabella Cho titled, “How one of Filipino America’s last newspapers folded.”

• Rohana John (‘24) was the recipient of the Vera Cruz-Kochiyama Award at the 43rd Annual University Student Leadership Awards.

• Elizabeth Tran (‘24) served as AAST’s student representative on the UGST Student Advisory Board.

• Amanda Vu (‘24) served as an intern at the Asian American Health Initiative Intern and taught ESOL (English as a Second Language) & Life Skills sessions at CASA. Amanda was also selected as a summer community outreach intern with OCA–Asian Pacific American Advocates.

Alumni Highlights

• Marjorie Justine Antonio (‘22) chaired and Jessica Nguyen (‘23) presented a roundtable, Student Organizer Perspectives: Collective Strategizing for Student-Led AAS Movements, at the 2024 Association of Asian American Studies Conference in Seattle, WA.

• M Pease (‘22) published an op-ed in The Baltimore Sun titled, “Maryland must protect and uplift trans communities” and successfully defended their Master’s thesis titled, “Colonial Mentality and the Intersectional Experiences of LGBTQ+ Filipina/x/o Americans” within the Department of Psychology.

• Justin Fox (‘23) was selected to participate in The Kakehashi Project, a program designed to promote people-to-people exchange between Japan and the United States. This program is organized jointly by the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies (APAICS) and the Japan International Cooperation Center (JICE).

Faculty/Staff Recognition

• Jennifer Cho, PhD, will be promoted to Senior Lecturer in Fall 2024. Dr. Cho’s publications, conferences/talks, and honors include:

  • “‘It hurts, that’s all I know’: Hyperempathy, Race and Gender Disability, and the Possibilities of Social Animacy in Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower,” The Routledge Companion to Literature and Social Justice, Masood Raja and Nick Lu, ed. New York: Routledge, 2024. 315-326.

  • “The Kiss and the Cut”: Reassemblages of the Techno-Orientalist Clone Through Multi-Species Grief and Intimacy in Larissa Lai’s The Tiger Flu. Forthcoming in “Special Issue: Unbearable Being(s)” of WSQ: Women’s Studies Quarterly

  • "Kimchi Blues and Jolly Pong: Emotional Eating in Tastes Like War and Crying in H Mart" -- at Association for Asian American Studies, Seattle, WA, 2024.

  • "A Mourning That Is (Not) Ours: Assembling Multi-Species Kinships in Lois Ann Yamanaka’s Blu’s Hanging" -- at American Comparative Literature Association, Montreal, Canada, 2024.

  • "From Grief We Grow," Guest Speaker for AANHPI Heritage and Mental Health Awareness Month, National Partnerships for Women and Families, Washington DC (May) 

  • Academic Essay Prize from Circle for Asian American Literary Studies (for article: “Techno-Orientalist Domesticities: Short Circuits in Machine Labor and Care Work in The School for Good Mothers and After Yang")

• Binod Paudyal, PhD, has been selected to serve as a University Honors Faculty Fellow for 2025-2027. His proposed course, “Asian American Cosmopolitanism," will be part of the thematic cluster devoted to migration and borders. Dr. Paudyal’s publication and conferences/talks include:

  • “Resisting New Racialization: Teaching Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist in Ethnic Studies Courses.” Teaching South Asian Diasporic Literature, edited by Nalini Iyer and Pallavi Rastogi, Modern Language Association, Options for Teaching Series, 2024.

  • “Stories from the Margin: Reframing South Asian American Studies,” Association for Asian American Studies, Seattle, WA, 2024.

  • “Rethinking Asian American Literary Criticism in the 2020s,” Roundtable, Association for Asian American Studies, Seattle, WA, 2024.

  • “Ethnic Studies Now: Building Solidarities with Critical Mixed Race Studies,” Panel Discussion. The Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy (MICA), University of Maryland, College Park, 2024.

  • “South Asian American Representation in Media and Literature,” The Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) Studies, Northwest High School, Germantown, MD, 2024.

  • “History of AANHPI Studies and Steps to Expansion," Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Studies Summit, in partnership with the DC Chapter of OCA-Asian Pacific American Advocates, Georgetown University, DC, September 2023.

• Alexandria Grant, MBA, received her Masters in Business Administration from University of Maryland Global Campus in March 2024.

• Joan Hong, PhD, joined AAST as the program’s 4th Calvin J. Li Postdoctoral Fellow. Dr. Hong’s presentations include:

  • "Testimonio as a Speculative Tool for Disability-Language-Race Informed (Inclusive) Education." American Educational Research Association 2024 Annual Meeting. Philadelphia, PA.

  • "Testimonio as a Re-mediation tool for resisting, rewriting, and re-envisioning school: Hmong and Latina/o/x Bilingual Youth Speak Back." American Educational Research Association 2024 Annual Meeting. Philadelphia, PA.

  • "Researching and Designing Connective K-12 Antibias Mathematics Professional Development." American Educational Research Association 2024 Annual Meeting. Philadelphia, PA.

  • "Generative Contradictions in Doing Antibias Math Teaching and Leading with K12 Teacher Leaders." 2024 Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators Annual Conference. Orlando, FL.

  • "Design and Facilitation of Anti-Bias Mathematics Professional Development." 2023 National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Research Conference. Washington, DC.

• Kai Kai Mascareñas, M.Ed., was the keynote speaker for Kabataan Alliance’s Town Hall (October 2023) and the Asian American Student Union’s F.U.E.L. Leadership Conference (November 2023). Kai Kai also helped plan UGST’s Annual Diversity Retreat while serving on the DEI Task Force. In addition, Kai Kai was a guest lecturer for Northwest High School’s APIDA Studies class (November 2023) on the Third World Liberation Front and creation of ethnic and Asian American Studies.

• Phil Tajitsu Nash, Esq., co-chaired the 50th Anniversary Gala for the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) in NYC on May 20 in NYC and chaired the second of a four-part series of programs on Asian Americans in the Law at the Association for Asian American Studies Annual Conference in Seattle (April 2024). As part of his AAST421: Asian American Public Policy class, he led field trips to the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian. Additionally, he co-curated, "Thank You, Corky Lee: The Unofficial Photographer Laureate of Asian Americans", an Exhibition at the Chinese American Museum in DC (July 2023 - May 2024).

• Julie Park, PhD, published "A Bittersweet Graduation." in Healing Ourselves and Changing the World Through Sociology, edited by Marika Lindholm and Elizabeth Anne Wood. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

• Janelle Wong, PhD, was selected to join the incoming Fall 2024 cohort of Fellows of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. She will be inducted as the W.E.B Du Bois Fellow in November 2024. She also published two articles, including "An Incomplete Recognition: An Analysis of Political Science Department Statements after the Murder of George Floyd" with Nadia Brown and Fernando Tormos-Aponte in the American Political Science Review and "Avoiding the Anti-Black Trap: Toward a Robust Interpretation of the Racial Triangulation of Asian Americans in Polity. Dr. Wong served on the academic advisory boards of the 2023-24 Pew Asian American Survey, the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), and Facing History and Ourselves. She also served as a Senior Researcher for AAPI Data. 

• AAST faculty and affiliate faculty members were well represented at the 2024 Association of Asian American Studies Conference in Seattle, WA.

  • Jennifer Cho, PhD: Presenter, Emotional Asians: Theorizing the Affective Landscapes of Asian America After 2020: Kimchi Blues and Jolly Pong: Emotional Eating in Tastes Like War and Crying in H Mart

  • Michelle Magalong, PhD: Presenter, Who Controls History?: The Forced Unearthing of the Wakasa at Topaz, Utah

  • Phil Tajitsu Nash, Esq.: Chair, Asian American Law Professors: Where We've Been, Where We're Going

  • Van Tran Nguyen, MFA, PhD: Presenter, Undoing, Unbecoming: Grief, Care, and Asian American Artist-Scholarship

  • Binod Paudyal, PhD: Presenter, Re-Thinking Asian American Literary Criticism in the 2020s; Presenter, Reframing Storytelling and Activism in South Asian America: Hidden Histories, Memories, Literatures: Stories from the Margin: Reframing South Asian American Studies

Farewell from the Program

Abigail jin
Undergraduate Assistant

Abbie (AAST minor, ‘24) served as AAST’s Undergraduate Assistant for social media development and website management for two years.

2024-2025 AAST Scholarship Recipients

Timothy J Ng Scholarship in Asian American Studies

The Timothy J Ng Scholarship in Asian American Studies encourages undergraduates who demonstrate strength in academics and leadership, especially where such achievement leads to improvement in the lives of Asian Americans.

Linh-Thong Huu Nguyen Memorial Scholarship

This memorial scholarship was established in 2008 by Tone’s brother and fellow Terp Tuan Nguyen to support undergraduates who are enrolled in the Asian American Studies Minor and demonstrate consistent academic achievement in their studies.

Major General Antonio Taguba Profiles in Courage and Leadership Scholarship

This scholarship recognizes undergraduates who demonstrate scholarship and outstanding leadership. Students are either Asian American Studies students or enrolled in the Army, Navy or Air Force ROTC program at the University of Maryland, and considering a career in federal public service, either civilian or military.

2023-2024 Asian American Studies Minors