L98 AAS 250 Intro to Asian American and Pacific Islander Studies
Welcome to the first ‘Intro to Asian American and Pacific Islander Studies’ at WashU!
This course aims to build foundational knowledge of Asian American cultures, historical presence, internal diversities, and stereotypes to unpack the term “Asian American”. The general absence and silencing of Asian American presence in the U.S. has led to the widespread idea that there is no Asian American narrative. This course interrogates our selective knowledge about Asian America and gives us a general sense of the Asian American canon, timeline, history, major events, and popular discourses. Covering foundational themes of histories, immigration, cultures, silencing, survival, stereotypes, tiger moms, whiz kids, and food, we explore culturally sensitive ways to read Asian American texts, and develop critical frameworks to understand the physical and material conditions of Asian American survival in the U.S. No previous knowledge of Asian American and/or Pacific Islander studies is required. Texts of study include diverse literary genres, film, and popular culture.
Doctor Ghosh’s research focuses on displacement aesthetics in Asian American and Postcolonial Studies, interrogating how themes of displacement, diaspora, migration, immigration laws, new materialisms manifest in literary forms and disrupt questions of identity, culture, ethics, alterity, and nationhood.
