Andrew Mellon Foundation is a host of exceptional ability. Studies show that a vast majority of guests attending events by Andrew Mellon have been known to leave more elated than visitors to Santa's Workshop, The Lost of Continent of Atlantis, and the Fountain of Youth. Andrew Mellon Foundation is a host of exceptional ability. Studies show that a vast majority of guests attending events by Andrew Mellon have been known to leave more elated than visitors to Santa's Workshop, The Lost of Continent of Atlantis, and the Fountain of Youth. Andrew Mellon Foundation is a host of exceptional ability. Studies show that a vast majority of guests attending events by Andrew Mellon have been known to leave more elated than visitors to Santa's Workshop, The Lost of Continent of Atlantis, and the Fountain of Youth.
Chinese immigrants and their descendants have shaped the United States, but their experiences are not always acknowledged as part of our collective history.
Chinese American stories touch on every facet of the American experience: from those of immigrants who arrived at the US via the Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco; to builders of the transcontinental railroad connecting America’s east and west; drivers of urban development and access to public education; and subjects of discrimination and anti-Chinese legislation. In sharing these histories, we can cultivate a fuller understanding of our current moment and promote truthful narratives about Chinese American histories and Asian American experiences.
Join us as we celebrate under-told Chinese American stories and understand their place in our rich tapestry. Mellon Foundation President Dr. Elizabeth Alexander hosts a virtual livestream that is part history lesson and part conversation, featuring three leading authors, scholars, and advocates: Dr. Erika Lee, Dr. Mae Ngai, and Helen Zia.
Elizabeth Alexander – decorated poet, educator, memoirist, scholar, and cultural advocate – is president of the Mellon Foundation, the nation’s largest funder in arts and culture, and humanities in higher education. Dr. Alexander has held distinguished professorships at Smith College, Columbia University, and Yale University, where she taught for 15 years and chaired the African American Studies Department. She is Chancellor Emeritus of the Academy of American Poets, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, serves on the Pulitzer Prize Board, and co-designed the Art for Justice Fund. Notably, Dr. Alexander composed and delivered “Praise Song for the Day” for the 2009 inauguration of President Barack Obama, and is author or co-author of fifteen books. Her book of poems, American Sublime, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 2006, and her memoir, The Light of the World, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Biography in 2015. Her latest book, released in 2022, is The Trayvon Generation.
For more information, please visit mellon.org or on Twitter @ProfessorEA
Dr. Erika Lee is an award-winning historian, author, and advocate. She is a Regents Professor of History and Asian American Studies, Director of the Immigration History Research Center at the University of Minnesota, and President of the Organization of American Historians. The granddaughter of Chinese immigrants, Lee was recently elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and the American Antiquarian Society and testified before Congress in its historic hearings on anti-Asian discrimination and violence. She is the author of four award-winning books including The Making of Asian America and America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in America, which won the American Book Award and the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, as well as other honors. Named to many best books lists and identified as an essential book illuminating the Trump era and the 2020 elections, it was recently re-published with a new epilogue on xenophobia and racism during the COVID-19 pandemic.
For more information, please visit erikalee.org or on Twitter @prof_erikalee
Dr. Mae Ngai is a US legal and political historian interested in questions of immigration, citizenship, and nationalism. She is the author of several books, including the award-winning Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America (2004) and The Lucky Ones: One Family and the Extraordinary Invention of Chinese America (2010). Dr. Ngai’s latest book, The Chinese Question: The Gold Rushes and Global Politics (2021), won the 2002 Bancroft Prize in American History and Diplomacy and was a finalist for the LA Times book prize in history. The book studies how Chinese migration to the world’s goldfields upended global power and economics and forged modern conceptions of race. Ngai is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Society of American Historians, and the American Antiquarian Society. She has written on immigration history and policy matters for The Washington Post, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Nation, and The Atlantic. Before becoming a historian, she was a labor-union organizer and educator in New York City, working for District 65-UAW and the Consortium for Worker Education.
For more information, please visit history.columbia.edu/person/ngai-mae/
Helen Zia is the author of Last Boat out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution, a book tracing the lives of migrants and refugees from another cataclysmic time in history that has striking parallels to the difficulties facing migrants today. Zia interviewed more than 100 survivors of that exodus and countless others. Helen’s essay in The New York Times reveals her mother’s secret that inspired her to write this book.
In 2000, Zia published Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People, a finalist for the prestigious Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize. She also authored the story of Wen Ho Lee in My Country Versus Me, about the Los Alamos scientist who was falsely accused of being a spy for China in the “worst case since the Rosenbergs.” She was Executive Editor of Ms. Magazine and a founding board co-chair of the Women’s Media Center. She has been active in many non-profit organizations, including Equality Now, AAJA, and KQED. In 2008, Helen was a Torchbearer in San Francisco for the Beijing Olympics amid great controversy; in 2010, she was a witness in the federal marriage equality case decided by the US Supreme Court.
For more information, please visit helenzia.com or on Twitter @HelenZiaReal