We Need To Be Teaching Asian American and Pacific Islander History:
In May of 2023, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law a bill requiring the teaching of Asian American and Pacific Islander history in K-12 curriculums in Florida public schools. This came right on the heels of Governor DeSantis barring public schools from participating in a pilot of the College Board’s course on African American Studies.
In response to the Florida Governor’s decisions, many activists were outraged and spoke out in opposition to the educational and social-emotional harm the decision against the African American Studies course would have on students in Florida. This harm would be especially impactful for the Black students being told by their leaders that the histories of their communities were not worthy of being taught in school, while the histories of their Asian American and Pacific Islander peers were deemed to be necessary. Education advocates and community members were also deeply concerned with the potential rippling effect DeSantis’ policies could have on local and state education policies in other parts of the country.
The pair of decisions to bar African American Studies while simultaneously mandating Asian American and Pacific Islander History may initially appear contradictory. Unfortunately, this would not be the first time unsavory political actors have attempted to pit Asian Americans against other ethnic and racial minority groups in the United States.
The model minority myth, a stereotype of Asian Americans that creates a hierarchy within communities of color, was invented and continues to be perpetuated to block those seeking to end the educational, economic, and social disparities facing marginalized communities. This harmful stereotype and resulting racial stratification hurts everyone, including the Asian American students and community members that are being used as tools against solidarity.
Unfortunately, often lost in the intentionally drummed up outrage is space for conversations about the harm that being used as political pawns has on Asian American communities. We also lose sight of the reality that there is a near complete lack of Asian American history or Pacific Islander history being taught in American public schools. Currently, just 11 states require K-12 students to learn Asian American and/or Pacific Islander history at any point in their years of schooling. This is a serious issue that does need to be addressed, and not just used for political aims. Clearly, we have a real need for a thorough and accurate Asian American History and Pacific Islander Education in our schools.
What is the model minority myth?
First popularized amid the 1960s Civil Rights Movement, the model minority myth was created to define Asian Americans in opposition to other racial and ethnic minority groups.
Relying on stereotypes and out-of-context data, this myth paints Asian Americans collectively as financially well-off, hardworking, and socially and politically docile. The model minority myth creates a monolithic story of over 26 million Americans with family ties to nearly 50 countries, erasing the vastly different backgrounds, histories, and lived experiences of dozens of different communities.
Why AAPI?
AAPI is a commonly used acronym for Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. Historically, the United States government has grouped Asian Americans with Native Hawaiian people, as well as others from islands across the Pacific including Guam, Samoa, and Tonga.
While there is a long history of these communities intentionally linking themselves in the United States as a way to form networks of solidarity and push collectively for positive social change, the grouping can also be seen as a harmful generalization. This is especially true for Pacific Islanders who may feel that the grouping erases the distinct histories and cultures of their nations and communities. Due to the fact that most education policies being pushed make this link between Asian American and Pacific Islanders, it is the framework most often used to discuss the current debates and issues in education. It is important to recognize that the term AAPI encompasses millions of Americans with heritage from dozens of different nations, and for education advocates and leaders to seek specificity when available and appropriate.
How are we teaching Asian American History now?
Like many marginalized communities in the US, most of us could sum up what we learn about Asian Americans into a few pages in our United States history textbooks— if we’re lucky. For most American public school students, that might look like a brief discussion of Japanese internment during WWII, the red scare and rise of communist China, a blip about the Vietnam war, and for current students and recent graduates, possibly a lesson on the War on Terror. That is, if they make it that far before the end of year exams.
In these limited conversations, the stories, contributions of, and impacts on Asian Americans are rarely mentioned, if at all. In all these historical moments, Asian Americans are painted as “the foreign other” to be suspicious of, never as fellow Americans. This serves to isolate Asian American students and educators in the classroom and Asian parents and families in the broader community.
Discussions of the histories of Pacific Islanders in the United States are even rarer. Few students in the United States learn anything about how the state of Hawai’i became a part of the United States, let alone anything about the island’s history pre-European contact. This is also true of other United States territories of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and American Samoa. Millions of Americans have ancestry from these islands and other parts of the Pacific, yet their histories go completely unexamined in most American classrooms. These gaps in our textbooks end up disappearing the voices and contributions of Pacific Islander communities in the US.
The way we currently teach Asian American and Pacific Islander histories (when we do) leads to real world harm. When Asian American and Pacific Islander students see their community members exclusively painted as a threat when mentioned, and otherwise disappeared from the rest of their textbooks, that causes serious mental and emotional harm. And it has major impacts on these students’ social and educational outcomes.
Paired with the pressure of unattainable standards perpetuated by the model minority myth, Asian students report experiencing adverse mental health conditions, including alarmingly high reports of thoughts of or attempted self-harm. Pacific Islander communities similarly experience erasure of their histories from textbooks along with high rates of young people reporting mental health issues.
This also manifests into violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders from people who have spent their whole lives being taught to distrust their peers and neighbors.
When we teach an inaccurate and incomplete American history and refuse to be honest about the ways that shapes the present, all students are harmed as they are robbed of a quality education and the opportunity to learn about the contribution of Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. And Asian American and Pacific Islander students take the brunt of this harm— mentally, socially, and academically.
What can we do?
1. Resist the Bait.
Politicians have long used Asian Americans and Pacific Islander as a wedge between communities of color looking to advance goals of equity and freedom. We must avoid allowing ourselves to be distracted by these attempts to separate those of us pushing for change. Instead, form relationships and find spaces of shared struggle and solidarity with everyone in the fight for educational equity for all students!
2. Get Educated.
It is critical to educate ourselves and the people in our lives on the impacts Asian Americans have had on this country, issues facing Asian American and Pacific Islander students and communities today, and the need to join in the fight for safe, equitable education for every child.
3. Push for Change.
We have to continue to push for more opportunities for teaching Asian American and Pacific Islander history both in specialized classes but also as mandatory parts of a comprehensive United States history and civics education.
What was your experience learning about Asian American and Pacific Islander History? Let us know in the comments below or by sharing your story here.
