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I. Mark Chiang’s book, The Cultural Capital of Asian American Studies: Autonomy and Representation in the University, is an addition to the growing literature on ethnic studies and multiculturalism in the academy. It discusses an issue that, suprisingly, has not recieved much attention in the literature: what’s the deal with Asian American Studies? Is it a discipline? Is there really an “Asian America” that you can study in the same way that there’s a Black America?

Chiang’s approach draws heavily on Bourdieu’s theories of symbolic capital. His goal is to understand the academic object that Asian Americanists have developed and how that relates to different audiences inside and outside of the academy – the “cultural capital of the field.” In true Bourdieu-ian fashion, Chiang tries to explain how the object of Asian American Studies enabled the creation of the field. Perhaps Chiang’s biggest insight is that this ultimately required a form of “nonrepresentative representation.” In more plain language, you can’t act as a political advocate in your scholarship for Asian Americans. Instead, you must abstractly study their culture.

Long time readers of this blog know that the evolution of Black Studies has been a central focus of my research. Thus, I am very  interested in how a Bourdieu-ian analysis differs from my very anti-Bourdieu-ian take on things. Chiang and I both agree on the basic dilemma for ethnic studies. The ethnic studies movement was very community oriented, but exists in an institutional framework that imposes a Mertionian universalism. You must strive to be value free and non-political in your work. Chiang and I also agree that ethnic studies has experienced a corresponding shift to professionalism. Community members and activists do not define later generations of ethnic studies. De-radicalization is required for acceptance into the field. Very Bourdieu.

Here’s where we depart. Chiang, I think, views Asian American Studies as a field that has shifted to a professional mode where value is determined through technical skill. For example, he relies on this view when describing a highly contentious dispute in 1999 over a book award (more below). He thinks the conflict revolved around those who valued the book in question on its technical features, while opponents focused more on negative representations of characters from specific ethnic groups. Thus, a focus on the technical analysis of Asian American culture, rather than representation of Asian American people, is the “cultural capital” of the field.

In contrast, I would suggest that Asian American Studies, like Black Studies, might be in a sort of intermediate position that allows for both highly technocratic discourse and political advocacy, which in turn affects the rest of the university. This is the position I took in Chapter 7 of From Black Power. In other words, ethnic studies retains an oppositional stance because it is situated within a mainstream institution while being highly reflexive. Very un-Bourdieu.

II. Let me now change subjects by discussing the concluding chapter that focsuses on the dispute over the 1999 Association for Asian American Studies book award. The essence of the dispute was that Filipino activists and academics believed that Lois-ann’s Yamanaka’s Blu’s Hanging relied heavily on negative stereotypes of Filipino characters. This is a very sensitive issue because Filipinos and other Pacific islanders are low status in Hawaii. Not surprisingly, Yamanaka’s texts had generated intense feelings before, during, and after the award. Here’t the Atlantic Monthly on the controversy. In covering this part of the book, let me disclose that I am married to a person who strongly opposed the award, so I’ll tread lightly here. It’s also important to note that Chiang admits that he voted to revoke the book award.

Chiang’s explanation of the conflict was that it reflected unresolved tensions about the field’s basic object of study – Asian America.  By engaging in nonrepresentative representation, the AAAS book award committee engaged in a highly technical analyis that viewed the negatively portrayed Filipino characters as a literary tool. The opponents thought that was disingenuous, in the same way that whites sometimes exonerate themselves from racist utterances by insisting that it was ironic or humorous.  Chiang casts this episode as a fight between those with the right kinds of capital (AAAS insiders) and those who don’t (Filipino academics and writers).  It was a fight, ultimately, between those who worked with the idea of Asian American Studies as the study of culture against those who promoted Asian American Studies as the representation of the community.

Now, it is likely true that the book award committee saw themselves as rewarding a book on technical grounds. It seemed to me, at the time and now ten years later, that the conflict was about something much larger and it wasn’t cultural nationalism in ethnic studies. The ultimate root of the conflict was about ethnic hierarchy. Yamanaka’s books had already attracted considerable critique, but what really triggered outrage was that a professional association that was rewarding someone who benefited from racial inequalities that the association was supposed to be against. In other words, Asian American Studies had built an egalitarian identity around this idea of studying a pan-ethnic community. Yet, this same community was rewarding an author for exploiting some very real inequalities. The book award signalled to a marginalized group that their inferior position could be used to win awards.

To be fair to Chiang, he does address this issue from time to time in the text. For example, he notes that Yamanaka is highly dismissive of protesters and tells them to write their own novels. Chiang correctly notes that some groups don’t have regular access to publishers, so they are reduced to complaining about other people’s books. Chiang is clearly sympathetic. Chiang also notes that protestors pushed their own policy proposal to minimize ethnic inequality within Asian American Studies. However, these issues are subverted to a narrative about nonrepresentative representation.

It might have more useful to describe two parallel problems for Asian American Studies. First, the field has to contend with an institutional system that demands value free inquiry. The solution to the problem is “nonrepresentative representation.” Second, the field is egalitarian in its ethos, but its members are stratified by nationality and have unequal access to the academic system. This problem is unsolved. These are distinct, but interrelated, issues and recognizing them more clearly I think could have improved the analysis of the book award incident.

III. Even though I critique Chiang a bit, I feel that this is an important book for anyone interested in the dynamics of ethnic studies. It expands on issues in my book, Amy Binder’s book Contentious Curricula, Small’s article on Black Studies, Boxer’s work on women’s studies, and Yamane’s book on multiculturalism. It’s also useful because it’s both an insider’s account and uses analytic tools from the social sciences and humanities. Recommended.