UCLA online textbook gives voice to Asian American, Pacific Islander history and cultures

Model minority. Perpetual foreigner. The centuries-old stereotypes of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders as passive bystanders in American culture and politics still persist, despite U.S. history being full of examples to the contrary. The way to change that, scholars believe, is by teaching younger generations that history.

A free, digital textbook overseen by the UCLA Asian American Studies Center aims to be a high-caliber guide to help high school and college educators nationwide teach more effectively about AAPI experiences. “Foundations and Futures: Asian American and Pacific Islander Multimedia Textbook” is the culmination of years of work by 100 contributors, from curriculum developers to illustrators.

“Our presence, our practices, our cultural rituals and things like that are not deemed as ‘American,’” Karen Umemoto, a co-editor and the Center’s director, told The AP exclusively before the $12 million project's official launch Saturday. “The actual putting together of this textbook also became our fight for inclusion and represents our right to be seen, our right to speak.”

The textbook covers a wide breadth of AAPI communities and their struggles, with more chapters to be added on a rolling basis. While May is AAPI Heritage Month, this platform is about keeping the spotlight on year-round.

“Young people are going to have so many different opportunities to see themselves and their communities represented in this core text. Now I can’t wait,” said Kelly Fong, a co-editor.

These scholars are well aware that with President Donald Trump and fellow Republicans working to dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives in education, it may be difficult to persuade some states and teachers to use the textbook at first. But that's not dampening their enthusiasm.

Working through anti-Asian and anti-immigrant sentiment

Academic freedom and editorial independence have been guiding principles since they first developed the idea for this textbook eight years ago. Then came the pandemic, and with it, a rise in anti-Asian hate crimes. Racial reckoning and fighting anti-Asian hate became part of the national conversation as they developed a prototype.

“COVID, I think, was really one of the things that shaped the textbook the way that it did,” Fong said. “We understood that it was about education as one of the ways to fight racism.”

The project felt like a “bridge” as a 2021 California law made ethnic studies a high school graduation requirement, Fong added. By 2022, the Asian American Studies Center received federal and state funding for the textbook.

At a time when a large share of AAPI adults still worry about racial discrimination and now anti-immigrant rhetoric, Umemoto hopes learning stories about the challenges and achievements of individual immigrants will create some “historical empathy.”

Giving voice to underrepresented AAPI voices, including women

The textbook’s expansive scope goes well beyond the Japanese detention camps and Chinese laborers mentioned in standard textbooks. The editorial team whittled 150 ideas for chapter topics down to 50, with sections on the formation of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance and Asian Americans in the South, chapters related to Vietnamese, Hmong and Indigenous Hawaiians, and archival photos and embedded videos, including one on Filipino farmworkers narrated by rapper Ruby Ibarra.

“We were trying to be as inclusive as possible,” said Melany De La Cruz-Viesca, the Center's deputy director.

The book also gives space to individual female stories. You can read about Cornelia Delute, a Filipina supporter of the United Farm Workers, or Mamie Tape, an 8-year-old Chinese American girl whose efforts to attend public school were approved by the California Supreme Court.

As the first woman of color and Asian American woman elected to Congress, Patsy Takemoto Mink opposed the Vietnam War and worked to prevent sex discrimination in education through Title IX. For her section, they found a political scientist who could contribute intimate knowledge — her daughter, Gwendolyn “Wendy” Mink.

“I’m just glad that the whole project exists,” Mink said, since her mother's generation is dwindling. “She was a fighter, she was principled, she offered hope to people who felt beaten down by defeats on struggles for justice. I hear it less because fewer people know about her deeply.”

Elevating AAPI history amid anti-DEI sentiment

The political landscape has shifted dramatically since the textbook was first proposed. Republicans now say DEI initiatives discriminate against white and Asian students in the college admissions process, a view shared by some Asian American advocates. The Trump administration has attempted to withhold funding from schools, including UCLA, for factoring race in admissions and for campus programs that support students based on their identities.

Some states have set up hotlines or websites to report any DEI practices at publicly-funded schools. And with critics likening ethnic studies to indoctrination, some schools are reluctant to support Asian American history in K-12 classrooms. Many teachers have been thrust onto “the front lines” of a cultural back-and-forth, Fong said.

“It's changed for the teachers who we were hoping would use the textbook. We have tried to figure out how to respond to best support them,” Fong said. “We don’t necessarily have an answer to that yet.”

While some states are focusing less on incorporating AAPI history now, the work continues in others -- often led by lobbying from large AAPI populations, said Tina Ellsworth, president of the National Council for the Social Studies.

Ellsworth, who has been a textbook reviewer, said textbooks have improved somewhat in terms of cultural relevancy and sensitivity to language. But she says this multimedia textbook “will come in very handy” as teachers seek additional materials on marginalized histories, particularly because it's free and attached to a reputable university.

“It’s just about letting people know that it’s out there,” Ellsworth said.

The textbook's authors are seeking another $5 million through private donations to expand it, market it and pay for cloud storage. New sections could involve Tongan Americans and Taiwanese Americans. “There are so many fascinating stories that have yet to be shared with the world,” Umemoto said.