New media platforms are providing novel avenues of inquiry into what it means to be Asian American. Guest edited by Victor Bascara (UCLA) and Lisa Nakamura (University of Michigan), the latest Amerasia Journal, Issue 40:2 “Asian American Cultural Politics Across Platforms,” is a path-breaking exploration of the relationship between Asian American Studies and the emerging field of platform studies. Covering a wide range of media, from conceptual art to music video, photography to video gaming, “Asian American Cultural Politics Across Platforms” engages the most contemporary forms of cultural representation and how they shape the identities of their consumers and users.
Prompted by the guest editors’ goal to call attention to “new scholarship in Asian American Studies that takes platforms into consideration” in our post-digital era, the special issue asks how Asian American culture and politics are increasingly shaped by new media across real and virtual environments. Valerie Soe’s contribution examines how three Asian American artists confront ingrained inequalities in the art world, challenging stereotypes of Asian American identity in thought-provoking and provocative ways. Similarly, Warren Liu revisits Tseng Kwong Chi’s Mao suit photography series and reimagines how the iconic images represent Chineseness as a reflection of American and Western anxieties over China.
The special issue goes beyond these art forms and delves into other creative realms. Erin Suzuki interrogates East-West power dynamics in a comparative analysis of Psy’s “Gangnam Style” music video and Jessica Hagedorn’s novel Dogeaters, as she focuses on how references to pop culture cited in each index a global pecking order on both cultural and economic terms. Takeo Rivera tackles the issue of Orientalist stereotypes as they appear in the best-selling video game Deus Ex: Human Revolution, as he delves into the ambivalence of Asian gamers who might feel both pleasure and trauma in annihilating the game’s virtual Asian bodies. Loan Dao, on the other hand, considers how youth culture and social networking enable political praxis, detailing how Southeast Asian American youth have embraced and engaged with hip hop culture to advocate for immigrant rights.
The special issue marks the passing of civil rights pioneer Yuri Kochiyama with a personal tribute by Mary Uyematsu Kao. Also featured in the issue are a community spotlight on Los Angeles-based media arts institution Visual Communications and reviews of Lucy Burns’s Puro Arte, Stephen Sohn’s Racial Asymmetries, and other recent publications.
Published by UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center since 1971, Amerasia Journal is regarded as the core journal in the field of Asian American Studies.
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