Written by Esther Hwang As she stepped onto the tiny green campus, Sharon Quinsaat explored her potential role in this unique space. This space, Grinnell College, is a social justice-oriented college in rural Iowa. And Quinsaat, a sociologist from the Philippines with a background in migration, transnationalism, and social movements, had a lot to offer Grinnell.
When Quinsaat told her colleagues she was looking forward to teaching a section called “Sociology of Asian America,” a history professor standing nearby joked that she would quickly run out of material to teach. There just isn’t that much to be said for Asian American history, he said. This joke did not amuse Quinsaat. But the history professor’s laughter kept ringing in her ears. That laugh was important. It sent a spark to Quinsaat, and she knew in that moment that she would lead a charge for Asian American studies at Grinnell. With a larger mission for inclusive education across the country, Quinsaat would empower her students through her classes and prove that Asian American studies is more than worthwhile, it is essential. Now let me tell you how that “Sociology of Asian America” class went… When course registration opened, “Sociology of Asian America” filled up instantly. Our college is tiny, with tiny classes to match. Each of our classes usually caps at 30 students. So there we were, 30 of us elbow to elbow in a seminar room meant for 15, all of us with different identities and reasons for enrolling in the course. Some of us were second generation Asian Americans with a thirst for self-discovery through history. Some of us were South Asians wanting to hear about Asians who weren’t just from China, Japan, or Korea. Some of us were international students from Asia wondering why they felt so different from their Asian American peers. Some of us came from hometowns that were filled with Southeast Asian refugees and wanted to learn how they got there. And some of us enrolled simply because it was something new and exciting for Grinnell. And it was new and exciting. Each reading was a treasure, a realization that, wow, Asian Americans are everywhere! How have we never noticed or listened to them? By teaching this class, Quinsaat gave visibility to those erased and voice to those otherwise unheard: Afro-Amerasians who struggle with conflicting messages from African American and Asian communities, Chinese American men who found themselves emasculated when they migrated to America, Asian American women who were chastised by their communities when they married white men, Vietnamese nail shop owners and their triangular relationship with Latino workers, Pakistanis who found rebellious release through punk music, Asian movie stars who had to succumb to imposed stereotypes in order to make a living, the struggle of Asians trying to climb into executive positions in America. Each reading was a journey to a scattered Asian diaspora in America, and each class discussion an intimate conversation about the meaning of those communities through a transnational perspective. History was hands-down my least favorite subject in high school. None of my teachers taught me history the way I learned it with Quinsaat, as a beautiful narrative of the historical processes that bring us to the intricacies of society today. This class was everything that my social studies courses in high school couldn’t be for me, because this class actually included me. At the end of the semester, our class held a campus-wide presentation of our final projects, and the professors who attended were blown away. They had not seen such thoughtful and accurate projects done by 19- and 20- year olds in decades. And they certainly hadn’t heard about the studies and histories of Asian Americans of which, by the end of the semester, we were experts. And now we look back on the hard-fought victory of Sharon Quinsaat, professor and activist extraordinaire. Sharon Quinsaat succeeded in her mission. She single-handedly empowered her students by giving representation to the underrepresented. At the end of the semester, no one could deny that Asian American studies was much richer than we all thought. Who’s laughing now?
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AuthorSirena Backham Archives
August 2017
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