Research Guides: Asian American Studies: Research Resources

Campus Resources

Asian American Studies
by Julia Huynh Last Updated Nov 6, 2025 707 views this year
Critical Refugee Studies
by Julia Huynh Last Updated Sep 5, 2025 166 views this year
Southeast Asian Diaspora Studies
by Julia Huynh Last Updated Jul 14, 2025 757 views this year

Research Resources

Asian American Feminisms and Women of Color Politics by Lynn Fujiwara (Editor); Shireen Roshanravan (Editor); Piya Chatterjee (Series edited by)
ISBN: 0295744375

Publication Date: 2018-12-04
Asian Americans by Xiaojian Zhao (Editor); Edward J. W. Park (Editor)
ISBN: 9781598842401

Publication Date: 2013-11-01
The Asian Americans by Chan, Sucheng
ISBN: 0805784373

Publication Date: 1991-01-01
Asian American Studies by Min Song; Jean Yu-Wen Shen Wu (Editor)
ISBN: 0813527252

Publication Date: 2000-05-01
A Companion to Asian American Studies by Kent A. Ono (Editor)
ISBN: 9781405137096

Publication Date: 2008-04-15
Encyclopedia of Asian American Issues Today by Edith Wen-Chu Chen (Editor); Grace J. Yoo (Editor); Wendy Ng
ISBN: 0313347506

Publication Date: 2010-12-23
Keywords for Asian American studies by Schlund-Vials, Cathy J., 1974- editor.; Võ, Linda Trinh, 1964- editor.; Wong, Kevin Scott, editor.
ISBN: 9781479883851

Publication Date: 2015
The Making of Asian America by Erika Lee
ISBN: 1476739412

Publication Date: 2016-08-16

Archipelago of Resettlement by Evyn Lê Espiritu Gandhi
ISBN: 0520379659

Publication Date: 2022-04-26

From April to November 1975, the US military processed over 112,000 Vietnamese refugees on the unincorporated territory of Guam; from 1977 to 1979, the State of Israel granted asylum and citizenship to 366 non-Jewish Vietnamese refugees. Evyn Lê Espiritu Gandhi analyzes these two cases to theorize what she calls the refugee settler condition: the fraught positionality of refugee subjects whose resettlement in a settler colonial state is predicated on the unjust dispossession of an Indigenous population. This groundbreaking book explores two forms of critical geography: first, archipelagos of empire, examining how the Vietnam War is linked to the US military buildup in Guam and unwavering support of Israel, and second, corresponding archipelagos of trans-Indigenous resistance, tracing how Chamorro decolonization efforts and Palestinian liberation struggles are connected through the Vietnamese refugee figure. Considering distinct yet overlapping modalities of refugee and Indigenous displacement, Gandhi offers tools for imagining emergent forms of decolonial solidarity between refugee settlers and Indigenous peoples.
Performing Chinatown by William Gow
ISBN: 1503639088

Publication Date: 2024-05-14

In 1938, China City opened near downtown Los Angeles. Featuring a recreation of the House of Wang set from MGM's The Good Earth, this new Chinatown employed many of the same Chinese Americans who performed as background extras in the 1937 film. Chinatown and Hollywood represented the two primary sites where Chinese Americans performed racial difference for popular audiences during the Chinese exclusion era. In Performing Chinatown, historian William Gow argues that Chinese Americans in Los Angeles used these performances in Hollywood films and in Chinatown for tourists to shape widely held understandings of race and national belonging during this pivotal chapter in U.S. history. Performing Chinatown conceives of these racial representations as intimately connected to the restrictive immigration laws that limited Chinese entry into the U.S. beginning with the 1875 Page Act and continuing until the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. At the heart of this argument are the voices of everyday people including Chinese American movie extras, street performers, and merchants. Drawing on more than 40 oral history interviews as well as research in more than a dozen archival and family collections, this book retells the long-overlooked history of the ways that Los Angeles Chinatown shaped Hollywood and how Hollywood, in turn, shaped perceptions of Asian American identity.
The Power of Chinatown by Laureen D. Hom
ISBN: 0520391233

Publication Date: 2024-06-18

Urban Chinatowns are dynamic, contested spaces that have persevered amid changes in the American cityscape. These neighborhoods are significant for many, from the residents and workers who rely on them for their livelihoods to the broader Chinese American community and political leaders who recognize their cultural heritage and economic value. In The Power of Chinatown, Laureen D. Hom provides a critical examination of the politics shaping the trajectory of development in Los Angeles Chinatown, one of the oldest urban Chinatowns in the United States. Working from ethnographic fieldwork, Hom chronicles how Chinese Americans continue to gravitate to this space--despite being a geographically dispersed community--and how they have both resisted and encouraged processes of gentrification and displacement. The Power of Chinatown bridges understandings of community, geography, political economy, and race to show the complexities and contradictions of building community power, illuminating how these place-based ethnic politics might give rise to a more expansive vision of Asian American belonging and a just city for all.

Academic Search Complete
A scholarly, multidisciplinary database that provides access to journal articles covering a range of topics, including archaeology, area studies, astronomy, biology, chemistry, civil engineering, electrical engineering, ethnic & multicultural studies, food science & technology, general science, geography, geology, law, mathematics, mechanical engineering, music, physics, psychology, religion & theology, women's studies, and other fields. It also indexes monographs, reports, and conference proceedings.
Asian American Drama
Contains the full text of plays written by Asian American playwrights. Plays were written from late 19th century to the present, and almost half aren't published in any other place.
Project Muse
A broad collection of journals and ebooks with emphasis on humanities and social sciences. Publishers include numerous university presses and scholarly societies.
ERIC (via ProQuest)
Journal articles, conferences, meetings, government documents, theses, dissertations, reports, audiovisual media, bibliographies, directories, books and monographs on education-related literature compiled by the U.S. Institute of Education Science but using the ProQuest search interface.

For material not available in full text, ProQuest links to where UCI has full text access. A free, publicly accessible version of ERIC is at https://eric.ed.gov/ .
MLA International Bibliography
Produced by the Modern Language Association (MLA), the MLA International Bibliography is an index for the study of language, literature, linguistics, rhetoric and composition, folklore, and film, covering scholarly publications from the early 20th century to the present. International in scope, it includes citations to journal articles, books, articles in books, series, translations, scholarly editions, websites, and dissertations, with links to full text in other subscription databases. The database also includes the MLA Directory of Periodicals and the MLA Thesaurus.
America: History & Life
Index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present.
PsycINFO
Published by the American Psychological Association (APA), PsycINFO provides an international index for scholarly literature in the psychological, social, behavioral, and health sciences. The database includes material of relevance to psychologists and professionals in related fields such as psychiatry, management, business, education, social science, neuroscience, law, medicine, and social work.
Ethnic NewsWatch
Contains newspapers, magazines, and journals of the ethnic and minority press. It also provides historical coverage of Native American, African American, and Hispanic American periodicals from 1959-1989.
JSTOR
Provides access to scholarly journals, primarily in the humanities and social sciences. In addition to journal articles, users can access book chapters, ebooks, and primary source documents.