During the month of May, the United States observes Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. While the population is sometimes referred to by the shortened form of AANHPI, its community members are diverse and represent a broad range of peoples and traditions.
Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders represent more than 30 countries and 100 languages. Asian Americans include those whose ancestry is traced to the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent. Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders include those descended from Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands.
The Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies and the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center are partnering to provide an opportunity for Notre Dame and the surrounding community to celebrate AANHPI stories through screenings of The Boy and The Heron, which won an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, May 2-5.
To kick off Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the Liu institute also sponsored student presentations on South Asia-focused research and hosted the Justice and Asia Distinguished Lecture featuring Alpa Shah, anthropologist and writer. Shah’s lecture was based on her forthcoming book The Incarcerations: BK16 and the Search for Democracy in India, which examines the 2018 violence and arrests of 16 human rights defenders (the BK-16)—professors, lawyers, journalists, and poets—who were labeled as Maoist terrorist and accused of inciting violence and plotting against Indian prime minister Narendra Modi. (Video of the lecture will be posted soon.)
“This month, we celebrate the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AA and NHPI) communities, whose ingenuity, grit, and perseverance have pushed our great American experiment forward,” U.S. President Joseph R. Biden wrote in a proclamation. “From Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders whose ancestors have called their lands home for hundreds of years to Asian immigrants who have newly arrived and those whose families have been here for generations — AA and NHPI heritage has long been a part of the history of our great country and a defining force in the soul of our Nation.”
Learn more about AANHPI history and experiences:
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Resources on anti-Asian discrimination from the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies
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The Klau Center for Civil and Human Rights’ Building an Anti-Racist Vocabulary lecture—Asian Americans in an Anti-Black World by Claire Jean Kim, University of California Irvine
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The film Asian Americans, now streaming on PBS, is a five-hour film series that explores the history, contributions and challenges experienced by Americans of Asian descent
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10 Movies that Celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage—DirecTV
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Must-Read Books for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month—Penguin Random House
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15 Asian American and Pacific Islander Podcasts You Need to Listen To—Reader’s Digest
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A Spotify playlist of Asian American and Pacific Islander artists curated by the Recording Academy/Grammys