The Final Week (Sort of)

Sorry I haven't posted in a while! I've been traveling out of state for the last couple weeks for college admit weekends. But anyway, this week is supposed to be the final week for the Senior Research Project and finals week for ASU. Slight problem: the IRB has not approved our data collection yet. Therefore, my project is going to run until the very last day, May 23rd, when I will be presenting my experience and findings at the Mustang Library (wink wink please come).

The survey itself has been completed and transferred on to Google Forms (because SurveyMonkey costs money, which we don't have). Although I would love to show you the survey, I can't because viewing the questions beforehand may influence the results of those who will take the survey, but have also read my blog.

I'm really excited that I'm finally going to see the results of all those hours of reading through previous studies, planning the variables, discussing logistics, sorting through different measures, and changing the entire project multiple times because of funding issues. Finally. I never realized how much work went in to planning a research project, not just the data collection/experiment itself. Although my SRP presentation will (hopefully) include more preliminary trends from our data, my professor intends to continue analyzing it for different relationships between different combinations of variables for the rest of the year.

Now for the more exciting part of my posts: what I've learned in class. Last week, we discussed how race crosses with gender and sexual orientation. More specifically, how the LGBT experience is unique for Asian Americans. To be honest, I don't as much about the LGBT community as I do about the Asian American community, so please excuse me if I accidentally use incorrect wording to describe something and feel free to add any comments/thoughts below.

Our class split up into four groups and took turns writing on the whiteboard all the stereotypes, associated words, and famous examples of lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgenders. Although I don't have a picture of the whiteboard that we filled up, here's a picture of some of the things we wrote down for stereotypes of gay people:

I want to make it clear that a) I am in no way trying to promote these stereotypes through this picture, rather trying to raise awareness about the fact that they are simply stereotypes and b) I did not choose a gay example as an act of discrimination against lesbians, bisexuals, and transgenders (there seems to be a social hierarchy within the LGBT community, too).

After we complied the lists, we realized that race had a very prominent intersection with sexual orientation. Most of the famous examples of people who came out were White, such as Sam Smith, Ellen DeGeneres, and Anderson Cooper. This may be due to the fact that minorities are still underrepresented in the media and entertainment industry, but for Asian Americans, it also has to do with the idea of the Model Minority Myth, the idea that Asian Americans are "perfect." In terms of sexual orientation and sexuality in our society today, "perfect" means heterosexual. It's almost as if Asian Americans aren't allowed to come out because it would dishonor their family and make them less Asian, or so society says.

Regardless of what background and values you have, I want to hear anything you have to say about heterosexism in the United States, more specifically, what you think about the clash between stereotypical Asian American values and sexual orientation. Thanks for reading my extra-long post, and more updates on the project soon to come!

Is Racism Even Real?

To be honest with you, not much happened this week. I was so excited all of last week to start writing to the IRB for approval of our project. On Tuesday, I got food poisoning. When I wasn't knocked out from medication (my mother thought I had the flu and gave me some to lower my fever) or throwing up or drooling at food pictures because I didn't eat solid food for two days, I officially finished typing up the survey. I will take the survey soon, and depending on how long it takes, we might cut some of the questions.

In class last week, we watched a documentary called "The Color of Fear" (1994). It captures a dialogue between two African American, two Latino, two Asian American, and two Caucasian men regarding race and racism in the United States. I thought it was particularly interesting because I was presented with multiple perspectives of the same topic. If you have 90 minutes to spare, this documentary is worth watching 10/10, regardless of your race and current understanding on racism.

Here is short moment that I related to because I have also previously tried to explain racism to people who believe that it no longer exists in the United States. The video quality isn't too great, but what Victor Lewis says about the experience of racism definitely makes up for it:

For those that cannot watch the documentary, one of the most important points that it makes is that racism is real. It has existed in the past, and it still exists today. Every day, people of color are consciously and unconsciously discriminated against by White people–or even other people of color–because of their race. And, this discrimination is physically and psychologically harmful to every single person of color: African American, Asian American, Native American, Latino. Racism is real. It's a problem. And, we all need to understand that.

It's not just racism, however. Sexism, classism, heterosexism are also detrimental and heavily debated in today's society. All of these "-isms" derive from the idea that one group is inherently superior over another. But, aren't we all humans? Then, what makes one human better than another? Better enough that society can be controlled by them?

On that note, I'll leave you to chew this post for a little while. If you have any thoughts about "The Color of Fear" or just the general topic of race, racism, or any other -ism, please feel free to comment below! 

Adventures at ASU

One of the best parts about the Senior Research Project is the internship experience. The past couple weeks, I've been too enthusiastic about sharing what I've learned in class, so I'll change it up a bit this time. During my internship, I feel like a slightly-less-busy grad student. On a typical day at ASU, I do some work at the Hayden Library with Tina (who also kindly drives me to ASU every week, along with her sister, Vicki), meet with my professor, grab some lunch (if we want to be fancy or have something to celebrate, maybe Engrained), do some more work, then go to class.

Sometimes, however, I try to take a little more advantage of pretending to be a college student. Two weeks ago, Tina and I decided to visit Gammage, the arts auditorium at ASU Tempe, and stumbled across an art museum. Underground. Although I was too engrossed by the artwork to take any pictures, here is a picture of the art museum itself (according to Google):

It's a petite museum, but definitely one worth visiting, as I'm on the campus anyways. Maybe I'll go back once the construction is finished because I plan to make the most of my semi-college experience.

On March 24th, there was a farmers market in front of the student services center that I vowed to myself and Tina to visit. And of course, I forgot. But, I definitely will go to the next one on April 7th!

While working with Dr. Yoo, I've been introduced to many of his colleagues, such as Professor Karen Kuo. Who also happens to be my classmate Massimo's mother, once again reminding me of the significance of networks. It's a small world.

This Thursday, I was drawn to the henna tattoo booth set up in front of the Memorial Union. The artist that was decorating my hand told me a bit about henna (also called mehndi). Henna is generally used in the Middle East, Pakistan, and India to dye skin, hair, and fabrics for celebrating special occasions. It's supposed to last for a week, so it's still pretty visible on my hand.

As for the project progress, I am almost finished typing up the survey after weeks of finding and sorting through different measures and obtaining permissions to use them. Honestly, I've experienced a bit of frustration with formatting and organizing the different measures into a cohesive survey, but my professor says I have it a lot easier. He had to look everything up in books and libraries, writing things by hand, manual copy and paste. I couldn't complain after that.

In the next week or two, I'll contact the IRB (Institutional Review Board) to receive official approval for the study and create an online survey to be distributed to Asian American high school students all across Arizona. More updates on the survey coming soon (if you are an Asian American high school student living in Arizona and would like to participate, I need around 200 people)!