Zach Moore's Asian American Post

When most people think of oppressed races in America they probably think of African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and Native Americans. One race that people forget was oppressed were Asian-Americans; people forget this tragic fact mainly because of how well off Asian-Americans are today. One could argue that they are probably the best fairing minority in the country because of the current socioeconomic states of the other minorities present. However, Asian-Americans were not previously viewed this way in the United States. In Lisa Lowe's journal article Work, Immigration, Gender: New Subjects of Cultural Politics she points out some of the hardships and woes that Asian-Americans faced even as late as the 1990's. She tells the story of Fu Lee, a 41 year old married woman with a 9 year old daughter. Fu Lee, an immigrant from Hong Kong, worked as a seamstress in Oakland's chinatown where the working conditions were very poor and unhealthy for any human-being. Mrs. Lee stated, “ My eyes hurt from straining under poor lighting; my throat hurt because of the chemical fumes from the fabric dye. Sometimes, I would wear surgical masks so I don't have to breathe in all the dust from the fabric. My back never stopped hurting from bending over the sewing machine all day. Our boss was like a dictator”(31). This quotation further explains the atrocious life of an Asian-American worker in the late 1900's.

Lowe makes plenty of valid points about the struggles of Asian-Americans; however, I agree with what Jarrod said about her not mentioning examples of Asian-Americans who are successful because there are many of them. Actually, when I think of an average Asian-American person today, I think of a pretty successful, respected person. Maybe this is just my ignorance to the way things really are, but I still think that Lowe could have at least acknowledged successful Asian-Americans.