A Study of Asian American Issues in the United States - Nicoline Pedersen - Krista Celo - Eden Stilman - Seren Ventullo

Transpacific Racial Unity

Balce, the author of "Filipino Bodies, Lynching, and the Language of Empire" and Onishi, the author of "Transpacific Antiracism: Afro-Asian Solidarity in 20th-Century Black America, Japan, and Okinawa" express a connection between Black Americans in the United States and other races that the US military were attempting to dominate through imperialism. The United States began to expand globally, hegemonizing countries they felt needed their political and social guidance. When the United States stretched into Asia and attempted to exploit China for resources similar to African countries, Japan imposed. Japan strongly defied the imperialistic attitude of America and refused to allow them to take over Asia as well. Afro-Asian philosophy began as a result of Black Americans identifying with Japan’s fight. This way of thinking allowed a global resistance against white colonizing powers. Race morphed from a concept of differentiating groups of people by skin color to a political category. This political category unified groups from different nations to create a strong force of opposition.

These two images are of DuBois (centered in the image above), a well-known African American scholar, socialist, and historian meeting with Japanese scholars. “The magic of the word 'white' is already broken. The awakening of the yellow races is certain… the awakening of the brown and black races will follow in time.” W. E. B. Du Bois

The Japanese and Filipinos were two groups subjected to US expansion, but openly defied their power. Filipinos fought in the Philippine-American War (see pages 5-8) for their freedom and lost roughly half a million of their people in the effort. Black Americans allied themselves with these groups in order to express a global movement against white supremacy, imperialism, and colonization. Black, Japanese, and Filipinos all suffered at the hands of the United States’ power and made connections through their struggles. This transpacific movement empowered people who were separated by oceans but connected by political identities.

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