Highlighting AAPI Research & Community Leaders at UCLA

In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the Center for the Study of Women | Barbra Streisand Center is proud to recognize the scholars, students, and organizations whose work enriches UCLA and contributes to a deeper understanding of AAPI histories, cultures, and futures. Across disciplines and communities, AAPI leaders at UCLA are advancing research, fostering dialogue, supporting student activism, and creating new opportunities for learning and engagement. This spotlight highlights just a few of the many individuals and initiatives helping to build a more inclusive and equitable university community.

Highlighting CSWAC Research 

To support our mission, CSW|Streisand Center faculty (CSWAC) provides an environment within which scholars explore new frontiers of knowledge about women, sexuality, and gender. We draw on the expertise of our executive board and advisory committee (all distinguished scholars in their own fields) to develop and refine our mission. Our CSWAC members have made significant contributions to work surrounding Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. 

• Ju Hui Judy Han, CSWAC chair, is a cultural geographer and Associate Professor of Gender Studies committed to building critical and transnational conversations concerning gender, sexuality, and activism. Her comics and writings about (im)mobilities, religion and faith-based movements, and queer politics have been published in Journal of Asian Studies, Critical Asian Studies, positions: asia critique, and Journal of Korean Studies as well as in several edited books including Religion, Protest, Social Upheaval (2022), Ethnographies of U.S. Empire (2018), Territories of Poverty: Rethinking North and South (2015), and Q&A: Queer in Asian America (1998). She is also the author of Queer Throughlines: Spaces of Queer Activism in South Korea and the Korean Diaspora (forthcoming in 2025, University of Michigan Press), co-author of Against Abandonment: Repertoires of Solidarity in South Korean Protest (forthcoming in 2025, Stanford University Press) with Jennifer Jihye Chun, and a co-editor for Detours: A Decolonial Guide to Korea (in progress).
• Victor Bascara: As an Associate Professor of Asian American studies at UCLA, Victor Basara conducts important researching examination various manifestations of formal and informal colonialism, with a particular emphasis on Asian American cultural politics.  His current research includes a comparative study of the early 20th-century histories of the Universities of Puerto Rico, Hawai’i, and the Philippines, and he is completing a monograph on the relationship between U.S. imperialism and isolationism in the interwar period (c. 1919-1941).  He is co-editing, with Prof. Lisa Nakamura (U. of Michigan – Ann Arbor), a special issue of Amerasia Journal called “Asian American Cultural Politics Across Platforms:  Literature, Film, New Media, and Beyond.”
• Lucy Burns has made significant contributions to the Asian American community as an Associate Professor of Asian American Studies. Burns’s writings include Puro Arte: Filipinos on the Stages of Global Empire (NYU Press, 2014 Outstanding Book Award in Cultural Studies by the Asian American Studies Association) and the co-edited anthology California Dreaming: Place and Movement in Asian American Imaginary (2020, University of Hawai’i Press). Burns is working on a second monograph, Asian American Elsewheres. As a dramaturg, Burns has collaborated with BIPOC inter/multidisciplinary theater- and dance-makers David Rousseve/REALITY; Leilani Chan/TeAda Productions; Priya Srinivasan; Jay Carlon; and R. Zamora Linmark. Burns is also a member of a research group consisting of artists, scholars, and art professionals who have been conducting research and conversations about the impact of COVID-19 closures and the COVID-19 pandemic on BIPOC theater artists and organizations

AAPI-Centered Organizations at UCLA  

• Asian Pacific Coalition: The Asian Pacific Coalition at UCLA is made up of 19 UCLA-based, AAPI student organizations, or “member organizations” and is dedicated to the conscious pursuit of collective liberation*, through coalition-building* efforts within and beyond the AAPI* (Asian American and Pacific Islander) community. As a collective of UCLA-based AAPI organizations, they unite around the commitment to dismantling systems of oppression, strengthening collective-based knowledge, and activating the political power of our communities. These organizations include the Association of Chinese Americans, Association fo Hmong students at UCLA, BURSA at UCLA, Hui O ‘Imiloa, Indian Student Association, Korean American Student Association, LCC Theatre Co., Mixed Student Union at UCLA, Nikkei Student Association, Pacific Island’s Student Association, Pacific Ties News Magazine, Pilipino Transfer Student Partnership, South Asian Student Union, Samahang Dance, Taiwanese American Student Association, Thai Student Association, United Khmer Students, and Vietnamese Student Union.

AAPI-Led Initiatives at UCLA  

• Asian American & Pacific Islander (AAPI) Policy Initiative
  The Asian American & Pacific Islander (AAPI) Policy Initiative launched by the the UCLA Asian American Studies Center (AASC) in 2021 and has since built on their long history as a recognized leader in Asian American Studies with a track record of excellence in applied policy research, publications, and leadership development.
  
  This initiative supports and produces research in collaboration with nonprofit advocacy organizations and policy makers to uplift AAPI perspectives in civic life and public decision-making in California and across the nation. As a nonpartisan research entity housed under AASC, the AAPI Policy Initiative conducts applied research and facilitate engagement between stakeholders, policy makers, and government decision-makers.

• New Accessible Textbooks Platforms AAPI History & Culture
  The Associated Press featured an article about the launch of a free digital textbook overseen by the UCLA Asian American Studies Center that aims to be a high-caliber guide to help high school and college educators nationwide teach more effectively about AAPI experiences. “Foundations and Futures: Asian American and Pacific Islander Multimedia Textbook” is the culmination of years of work by 100 contributors, from curriculum developers to illustrators. The textbook covers a wide breadth of AAPI communities and their struggles, with more chapters to be added on a rolling basis and while May is AAPI Heritage Month, this resource keep the spotlight on AAPI voices year-round.

• AAPI Caucus at UCLA Luskin Public Affairs
  The AAPI Caucus at UCLA Luskin is a graduate student organization that welcomes Public Policy, Social Welfare, & Urban Planning students of all cultures and backgrounds to explore issues in the diverse Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. TheAAPI Caucus at UCLA Luskin empowers and advocates for the Asian American and Pacific Islander diaspora on campus through campus-wide events, fundraisers, screenings, and more.

Ria Rao is a junior at UCLA studying Cognitive Science and Statistics & Data Science. She has been involved with UCLA student media organizations UCLA Radio and FEM News Magazine, and now serves the CSW|Streisand Center as a Student Worker.