Thoai Nguyen, director of the Committee Against Anti-Asian-American violence, described the continued persecution of Asian-Americans in this country to an audience of about 25 people yesterday in the Rockefeller Center.
The speech was the College's first event in celebration of Asian Pacific Heritage Month, which will feature various speeches and events throughout this month.
Nguyen read a harrowing account of the brutal murder in January of a Vietnamese-American by white supremacists.
The alleged murderers approached the victim as he was roller-blading on a tennis court and stabbed him repeatedly in the side, back and heart, Nguyen said.
He said this sort of incident "typifies ... the brutal murder of Asians in the United States."
White supremacists target not only African-Americans and Jews but also Asians, he said.
Americans usually conceive of racism as a black versus white issue and ignore the prevalence of violence against Asian-Americans, he said.
Nguyen said Asian-Americans are "seen as perpetual foreigners in this country," even those whose families have been in America for several generations.
Nguyen described many ways Asian-Americans are terrorized, including murder, brutality and hate speech.
He said the media contributes to these racist perceptions and acts by reinforcing stereotypes of Asian-Americans.
The media "adds to the Asian-American violence psyche," Nguyen said.
He said, "The media capitalizes upon already existing stereotypes" by portraying Asians as "geeks, gangsters or gurus."
But he said Asian-Americans have not remained passive in the face of discrimination and hate crimes.
They have "actively resisted against this kind of oppression," Nguyen said, giving numerous examples of their resistance.
Nguyen offered many reasons to explain why Asians come to America, including war or oppression in their native countries, the availability of education in America and the need for cheap labor.
He recounted Asian-American history from the earliest settlements in the 17th century, through the upheavals of the California gold rush in 1848 and the incarceration of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
"The history of Asians in America is synonymous with the history of anti-Asian violence," he said.
Nguyen ended his speech by giving advice to the Asian-American students in the audience.
"I used what I learned from institutions such as Dartmouth to work with my community," he said. Nguyen encouraged the audience to learn about Asian-American history to prepare for the future.
