History of Asian Americans

Asian American history is the history of ethnic and racial groups in the United States who are of Asian descent. Spickard (2007) shows that "'Asian American' was an idea invented in the 1960s to bring together Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino Americans for strategic political purposes. Soon other Asian-origin groups, such as Korean, Vietnamese, Hmong, and South Asian Americans, were added." For example, while many Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino immigrants arrived as unskilled workers in significant numbers 1850–1905 and largely settled in Hawaii and California, many Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Hmong Americans arrived in the United States as refugees following the Vietnam War. These separate histories have often been overlooked in conventional frameworks of Asian American history.

Since 1965, shifting immigration patterns have resulted in a higher proportion of highly-educated Asian immigrants entering the United States. This image of success is often referred to as the "model minority" myth. For the contemporary situation, see Asian American.

The Chinese arrived in the U.S. in large numbers on the West Coast in the 1850s and 1860s to work in the gold mines and railroads. They encountered very strong opposition—violent as riots and physical attacks forced them out of the gold mines (citation needed). The Central Pacific railroad hired thousands, but after the line was finished in 1869 they were hounded out of many railroad towns in states such as Wyoming and Nevada. Most wound up in Chinatowns—areas of large cities which the police largely ignored. The Chinese were further alleged to be "coolies" and were said to be not suitable for becoming independent thoughtful voters because of their control by tongs. The same negative reception hit the Asians who migrated to Mexico and Canada.

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