The Loneliest Americans

In this latest book, Kang (The Dead Do Not Improve) suggests that to understand the history of Asian Americans, one need only go back to 1968, when the term “Asian American” was created by a group of students in Berkeley. Prior to 1968, Kang writes, there were only “Asians in the United States,” whom white Americans largely did not think of as fellow citizens. Kang addresses the history of the Berkeley movement in order to contextualize the construct of Asian American-ness, an identity that he describes as problematic in a country that still looks at race largely in terms of Blackness and whiteness. Kang frames his argument with a first chapter that focuses on his family’s migrations from North Korea to South Korea, and eventually to the United States after the passage of the Hart-Celler Immigration Act of 1965. His cultural criticism adds a much-needed perspective to the growing body of literature by the children of Korean immigrants in the United States, including Cathy Park Hong’s autobiographical essay collection Minor Feelings. Kang also devotes chapters to his coverage of the Black Lives Matter protests, the online community of men’s rights activists, and the “aznidentity” subreddit.