023 - Changing Places, New Spaces (from Mid Pacific)
May 31, 2023
Show notes
Featured story from “Mid Pacific” podcast:
For Chinatowns, Japantowns, K-Towns, and other Asian-American communities in the United States, the only constant these days is change. But our need for cultural connection remains the same. Take a tour with Mid Pacific host Sarah Mizes-Tan to see what these spaces mean today.
Books & Boba - from the Potluck Podcast Collective
May 19, 2023
Show notes
For Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, we’re bringing you an episode from Books & Boba, one of our fellow podcasts from the Potluck Podcast Collective.
Books & Boba is a book club podcast featuring books by Asian and Asian American authors. In addition to discussing books from a wide range of genres, they also bring you interviews with Asian authors and monthly book news updates.
Asians in Baseball - from the Potluck Podcast Collective
May 12, 2023
Show notes
For Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, we’re bringing you an episode from Asians in Baseball, one of our fellow podcasts from the Potluck Podcast Collective.
Each week, hosts Naomi Ko, Scott Okamoto, and Kim Cooper break down what’s notable with the Asian players in the MLB and then take a deeper dive into the Asians and Asian Americans who have shaped baseball as it is today.
022 - Whose Chinatown? (from A Better Life?)
May 25, 2022
Show notes
Featured story from “A Better Life?” podcast:
In Los Angeles Chinatown, local shops and restaurants eagerly welcome back customers as they return to business after the height of the pandemic shutdown. But the neighborhood’s rebound from Covid has been uneven. The pandemic has shone a light on the divide separating the successful and the struggling, as well as concerns about the varied nature of anti-Asian violence.
Producer Quincy Surasmith explores the starkly different visions for the future of L.A. Chinatown and the organizations promoting these competing ideas.
022 - Whose Chinatown? (from A Better Life?)
Asian Americana
Read the full story and see other episodes at A Better Life?
021 - I Want To Stay Here, Just Not Forever (from A Better Life?)
Apr 18, 2022
Show notes
Mohammed Ahsanul and his wife Tropa on their trip across the U.S. Photo courtesy of Mohammed Ahsanul.
Featured story from “A Better Life?” podcast:
Mohammed Ahsanul is an international student at the University of Wyoming. Once he finishes his Ph.D., he expects to return home to Dhaka, Bangladesh—but not before his family reunites with him for the first time since the pandemic began.
Producer Naina Rao joins Mohammed and his family for a trip to see America as she examines the ways a better life in the U.S. doesn’t always mean a permanent stay.
Listen:
021 - I Want To Stay Here, Just Not Forever (from A Better Life?)
Asian Americana
You can find out more about Feet in 2 Worlds and apply to their Editing Fellowship at their website fi2w.org.
020 - Searching For Solace (from A Better Life?)
Mar 30, 2022
Show notes
Jasmine Jiwani lays roses at her the grave of her husband Asif Parbatani in Lawrenceville, Georgia. Photo by Zulekha Nathoo.
Today we’re featuring a story from the “A Better Life?” podcast:
Jasmine Jiwani is part of Atlanta’s large Ismaili Muslim community. Covid restrictions prevented the community from gathering for the funeral of her husband, who died of Covid-19. Producer Zulekha Nathoo reports on how the pandemic has created unique challenges for Jiwani and other Ismaili Muslims.
Listen:
020 - Searching for Solace (from A Better Life?)
Asian Americana
You can find out more about Feet in 2 Worlds and apply to their Editing Fellowship at their website fi2w.org.
019 - Country Music for a Baan Nok Boy
Nov 16, 2021
Show notes
Photo courtesy Timothy Singratsomboune
Timothy Singratsomboune had a complicated relationship to country music. How did his own experiences bring him away from and eventually back to the genre? And how does country music connect Tim to both Lao culture and the Lao communities he grew up around?
In this episode, we explore the connections between Asian Americans, country music, and rural life.
Listen:
019 - Country Music for a Baan Nok Boy
Asian Americana
Five years ago in Spring of 2016, we launched Asian Americana. For our fifth anniversary, we take a moment to revisit all of the stories we’ve done from our first episode through the end of 2020. What happened after we stopped recording? What are those people doing now? Listen and find out.
The piece “1965-1970: Filipino Farmworkers lead the Delano Grape Strike” in Time’s “11 Moments From Asian American History That You Should Know” was credited to “Dawn Bohulano Mabalon, Associate Professor, History, San Francisco State University; Gayle Romasanta, Founder and Writer, Bridge and Delta Publishing; Allyson Tintiangco-Cubales, Professor, Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University”
Learn more about Cambodian Rock Band’s run at Oregon Shakespeare Festival on the OSF website, and see the trailer for the Signature Theatre run in New York:
Here’s their show with the LA Public Library that drew everyone’s attention:
017 - Until it Happened To Us
Mar 25, 2021
Show notes
The Covid-19 pandemic has been in the United States for over a year, but the way we each think about it is shaped heavily by how it does or doesn’t directly affect us individually. For some people, they’ve become all too familiar with the impact of the coronavirus. Contributor Denise Chan shares her family’s experience with Covid-19 from her podcast, Until it Happened to Us, which originally ran in December of 2020.
016 - Comfort Food, part 2
Feb 15, 2021
Show notes
Shin Ramyun with cheese. Photo credit: Quincy Surasmith
This is the second part of our comfort food episode. In the previous episode, we focused on the ways food traditions get passed down through families, communities, and cookbooks, and the way they adapt over time. Today, we look at how simple foods, convenience foods, and even fast food restaurants can become part of our cherished memories and culture.
Check out Soleil Ho’s twitter thread on comfort food to see all the responses she got. You can find Soleil Ho’s current writing on The San Francisco Chronicle.