Carving Out Their Own Niche

African-American cultural expression is one of the many influences fueling Asian-American artistry.

By Lydia Lum

Asian-American performers were few and far between when Dr. Oliver Wang was growing up in the 1970s and ’80s. Looking back, he says the lack of artists may have been the result of a lack of role models, since Asian immigrants didn’t begin to arrive in the United States in large numbers until after immigration laws eased in the mid-1960s.

Observers say Asian-Americans have tended to gravitate towards classical music and visual arts instead of verbal art forms like acting and singing. That’s not a surprise, given that many traditional Asian cultures are reproachful of speaking out, says Dr. Peter Kiang, director of Asian-American studies at the University of Massachusetts-Boston.

All this is changing fast though, and Black cultural expression is one of the many influences fueling Asian American artistry.

“African-American culture becomes a very obvious place to turn to because of its explicit engagements with race and the similar issues of marginalization in U.S. society,” says Wang, an assistant professor in sociology at California State University-Long Beach who teaches courses on popular culture and social issues.

Rapper apl.de.ap of the Grammy Award-winning hip-hop group Black Eyed Peas is one of the highest-profile Asian-American recording artists today. Born and raised in the Philippines, he has incorporated his native Tagalog dialect into some of the group’s song lyrics. Other rap artists popular among college students, Kiang says, include Cambodian-American Prach Ly and Vietnamese-Canadian Chuckie Akenz.

Wang, who has worked as a disc jockey and written extensively on pop music, estimates “a ten-fold explosion” among Asian-Americans in hip-hop and soul since the early 1990s. He attributes that to the easily accessible technology in the YouTube era that lets many individuals become a producer or singer virtually overnight.