Asian Americans have made countless distinguished contributions to American society. Like other American racial minorities who have historically been denied opportunities within the American electoral system, Asian Americans have worked steadily to participate in U.S. politics and its judicial system. Asian Americans have a long history of seeking social justice and equal treatment by challenging discriminatory laws and practices in education, employment, housing, land ownership, immigration, and other significant public-policy- issue areas. Distinguished Asian American Political and Governmental Leaders is the first-ever compilation of biographies of Asian American elected officials, major political appointees, judges, and activists. It provides information on the life histories and political accomplishments of 96 Asian Americans, who have participated in political, judicial, and civil rights arenas of this nation from 1950 to the present. Most of the distinguished Americans profiled in this important resource were trailblazers, being the first Asian American or the first of a particular Asian ethnic community, for example, Vietnamese Americans, to be elected or appointed to a leadership position. The late Dalip Singh Saund, for example, became the first Asian American and the first Indo-American ever elected to the U.S. House of Representatives when voters in Imperial and Riverside counties in Southern California elected him in 1957. Elaine Chao was the first Asian American and Chinese American woman appointed to a presidential cabinet post when President George W. Bush nominated her to be the U.S. Secretary of Labor in 2001. And the late John Aiso became the first Japanese American, as well as Asian American, judge in California when he was appointed in 1953. In selecting the leaders for this book, the authors have provided a glimpse of the diversity of electoral and nonelectoral forms of political participation and representation that Asian Americans have pursued. Included are biographies on each Asian American who has served or is serving as a state governor (Ariyoshi, Cayetano, Locke, Waihee); other statewide elected office (Eu, Fong, Hirono, Kealoha, King, Lau, Woo); the U.S. Senate (Akaka, Fong, Hayakawa, Inouye, Matsunaga); the U.S. House of Representatives (Faleomavaega, Kim, Matsui, Mineta, Mink, Saiki, Saund, Wu); and as a presidential cabinet member (Chao, Mineta). The authors have also provided a cross-section of 45 Asian American elected officials at the municipal and state levels for 12 states from Alaska to Massachusetts and from Minnesota to Texas. Among them are the first Cambodian, Hmong, and Vietnamese American elected officials, as well as some of the longest-serving Asian Americans, such as Harry Lee, who has been continuously re-elected as Sheriff of Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, since 1979. Also profiled are Asian Americans who have played major leadership roles in nonelectoral political pursuits, such as Yuri Kochiyama, Philip Vera Cruz, and Angela Oh, who have made significant contributions in the areas of human rights, union organizing, and race relations.

By focusing on how the idea of heroism on the battlefield helped construct, perpetuate, and challenge racial and gender hierarchies in the United States between World War I and the present, Warring over Valor provides fresh perspectives on the history of American military heroism. The book offers two major insights into the history of military heroism. First, it reveals a precarious ambiguity in the efforts of minorities such as African Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, women, and gay men to be recognized as heroic soldiers. Paradoxically, America's heroism discourse allowed them to press their case for full membership in the nation, but doing so simultaneously validated the dichotomous interpretations of race and gender they repudiated. The ambiguous role of marginalized groups in war-related hero-making processes also testifies to this volume's second general insight: the durability and tenacity of the masculine warrior hero in U.S. society and culture. Warring over Valor bridges a gap in the historiography of heroism and military affairs.

By focusing on how the idea of heroism on the battlefield helped construct, perpetuate, and challenge racial and gender hierarchies in the United States between World War I and the present, Warring over Valor provides fresh perspectives on the history of American military heroism. The book offers two major insights into the history of military heroism. First, it reveals a precarious ambiguity in the efforts of minorities such as African Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans, women, and gay men to be recognized as heroic soldiers. Paradoxically, America's heroism discourse allowed them to press their case for full membership in the nation, but doing so simultaneously validated the dichotomous interpretations of race and gender they repudiated. The ambiguous role of marginalized groups in war-related hero-making processes also testifies to this volume's second general insight: the durability and tenacity of the masculine warrior hero in U.S. society and culture. Warring over Valor bridges a gap in the historiography of heroism and military affairs.

The Color of Success tells of the astonishing transformation of Asians in the United States from the "yellow peril" to "model minorities"--peoples distinct from the white majority but lauded as well-assimilated, upwardly mobile, and exemplars of traditional family values--in the middle decades of the twentieth century. As Ellen Wu shows, liberals argued for the acceptance of these immigrant communities into the national fold, charging that the failure of America to live in accordance with its democratic ideals endangered the country's aspirations to world leadership. Weaving together myriad perspectives, Wu provides an unprecedented view of racial reform and the contradictions of national belonging in the civil rights era. She highlights the contests for power and authority within Japanese and Chinese America alongside the designs of those external to these populations, including government officials, social scientists, journalists, and others. And she demonstrates that the invention of the model minority took place in multiple arenas, such as battles over zoot suiters leaving wartime internment camps, the juvenile delinquency panic of the 1950s, Hawaii statehood, and the African American freedom movement. Together, these illuminate the impact of foreign relations on the domestic racial order and how the nation accepted Asians as legitimate citizens while continuing to perceive them as indelible outsiders. By charting the emergence of the model minority stereotype, The Color of Success reveals that this far-reaching, politically charged process continues to have profound implications for how Americans understand race, opportunity, and nationhood.