Each May, the United States observes Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) Heritage Month, a time for the nation to commemorate and recognize the history and contributions of members within the broader AANHPI community.
The term AANHPI encompasses a combined population of over 26 million people in the U.S. They speak some 100 languages and belong to 50 distinct ethnic groups — from larger groups such as Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese, to smaller groups such as Hmong, Marshallese, Chamorro, Tongan, and more.
The history of the month goes back to 1978, when “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week” was established by Congress, and eventually became its own month. Ever since the U.S. Census in 1990, Pacific Islands and Native Hawaiians have also been grouped under the term AANHPI.
Because of its vast definition, the term AANHPI has drawn controversy from different communities across the nation, including in Washington state. While the term was coined in an effort to unite disparate people facing some of the same political and social issues, many people point out that different groups under this label face very different issues and histories in the U.S.
“I do think the AA[NH]PI term has been unifying for the most part,” said Jamyang Dorjee, a board member and former president of the Tibetan Association of Washington. “There is a recognition in the broader race discussion that we do exist particularly in the political context. I do however think that it can be a bit limiting — just because of the sheer size and diversity of the Asian diaspora — that there is a tendency for the micro minority communities to feel less included. And conversely, the larger, populous Asian communities of India, China, perhaps even Japan and Korea…to feel a bit indifferent to the spirit of the moniker AA[NH]PI.”
Asian Americans comprise almost 25 million people in the United States, the Pew Research Center estimates, drawing from the most recent Census. Pew estimates that Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders alone comprise some 1.7 million people in the United States.
Joseph Seia, executive director of Oceania NW Director in Tukwila, is an outspoken critic of the AANHPI term. He believes that in addition to Pacific Islanders’ disinvolvement in the creation of the term, the acronym has created negative outcomes for their communities. Seia has ancestral roots in Samoa, Tonga, and Aotearoa New Zealand. He is an anti-racist organizer in Washington, and founded the Pacific Islander Community Association of Washington.
“It’s a racist term for me,” Seia said. “It erases us in data and funding priorities, and does not acknowledge our Indigenous identity over territories that were and are currently occupied and colonized by the U.S.”
Seia also references concerns of how the term first came about in the U.S. The Pacific was often used as a “military highway” during U.S. wars. Seia said Pacific islands were essentially turned into gas stations for the U.S. to refuel its war instruments while the country was at war with Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.
“Nowhere in the world were we lumped together,” Seia said, “but somehow in the racist minds of Americans, we were lumped due to the scenes of the past wars being fought over Pacific waters and our Pacific islands.”
Pacific Islanders advocate for full disaggregation of data, Seia said, and tend to self-identify as Pacific Islander, Pasifika, or Oceanian, while using the term NH/PI (Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander), without the AA in front of it, in advocacy work. “Pasifika community members mostly never identify as AAPI unless they have spent significant time in U.S. prison systems where they group us together for convenience,” Seia added.
University of Washington (UW) Professor Connie So has spent years teaching on Asian American history. She emphasizes that terms like AANHPI exist for political reasons.
“These terms are more for Census, and for filling out forms,” So said.
However, So believes the term has been helpful in helping people unify over demands and issues. “You need to have numbers for people to listen,” she said. “A lot of our issues are a numbers game. They can ignore us, but we have to come together in our demand.”
So brings up the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the surge in anti-Asian hate. Many community members who were victimized were Chinese, along with other Asians. However, she said that as a whole, Pacific Islanders were disproportionately impacted by these incidents and experienced the highest proportion of COVID-19 infection rates and deaths. Asians joining forces with Pacific Islanders allowed for a louder voice, So believes.
“The term helps with numbers when presenting issues to our government,” So said. “However, I think the thing I hear the most from people is that it’s a mouthful.”
When it comes to Pacific Islanders’ inclusion in the term AANHPI, UW American Ethnic Studies Professor Vince Schleitwiler defers to those with background and expertise who can speak more accountably to Pacific Islander perspectives. However, he likes to remind others that the term “Asian American” itself should be continually held in question.
“People sometimes forget that the term is historically contingent,” Schleitwiler said. “It was invented, and subsequently evolved, under conditions that could have been different.”
He said the term was originally created by a radical social movement to name a political identification. “The term was a tool to understand how your liberation is bound up with the liberation of others.”
However, in Schleitwiler’s view, the political core of “Asian American” has largely faded. “The cause of solidarity demands need better language to articulate differences, not just to categorize identities” Scheitweiller said.
He continued: “If you care about the histories that produced these terms because you are committed to the questions of liberation, alliance, and solidarity that those histories raised, then you should recognize that the terms themselves are merely secondary.”
