How Zines gave a Voice to the Asian American Community
- In Rachel Rubin’s article Cyberspace, Y2K: Giant Robots Asian Punks she argues that non-commercial form of media such as “zines” have been an important tool for Asian Americans and has allowed them to create works “devoted to the talents, cultural needs, and political realities of Asian Americans”. (p.1)
- She supports this thesis by showing examples of how zines have effectively adapted to the needs of the community. Her first example is how the term “Asian American” has proven to be difficult to define and can include different countries depending on who you ask. However, zones have been able to keep up with the changing term by allowing users to self-identify. This means anyone who feels like they can relate to the content produced by an “Asian American” zine is free to read and comment on its content. She also relates the seemingly “uncontrollable” nature of the Internet is similar to the way many zines are started, to fill a void because “they could not find publications that suited their own cultural needs” (p. 7).
- Rubin does bring up a few existing terms to point out their complexity. For example, “Asian American” can include many generations past the first to immigrate. She also introduces the term of “new immigration” which she uses to describe the wave of Asian Americans who arrived from countries like South Korea, The Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, India, and Pakistan. These new immigrants arrived as a result of devastation in their home countries, resulting in their arrival in mass numbers, with intentions to stay permanently. She also defines the word zine as “part of a cultural underground; self-produced and haphazardly distributed, they were driven by passion rather than profit, […] a celebration of the quirky and the confessional, and a respect for the open expression of unpopular tastes and ideas.” (p.12). This made them an ideal media for the growing Asian American voice, who could mold the format to fit their needs.
- The first thing this article made me think of was a quote from Constance Wu, the star of the new movie Crazy Rich Asians. In an interview she said about the film industry, “It’s changing because we are making it change, not because anyone in letting us in… I think the people who live the stories should be the people who should tell the stories”. Wu’s comment on her new film is just as applicable to the Asian American zine writers referenced in this article. Most of them were create content in direct reaction to the lack of relatable content they themselves were experiencing.
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