What Can Professional Organizations do to Stop Anti-AAAPI Racism and Rhetoric?

On Wednesday, May 5, 2021 the Coalition hosted an online session called “Witnessing Anti-Asian Racism and Rhetoric: A Speaking and Listening Forum.” Co-facilitated by Jennifer Sano-Franchini, Bo Wang, and Wendy Sharer, the forum began by inviting attendees to share their experiences of Anti-Asian Racism and Rhetoric. We then asked attendees to share their strategies for confronting this racism and rhetoric. Below are ideas shared during the session in response to a question about the role(s) of professional organizations in this work. As the short list suggests, we ran out of time, so we would love to hear suggestions to help expand this list! Please share your suggestions with Wendy Sharer, President CFSHRC, at president@cfshrc.org and we will gladly add them to this resource.

Question: We want to use this session to begin a conversation about this important issue. As we move forward, what suggestions would you give our institutions and disciplinary organizations in combating anti-Asian racism/rhetoric?

  1. Support more historical work in AAAPI communities, particularly with regard to the contributions that these communities have made to our discipline and our professional organizations. Professional organizations should support this research through funding and recognize it in publications and awards.
  2. Produce a specific call to action, like the ATTW President’s Call to Action, that gives members of the organization a clear exigence and steps for action and for holding ourselves and each other accountable: https://attw.org/category/blog/
  3. Host Bystander workshops.