The changing contours of Asian-American historiography

This article traces the changing contours of Asian-American historiography and divides the literature into five periods: 1850s - 1920s; 1920s - 1960s; 1960s - 1970s; 1970s - early 1980s; 1990s - the present. After identifying the salient characteristics of the first four periods, the article discusses more than a hundred major books published since the 1990s and groups them into the following categories: studies of traumatic defining events; Asian diasporas; the social dynamics within contemporary Asian immigrant communities and their cultural histories.