I do not know if this is true. I imagine there must be some research done on attrition rates in higher education and the demographics of university educators that might confirm this, but I'll let people who specialize in that sort of thing dig that out. True or not, this depressing statistic certainly feels true. I've had many White Dude Professors. And White Women Professors. But until I took a seminar with a South Asian woman who at the time was a junior faculty member a few years ago, I had never been taught by an Asian woman.
I knew that Asian female professors existed in my undergraduate institution. And I see them where I am attending graduate school. But I am also aware of the fact that both schools belong to a university system in which there is such a thing as Ethnic Studies and/or Asian American Studies. Indeed, all the professors I know who happen to be Asian American (including the one who warned me of how difficult it is to be an Asian woman in academia) either belong to an Asian American Studies/Ethnic Studies department or are the token Asian American specialist in a department like American Studies or English. In the position that I will be starting in the fall, I will be one of two Asians (the other is a South Asian man who does Postcolonial Studies), and certainly the only Asian woman in the English department. I was hired as an Asian American literature specialist.
So, as one can imagine, in most universities in the U.S., there isn't a need or demand for even that token Asian Americanist. This means that in most universities, there are no avenues through which Asian folks can break into the academy. East Asian Studies might be an exception, but only to a certain degree-- Universities will often have departments devoted to studying China, Japan, Korea, etc. So Asian women may be hired there. Though also, from what I've seen, these departments also hire a lot of white people who specialize in Asian Studies. Aforementioned Asian Girl Professor, for example, was the first Filipina to be hired as a tenure-track professor specializing in the Philippines. Prior to her, folks doing work on the Philippines have been white men. (Damn colonialism.) So yes, if you are Asian and American, finding a place in academia can be tricky. There are some who manage to make it into the profession without doing anything Asian or Asian American related-- I know one young-ish Asian American professor who does Medieval Studies, for example. But if universities won't hire Asian folks as experts of Asian history and culture, I imagine they would be even less inclined to hire them as experts of white history and culture. Racism sucks.
Aside from these institutional factors, Asian women also have to deal with the day-to-day experiences of being, well, Asian women. It's not only my mother who says that I look like a little girl pretending to be a professor. Colleagues, professors, even my students often view me in that way. A classmate of mine, a white woman who is only a few years older than me, used to always comment on my small stature and pat me on the head. Students will often ask me how old I am. (I doubt they'll ask their Old White Dude Professor the same question.) At a recent job interview, one faculty member mistook me for an undergraduate. Here's the funny thing, though-- I actually don't think I look all that young. I see the faint lines forming at the edges of my eyes, the white hairs popping out of my head. I look exactly as one my age should look, I think. I don't dress like a teeny-bopper or talk with a baby voice. So I know that people's tendency to view me as a little girl is a projection of their own internalized notions about Asian women being young and docile or whatever. Orientalism sucks.
I've learned to not get too angry when these things happen, and to just accept them as a fact that I'll just have to deal with and negotiate. Still, I wonder to what extent have I internalized how people seem to view me. I wonder if I've ever underestimated myself or failed to fight for my interest because I felt marked as an Asian girl. And I wonder to what extent I've grown a chip on my shoulder because of it.
Every quarter that I've taught at Yuppie Cowtown U, a school in which a disproportionately large portion of the undergraduate population is Asian American, there has always been at least one student, usually Asian, usually a girl (but sometimes a boy), who comes to my office. She won't ask me questions about the course material, but about my life trajectory. She'll ask me how I decided to major in English, to go to grad school, to become a professor. So I know that at least for her, my being an Asian Girl Professor at the podium, in a position of authority, relaying my expertise, commanding attention, means something, just as my meeting other Asian Girl Professors means something to me.
So I guess that's why I've named this blog Asian Girl Professor-- I know that my breaking into this profession is indebted to the work of Asian women who came before me, and I hope that my making it will also enable other Asian women to do the same.
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