Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month, AAPIHM, is right around the corner once again and for most years I have felt unprepared in really diving into it. But it’s 2023 and I’m more in tune with my identity, including my cultural/ancestral identity, more than I’ve ever been in my life.

This AAPIHM month, I’m creating a maker’s edition of this month to celebrate and highlight our stories as Asian Americans and Asians in America with and around our crafts and making life. Use #AAPIHMinMakingCommunities on Instagram to find each other and to connect and resonate.

It is important to point out that there are plenty of Asians and Pacific Islanders who live in America who are not American citizens that go through similar experience acts of hate, racism, and discrimination. And they, too, belong.

I want this month to be about telling our stories through our own voices. There are plenty of people who gatekeep our cultural identities as Asian Americans and Asians in America. They want to put us in a box and they can’t. We are undefinable. We are unique and different and not one of us are the same, and that scares people. Fear is a hell of a weapon. Even some of our own cultures gatekeep how “enough” we are and try to diminish our cultural identity by othering us as well because we were born and raised outside of the motherland.

So for this AAPIHM month challenge, I want to hear from makers of IG who are Asian Pacific Islander American and Asian Pacific Islander in America directly. Tell us your stories about being AAPI and what it means to you. Here we can connect with others, share experiences, reclaim our identities, discover things about ourselves and our culture we might not have known through these weekly prompts. Sometimes we feel isolated in our experiences but what I’ve learned is there are many who resonate and share in our grief and joy in our AAPI communities.

Week 1: Introduction - “Where are you from?”

Ah, the ever so dreaded question. As AAPI, this question has always got us questioning our belonging and the perpetual foreigner mindset of others that are projected onto us. If you want to know what my heritage or ethnicity is, ask, “What’s your cultural identity?”. If you want to know where my parents or family are from, ask, “What’s your ancestral background?”

No matter what, these can all be loaded questions because:

Not every Asian Pacific Islander will know their ancestral background due to colonization, genocide, assimilation, adoption, cultural erasure, and so much more devastating events led by WS that caused these disconnections to our cultural roots.
Immigrants could have lived here for YEARS and still not be allowed to legally be an American citizen, even if they have gone through all the channels to become one to not be considered an “alien”. They contribute to the country just like a citizen without the benefits and the constant fear of deportation because they are not “white enough” to blend in.
Shame. Yes, shame. I can not explain with words alone the many years of internal racism that I lived with as an American-born Chinese.
So many reasons. Each individual has their own journey with their cultural roots.

So here is to reclaiming this question and really show exactly how diverse the AAPI community is. Tell us who you are, where you were born and raised, your cultural identity, or identities, and anything else you’ll like us to know about you. My hope for the present, and the future, is we feel prideful in representing ourselves as we are. To quote Sandra Oh, “It’s An Honor Just To Be Asian.”

Week 2: How Cultural Identities Inspire Your Making

Whether it’s a garment silhouette in sewing or a color palette in your fiber or yarn choices, how does your cultural identity show up in your making? There could be a craft that originated from your ancestors or a making technique that has heavy origins in your motherland. Or it’s a motif or symbol in your culture that has significant influence for what you make.

If you’ve heard me during interviews or seen my design work, I am constantly inspired by my cultural identity. I designed Double Gourd Sweater, Seven Maidens Shawl, and Lunar New Year Decorations. I am influenced by my personal experiences and my relationship with my culture. I think it’s important to note that I do not create from a place of representing an entire culture because one’s culture can mean different things from one person to another. I create to represent myself and my cultural identity is just one portion of that creative flow.

Week 3: Favorite Creatives of Asian Pacific Islander Descent

Shout out your favorite AAPI creatives! Whether it’s clothing designers, fiber artists, painter, illustrator, photographers, musicians, actors, dancers, directors, song writers, content creators, etc., etc., any creative art form that inspires you!

Week 4: FOOD, FOOD, FOOD

I cannot say enough how much FOOD is rooted in my connection to my cultural roots. Tell us about how food is part of your relationship to your culture. Whether it’s a specific food dish or the act of cooking or how certain foods bring back memories of your culture and how it relates to the love language that food has with our elders and family.

Week 5: The ~fEeLiNgS~ of being Asian American Pacific Islander/Asian Pacific Islander in America

Let’s be honest, we are all on our own journey and discovery of how we navigate and share our ancestral culture in a predominantly white society. Sometimes, we feel all the pride. And sometimes we really feel the collective grief and sadness that comes with realizing there are people who hate us just because we are who we are. There are complicated feelings of how our cultures have homophobic, misogynistic, anti-black, colorism, transphobic tendencies and how we feel about breaking a part those things in association with our culture. Hate should have no place in our roots. Breaking through generational trauma, stigma of mental health awareness, and monolithic stereotypes.

AAPIHM in Making Communities