This is an old article from Bumblebee's Archives that I orignally posted when I first created the forum.

I hope everyone enjoys rereading it.

AFRICANS & ASIANS

Breaking Boundaries

What do we Asians and Africans know about each other? What do we know about ourselves?

Recently, I gave a lecture in New York about the Chinese Cuban community in Havana. One young black man asked with some
emotion: Did you meet anyone with my last name?

In North America, this man is labeled "African American" or "black" based on his dark skin. But he is also Afro-Chinese of
Cuba. Like many peoples of the Caribbean, he is a product of an African-Asian legacy. In Cuba, African slaves and Chinese
Coolies labored on the sugar plantations during the 19th century. Chinese were kidnapped or decoyed from home villages, and
grafted onto the Cuban slavery system. Like their African counterparts, Chinese coolies lost their lives. 125,000 Chinese were
recorded as sold in Havana, not including many who were undocumented. Less than 50 percent survived past 8 years. When
these facts were mentioned at a 1998 Africana/ Walter Rodney conference, a black scholar dismissed them with disbelief.
Afterwards, we talked and wondered: What do we Asians and Africans know about each other? Furthermore, what do we
know about ourselves?

Besides being the source of labor, both Africa and Asia were sites of magnificent cultural and scientific developments, with
histories measured in millennia. These overlapping pasts of cultural and capital movements are part of a complex global history of
colonialism, independence wars and tremendous human labor. However, Africa and Asia encountered mutual respect before
European interventions. While sporadic contacts were made during the last millennium, it was in 1418 that a meeting of large
proportions occurred. The Chinese Muslim Admiral Cheng Ho (or "Zheng He") and the imperial Chinese fleet of startling
proportions, 300 ships and 28,000 men, ventured out in peace to learn from and trade with other peoples of the world. The fleet
arrived in East Africa. As villagers looked on, the fleet returned to them several African emissaries who had journeyed to China in
1416 to introduce African animals, giraffes, oxen and zebras.

Such shared legacies independent of Euro-American involvement are rarely studied. Similarly, Americans of African and Asian
descent are studied for "differences" and conflict in the mainstream. The differences and diversities are real, but the linkages are
significant. The fact that a Japanese American activist of Harlem, Yuri Kochiyama, held her comrade Malcolm X as he died on
the Audubon Ballroom floor has been erased from the books. The fact that Richard Wright was an accomplished writer of haiku
poetry, a Japanese art form, has been barely noticed. The fact that Katherine Dunham incorporated Asian dance forms and rituals
in her performance art is not widely known.

Afro-Asian linkages in the U.S. extend back to the 1800s, when the fate of early Asian arrivals was linked to African Americans.
Southern Chinese arrived as the initial Asian influx and were labeled "nagurs" in California. Segregated under law like blacks,
Chinese were barred from public schools, theaters, white neighborhoods and the vote. However, it was during the 1970s with the
advent of television and war, that linkages between blacks and Asians were more visibly articulated. The Vietnam War, Civil
Rights, and communist revolution were the talk of radical intelligentsia. Muhammad Ali proclaimed he had no quarrel with the
Vietnamese people and was jailed for his resistance. Yusef Komunyakaa returned from the war to write poetry marked by
knowledge of the Vietnamese people and later earned a Pulitzer Prize. Meanwhile, a barefisted Bruce Lee became an idol for
millions, with black and Asian folks cheering in theaters around the world as he stood up to capitalist exploiters. It was during this
period that African Americans and Asian Americans commenced an enduring cultural and political dialogue. It was in the '70s
crucible that African American, Asian American, Chicano and Native American studies as academic disciplines were born.

However, in the '80s and '90s, calling it nostalgia that overlooks chasms of difference, identity politicians regard cross-racial
coalition-building with disdain. There are many though, who cross the boundaries, using art to open dialogues and redefine cultural
forms. Poet Kalamu ya Salaam performs with jazz musician Fred Ho, envisioning spoken word and music with African and Asian
rhythms. Vocalist Bobby McFerrin collaborates with cellist Yo Yo Ma, reinventing oral tradition with string sounds. Saxophonist
Steve Coleman collaborates with pianist Vijay Iyer. Internationally acclaimed jazz pianist and bandleader Toshiko Akiyoshi
publicly credits Bud Powell, Charlie Mingus and John Lewis for supporting her work when white musicians were not ready to
give her a chance. Writer Ishmael Reed includes Asian Americans in his continuing dialogues on race in America, while poets such
as Janice Mirikitani acknowledge in their writings a kinship with their black sisters. The New York poetry scene includes regular
black-Asian collaborations between performers such as Regie Cabico, Ishle Park, Roger Bonair Agard and Stacy Ann Chin.
Unlike some Asia "specialists" black scholars and writers have made meaningful forays into studying Asian culture and religions
with a respect born of their own experiences.

In Boston, I was asked to speak on a panel regarding African American and Asian American relations. Afterwards, it was my
turn to listen. I stood with my mouth open while Lynette Clements, a young black journalist from Newsweek, conversed in
Chinese with an elder black professor from Morehouse College. The professor said, "you know, communication takes more than
just words." I thought, yes indeed.

By Lisa Yun, Dr.

This article originally appeared in the May/June issue of Black Issues Book Review