Asian American Representation Quotes

When I arrived at the Capitol in 2007 to take my oath as a new member of the U.S. House of Representatives, I had the privilege of filling the seat held for so long and so well by my friend Patsy Takemoto Mink, the first Asian-American woman elected to Congress. I was so grateful to her.

Danny Chung in 'Veep' is a really unique, very anti-stereotypical role for an Asian-American actor, and being able to play that has been super fun.

I feel that its important for me to be out there and to represent the face. At the same time, for me as an individual, I think the Asian-American face can be crowded with the American identity.

It's weird for me to say I'm lucky when I can't go into a bookstore and have more than five choices if I want to read something about Asian-American characters.

I grew up thinking Margaret Cho and Lucy Liu were my idols because that's it.

'The Green Turtle' was created in the 1940s by a cartoonist named Chu Hing, one of the first Asian Americans to work in the American comic book industry.

To be honest, at that point, just being so fresh to L.A., I was in the mind-set of just getting work, at all costs. But, if you take a step back from it, it's just such a blessing to be able to play somebody like Glenn. Me being Asian American, it's nice to have something to play that's not so very stereotypical. It's also nice to have somebody that I identify with.

I hope Hong Kong and Asia wants to hire American Asian actresses as much as Hollywood has been hiring Chinese actors from Asia.

I think that's why I was able to do well in the beginning: because it was such a foreign thing. People frame it in a negative way, like, 'For Asian-Americans there's no one out there, so that must be really bad for you.' No, I benefited from it.

But, yeah, as far as Asian Americans go, I hope they know they can look at me and see that they can do music on their own, within a band or just on their own, and not feel like there's any barriers. I've never felt any particular barriers myself, being who I am.

I saw 'Joy Luck Club' when it came out, so that was early mid-'90s, and I remember seeing it with my long-time collaborator, Mina Shum. We'd just done 'Double Happiness,' and we saw this movie, and we were weeping. Like, shuddering weeping. Weeping more than really the film deserved.

For us as Asian-Americans, I think the bane of our existence is one stereotype - 'Sixteen Candles,' the Long Duk Dong character.

But I try to play everything very authentically, even if it is an accented immigrant, Jian Yang, that I play on 'Silicon Valley.'

When I was finishing 'Now You See Me 2,' I remember thinking about exploring the Asian-American identity side of my brain.

I've been called the first Asian legislator in our Nevada State Assembly.

Hawaii's own Patsy Mink served as the first congresswoman of color and first Asian American woman in the House; she later sought the Democratic Party presidential nomination.

My brother often complains to me about the 'angry Asian male' in the United States. As a female, I haven't encountered this, but Asian-American men are angry. They're angry because, for so many years, they've been neglected as sex symbols. Asian women have it much easier, I think; we're accepted into various circles.

I happen to be one of those lucky people who says that she's a working actor. And to always be working is very fulfilling and I'm just lucky because the opportunities just came up. And as an Asian American female actor, the opportunities have been furthering, have been widening all across the years. And I can say that there are many young people who see that the opportunities are expanding, as well as you can make it yourself.

You'd see Asian faces on TV, but it was so rare, especially in the comedy space - that for me was Ken Jeong doing stand-up... it's amazing that I can call him a friend now and a colleague.

There have been, in recent years, many Asian American pioneers in the public eye who've defied the condescendingly complimentary 'model minority' stereotype: actors like Lucy Liu, artists like Maya Lin, moguls like Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh. They are known, often admired.

I have minor characters who are Asian-American, and I've been using them throughout my career, but they've never taken center stage, they've never been really powerful, they've never expressed some of the experiences I had growing up in the U.S. Johnny Tam is the first one.

People ask me what I'm writing. They think I'm Sandra Tsing Loh. Or they ask about stand-up. 'No, that's Margaret Cho.' I really think there is this kind of glomming, that they think we are somehow all the same person.

I'm so sick of people misunderstanding Asians in America and what we're about.

I'm a chairman on the Board of Governors for the East-West Players, the longest-running Asian-American theater company in America.

My only goal as a comedian was to stomp the life out of the model-minority myth.