Resistance and “PerforMemory” amidst Pandemic-era Anti-Asian Hate: Unsettling Chronologies of Exclusion at Angel Island (IIAS Newsletter)
Summer 2023
By Els van Dongen
The year 2022 marked the 140th anniversary of the Chinese Exclusion Act. A series of events in the San Francisco Bay Area revolving around the Angel Island Immigration Station re-engaged with questions pertaining to exclusion, migration, race, and incarceration amidst a new wave of anti-Asian hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, renewed immigration restrictions and border controls brought debates on immigration back to the foreground. This piece looks at two of these initiatives more closely and, drawing on Catherine Choy and Layla Zami, makes two central points.