Hyphen magazine - Asian American arts, culture, and politics

Youtube is a boon to Asian Australians as well. Not sure what that means for the rest of us.

Oh well. On to the lynks:

• The second of two elderly Sikh men shot in Sacramento last month has died. Police are trying to figure out if the double homicide should be classified as a hate crime. The Sikh community has collected a reward of over $50k for information leading to an arrest.

• Asianjournal.com has a profile of Flickr cofounder Caterina Fake.

• Dayum. Is the Vietnamese government colluding with U.S. labor supply companies to make Vietnamese shipping workers into virtual indentured servants? A federal case sez they might be. Some of these workers have already been awarded millions in damages, but may never see a dime of that money, or be allowed to stay in the U.S. In fact, they were isolated from the Viet Am community in Houston (where they were housed) and were only saved from their predicament by ... wait for it ... Jehovah's Witnesses.

• North Korea plans to indict Jun Young-su.

• An Iranian American is suing the DOJ and the FBI, among others, for endangering her and her family by turning over files on her to a foreign intelligence agency that can be expected to share them with the Iranian government.

• After firing an Armenian American curator last week (mentioned in last week's Lynks) the Sharjah Biennial is now entering culture wars territory with a vengeance, by demanding that a short film they commissioned from an Iranian American artist be destroyed. You gotta wonder what goes through people's heads when they pay for an artist known for irreverence to make a work and then tell that artist not to use the work to make fun of the ruler of Sharjah. I mean, seriously, if you considered yourself a cultural gadfly, what would you do?

• A California resident and Chinese national has been arrested for creating a scam U.S. Army unit, which he invited other Chinese nationals to join ... for a fee. They even marched in parades. You gotta hand it to him: make money and play out a fantasy all in one. Model minority jah maaaah! A reminder to Chi Ams: you don't have to pay to join the army!

• A buncha Chicago IndiAm docs have been subpoenaed in connection with more Blagojevich shenanigans. Oh, I'm just going to be vague about it because I don't really care.

• A Chi Am music prof has won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for music.

• A profile of the only Fil Am to serve on the board of a Fortune 500 company.

• A medical study showed a high prevalence of narrow anterior chamber angles in the eyes of Filipino Americans. Yeah, I have no idea what that means, either.

• Iranian Am fashion designer dies.

• For those of you who think "Asian Americans" don't face racism, discrimination, or culturally-based problems anymore: an article breaking down the standing of Southeast Asians and South Asians.

• And finally, a cultural moment, and this is kinda weird: this NYT wedding announcement popped up on my radar. The Asian American bride and groom aren't exactly the stuff of an NYT society notice; they're both mid-level: one corporate, the other nonprofit, and only one went to an Ivy. Their parents aren't society, either. But the nonprofiteer works for The Committee of 100. Is this what power looks like, or is it just trying too hard?