Podcast appearances and mentions of beth lew williams

Welcome to Season 5, Episode 41! Today's guest is award-winning author Beth Lew-Williams. She's a Professor of History and the Director of the Program in Asian American Studies at Princeton University. She's best known for her work on migration, violence, and ethnic studies. She's also a 2025 winner of the Dan David Prize that honors innovative research on the human past. It's the largest history prize in the world, and only nine people were awarded it in 2025! Her latest book is John Doe Chinaman: A Forgotten History of Chinese Life under American Racial Law is published by Harvard University Press and was released on September 16 of this year (so it's available now)! We love the angle she takes by examining the laws, policies, and various regulations created by Federal, State, and Local leaders that impacted the Chinese in America. She uncovered thousands of laws and policies across the nation that targeted Chinese migrants. She also tells the stories of the Chinese Americans who refused to accept a conditional place in U.S. life. Lew-Williams previous book was The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America published in 2018 (also by Harvard University Press). In it, she maps the tangled relationships between local racial violence, federal immigration policy, and U.S. imperial ambitions in Asia. The Chinese Must Go won the Ray Allen Billington Prize and the Ellis W. Halley Prize from the Organization of American Historians. John Doe Chinaman isn't just for academia. It's for all those who are interested in reading about a part of America that hasn't been talked about as much. So it's great for all! If you like what we do, please share, follow, and like us in your podcast directory of choice or on Instagram @AAHistory101. For previous episodes and resources, please visit our site at https://asianamericanhistory101.libsyn.com or our links at http://castpie.com/AAHistory101. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, email us at info@aahistory101.com.

Who is an apology for? The answer is more obvious when the person you’re apologizing to is standing in front of you. You want their forgiveness. Or for them to feel better. Or for you to feel better. But when the people who were hurt, or those who hurt them, are long gone – what does apologizing actually accomplish? That’s one of the questions behind a recent essay in the New Yorker. It’s called “The Ritual of Civic Apology,” by Beth Lew-Williams. Lew-Williams is a Professor of History and Director of the Program in Asian American Studies at Princeton University. She begins her essay by recounting a talk she gave in Tacoma, a few years ago. It was about the forced expulsion of Tacoma’s Chinese residents in November 1885. And the city’s attempts to apologize for it, generations later. Guest: Beth Lew-Williams is Professor of History and Director of the Program in Asian American Studies at Princeton University. Her new book “John Doe Chinaman: A Forgotten History of Chinese Life under American Racial Law” published in September of this year Related stories: The Ritual of Civic Apology - The New Yorker Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you help make this show possible! If you want to help out, go to kuow.org/donate/soundsidenotes. Soundside is a production of KUOW in Seattle, a proud member of the NPR Network.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Chinese immigrants helped establish America's foothold on the western coast, yet few of us know what life looked like for those Chinese people who came to live in the US. In this episode, Beth Lew-Williams joins us to discuss her new book, John Doe Chinaman: A Forgotten History of Chinese Life Under American Racial Law, which blends extensive archival research with new technologies to illuminate stories that have long been buried in our history. Beth Lew-Williams is Professor of History at Princeton University and a recipient of the 2025 Dan David Prize. If you enjoy this episode make sure to check out our conversations with previous Dan David Prize winners: Women and American Slavery w/ Stephanie E. Jones Rogers (#270) and The Archaeology of Dust w/ Anita Radini (#269). This episode was edited by Ben Sawyer. 

As the labor movement pushed for greater recognition, pay, and conditions in the workplace (on land), the sailors of America had a tougher fight. The nature of maritime commerce made sailors foreign in a domestic sense, as the Supreme Court would rule. Geography complicated their place in constitutional law, and made them at once victims and agents of the American empire. Will Riddell joins me to discuss these labor issues and his new book On the Waves of Empire.Essential Reading:William D. Riddell, On the Waves of Empire: U.S. Imperialism and Merchant Sailors, 1872-1924 (2023).Recommended Reading:Julie Greene, “The Wages of Empire: Capitalism, Expansion, and Working-Class Formation,” in Daniel E. Bender and Jana K. Lipman (eds.), Making the Empire Work: Labor and United States Imperialism (2015) 35-58.Beth Lew-Williams, The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (2018).Leon Fink, Sweatshops of the Sea: Merchant Seamen in the World's First Globalized Industry, From 1812 to the Present (2011).Moon-Ho Jung, Menace to Empire: Anti-Colonial Solidarities and the Transpacific Origins of the U.S. National Security State (2022).Marilyn Lake, Progressive New World: How Settler Colonialism and Transpacific Exchange Shaped American Reform (2019), Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was the first federal legislation to prohibit an entire nation of people from coming to the United States. It instigated a century or more or immigration regulations and codified "illegal" immigration. Dr. Ben Railton joins the show to explore the act. Ten years ago, Ben wrote about how the legislation still reverberates throughout the twentieth century, and in this episode we bring that history to bear on current events.Essential Reading:Benjamin Railton, The Chinese Exclusion Act: What It Can Teach Us about America (2013).Recommended Reading:Hidetaka Hirota, Expelling the Poor: Atlantic Seaboard States and the Nineteenth-Century Origins of American Immigration Policy (2017).Jane Hong, Opening the Gates to Asia: A Transpacific History of How America Repealed Asian Exclusion (2019).Erika Lee, America for Americans and The Making of Asian America (2016).Liel Leibovitz and Matthew Miller, Fortunate Sons: The 120 Chinese Boys Who Came to America, Went to School, and Revolutionized an Ancient Civilization (2011).Beth Lew-Williams, The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (2021).Robert Weir, Knights Unhorsed: Internal Conflict in a Gilded Age Social Movement (2000). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Conversation with Beth Lew-Williams about her 2018 book, "The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America," published by Harvard University Press in 2018. The Writing Westward Podcast is a production of the Charles Redd Center for Western Studies at Brigham Young University and hosted by Brenden W. Rensink. Follow the BYU Redd Center and the Writing Westward Podcast on Facebook or Twitter or get more information @ http://reddcenter.byu.edu/pages/writing-westward-podcast. Theme music by Micah Dahl Anderson @ www.micahdahlanderson.com

Issues related to immigration have occupied a central role in political debates, especially during the Trump presidency. Although the current focus tends to be on on Central and Latin America, backlash unfolded throughout American history, including among Chinese immigrants in the 19th century. Much of what took place then has shaped the contours of immigration policy today. Joining today's episode to discuss immigration is Beth Lew-Williams, assistant professor of history at Princeton University. Lew-Williams is a historian of race and migration in the United States, specializing in Asian American history. Her book, "The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America," maps the tangled relationships between local racial violence, federal immigration policy, and U.S. imperial ambitions in Asia.

The American West erupted in anti-Chinese violence in 1885. Following the massacre of Chinese miners in Wyoming Territory, communities throughout California and the Pacific Northwest harassed, assaulted, and expelled thousands of Chinese immigrants. In The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (Harvard University Press, 2018). Beth Lew-Williams shows how American immigration policies incited this violence and how the violence, in turn, provoked new exclusionary policies. Ultimately, Lew-Williams argues, Chinese expulsion and exclusion produced the concept of the “alien” in modern America. The Chinese Must Go begins in the 1850s, before federal border control established strict divisions between citizens and aliens. Across decades of felling trees and laying tracks in the American West, Chinese workers faced escalating racial conflict and unrest. In response, Congress passed the Chinese Restriction Act of 1882 and made its first attempt to bar immigrants based on race and class. When this unprecedented experiment in federal border control failed to slow Chinese migration, vigilantes attempted to take the matter into their own hands. Fearing the spread of mob violence, U.S. policymakers redoubled their efforts to keep the Chinese out, overhauling U.S. immigration law and transforming diplomatic relations with China. By locating the origins of the modern American alien in this violent era, Lew-Williams recasts the significance of Chinese exclusion in U.S. history. As The Chinese Must Go makes clear, anti-Chinese law and violence continues to have consequences for today's immigrants. The present resurgence of xenophobia builds mightily upon past fears of the “heathen Chinaman.” Lori A. Flores is an Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY) and the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale University Press), out in paperback May 2018). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American West erupted in anti-Chinese violence in 1885. Following the massacre of Chinese miners in Wyoming Territory, communities throughout California and the Pacific Northwest harassed, assaulted, and expelled thousands of Chinese immigrants. In The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (Harvard University Press, 2018). Beth Lew-Williams shows how American immigration policies incited this violence and how the violence, in turn, provoked new exclusionary policies. Ultimately, Lew-Williams argues, Chinese expulsion and exclusion produced the concept of the “alien” in modern America. The Chinese Must Go begins in the 1850s, before federal border control established strict divisions between citizens and aliens. Across decades of felling trees and laying tracks in the American West, Chinese workers faced escalating racial conflict and unrest. In response, Congress passed the Chinese Restriction Act of 1882 and made its first attempt to bar immigrants based on race and class. When this unprecedented experiment in federal border control failed to slow Chinese migration, vigilantes attempted to take the matter into their own hands. Fearing the spread of mob violence, U.S. policymakers redoubled their efforts to keep the Chinese out, overhauling U.S. immigration law and transforming diplomatic relations with China. By locating the origins of the modern American alien in this violent era, Lew-Williams recasts the significance of Chinese exclusion in U.S. history. As The Chinese Must Go makes clear, anti-Chinese law and violence continues to have consequences for today’s immigrants. The present resurgence of xenophobia builds mightily upon past fears of the “heathen Chinaman.” Lori A. Flores is an Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY) and the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale University Press), out in paperback May 2018). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American West erupted in anti-Chinese violence in 1885. Following the massacre of Chinese miners in Wyoming Territory, communities throughout California and the Pacific Northwest harassed, assaulted, and expelled thousands of Chinese immigrants. In The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (Harvard University Press, 2018). Beth Lew-Williams shows how American immigration policies incited this violence and how the violence, in turn, provoked new exclusionary policies. Ultimately, Lew-Williams argues, Chinese expulsion and exclusion produced the concept of the “alien” in modern America. The Chinese Must Go begins in the 1850s, before federal border control established strict divisions between citizens and aliens. Across decades of felling trees and laying tracks in the American West, Chinese workers faced escalating racial conflict and unrest. In response, Congress passed the Chinese Restriction Act of 1882 and made its first attempt to bar immigrants based on race and class. When this unprecedented experiment in federal border control failed to slow Chinese migration, vigilantes attempted to take the matter into their own hands. Fearing the spread of mob violence, U.S. policymakers redoubled their efforts to keep the Chinese out, overhauling U.S. immigration law and transforming diplomatic relations with China. By locating the origins of the modern American alien in this violent era, Lew-Williams recasts the significance of Chinese exclusion in U.S. history. As The Chinese Must Go makes clear, anti-Chinese law and violence continues to have consequences for today’s immigrants. The present resurgence of xenophobia builds mightily upon past fears of the “heathen Chinaman.” Lori A. Flores is an Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY) and the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale University Press), out in paperback May 2018). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American West erupted in anti-Chinese violence in 1885. Following the massacre of Chinese miners in Wyoming Territory, communities throughout California and the Pacific Northwest harassed, assaulted, and expelled thousands of Chinese immigrants. In The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (Harvard University Press, 2018). Beth Lew-Williams shows how American immigration policies incited this violence and how the violence, in turn, provoked new exclusionary policies. Ultimately, Lew-Williams argues, Chinese expulsion and exclusion produced the concept of the “alien” in modern America. The Chinese Must Go begins in the 1850s, before federal border control established strict divisions between citizens and aliens. Across decades of felling trees and laying tracks in the American West, Chinese workers faced escalating racial conflict and unrest. In response, Congress passed the Chinese Restriction Act of 1882 and made its first attempt to bar immigrants based on race and class. When this unprecedented experiment in federal border control failed to slow Chinese migration, vigilantes attempted to take the matter into their own hands. Fearing the spread of mob violence, U.S. policymakers redoubled their efforts to keep the Chinese out, overhauling U.S. immigration law and transforming diplomatic relations with China. By locating the origins of the modern American alien in this violent era, Lew-Williams recasts the significance of Chinese exclusion in U.S. history. As The Chinese Must Go makes clear, anti-Chinese law and violence continues to have consequences for today’s immigrants. The present resurgence of xenophobia builds mightily upon past fears of the “heathen Chinaman.” Lori A. Flores is an Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY) and the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale University Press), out in paperback May 2018). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American West erupted in anti-Chinese violence in 1885. Following the massacre of Chinese miners in Wyoming Territory, communities throughout California and the Pacific Northwest harassed, assaulted, and expelled thousands of Chinese immigrants. In The Chinese Must Go: Violence, Exclusion, and the Making of the Alien in America (Harvard University Press, 2018). Beth Lew-Williams shows how American immigration policies incited this violence and how the violence, in turn, provoked new exclusionary policies. Ultimately, Lew-Williams argues, Chinese expulsion and exclusion produced the concept of the “alien” in modern America. The Chinese Must Go begins in the 1850s, before federal border control established strict divisions between citizens and aliens. Across decades of felling trees and laying tracks in the American West, Chinese workers faced escalating racial conflict and unrest. In response, Congress passed the Chinese Restriction Act of 1882 and made its first attempt to bar immigrants based on race and class. When this unprecedented experiment in federal border control failed to slow Chinese migration, vigilantes attempted to take the matter into their own hands. Fearing the spread of mob violence, U.S. policymakers redoubled their efforts to keep the Chinese out, overhauling U.S. immigration law and transforming diplomatic relations with China. By locating the origins of the modern American alien in this violent era, Lew-Williams recasts the significance of Chinese exclusion in U.S. history. As The Chinese Must Go makes clear, anti-Chinese law and violence continues to have consequences for today’s immigrants. The present resurgence of xenophobia builds mightily upon past fears of the “heathen Chinaman.” Lori A. Flores is an Associate Professor of History at Stony Brook University (SUNY) and the author of Grounds for Dreaming: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the California Farmworker Movement (Yale University Press), out in paperback May 2018). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices