The Changs Next Door to the Diazes Review

The Changs Adjacent Door to the Díazes

Remapping Race in Suburban California

The multiracial suburb, offering a glimpse into America'due south future

Examining the San Gabriel Valley, Wendy Cheng unpacks questions of how identity—especially racial identity—is shaped by place. Informed by nearly seventy interviews, Cheng argues that people's daily experiences securely influence their racial consciousness, providing a model for because the spatial dimensions of racial germination and the significant demographic shifts taking place across the national landscape.

What sets The Changs Side by side Door to the Díazes apart is Wendy Cheng'south attention to the ways in which the demographic shifts over the last 40 years take made their way into the everyday lives of West San Gabriel Valley residents. Cheng has fabricated a compelling example for the placeness of this function of the San Gabriel Valley.

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James Kyung-Jin Lee, University of California, Irvine

U.South. suburbs are typically imagined to be predominantly white communities, but this is increasingly untrue in many parts of the country. Examining a multiracial suburb that is decidedly nonwhite, Wendy Cheng unpacks questions of how identity—peculiarly racial identity—is shaped by place. She offers an in-depth portrait, enriched by well-nigh lxx interviews, of the San Gabriel Valley, non far from downtown Los Angeles, where approximately 60 percent of residents are Asian American and more than than thirty pct are Latino. At first glance, the cities of the San Gabriel Valley wait similar stereotypical suburbs, but nearly no ane who lives in that location is white.

The Changs Side by side Door to the Díazes reveals how a singled-out civilisation is being fashioned in, and simultaneously reshaping, an surround of strip malls, multifamily housing, and faux Mediterranean tract homes. Informed past her interviews also every bit extensive analysis of three episodic instance studies, Cheng argues that people'southward daily experiences—in neighborhoods, schools, civic organizations, and public space—deeply influence their racial consciousness. In the San Gabriel Valley, racial ideologies are being reformulated past these encounters. Cheng views everyday landscapes equally crucial terrains through which racial hierarchies are learned, instantiated, and transformed. She terms the process "regional racial germination," through which locally accepted racial orders and hierarchies complicate and often challenge prevailing notions of race.

There is a place-specific state of mind hither, Cheng finds. Agreement the processes of racial formation in the San Gabriel Valley in the contemporary moment is of import in itself but likewise has larger value equally a model for considering the spatial dimensions of racial formation and the significant demographic shifts taking place across the national mural.

Awards

Virtually Outstanding Book on Asian America laurels from the American Sociological Association's Section on Asia and Asian America

Wendy Cheng is assistant professor of Asian Pacific American studies and justice and social inquiry in the Schoolhouse of Social Transformation at Arizona Land Academy. She is coauthor of A People's Guide to Los Angeles.

What sets The Changs Next Door to the Díazes autonomously is Wendy Cheng's attention to the ways in which the demographic shifts over the final 40 years accept made their way into the everyday lives of W San Gabriel Valley residents. Cheng has fabricated a compelling case for the placeness of this part of the San Gabriel Valley.

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James Kyung-Jin Lee, Academy of California, Irvine

"Unpacks the innovative ways racial identity is shaped by place in
the San Gabriel Valley... Delivers an in-depth portrait of race and place in the SGV."

Overall, among the factors making Cheng's piece of work unique is her focus on how ascendant communities of color negotiate race in the context of whiteness. Her combination of interviews and academic scholarship will make this accessible book appealing to a range of audiences.

Cheng's accessible writing and power to ground theorization of complex racial formations in strong ethnographic material proves her book valuable to advanced researchers and beginning students alike.

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Periodical of Cultural Geography

A bright portrait of San Gabriel Valley - a fascinating case study of ethnic relations in a multiethnic suburb.

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American Journal of Sociology

Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments

Introduction: Theorizing Regional Racial Formation
i. Not "For Caucasians Only": Race, Property, and Homeownership
2. "The Asian and Latino Thing in Schools": Bookish Achievement and Racialized Privilege
iii. "Just Like Any Other Boy"? Race and the San Gabriel Valley Boy Scouts of America
4. Diverseness on Main Street: Civic Landscapes and Historical Geographies of Race
v. SGV Dreamgirl: Interracial Intimacies and the Production of Place
Conclusion: How Localized Knowledges Travel

Appendix: Cerebral Maps of Race, Place, and Region
Notes
Bibliography
Index

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Source: https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-changs-next-door-to-the-daazes

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