Books published by Rutgers University Press

The words "Asian American film" might evoke a painfully earnest, low-budget documentary or family drama, destined to be seen only in small film festivals or on PBS. In her groundbreaking study of the past fifty years of Asian American film and video, Jun Okada demonstrates that although this stereotype is not entirely unfounded, a remarkably diverse range of Asian American filmmaking has emerged.

A provocative work that will prompt a thorough reevaluation of the culture of secondary education, Defining Student Success shows how different schools, promoting modified versions of larger cultural ideas of success, foster distinct understandings of what it takes to succeed--understandings that do more to reproduce a socioeconomic status quo than to promote upward mobility.

Brings together a group of professionals and activists whose lives have been dedicated to health internationalism. By presenting a combination of historical accounts and first-hand reflections, this collection of essays draws attention to the longstanding international activities of the American health left and the lessons they brought home.

Examines the ways in which recent U.S. Latina literature challenges popular definitions of nationhood and national identity. It explores a group of feminist texts that are representative of the U.S. Latina literary boom of the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, when an emerging group of writers gained prominence in mainstream and academic circles.

Explores how US Mexicana and Chicana authors and artists across different historical periods and regions use domestic space to actively claim their own histories. Through "negotiation" and "self-fashioning", Marci R. McMahon demonstrates how the sites of domesticity are used to engage the many political and recurring debates about race, gender, and immigration affecting Mexicanas and Chicanas.

Documents the transition to adulthood for a particularly vulnerable population: young inner-city men of colour who have, by the age of eighteen, already been imprisoned. How do such precariously situated youth become adult men? What are the sources of change in their lives? Falling Back is based on over three years of ethnographic research with black and Latino males.

When wielded by the white majority, ethnic humor can be used to ridicule and demean marginalized groups. In the hands of ethnic minorities themselves, ethnic humor can work as a site of community building and resistance. David Gillota explores the ways in which contemporary comic works both reflect and participate in national conversations about race and ethnicity.

With a detailed account of the experience of Black and Jewish parents in New York City, this book explores how activists, particularly parents and children, responded to inequality; the short-term effects of their involvement; and the long-term benefits t

This uses in-depth interviews with an economically diverse group of African American children and their mothers to reorient the way we look at how children develop their ideas about race. It shows the importance of considering this process from children's points of view and listening to their interpretations of their experiences.