Articles

Esther Don Tang’s Home: Southern Arizona and Gender in the Construction of the Model Minority Myth 1950-1975

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Abstract

In the decades after World War II, mainstream perceptions of Asian Americans flipped from being viewed as an unassimilable threat to White American society into a well assimilated model minority. Esther Don Tang, a Tucson native and lifelong community leader, was a part of this larger process as she would advocate for the Chinese American community in the town. This article uses a collection of archival documents on Tang’s life to argue that Tucson’s local history and changing gender norms shaped Tang’s advocacy for Chinese Americans in the 1950s and 1960s. In doing so, the article demonstrates how local societal circumstances profoundly affected Cold War advocacy for Chinese Americans.

Keywords: Asian Americans, Chinese Americans, Cold War, Model Minority Myth, Yellow Peril, Model Minority, Gender, Southern Arizona, Tucson, Chinese Food, Multiculturalism, Arizona-Mexico Borderland, Women's Liberation Movement, Civil Rights Movement

How to Cite:

Peng, E., (2026) “Esther Don Tang’s Home: Southern Arizona and Gender in the Construction of the Model Minority Myth 1950-1975”, Footnotes: A Journal of History 8, 61-69.