7-12
Barde, Robert Eric. Immigration at the Golden Gate: Passenger Ships, Exclusion, and Angel Island. Westport: Praeger, 2008. Barde examines the history of Asian passenger steamship travel and immigration through Angel Island. The voices of a century ago—of exclusion, bureaucratic and judicial nightmares, fear of foreigners and their diseases, and moral ambiguity and uncertainty—all echo to the present day.
Bustard, Bruce. Attachments: Faces and Stories from America’s Gates. Washington, D.C.: Foundation for the National Archives, 2012. This collection of documents and photographs draws from the millions of immigration case files in the National Archives to tell some of the most gripping stories of immigrants entering, leaving, or staying in America. Many Angel Island stories are included.
Chang, Iris. The Chinese in America: A Narrative History. Penguin Books, 2003. Angel Island was the main point of entry for Chinese immigrants from 1910-1940. A richly detailed, time-spanning history of what they faced, including discrimination, exploitation, legal barriers, and opportunities. This book discusses how they met these challenges, and their many contributions.
Fanning, Bramwell and Wong, William. Images of America: Angel Island. Arcadia Publishers, 2007. This hoto history book has a extensive chapter on the history of the immigration station and on AIISF's efforts to preserve the site.
Fujii, Marie Park. Growing Up American in Papa's World. Honolulu: Belknap Publishing & Design, 2011. This is a heart-warming memoir of the Park family, their immigration to America through Angel Island, and their struggle to survive as farmers in Oregon and Idaho during the Depression years.
Hing, Bll Ong. Making and Remaking Asian America through Immigration Policy 1850-1990. Stanford Univeristy Press, 1993. This is the first comprehensive study of how U.S. immigration policies have shaped – demographically, economically, and socially – the six largest Asian American communities: Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Asian Indian.
Lai, Him Mark, Genny Lim, Judy Yung. Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, 1910-1940. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1980, 1999. This book contains an overview history of the immigration station, provides oral histories excerpts from former detainees, and documents 135 poems written on the walls in Chinese with English translations. This book can be ordered through AIISF.
Lau, Estelle. Paper Families: Identity, Immigration Administration, and Chinese Exclusion. Durham: Duke University Press, 2007. Lau highlights how immigrant identity formation was a two-way process involving both subterfuge on the part of Chinese immigrants and the relentless efforts of immigration officials to exclude them. She points out that the Exclusion Acts and the pseudo-familial structures that emerged in response have had lasting effects on Chinese American identity and concludes with a look at exclusion’s legacy, including the Confession Program of the 1960s.
Lee, Erika. At America’s Gates: Chinese Immigration during the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003. Drawing on a rich trove of historical sources—including immigration records, oral histories, and letters—Lee explores how Chinese exclusion laws not only transformed Chinese American lives, immigration patterns, identities, and families but also recast the United States into a “gatekeeping nation.”
Lee, Erika and Judy Yung. Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. In this landmark book commemorating the immigration station’s 100th anniversary, Lee and Yung provides a sweeping yet personal history of Chinese “paper sons,” Japanese picture brides Korean refugee students, South Asian political activists, Russian and Jewish refugees, Mexican families, Filipino repatriates, and many others from around the world. Their experiences on Angel Island reveal how America’s discriminatory immigration policies changed the lives of immigrants and transformed the nation.
Otsuka, Julie. The Buddha in the Attic. Anchor, 2011. A tour-de-force about a group of women brought from Japan to San Francisco in the early 1900s as mial-order-brides.
Pegler-Gordon, Anna. In Sight of America - Photography and the Development of U.S. Immigration Policy, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Using rare photographs and documents culled from the National Archives, Pegler-Gordon examines the impact photography had in implementing immigration policies at Angel Island, Ellis Island, and on the U.S.-Mexico border. The chapters devoted to the Angel Island experience reveal the creativity used by Chinese and Japanese immigrants to set their image in the proper context to garner more favorable treatment.
Rouse Jorae, Wendy. The Children of Chinatown - Growing Up Chinese American in San Francisco 1850-1920. Rouse Jorae provides captivating portrayals of young people stranded at the Angel Island Immigration Station, rescued from sexual and domestic abuse in Chinatown, and as marginalized Americans in a racist society. She engages the reader with lively accounts of how the Chinese actively sought to shape their destinies in the face of discrimination, contesting authorities for educational rights and economic equality.
Soennichsen, John. Miwoks to Missiles: A History of Angel Island. Tiburon: Angel Island Association, 2001. This book covers over two hundred years of the island’s history, from the Miwok Indians and Spanish explorers to the U.S. military, establishment of the immigration station, and transition into a state park. The author’s use of historic photographs and personal recollections bring the island and its people to life in dramatic fashion.
Stavans, Ilan. Becoming Americans - Four Centuries of Immigrant Writing. New York: Library of America, 2009. Comprised mostly of memoirs with some fiction, this volume gathers selections from the writings of 85 immigrants from 45 countries, including Chinese poems from Angel Island, that illustrate the changing views of immigrants in the United States. Through their voices we relive the fears, hopes, and bewilderment of people yearning to be full partners in a nation that alternately welcomes and rejects their presence.
Saylor, Lucy. Laws as Harsh as Tigers: Chinese Immigration and the Shaping of Modern Immigration Law. University of North Carolina Press. 1995. Focusing primarily on the exclusion of the Chinese, Lucy Salyer analyzes the popular and legal debates surrounding immigration law and its enforcement during the height of nativist sentiment in the early twentieth century. She argues that the struggles between Chinese immigrants, U.S. government officials, and the lower federal courts that took place around the turn of the century established fundamental principles that continue to dominate immigration law today and make it unique among branches of American law. By establishing the centrality of the Chinese to immigration policy, Salyer also integrates the history of Asian immigrants on the West Coast with that of European immigrants in the East.
See, Lisa. Shanghai Girls. Random House, 2010. Forced to leave Shanghai when their father sells them to California suitors, sisters May and Pearl struggle to adapt to life in 1930s Los Angeles while still bound to old customs, as they face discrimination and confront a life-altering secret.
Takaki, Ronald. Strangers from a Different Shore. Boston: Little Brown & Co., 1989. In this narrative history, Takaki tells the richly diverse stories of Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, Asian Indians, Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Laotians who have come to the United States during the past century and a half. He allows these immigrants to speak through their songs, poems, and letters, and weaves their voices into the broad context of American history. Angel Island is covered in the chapter about Chinese immigration.
Yung, Judy. Unbound Voices: A Documentary History of Chinese Women in San Francisco. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. This book documents Chinese American women’s lives through their writings and oral histories. The first and last chapters are devoted to how to research the immigration history of Chinese women.
Bustard, Bruce. Attachments: Faces and Stories from America’s Gates. Washington, D.C.: Foundation for the National Archives, 2012. This collection of documents and photographs draws from the millions of immigration case files in the National Archives to tell some of the most gripping stories of immigrants entering, leaving, or staying in America. Many Angel Island stories are included.
Chang, Iris. The Chinese in America: A Narrative History. Penguin Books, 2003. Angel Island was the main point of entry for Chinese immigrants from 1910-1940. A richly detailed, time-spanning history of what they faced, including discrimination, exploitation, legal barriers, and opportunities. This book discusses how they met these challenges, and their many contributions.
Fanning, Bramwell and Wong, William. Images of America: Angel Island. Arcadia Publishers, 2007. This hoto history book has a extensive chapter on the history of the immigration station and on AIISF's efforts to preserve the site.
Fujii, Marie Park. Growing Up American in Papa's World. Honolulu: Belknap Publishing & Design, 2011. This is a heart-warming memoir of the Park family, their immigration to America through Angel Island, and their struggle to survive as farmers in Oregon and Idaho during the Depression years.
Hing, Bll Ong. Making and Remaking Asian America through Immigration Policy 1850-1990. Stanford Univeristy Press, 1993. This is the first comprehensive study of how U.S. immigration policies have shaped – demographically, economically, and socially – the six largest Asian American communities: Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Asian Indian.
Lai, Him Mark, Genny Lim, Judy Yung. Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, 1910-1940. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1980, 1999. This book contains an overview history of the immigration station, provides oral histories excerpts from former detainees, and documents 135 poems written on the walls in Chinese with English translations. This book can be ordered through AIISF.
Lau, Estelle. Paper Families: Identity, Immigration Administration, and Chinese Exclusion. Durham: Duke University Press, 2007. Lau highlights how immigrant identity formation was a two-way process involving both subterfuge on the part of Chinese immigrants and the relentless efforts of immigration officials to exclude them. She points out that the Exclusion Acts and the pseudo-familial structures that emerged in response have had lasting effects on Chinese American identity and concludes with a look at exclusion’s legacy, including the Confession Program of the 1960s.
Lee, Erika. At America’s Gates: Chinese Immigration during the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003. Drawing on a rich trove of historical sources—including immigration records, oral histories, and letters—Lee explores how Chinese exclusion laws not only transformed Chinese American lives, immigration patterns, identities, and families but also recast the United States into a “gatekeeping nation.”
Lee, Erika and Judy Yung. Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. In this landmark book commemorating the immigration station’s 100th anniversary, Lee and Yung provides a sweeping yet personal history of Chinese “paper sons,” Japanese picture brides Korean refugee students, South Asian political activists, Russian and Jewish refugees, Mexican families, Filipino repatriates, and many others from around the world. Their experiences on Angel Island reveal how America’s discriminatory immigration policies changed the lives of immigrants and transformed the nation.
Otsuka, Julie. The Buddha in the Attic. Anchor, 2011. A tour-de-force about a group of women brought from Japan to San Francisco in the early 1900s as mial-order-brides.
Pegler-Gordon, Anna. In Sight of America - Photography and the Development of U.S. Immigration Policy, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Using rare photographs and documents culled from the National Archives, Pegler-Gordon examines the impact photography had in implementing immigration policies at Angel Island, Ellis Island, and on the U.S.-Mexico border. The chapters devoted to the Angel Island experience reveal the creativity used by Chinese and Japanese immigrants to set their image in the proper context to garner more favorable treatment.
Rouse Jorae, Wendy. The Children of Chinatown - Growing Up Chinese American in San Francisco 1850-1920. Rouse Jorae provides captivating portrayals of young people stranded at the Angel Island Immigration Station, rescued from sexual and domestic abuse in Chinatown, and as marginalized Americans in a racist society. She engages the reader with lively accounts of how the Chinese actively sought to shape their destinies in the face of discrimination, contesting authorities for educational rights and economic equality.
Soennichsen, John. Miwoks to Missiles: A History of Angel Island. Tiburon: Angel Island Association, 2001. This book covers over two hundred years of the island’s history, from the Miwok Indians and Spanish explorers to the U.S. military, establishment of the immigration station, and transition into a state park. The author’s use of historic photographs and personal recollections bring the island and its people to life in dramatic fashion.
Stavans, Ilan. Becoming Americans - Four Centuries of Immigrant Writing. New York: Library of America, 2009. Comprised mostly of memoirs with some fiction, this volume gathers selections from the writings of 85 immigrants from 45 countries, including Chinese poems from Angel Island, that illustrate the changing views of immigrants in the United States. Through their voices we relive the fears, hopes, and bewilderment of people yearning to be full partners in a nation that alternately welcomes and rejects their presence.
Saylor, Lucy. Laws as Harsh as Tigers: Chinese Immigration and the Shaping of Modern Immigration Law. University of North Carolina Press. 1995. Focusing primarily on the exclusion of the Chinese, Lucy Salyer analyzes the popular and legal debates surrounding immigration law and its enforcement during the height of nativist sentiment in the early twentieth century. She argues that the struggles between Chinese immigrants, U.S. government officials, and the lower federal courts that took place around the turn of the century established fundamental principles that continue to dominate immigration law today and make it unique among branches of American law. By establishing the centrality of the Chinese to immigration policy, Salyer also integrates the history of Asian immigrants on the West Coast with that of European immigrants in the East.
See, Lisa. Shanghai Girls. Random House, 2010. Forced to leave Shanghai when their father sells them to California suitors, sisters May and Pearl struggle to adapt to life in 1930s Los Angeles while still bound to old customs, as they face discrimination and confront a life-altering secret.
Takaki, Ronald. Strangers from a Different Shore. Boston: Little Brown & Co., 1989. In this narrative history, Takaki tells the richly diverse stories of Japanese, Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, Asian Indians, Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Laotians who have come to the United States during the past century and a half. He allows these immigrants to speak through their songs, poems, and letters, and weaves their voices into the broad context of American history. Angel Island is covered in the chapter about Chinese immigration.
Yung, Judy. Unbound Voices: A Documentary History of Chinese Women in San Francisco. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. This book documents Chinese American women’s lives through their writings and oral histories. The first and last chapters are devoted to how to research the immigration history of Chinese women.