Chinese Immigrant Religious Institutions’ Response to HIV/AIDS in New York City

By , , and

09-11-06 Chin 014

In API immigrant communities, where language and cultural barriers are persistent, religious institutions play an essential role in providing emotional and social support, social services, information, and connections to employment. Their multi-faceted role of being providers of services and arbiters of values places them in a unique position to challenge misinformation about HIV/AIDS, or alternatively to promote continued silence and stigmatization in API communities.

This presentation will explore Chinese immigrant religious institutions’ response to HIV/AIDS and the potential for government and other nonprofit organizations to partner with them on HIV prevention, support and stigma-reduction activities. Religious institutions’ HIV/AIDS engagement also acts as a lens for viewing community institutions’ roles in preserving culture and managing cultural change in response to new realities in the receiving country. Being in an alien environment increases religious institutions’ sense of urgency about preserving cultural norms and traditions while the day-to-day needs and realities of members encourage religious institutions to change in ways that allow them to be most responsive to those needs.

The presentation will draw on data collected to-date in our study of religious institutions in the Chinese immigrant community in New York City (NYC), funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH Grant Number R01HD054303). Data sources include a census of Chinese immigrant religious institutions in New York City, a survey of a sample of these institutions, and qualitative interviews with leaders of these institutions.

Author Bio

Presented By:

John J. Chin is a Professor of Urban Policy and Planning at Hunter College, City University of New York. He is also the director of Hunter College’s Graduate Program in Urban Planning. His research has focused on the role of community institutions in the delivery of social and health services, particularly to under-served communities, such as immigrant communities and communities of color. He is also interested in how key community-based institutions in immigrant and minority communities shape community values and norms, particularly in relation to controversial or sensitive topics, like HIV. Prior to his academic/research career, he helped to found the Asian & Pacific Islander Coalition on HIV/AIDS (now a Federally Qualified Health Center known as Apicha Community Health Center), where he served as Deputy Executive Director.

Professor Chin is the Principal Investigator of a 5-year study funded by the National Institutes of Health on Asian immigrant religious institutions and their potential role in HIV prevention for Asian immigrant communities. Prior to coming to Hunter College, Professor Chin was a Senior Research Associate for 6 years at the New York Academy of Medicine. Previously, he was also an assistant professor of clinical sociomedical sciences at Columbia University (Mailman School of Public Health) and a visiting assistant research scientist at the University of California, San Francisco. Prior to his academic/research career, Professor Chin was on staff for 8 years at the the Asian & Pacific Islander Coalition on HIV/AIDS (APICHA), a NYC-based nonprofit organization, of which he was a co-founder and Deputy Executive Director. He also worked for the NYC Commission on Human Rights and the NYC Comptroller’s Office. He has a Ph.D. in Urban Planning from Columbia University and an M.S. in Urban Policy Analysis from the New School for Social Research.


Presented By:

Elana Behar is the Project Director for Professor Chin’s study on Asian immigrant religious organizations and HIV. Prior to joining the research staff at Hunter College, Elana worked at the New York Academy of Medicine and was involved in various research projects having to do with understanding and learning how to remove barriers to health care for people with HIV/AIDS, and a research project assessing how NYC pharmacies explain prescription medicines to limited English proficient New Yorkers. Elana received an MA in Applied Anthropology from Montclair State University, and a BA from Grinnell College.


Presented By:

Min Ying Li is a Research Associate for Professor Chin’s study on Asian immigrant religious organizations and HIV. Min Ying received her B.A. in Social Work and Psychology from Syracuse University and MSW from Columbia University, with a concentration in Public Policy. During her academic education, she proposed and implemented an exploratory study to measure how acculturative stress, parental involvement and academic achievement related to the psychological well-being among recent Chinese immigrant adolescents in order to debunk the myth of the Model Minority and advocate for educational reform targeting a growing population at risk. The study was presented at the Society for Research in Child Development 2007 biennial conference poster session. In addition, she worked as a research assistant to analyze ethnographic data and examine the impact of maternal work-related stress on child outcomes as a result of the Welfare Reform as part of the New Hope Project. Aside from her research background, she interned at the YMCA of Greater New York, where she worked closely with the Department of Public Affairs on projects regarding public relations, funding activities and the development of the New American Welcome Center.


Presented By:

Po Chun Chen is a Research Associate for Professor Chin’s study on Asian immigrant religious organizations and HIV. Po Chun received her BA in Public Administration from National Chengchi University in Taiwan and an MS in Urban Affairs from Hunter College.