Judy Yung

Judy Yung, Professor Emerita, is a second-generation Chinese American born and raised in San Francisco Chinatown. She received her B.A. in English Literature and Chinese Language from San Francisco State University and her Master’s in Library Science and Ph.D. in Ethnic Studies from University of California, Berkeley. Yung worked as a public librarian and journalist before becoming Professor of American Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she taught courses in Asian American studies, women’s history, oral history, and mixed race.

Her publications include: Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island; Unbound Feet: A Social History of Chinese Women in San Francisco; Chinese American Voices: From the Gold Rush to the Present; The Adventures of Eddie Fung: Chinatown Kid, Texas Cowboy, Prisoner of War; and Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America. Yung has also directed exhibits and written pictorial history books on Chinese American women and San Francisco Chinatown.

For the past two decades, she has volunteered her services as a historical consultant to the Chinese Historical Society of America, Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation, and many film projects. She is the recipient of the Association for Asian American Studies’ Lifetime Achievement Award and UC Santa Cruz’s Excellence through Diversity Award and Excellence in Teaching Award.

Chinese Immigration and Poetry at Angel Island and Ellis Island

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In the early twentieth century, most Chinese immigrants coming to the United States were detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco Bay.  There, they were subject to physical exams, interrogations, and long detentions aimed at upholding the exclusion laws that kept Chinese out of the country. Many detainees recorded their anger and frustrations, … Read more