WEEK 9
Spring 2011- 5/8/11
After learning about “People Power” at the last session, this week, we invited guest speakers, May Chen and Margaret Chin, to bring in their expertise on the topic.
May Chen
May Chen is a labor organizer who for more than twenty years has been actively engaged in outreach and advocacy for immigrant workers. Born and raised in Boston, MA, she received her BA from Radcliffe College and her MA in Education at UCLA. While in California, she worked as a high school and adult education teacher, wrote for the A/PA publications Gidra and Roots, founded a day care center that employed mainly immigrant women, and taught Asian and Asian American Studies at California State University, Long Beach.
Chen’s involvement in the labor movement began in 1983 with her membership in Local 23-25 and her work on the ILGWU Immigration Project beginning in 1984. The first union-initiated legal advocacy department for immigrant workers, the Immigration Project assisted thousands of union members in application for U.S. citizenship, sponsorship petitions on behalf of relatives, and legalization under the “amnesty” clause of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act.
In 1989, Chen began a full-time position at Local 23-25’s Education Department, coordinating labor education programs, English and Civics classes, voter registration and political action projects, and numerous other union and community activities for members. She became active in other labor-related groups, including the Coalition of Labor Union Women, on whose National Executive Board she served from 1984 to 1993, the Asian Labor Committee of the New York City Central Labor Council, and the AFL-CIO’s Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA), of which she was a founding member and officer.
Up until her retirement in June 2009, Chen served as International Vice President of UNITE HERE and Manager of Local 23-25. She also served as Secretary of the New York Metropolitan Area Joint Board.
http://dlibdev.nyu.edu/tamimentapa/?q=node/113
Chen’s involvement in the labor movement began in 1983 with her membership in Local 23-25 and her work on the ILGWU Immigration Project beginning in 1984. The first union-initiated legal advocacy department for immigrant workers, the Immigration Project assisted thousands of union members in application for U.S. citizenship, sponsorship petitions on behalf of relatives, and legalization under the “amnesty” clause of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act.
In 1989, Chen began a full-time position at Local 23-25’s Education Department, coordinating labor education programs, English and Civics classes, voter registration and political action projects, and numerous other union and community activities for members. She became active in other labor-related groups, including the Coalition of Labor Union Women, on whose National Executive Board she served from 1984 to 1993, the Asian Labor Committee of the New York City Central Labor Council, and the AFL-CIO’s Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA), of which she was a founding member and officer.
Up until her retirement in June 2009, Chen served as International Vice President of UNITE HERE and Manager of Local 23-25. She also served as Secretary of the New York Metropolitan Area Joint Board.
http://dlibdev.nyu.edu/tamimentapa/?q=node/113
Margaret Chin
Margaret M. Chin joined the Sociology Department of Hunter College in September 2001. Her research interests focus on new immigrants, working poor families, race and ethnicity, and Asian Americans. She is currently working on a number of projects. They include: research on how Asian ethnic media is used by first and second generation Asians and Asian Americans; a project on the status of low wage immigrant workers and where they turn to for work and assistance during this recession; and a project on differences and similarities among Brooklyn’s Chinatown, Flushing’s Asiantown and Manhattan’s Chinatown. Professor Chin uses qualitative and comparative methods in her research.
Professor Chin was a Social Science Research Council Post Doctoral Fellow in International Migration, a Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation Junior Faculty Career Grant Recipient and a Gender Equity Project Associate. She has taught The Sociology of the Family, The Second Generation Experience of Asians, Latinos and Blacks, the Graduate Social Research course in qualitative research methods, and a CUNY Honors College Seminar – The Peopling of New York.
She received her BA in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University and her MA and PhD in Sociology from Columbia University.
http://maxweber.hunter.cuny.edu/socio/faculty/chin.html#bio
Professor Chin was a Social Science Research Council Post Doctoral Fellow in International Migration, a Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation Junior Faculty Career Grant Recipient and a Gender Equity Project Associate. She has taught The Sociology of the Family, The Second Generation Experience of Asians, Latinos and Blacks, the Graduate Social Research course in qualitative research methods, and a CUNY Honors College Seminar – The Peopling of New York.
She received her BA in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University and her MA and PhD in Sociology from Columbia University.
http://maxweber.hunter.cuny.edu/socio/faculty/chin.html#bio