Racializing Epidemics in the United States: A Brief History and Lesson Recommendation
Project LEARN Category
L- Listen
E- Educate
A - Acknowledge
R - Respond
Intended Audience(s)
Theme/Focus
History
Racism
Activism
Article Details
Citation:
An, S. (2021). Racializing Epidemics in the United States: A Brief History and Lesson Recommendation. Social Education, 85(4), 198–204. https://doi.org/https://www.socialstudies.org/
Article Abstract
Article Abstract - Incidents of verbal and physical harassment of Asian Americans have risen sharply since January 2020, when the first case of COVID-19 was identified in the United States. Within one month, from mid-March to mid-April in 2020, nearly 1,500 incidents of anti-Asian harassment were documented. These cases indicate that people of Asian descent have been spat on, yelled at, insulted, or have been beaten and otherwise faced bodily harm. This is not the first time Asian Americans have been targeted because of a public health crisis. It is also not the first time a racially marginalized group has been blamed for an epidemic in the United States.
In this essay, I contextualize the surge of anti-Asian violence during the COVID-19 pandemic by placing it within the long history of racialized diseases in the United States. I present different examples of racialized epidemics and offer recommendations for teachers to approach this history. This is not an exhaustive list of racialized epidemics, but specific examples that demonstrate how racially marginalized groups have been repeatedly scapegoated for public health crises.