The Racial Triangulation of Asian American Achievement

This Essay employs Professor Claire Jean Kim's racial triangulation framework to examine how Asian Americans are racialized via academic achievement. It argues that there are two components to the racial triangulation of Asian American achievement. On one hand, Asian Americans are valorized as a " model minority". We are praised for our achievement and cast as a model for other groups of people of color to follow. This ignores both the different histories of oppression that various groups of color have faced and the vast diversity of experiences among Asian Americans. But on the other hand, Asian Americans are also viewed as a threat to White dominance precisely because of our high achievement. For many privileged White Americans, we become a " peril of the mind"-a menacing foreign presence in elite educational spaces. This Essay focuses mainly on the peril of the mind phenomenon, which is much less widely acknowledged and theorized than the model minority. It examines peril of the mind in both higher education and K-12 education, examining affirmative action, admissions controversies, and the " new White flight". It argues that conservatives have thus far acknowledged and addressed animus against Asian American achievement more than progressives, and that they have used both model minority and peril of the mind stereotypes to attack affirmative action and racial equity initiatives. Ultimately, the Essay is a call for progressive advocates of these initiatives to be more vigilant in recognizing that Asian Americans are not weaponized as model minorities, but that we are also viewed as a threat because of our achievement.