Shirley Surt Ling Tang
is an Assistant Professor of Asian American Studies and American Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Having led public health community-centered research and young women organizing projects in immigrant/refugee communities in Massachusetts, she is currently focusing on research and writing about race, (im)migration and development. Her research and teaching interests include: comparative urban cultural history; Southeast Asian American community studies; social consequences of war; and creative expressions at local and transnational levels. She is working on a book manuscript that examines the development and displacement of the Khmer (Cambodian) American community in Revere, Massachusetts.

Courses Taught:
AMST 605, Ethnicity, race, and nationality
AmSt G100 U.S. Culture and Society
AmSt 100 American Identities  
AmSt/AfrSty 350 Race, Class, Gender: Issues of Diversity
AmSt/WoSt 376 Women of Color
AmSt 405 The Immigrant Experience
AsAmSt 220 Media, Culture, and the Chinese Diaspora (formerly “Chinese Pop Culture”)
AsAmSt 225 Southeast Asians in America
AsAmSt 370 Asian American Media Literacy (
AsAmSt 397/398 Applied Research in Asian American Studies I, II

Research Interests:
Asian American Studies
Comparative Ethnic Studies
War, race and migration
Southeast Asian American community studies
Cultural community/youth development
Expressive culture
 
Recent Publications:
Shirley Suet-ling Tang. 2008. “Challenges of Policy and Practice in Under-Resourced Asian American Communities: Analyzing Public Education, Health, Development Issues with Cambodian American Women.” Asian American Law Journal 15 (Fall). 153-175.
 
Peter N. Kiang and  Shirley Suet-ling Tang. 2006. “Electoral Politics and the Contexts of Empowerment, Displacement, and Diaspora for Boston’s Vietnamese and Cambodian American Communities.” Asian American Policy Review 15 (Spring). 13-29.
 
James ?i?n Bùi, Shirley Suet-ling Tang, and Peter Nien-chu Kiang. 2004. “The Local/Global Politics of Boston’s Viet-Vote.” AAPI Nexus: Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Policy, Practice and Community 2(2) (Summer/Fall). 10-18.  

Shirley Suet-ling Tang. “Community-Centered Research as Knowledge/Capacity-Building in Immigrant and Refugee Communities” in Engaging Contradictions: Theory, Politics and Methods of Activist Scholarship. Edited by Charles R. Hale. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2008. 237-263.
 
Peter Kiang, Karen Suyemoto and Shirley Tang. “Developing and sustaining community research methods and meanings in Asian American studies coursework” in Ethnic Studies Research: Approaches and Perspectives. Edited by Tim Fong. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008. 367-398.
 
Shirley S. Tang. “Learning to Build a Healthy Community: Youth Development for Street -Involved Cambodian American Young Women” in Asian Americans: Vulnerable Populations, Model Interventions, and Clarifying Agendas. Edited by Lin Zhan. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett, 2003. 171-195.
 
Shirley Suet-ling Tang. "Community Cultural Development and Education with Cambodian American Youth"  in Asian American Voices: Engaging, Empowering, and Enabling Edited by Lin Zhan. NY: National League for Nursing, 2008. 147-170.
 
James ?i?n Bùi, Peter Nien-chu Kiang, Shirley Suet-ling Tang, Janet H?ng Võ. “Cá Trí Nh?: Roles of Vietnamese American Studies and Education Post-Katrina” in Asian American Voices: Engaging, Empowering, and Enabling. Edited by Lin Zhan. NY: National League for Nursing, 2008. 171-190.
 
Works in Progress:
Apsaras on the Ave: War, Race, Migration, and Development,  an interdisciplinary study of the development (and displacement) of Revere’s Cambodian American community in relation to other ethnic and immigrant groups, both historically and comparatively.
 

Selected Publications:
An Assessment of Khmer American Community Needs in Lynn, Massachusetts (Lynn, MA: Khmer Association of the North Shore, 2004)

“Community-Centered Research as Knowledge/Capacity-Building in Immigrant and Refugee Communities” in Engaging Contradictions: Theory, Politics and Methods of Activist Scholarship, edited by Charles R. Hale (CA: California University Press, forthcoming 2008)

“Challenges of Policy and Practice in Under-Resourced Asian American Communities: Analyzing Public Education, Health, Development Issues with Cambodian American Women,” Asian American Law Journal (CA: University of California at Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law, forthcoming 2008

Shirley Suet-ling Tang and James Bui., “Cultural Development Matters: Vietnamese American Experience in Dorchester’s Fields Corner” in A Cultural History of Asian/Americans in New England, edited by Monica Chiu (MA: University Press of New England, forthcoming)

Peter Kiang and Shirley Suet Ling Tang, “Translocal Mobilization and Local Politics: An Analysis of Asian American Electoral Victories in Metro Boston,” in The Transnational Politics of Asian Americans, edited by Christian Collet and Pei-te Lien (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, forthcoming).

Office: Wheatley, 5th floor, Room 61
Email: shirley.tang@umb.edu
Phone 617-287-6777