Doctoral student Anna Lim Franck is a Glenn Research Fellow in the Educational Studies program with a specialization in Language & Literacy Education. She is a research assistant for Naomi Caselli’s ASL-LEX and ASL Vocabulary Acquisition Project and Amy Lieberman’s Language Acquisition & Visual Attention Lab. She recently finished collaborating on the video Anti-Asian Racism in the Time of Covid-19. 

Anna recently answered some of our questions about this project, sharing insights about her experiences and the creation of the video.

Tell us about yourself. What brought you to BU? What are some of your research goals and plans for life after BU?

I’m a multiethnic queer deaf immigrant womxn from a multigenerational deaf family in Manila, Philippines. I’m wife to a transracial and transnational Korean adoptee and mother to a toddler and another son coming this summer. I started out at BU as a research assistant for Dr. Caselli’s LexLab right after I graduated from Gallaudet University with a master’s degree in linguistics.

My main lab work right now is related to my capacity as a member of the LavaLab, where we look at how deaf children acquire language. I decided to pursue my doctoral studies at BU because I have great experiences working with the ASL and Deaf Studies faculty and with the ODS interpreting team. My research focus is on how deaf immigrant students of color navigate classroom discourse in the U.S. As for life after BU, I aspire to teach a Pilipino Studies class and work in a program that aims to be of assistance to deaf immigrant students of color.

Where did the idea to create this video come from?

About a couple of months ago, we watched the first town hall called “A Town Hall on Anti-Asian Racism: Race, Struggle, and Solidarity in The Time of A Global Pandemic” presented by the People’s Collective for Justice and Liberation and co-hosted by Gregory Cendana of Can’t Stop! Won’t Stop! Consulting and DJ Kuttin Kandi of Asian Solidarity Collective.

My wife, Nayo, got inspired by this town hall to take action to raise awareness in the deaf communities regarding the impact the pandemic has on Asian Americans because it is not widely discussed in circles we’re in. She wrote the script, and we got together with our Asian Womxn Signers Facebook group co-moderators to discuss about other potential signers to make sure other Asian communities, not just east Asian, are represented especially when their communities have also been impacted.

How did your time here at BU Wheelock shape your decision to respond to the current crises (yes, it’s plural!) in this way?

In most of the classes I took the last two years, I’ve had many opportunities to delve into analyses of how the forces of hegemonic power/status quo in society have shaped and are still shaping the way education is set up for different student populations. My learning has compelled me to argue for a more transformative approach to education in which equity and diversity is honored even if it means disrupting the dominant forms of pedagogy rooted in perpetuating colonialism.

I’m very lucky to have the opportunities to take classes from and sit down and talk with the wonderful BU Wheelock faculty members who have shifted the way I think about the current crises. For one of the classes, I’m deeply grateful to be allowed to create videos for my final papers. Because this modality (signing) works better for me in terms of content reception and production, it has strengthened my conviction that for any message to be able to make a visceral impact on the deaf communities, it must be visual and through sign. So when my wife decided to respond to the crises through a video, I jumped at the chance to participate.

In these times, people are grappling with a lot of stress and anxiety. This project seems like a really proactive approach. Does it feel that way to you? Was it therapeutic at all?

Yes, it definitely feels proactive and therapeutic for me. I’ve been raised to stay quiet and not speak up, to do what’s best to keep harmony in the group. I’m aware that this video will be perceived as overly negative by many deaf Asians and Asian Americans who think that the only valid way to approach problems (or crises, in this case) is to frame things in a positive light. But we cannot always put on our rose-colored glasses;  those who can afford to do so in these times are privileged to be able to gloss over the ugly parts since these do not seem to affect them personally.

How does this project help future teachers and counselors, policy makers and advocates, and higher ed professionals better understand and respond to the current crisis?

I think this project could make future teachers and counselors, policy makers and advocates, and higher ed professionals understand that certain groups, especially the deaf communities, are often left out from the national, scholarly, political conversations because of accessibility issues. Many deaf Asians may have experienced being targets of violence because of the current crisis but they may not be aware that there is a connection between what they have experienced and the anti-Asian sentiments that are historically situated and becoming as widespread as the virus itself. I managed to attend a few that provided ASL interpretation such as the town hall series presented by The People’s Collective for Justice and Liberation but I’m guessing there are many out there that don’t. 

What is something you learned as a result of creating this video?

Creating this video entails looking up on Asian American history (which I haven’t studied since I grew up in another country), and I learned that “Asian American” is a political identity established back in the 1960’s to promote inter-ethnic solidarity. However, as pointed out by deaf Desi collaborator Jerrin George, the term doesn’t seem to have accounted for Middle East/West Asians and Desi.

I also learned during the town hall debriefings with fellow deaf Asians that indeed, we need to continue the discussion with other deaf communities that we need to continue the discussion on the history of anti-Asian racism in the U.S. and how it is inextricably tied to oppression of Indigenous tribes and to sentiments and violence borne of anti-Blackness. We’ve discussed how the model minority myth is a tool used to divide us BIPOCs and play us into the system that seeks to eradicate us. We need to show up for Indigenous, Black, and Brown people and create more spaces for dialogues on inter-ethnic and cross-racial solidarity with calls to action that are not only radical but also something we can actually do.

What kinds of responses have you received so far?

Mostly positive. We’ve been told that this video is much needed, especially in the signing communities. However, we’ve also been told that certain individuals thought there is so much attention on anti-Asian racism and not on Black people in China and countries in Africa who were employed in Chinese businesses and maltreated/fired by their Chinese employers or not welcomed in Chinese establishments. This issue is definitely multilayered and one of things we Asians need to continue addressing is the anti-Blackness prevalent in Asian communities all over the world.

Tell us something we don’t know! (About you. About the world. Anything you want us to know.)

One aspect that I can truly relate to in narratives of the immigrant experience is how terrible homesickness can be. I think there’s a feeling of taboo against expressing longing to go back to the land you grew up on, to the way of life you used to live, and to the family you left back home, and discontent regarding the land you have willingly moved to. As a multicultural queer deaf womxn, moving to the U.S. alone nearly 7 years ago and living here since then has been very wonderful for me; I have been granted opportunities that I never thought, even in my wildest dreams, I would have — I am able to live with and create a family with the love of my life. And I am able to pursue my MA and  PhD degrees with the help of some of the best people I’ve met.

But I cannot remain silent when I see injustice even on this land that has given me so much. One way for me to give back is to join the efforts in disrupting dominant power structures that perpetuate these injustices. Since the U.S. is a country of immigrants standing on native land, we should fight for the Indigenous peoples who are OF this land. And when we have  moments to ourselves, we should be allowed to process what it means to not be on one’s native land and, through cultural customs, food, rituals, and spiritual practices, to keep returning to our roots however we can in our own small ways.