Asian American Studies program Associate Professor Wendy Ho adorns her office walls with samples of her students' artistic talent - from collages to paintings. Her former students now work within the community in a variety of professions. They're immigration, domestic violence and international relations consultants, lawyers, K-12 teachers and counselors, Peace Corps volunteers in Africa and Asia, news writers, cartoonists, poets and novelists.
"Students choose a variety of satisfying life tracks - not everyone is interested in seeking a doctorate or a university career," says Ho, who is also the major advisor for undergraduates in her department.
"We should be educating students to live in a dramatically changing California and global world."
This is the belief she brings to developing the program this fall when she assumes her new position as its director.
Among other goals, Ho hopes to create an internship program, offering students a chance to work in ethnically diverse regions. "Students need to be given a solid grounding," she says, "so they can apply their knowledge in ways that bridge them with communities at large in a productive and ethical manner."
Ho also plans to increase coordination with state, local and cultural community contacts throughout the region, Asia and elsewhere. "It would be one major way of making the program the strongest of its kind in the country," she says.
"Previous directors have contributed to the recruitment and retention of our faculty and to the establishment of a major, and I have the opportunity to build on their work in the next phase of development."
There are about 35 students majoring in the relatively new program, which began in Fall 1999. Ho knows most of them and enjoys that one-on-one contact. Still, those who meet with her may not know about her life before coming to UC Davis a decade ago.
Ho grew up in Hawai'i and originally planned to become an artist. She took pottery and painting classes at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. At the same time, she attended the University of Hawai'i, Manoa, where she received bachelor's and master's degrees in British and American Literature.
It was her love for Anglo-Saxon and medieval literature that led Ho to the University of Wisconsin, Madison, for her Ph.D. But while in the midst of writing her dissertation on 14th-century England and Chaucer, Ho found her personal and research interests returning to 19th and 20th century American ethnic literatures. After much soul-searching, she moved her research focus.
Along with her other credentials, Ho has written In Her Mother's House: The Politics of Asian American Mother-Daughter Writing. She also has two other projects in progress - a proposal for an anthology of selected essays based on a Critical Race Theory speakers series she has organized for two years, and an essay that deals with environmental, ecological and cultural politics of California.
From her many career experiences, Ho has learned a clear message that she passes along to her students: "One's life work should be graceful, passionate, spiritually fulfilling, and ethically accountable to her/his diverse communities."
What do you enjoy most about teaching?
The interaction. I love engaging in ideas, opening the world up in complex layers and exercising the intellectual-critical horizons of my students. In the process, my world is greatly expanded and enriched.
What's your favorite book?
Whatever I'm reading at a given moment. Right now it's J. M. Coetzee's Disgrace, Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, and The Eye of the Fish, by Han Ong Fixer Chao and Luis Francia. I am also reading environmental and ecological histories.
What do you do in your spare time?
I am wishfully planning a garden and sunroom for my backyard. And I'd like to watercolor my calico cat Chloe. I also am fascinated by California history. I drive through small or rural towns, especially those that used to have Chinatowns. I look into the archives and museums, meet people and visit the countryside and antique stores.
What do you consider some of your highest achievements?
Developing one of the first Asian Amer-ican Studies programs in the Midwest at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, as a graduate student; helping to get a multicultural center built with the Minority Coalition, a graduate student group; and co-founding the Pacific Asian and Women's Alliance, a social and public policy group at the University of Wisconsin. And just trying to carry through the everyday politics of being a decent individual before my time is up.
If you could have dinner with anyone (alive or dead), whom would you choose?
Black poet and author Audre Lorde (1934-1992), who wrote "The Black Unicorn" in 1978. I admire her politics, her intellectual and social activism and the way she articulates complex and radical ideas in an accessible fashion.
What's your favorite place on campus?
The new book section in Shields Library. I love new books, new research. Also, a spot in the arboretum across the street from the horse stables. There's a circular garden alcove surrounded by white roses. I find it very romantic and peaceful, especially during the gloaming hour of the evening. •