This month, APA Compass tackled the topic of homeland politics and how it effects Asian Pacific Americans. To look at it through a very specific issue, APA Compass member Priya Kandaswamy spoke to Dr. Svati Shah and author Minal Hajratwala about the recent decriminalization of gay sex in India.

Dr. Shah is Assistant Professor of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies at University of Massachussets at Amherst, and author of a forthcoming book about sex work in Mumbai. Ms. Hajratwala is author of Leaving India: My Family's Journey from Five Villages to Five Countries, as well as a poet, performer and queer activist.

Recently, APA Compass took a trip to a local Asian mall to talk to local community members about their ideas about home, homeland politics and maintaining those connections.

Last month we had a chance to meet students from the Pan Asian Rites of Passage program in Lane County, OR. During this month's program, APA Compass aired the audio from the video I Am Asian American by Jia Ming Chen & Eugenia. This is the audio we played. Click here for the original video.

Charges were recently dropped against 4 of the San Francisco 8, leaving only one defendent left.

We talk with Richard Brown of the SF8 and Miasha Quint from the Committee to defend the SF 8 about the recent developments, the sucess of the organizing, the cointelpro targeting of the Black Panther Party, and more.

http://freethesf8.blogspot.com/

"Se wo were fi na wosan kofa a, yenkyi"... From the Akan people of West Africa we get "Sankofa", which teaches us to return to our roots to move forward. We take the best of what our past has to teach us to become all we are and grow into our future. Whatever was lost, forgone, forgotten, or stolen will be reclaimed, revived, preserved and perpetuated.