Michael Chang – författare

The Asian American activist and political communities viewed 1996 as a watershed year, in which the Democratic Party took seriously its Asian American constituency—until the "Asian Donorgate" campaign finance controversy complicated that representation. In the ensuing public discourse Chinese Americans, and by proxy all Asian Americans, were depicted as foreigners subversively attempting to buy influence with U.S. politicians. While neither disputing nor confirming the guilt of the individuals charged in this episode with raising illegal foreign campaign money, Racial Politics in an Era of Transnational Citizenship highlights the conflation of Asian transnational capital and government interests with Asian Americans and the resulting racialization, foreignization, and even criminalization of this large community. Scholar Michael Chang asks, Will the perception of the Asian American as the "perpetual foreigner" continue to reproduce itself uncritically, heightening during times of media-supported nationalism? This incisive work contributes greatly to current debates on civil rights and on the meaning of "citizenship" and "belonging" among a transnational community and in a globalized world.

The Asian American activist and political communities viewed 1996 as a watershed year, in which the Democratic Party took seriously its Asian American constituency—until the "Asian Donorgate" campaign finance controversy complicated that representation. In the ensuing public discourse Chinese Americans, and by proxy all Asian Americans, were depicted as foreigners subversively attempting to buy influence with U.S. politicians. While neither disputing nor confirming the guilt of the individuals charged in this episode with raising illegal foreign campaign money, Racial Politics in an Era of Transnational Citizenship highlights the conflation of Asian transnational capital and government interests with Asian Americans and the resulting racialization, foreignization, and even criminalization of this large community. Scholar Michael Chang asks, Will the perception of the Asian American as the "perpetual foreigner" continue to reproduce itself uncritically, heightening during times of media-supported nationalism? This incisive work contributes greatly to current debates on civil rights and on the meaning of "citizenship" and "belonging" among a transnational community and in a globalized world.

Often characterized as David facing Goliath on the tennis court, at 5'9" and 150 pounds Michael Chang is used to playing with the big hitters. What he lacks in stature, he makes up for in determination. A serious contender at any Grand Slam event, his bold statement of faith in God makes him a role model we can all look up to. "What's nice," Michael says, "is that, as long as my priorities are straight, I'm able to go out with the mentality to really leave the winning and losing up to the Lord." In Holding Serve readers get a unique glimpse at Team Chang, Michael's powerful family unit that he credits with much of his success. Michael also shares the story of how he became a Christian and the central role his faith has played in his achievements.

A new poetry collection from award-winning author Michael Chang  A vital breath of life arrives in American poetry with Synthetic Jungle, the latest collection from acclaimed poet Michael Chang. With poems in a register both hilarious and scathing, Synthetic Jungle effortlessly bashes convention while simultaneously rebuilding the language we use to communicate our fears and joys.  Synthetic Jungle is a collection written by a brilliant jester who winks at you as you catch their every reference before sharing a laugh at your own self-satisfaction. Themes of identity, sexuality, and literacy play out in a dizzying rhythm of microtheaters. Readers will find themselves giggling, snorting, and guffawing their way through this work: whether at a repudiation of the literary landscape or a critique of a failing justice system, to laugh along with Chang is to recognize your mistakes and, ultimately, grow from them.  Fractal and kinetic in the quick-witted spirit of John Ashbery and Emily Dickinson, Chang’s tender poems dance around, between, and through the personal and philosophical. Synthetic Jungle is as sweet as it is grand, and beneath its sarcastic grin reverberates an immense, open heart.

In Michael Chang's latest, all the world's a vaudeville stage, and this poet is its jester with a knife.Like an elongated diss track, Chang's poems go from flirty to righteous, wrathful to lackadaisical, all in the span of one page.  The  titans  of  pop  culture  and  poetry  wrestle  at  Chang’s  whimsy, their poems a series of flings and retorts at the end of a late-night spree. Like a compendium of American poetics, this collection breezily changes style and mood as easily as a prom queen smiles beneath the crown. With nods to O’Hara and Ashbery, the poems in Things a Bright Boy Can Do flit from the sewage of Americana to the heights of ecstatic experience. Each poem is a playground meant to delight readers before they skip along. With each successive book, Michael Chang showcases a poet at home in the twenty-first century; nothing is too silly or too morbid for the page. When  reading  Chang’s  poetry,  the  madness  of  interpreting  the  social media age suddenly makes sense. You can’t help but join in on the heckling, sticking your tongue out in the face of our strange world.“Michael Chang is back, with their signature irrepressibility: the voice that bubbles with endlessly exuberant wit, encyclopedic pop culture references, playful orthography, and intense emotion. Oh, yes -- these poems are in their feelings! Are you here for poetry that can lure Superman, Dolly Parton, and Prince allusions together? Are you up for parataxis with a vengeance? If wordplay and irreverence are music to your ears, tune into Things a Bright Boy Can Do.” – Evie Shockley, author of Suddenly We“Michael Chang’s Things a Bright Boy Can Do pushes and pushes, and then pushes some more. It’s provocative, fearless, and relentless, unafraid to reinvent tone, grammar, and just about everything else that dares to enter the path of Chang’s perception. Things a Bright Boy Can Do is a ride on the back of a new modern language.” – Victoria Chang, author of The Trees Witness Everything