Sage Stobbart, Section A02, Week 5

In Shannon Deloso's piece titled "Precariously Positioned: Asian America Women Students' Negotiating Power in Academia", she focuses on the topic of activism. I think that there are so many issues in the world that require people to be activists and for people to fight, or else there will never be agreement, or in other words, there will never be peace. One part that caught my eye in particular was her commitment to changing from a student activist to an activist student. This was the first time that I have heard the term 'activist student', but it got me thinking about what the difference is between the two terms. In my mind, student activist refers to a student who does what they can here and there in order to be supportive of what they believe in, whereas an activist student puts activism first and uses their experiences to learn and grow, and their studies come as a compliment to what they believe.
Regardless of background, there is power behind people united around a mutual belief. Even if it involves minority groups, there is power! There is something undeniable about the strength a group of united individuals can have on influencing change, and I think Deloso was implying this. She claimed that "Within a week of working together, something beautiful emerged: people who had been strangers came together to fight for their shared vision of social justice offered by ethnic studies. Having this vision in our minds kept us wanting to put more meaning into all that we were doing." (Page 170)

Source: UVA Today, Activism in Youth: It's a Good Thing

Deloso also speaks on being a minority such as a woman, and how there are societal expectations on how you should act, as women as a whole are perceived as weaker than men, but I think she also made the point that you are entitled to fight for whatever you deem an important topic for yourself or society. Having the activist student mindset and identity allows you to fuel yourself and others on important issues and opens up so many more doors on how to approach social justice issues to instill change.

In an article titled "Activism in Youth: It's a Good Thing" by Ellen Daniels, she states "Youth are not only our future, they are actively shaping our world today. Young people have a long history of being on the vanguard of social change movements. Across the globe, young people are on the front lines of social change. This can be tremendously positive." I think this is a glimmer of hope in our future, and something that we should hold onto when we think about social change.


REFERENCES

Valverde, K.-L. C., & Dariotis, W. M. (2020). Fight the tower: Asian American women scholars resistance and renewal in the academy. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

Daniels, E. (2017, October 24). Activism in Youth: It's a Good Thing. Retrieved April 25, 2020, from https://news.virginia.edu/content/activism-youth-its-good-thing