Executive Committee Statement, 19 March 2021

The AAS Executive Committee is horrified and saddened by the murders of mostly Asian women in Atlanta, Georgia. The rising violence and growing anti-Asian rhetoric is exacerbated by the lack of media attention to the ongoing racism against Asian communities overseas and here in Australia. The AAS Executive Committee urges members to speak out against these acts of violence and anti-Asian sentiments and to take up the anthropological task to create spaces of cross-cultural understandings. We stand in solidarity with Asian communities across the world.

Race discrimination commissioner Chin Tan says Australia must be ‘brave’ to tackle racism and ‘our current efforts are not enough to achieve this’. Photograph: Johner Images/Alamy

A few relevant links:

• Australia urged to adopt plan to fight 'resurgence of racism', Paul Karp in The Guardian, 17 March 2021
• Nearly one in five Chinese-Australians threatened or attacked in past year, survey finds, Daniel Hurst in The Guardian, 3 March 2021
• Anti-Asian racism during coronavirus: How the language of disease produces hate and violence, Paula Larsson in The Conversation, 1 April 2020