Asian American Stereotypes end by storytelling

Fighting racial stereotypes has been a continuous challenge for Harry Mok, but writing untold stories on Asian-Americans is a motivation for him to fight racial issues.

Harry Mok was born in 1969 as a second generation Chinese-American at a small town in Woodland, Calif. Mok’s family runs a chinese vegetable farm. Growing up Mok would help his family’s farm, but he knew that writing was something he was passionate about.

“I would help out at my parent’s farm when I was little, and that was when I knew I wouldn’t want to do this for the rest of my life,” said Mok.

Woodland Calif.’s race demographic is 66.94 percent White, and 3.77 percent Asian according to the Woodland California Population and Demographics Resource.

“Growing up in Woodland where Asian population was so low, I have been call on racist names at school,” said Mok.

Mok knew he had to do something to fight against racial stereotypes and discrimination. By writing and reporting about the Asian-American community was Mok’s motive to fight against it.

Like many journalists, Mok joined his high school’s newspaper and took many journalism classes because he knew he loved to write.

“I think I am a better writer than a reporter,” Mok said.

Mok pursued his dream to be a journalist and got his bachelor’s degree in Journalism and a minor degree in Asian-American Studies. He then went on to get a master’s degree of Journalism from UC Berkeley. Although he joked and said to students not to get so many degrees in journalism, because of how hard it’s to make it. To reveal untold stories about his community and heritage is what made him want to stay in the journalism career he is in.

“My motives to be a journalist is to write about minorities and to inform the public about information they might not know about,” said Mok.

Mok said after college his dream job would have been to work for a self sustained publication that focuses on Asian Americans. He said a magazine that not only focuses on mainstream media but rather humanizes a community.

“Media has a shady history on coverage for minorities,” Mok said.

Mok shared stories to the audience on microaggressions he faced because of  his heritage. He said at work in the office colleagues would call him by his colleague’s name who was Asian as well.  

“There is this stereotype that all Asians look alike,” Mok said.

Students who are minorities at SF State felt inspired by Mok’s persisting attitude towards his career in journalism. Senior Shabaz Kazia, said he thought it was interesting to get a perspective of someone who is a minority in the journalism field.

“Me being a minority made me want to get to a newsroom and represent myself,” Kazia said.

Representing one’s culture seems to be a trend with minority groups who feel disenfranchised or misrepresented in mainstream media.

Mok was feeling the strain of misrepresentation and decided to take matters into his own hands.

Realizing the difficulties being a minority presented in the journalistic world, Harry and some friends decided to take matters into their own hand and create a publication of their own.

“When we first gathered around that kitchen table, it was simply because we were driven by a hunger for a more complex representation of Asian America” Hyphen Magazine.

In 2002, Harry, along with the help of others started a non profit magazine titled “Hyphen”, which focused on Asian American culture.

Since the first issue released  in 2003, America’s Asian American population was around 11 million, and has since reached 15.5 million.

Even with such a massive audience, magazines such as Hyphen face difficulties with generating enough income to be able to provide a full-time job.

“It’s a tough way to make a living”, Said Mok as he discussed the difficulties of making money on a donation based magazine where most people worked there for a part time job.

After his time with Hyphen, Mok decided to give up his dreams of creating a revenue generating publication and returned to more conventional journalistic work.

Mok has been in a career transition and looks to move back toward working as an editor after his time at Hyphen. One of the most critical positions to have a publication be successful is what Harry desires to return to–copy editor. Though their work is, at its best, invisible, the imprint of copy desks on newsroom culture is enormous.

Moving from a position where there is more freedom in what Mok writes about for a publication to one that keeps you focused on producing a specific spectrum of media however may be difficult to navigate.

“It doesn’t seem like he is following the passion he expressed for giving a voice to the voiceless,” said Aria Brock, a third year journalism student that attended Mok’s lecture.

Torn between pursuing a dream and having a full time job, it is clear to see through a student’s eyes how demanding journalism can be. “Although, he did give many years to Hyphen and he has probably grown since then, we all have to find new passions,” said Aria Brock.

With his time at the magazine done, Mok continues his journey through the journalism world pursuing many avenues enjoying the journey as it happens.