Monica M. Trieu
- Director // AAS // AMST // ASAM // LALS // SIS
- Professor // SIS
- Professor // Asian American Studies // SIS
- Professor // American Studies // SIS
Office and Contact
Courses
Undergraduate Courses:
- ASAM 240/AMST 301: Introduction to Asian American Studies
- ASAM 340/AMST 301: Asian American Popular Culture
Graduate Courses:
- AMST 601: Introduction to American Studies
- AMST 604: Transnational American Studies
- AMST 606: American Studies Methods
- AMST 650: Contemporary Issues in Asian American Studies
Ph.D., Sociology (graduate certificate in Asian American Studies), University of California, Irvine
M.A., Sociology, University of California, Irvine
B.A., Sociology (major) and Asian American Studies (minor), University of California, Davis
Specialization
Race and Space; Racialization; Children of Immigrants and Refugees (1.5 and Second-Generation Identity); Post-1950s Immigrants and Refugees; Transnational American Studies; Historical and Contemporary Asian American Experiences
Dr. Trieu is a Professor of Asian American Studies and American Studies Program, in the School of Interdisciplinary Studies. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology, with an emphasis in Asian American Studies, from the University of California, Irvine. Her research primarily focuses on children of the post-1960s Asian immigrants and political refugees—the 1.5 and second-generation Asian Americans. Her work explores the intersection of race, ethnicity, immigration, and identity. Specifically, she empirically examines the contextual factors (e.g., space, region, language, transnational behaviors, education) that influence identity formation and adaptation. Her interdisciplinary work is situated within, and contributes to, multiple disciplines. This includes the fields of Asian American studies, sociology, racial and ethnic studies, international migration studies, transnational studies, and refugee studies. She has written on themes including: internalized racism, race and space, (differential) racialization, family obligation, language and identity, transnational ties, and the role of Asian American Studies.
She is the author of Fighting Invisibility: Asian Americans in the Midwest (Rutgers University Press, 2023) and Identity Construction among Chinese-Vietnamese Americans: Being, Becoming, and Belonging (LFB, 2009). Her work has also appeared in Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, Journal of Asian American Studies, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Sociological Inquiry, Socius, Journal of Family Issues, Ethnicities, and Race Ethnicity and Education.
Currently, she is working on research project examining the relationship between Asian Americans, the U.S. National Parks, and the great outdoors.
Selected Publications:
Trieu, Monica M. 2025. “The Nation’s Storyteller: The National Park Service, the Mystery of Japanese Bellboys, and the Making of the Model Minority.” Journal of Asian American Studies 28(3): 327-358.
Sari, Pamela K., Monica M. Trieu, and Casiana Warfield (equal authorship). 2024. “Asian/Asian American Higher Education Practitioners in the Midwest during rising Anti-Asian Violence and COVID-19 Global Pandemic.” Women, Gender, and Families of Color 11 (1): 1–26.
Trieu, Monica M. and Hana C. Lee. 2018. “Asian Americans and Internalized Racial Oppression: Identified, Reproduced, and Dismantled.” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity 4(1): 67-82.
Trieu, Monica M. 2018. “‘It was about Claiming Space’: Exposure to Asian American Studies, Ethnic Organization Participation, and the Negotiation of Self Among Southeast Asian Americans.” Race Ethnicity and Education 21 (4): 518–539.