Helen Zia, a pioneering journalist, author and activist, will present the Asian American Distinguished Speaker Series lecture at the University of Notre Dame at 5 p.m. on March 19 (Wednesday) in the Smith Ballroom, Morris Inn. Jennifer Huynh, assistant professor of American Studies, will moderate the event, which is free and open to the public.

“Helen Zia is arguably the most important and most recognized Asian American activist of our time,” said Michel Hockx, director of the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, which organizes the lecture series. “She literally wrote the book on Asian American history and helped solidify the term ‘Asian American.’ It is especially meaningful that she started her activism while living in the midwest, only three hours from our campus. It is a great honor to welcome her to Notre Dame.”

Zia’s role in the national Asian American civil rights movement began after the racially motivated killing of 27-year-old Vincent Chin in Detroit in 1982. After a judge sentenced Chin’s attackers to probation, Zia helped organize and lead a coalition of Asian Americans to stand up for justice and equality. Zia’s efforts and this movement were crucial, prompting officials to bring federal civil rights charges against the perpetrators. Zia’s efforts are documented in the Academy-Award-nominated PBS film “Who Killed Vincent Chin?” After 40 years of civil, women’s and LGBTQ+ rights activism, Zia founded the Vincent Chin Institute in 2023 to build multiracial solidarity against hate.

“Today’s anti-Asian hate has uncanny parallels to the anti-Asian hate of the 1980s,” Zia said. “The Vincent Chin movement’s founding principles are the legacy of solidarity: In 1983, we declared our commitment to equal justice for all and a stand against racism and discrimination of any kind.”

The daughter of Chinese immigrants, Zia was born in New Jersey in 1952. She attended Princeton University where she co-founded the Asian American Students Association and graduated in the first co-educational class. After two years of medical school, she left to work as a construction laborer, autoworker and community organizer until she discovered her life’s work as a journalist, writer and activist.

Zia is the author of “Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People” (2001), a seminal work chronicling critical moments in Asian American history and race relations. Her 2019 book, “Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution,” researched during her experiences as a Fulbright Scholar in China, was an NPR best book and shortlisted for a national PEN America award. Zia served as executive editor of the iconic Ms. magazine, a feminist publication, and her essays and articles have appeared in publications including The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Zia received honorary doctorates from the University of San Francisco and the City University of New York (CUNY) for bringing important matters of law and civil rights into public view. CUNY has two faculty positions named for Zia: the Helen Zia Distinguished Lecturer in Asian American Studies at Hunter College and the Helen Zia Doctoral Lecturer in Sociology. For her work in human rights, Zia was selected as one of 79 people in North America who carried the 2008 Olympic torch in San Francisco on the way to Beijing. In 2010, she testified as a witness in the federal case on marriage equality decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Asian American Distinguished Speaker Series honors innovative, creative and effective Asian American leaders and celebrates their contributions. This year’s lecture is sponsored by the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies with the Department of American Studies, the Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics and Democracy, and the Klau Institute for Civil and Human Rights.

The Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, part of Notre Dame’s Keough School of Global Affairs, promotes awareness, understanding and knowledge of Asia through administering a supplementary major and minor in Asian studies, supporting student and faculty scholarship, organizing public events, and facilitating interaction and exchanges with partners in Asia. The institute was established by a gift from the RM Liu Foundation that supports the philanthropic activities of Robert and Mimi Liu and their children, Emily and Justin, both Notre Dame graduates.

For more information, please visit asia.nd.edu.

Originally published by Jennifer Lechtanski at asia.nd.edu on March 10, 2025.