University of Saint Joseph Professor Authors Book on Anti-Asian Racism

Joseph Cheah, a professor of religious studies and theology at the University of Saint Joseph in West Hartford, has recently published a book on anti-Asian racism.

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Father Joseph Cheah, OSM, Ph.D. and professor of religious studies and theology at the University of Saint Joseph (USJ) had his newest book, “Anti-Asian Racism: Myths, Stereotypes, and Catholic Social Teachings,” recently published by Orbis Books.

Father Cheah’s area of research and teaching at USJ is in the field of Asian American religions and race, and Asian American theology. His newest book is an analysis of anti-Asian racism, told from a Catholic and Catholic Social Teaching (CST) perspective and draws from his research, involvement in the AAPI communities, and USJ curriculum and classes.

At USJ, Father Cheah’s classes on Religion and Race, and Mercy Integrative Seminar explore the Sisters of Mercy’s Critical Concern of anti-racism, including anti-Asian racism, racial justice, Jesus’ unpalatable directive of loving our enemies and other Catholic social values. His teaching focuses on the Mercy Values of compassion, hospitality, and respect, as well as Catholic Social Teaching.

“Anti-Asian Racism: Myths, Stereotypes, and Catholic Social Teachings” challenges the politics of exclusion of AAPI in the Church’s documents on racism by examining the pervasive and destructive stereotypes that are part and parcel to the Asian American experience, namely, perpetual foreigner, Yellow Peril, and the myth of the model minority.

Father Cheah is also the author of “Race and Religion in American Buddhism: White Supremacy and Immigrant Adaptation, Theological Reflections on ‘Gangnam Style’: A Racial, Sexual and Cultural Critique” and co-editor of the Palgrave Macmillan series “Asian Christianity in the Diaspora.” He  is a recipient of two awards from the State of Connecticut for his work with Asian American and Pacific  Islander communities and is also a co-sponsor of an orphanage in Kyauktan, Myanmar (Burma).

“Anti-Asian Racism: Myths, Stereotypes, and Catholic Social Teachings” is available at