Some facts on Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month

(Crossposted from The Gypsy Librarian)

May is Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month, so a happy month to our Asian/Pacific American friends. It has been a national celebration since 1977.

I can always count on the Census Bureau to have one of their timely fact sheets. They have one for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. Some facts from that sheet, applicable to Asians. The Census also has separate numbers for Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders.

• 14.0 million
  The estimated number of U.S. residents in July 2004 who said they were Asian or Asian in combination with one or more other races. This group comprised 5 percent of the total population.
• 49%
  The percentage of Asians, age 25 and older, who have a bachelor’s degree or higher level of education. Asians have the highest proportion of college graduates of any race or ethnic group in the country.
• 2.3 million
  The number of people age 5 and older who speak Chinese at home. After Spanish, Chinese is the most widely spoken non-English language in the country. Tagalog and Vietnamese also have more than 1 million speakers.
• 282,000
  The number of Asian-American military veterans.

Infoplease has a pretty good summary of information on the month, including its history here. There are various links here that may be of interest.

The Asian Pacific American Heritage Association is the primary organization associated with the event.

The National Park Service has a listing of properties and places "listed in the National Register and the National Park Units highlighting important aspects of the Asian and Pacific experience in America" (from the website).

You can read the Presidential Proclamation for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month.

And here are some other links from the Librarian's Internet Index which may be of interest.

Oh, and a small addition for readers: some reading lists here, here, and here.