Asian American and dancing in Arizona: a reflection on the politics of choreographing migration and citizenship in a Red State

My thesis, Asian American and dancing in Arizona; A reflection on the politics of choreographing migration and citizenship in a Red State is a written document that reflects on my creative process of making You don’t belong here, a site-specific, multimedia dance theater piece which I conceived, choreographed, and directed in partial fulfillment of my Master in Fine Arts in Dance degree (MFA) at Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe, Arizona. I write this reflection from the corporeal perspective of my Asian body. My story comes from my cells that contain the memories of my ancestors, including the recent traumas of my parents that escaped war in China. I am writing from my feminist body, my fleshly archive. I am writing from a historically marginalized perspective. I write this reflection to provide my kinesthetic narrative for those that may not know that I exist at ASU. I consider the conservative political ethos of Arizona as an impetus to discover what it means to be Asian American and dancing in the desert.