Annie Nguyen started her undergraduate research to meet a requirement of the Campuswide Honors Program. She found a topic about which she was truly curious and approached Professor Wu about conducting a project under her guidance. Through her research, Annie found an intersection between academic analysis and popular media and was able to apply that to a subject relevant in current popular culture. This experience gave her the opportunity to approach a topic that relates to her personal experiences and explore it in a professional way. While at UC Irvine, Annie participated in student government and held an internship at the Public Defender’s office. After graduation, she hopes to attend law school.

Having celebrated its fifth season in 2019, “Fresh Off the Boat” is the first American television series featuring a predominantly Asian cast to have achieved such longstanding success. Through an exploration of genre and humor, I study how “Fresh Off the Boat” works to represent an Asian American family on the small screen. In a study of the series’ journey to production, I identify how “Fresh Off the Boat” relies heavily on the racial makeup of its audience. I argue that this consideration influences the type of Asian American narrative represented. The narrative thus becomes one which capitalizes on the experience of outsiderness as humorous. At the same time, the series claims outsiderness as an utterly American (and universal) sentiment. This perpetual outsiderness the characters of “Fresh Off the Boat” experience is how the series humanizes and makes relatable its Asian American subjects to a predominantly non-Asian audience. In close readings of particular scenes and characters from the series, I analyze how this outsider syndrome is a limited representation of the Asian American experience and identity. Through an analysis of the series’ origin and then the series itself, I argue that “Fresh Off the Boat” attempts to reposition Asian Americans to fit into mainstream television through the genre of the sitcom and the role of humor.

Judy Tzu-Chun Wu School of Humanities

It was a pleasure to mentor Annie Nguyen, whose essay offers a rich analysis about racial humor in the successful Asian American sitcom “Fresh Off the Boat.” Like all works of knowledge creation, Annie worked to understand what she wanted to research and argue. It can be a confusing process that raises doubts about oneself and one’s project. I am proud of Annie for persevering to discover her voice and analysis. Like Annie, I too completed an undergraduate thesis, and I, too, struggled to figure out what I wanted to say. I think this process is so important for transforming into a knowledge creator. I hope all UCI students will undertake research to discover aspects of their own capabilities and to help us understand the world around us in new ways.