ABSTRACT
One spring afternoon in 2010, I entered a subway car in downtown Boston on my way to the University of Massachusetts Boston campus. At the next subway stop, two White and two Asian American youths, who appeared to be around traditional college age, entered the subway car together and sat across from me. As the doors closed and the train proceeded to its next stop, the teens started joking and shortly thereafter their humor became racialized. I sat and observed as the two White youths began spouting racial jokes about their Asian American peers’ chinky eyes and inferior language speaking abilities. I observed the Asian American boys become visibly embarrassed, look seemingly ashamed, and struggle for words to respond.
