NOW Live from the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center

The Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program welcomes Dr. Konrad Ng as Acting Director. Dr. Ng, the Program’s scholar-in-residence in Fall 2009, is well-acquainted with — and already much appreciated throughout — the Smithsonian Institution. He is a professor of creative media at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa and a scholar of Asian American cinema and digital media with a decade-long history of working in Asian and Asian American cultural institutions, programs, and organizations.

Message from the Acting Director:

Dear Friends,

I am grateful for the opportunity to serve as Acting Director of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American (APA) Program. As we know, the APA Program is vital to the mission of the Smithsonian and plays an important role in telling the American story. I am absolutely committed to strengthening the program and celebrating the APA experience during my tenure.

I thank Dr. Richard Kurin, the Smithsonian’s Under Secretary for History, Art, and Culture, for overseeing the APA Program over the past several months. Though Dr. Kurin supervises some 19 museums and programs as well as a number of the Smithsonian’s major initiatives, he still found time to be a champion of the APA Program within the Smithsonian’s senior leadership.

Since my appointment, I have learned that the caliber of the APA Program is incumbent upon the commitment and generosity of people who believe in the Program’s importance and can envision its possibilities. As you will discover in our monthly newsletter, we have a number of terrific events and projects scheduled for the summer. I invite you to attend these events — there is no doubt that you will have fun — but there is an additional invitation that I must extend: Please join me in supporting our valuable APA Program; its future is up to us.

Yours,

Konrad Ng