Contributor
Oakland, CA
Yvonne Yen Liu is a senior researcher at the Applied Research Center, a racial justice think and action tank, which publishes Colorlines.com. In addition to contributing regularly to Colorlines.com, Yvonne has been published in Yes Magazine, In These Times, and Alternet. She serves on the board of SmartMeme and the advisory committee for the Food Chain Workers Alliance.
Yvonne has a BA in cultural anthropology from Columbia University and a MA degree in sociology from the CUNY Graduate Center, where she pursued a PhD.
Yvonne considers herself part of the post-Seattle generation, global justice activists both influenced and critical of the anti-WTO mobilizations. She cofounded NYC Summer, a youth of color organizing school, and served on the boards of WBAI 99.5 FM and Seven Stories Institute.
A native New Yorker, Yvonne is now based out of Oakland, California. Her family lives in Shanghai, China.
Follow Yvonne at @yvonnegraphy.
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Got a Hustle to Pay Rent While Jobless? You’re Part of a $1T Economy
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 4 2011, 9:54AM
Neither the public nor private sector is doing much to create jobs, and those that are popping up aren’t very good ones. So a lot of folks are taking matters into their own hands.
Topics: Economy, Jobs Crisis
Latina Activist Betita Martinez’s Wisdom for Young Organizers
by Yvonne Yen Liu on October 20 2011, 9:57AM
A trailblazing activist, Betita Martinez reflects on everything from motherhood to Occupy Wall Street.
Topics: Politics
Bay Area Residents Work to Turn Health Inequities Into a Solar Mosaic
by Yvonne Yen Liu on October 17 2011, 10:15AM
A new program in Oakland breaks away from the corporate bandwagon of going green to bring solar power to low-income residents.
Topics: Environment
Of Mice and Medicine: How Investing in Medicaid will Create Jobs
by Yvonne Yen Liu on September 13 2011, 8:50AM
A new report by the Commonwealth Fund highlights the dangers lawmakers face when they approach health care policy without the bigger picture in mind.
Topics: Health
Vermont Breaks Ground in Health Coverage for Migrant Workers
by Yvonne Yen Liu on June 10 2011, 9:49AM
The state’s historic new universal health care system will cover the undocumented workers who toil in dangerous isolation to keep Vermont’s farms in business.
Topics: Health, Immigration
Will 2012 Become Labor’s Moment of Political Truth?
by Yvonne Yen Liu on May 27 2011, 9:09AM
Let’s hope so. Because workers of color have rarely been in more dire need of a true political voice.
NAACP Report: Some Gulf Coast Oil Spill Toxins Are Harder to See
by Yvonne Yen Liu on April 20 2011, 6:08PM
From rising unemployment to domestic violence and depression, communities of color are still being hit hardest one year after the disaster.
Topics: Environment
by Yvonne Yen Liu on February 17 2011, 9:46AM
A new study from Colorlines’ publisher, the Applied Research Center, reveals deep inequity in the food system.
Topics: Economy, How We Eat
Congress Drops the Ball on Welfare Reform—Again
by Yvonne Yen Liu on December 2 2010, 11:40AM
Congress had a chance to continue a program that created 250,000 jobs and help single moms out of poverty. They blew it.
Topics:
The Physical and Emotional Costs of Long-Term Unemployment
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 17 2010, 3:43PM
Studies show this crisis isn’t just about money any more.
Topics: Economy, Health, Jobs Crisis
We’re Still Waiting On Those Green Jobs
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 11 2010, 11:57AM
We can’t train people for green jobs that don’t exist. Let’s instead look at solutions.
Topics: Jobs Crisis
The Insurance Industry’s Stealth Attack on Health Reform
by Yvonne Yen Liu on July 16 2010, 11:08AM
Why you should care about “Medical Loss Ratio.” No, really.
Topics: Health
Tesla Revives NUMMI Plant, But Will Workers of Color Benefit?
by Yvonne Yen Liu on May 21 2010, 8:59PM
California’s only auto plant will reopen, this time producing electric cars. Tesla Motors announced yesterday that they purchased the shuttered NUMMI factory in Fremont, California with a $50 million investment from Toyota. Advocates for a green economy see this as…
Topics:
Who is New SEIU President Mary Kay Henry?
by Yvonne Yen Liu on May 14 2010, 10:26AM
Mary Kay Henry has been appointed the new president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the fastest-growing union, and the one representing janitors, homecare workers, and security guards—a huge number of whom are people of color. Her predecessor Andy…
Topics: Immigration
by Yvonne Yen Liu on April 13 2010, 12:00PM
Workers nationwide are getting the skills to join a new green economy. Problem is, it doesn’t exist. How Reagan’s job-training ghost haunts our response to unemployment.
Topics:
Coal Mining Curbed on the Black Mesa, Paving Way for Navajo Green Economy
by Yvonne Yen Liu on January 13 2010, 9:33AM
The indigenous environmental justice movement celebrated a victory last Friday when a judge ruled that Peabody Energy cannot expand its coal mining operations on the Black Mesa in northern Arizona. Former president Bush Jr. approved a permit for Peabody in…
Topics: Environment
Tiger Woods Likes White Women, So What?
by Yvonne Yen Liu on December 14 2009, 3:20PM
Say it. Tiger Woods has a thing for white women. That’s the unspoken message haunting photos documenting Tiger Woods’ fall from grace: a series of white women, some blonde, others brunette, but all clearly racialized as white. It is…
Topics: Media
Kids Reenacting First Thanksgiving with Smallpox Blankets
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 25 2009, 11:08AM
Kids say the darnedest things. Especially when they voice social truths about history. Here, kids reenact the First Thanksgiving, how it really went down. The white settlers greet the American Indians as “savages”, greedily eat the food, strong-arm the…
Topics: History
Got Green? Mobilizing Women and People of Color to Seize the Green Promise
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 13 2009, 7:42PM
This piece originally appeared at In These Times. “Green jobs” has become the latest buzz-word, with stimulus monies pouring into green job creation programs around the country. There is a window of opportunity to ensure equity, transparency, and accountability in…
Topics:
Is Sammy Sosa bleaching his skin white?
by Yvonne Yen Liu on November 9 2009, 12:20AM
This question has making the rounds on blogs and Facebook this weekend: is Sosa bleaching his skin white? A recent photo released of him reveals a starkly lighter-skinned Sosa with his wife at a glamourous black tie affair in…
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