Water Mirror Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian America
Presented by the NYU Center for Black Visual Culture. Co-sponsored by the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU.
Jeff Chang and cultural critic Bakari Kitwana discuss Chang’s new publication Water Mirror Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian America (Mariner, 2025). This conversation will be followed by a book signing, during which copies will be available for purchase.
As the best-known martial artist and one of the most celebrated action stars ever, Bruce Lee is a global icon. He symbolizes swagger, strength, and the unbeatable spirit of the underdog. But in more than fifty years since his untimely death at age thirty-two, the legend has eclipsed the real man. During his lifetime, Lee fought to be seen—from Hong Kong to Hollywood, Asian tenements to American ghettos, the lonely garret to the international screen. He emerged as a star in an era when Asian Americans were fighting against exclusion and invisibility. Now, drawing on private letters, rare documents and photos, and interviews with his closest confidants, Water Mirror Echo reveals the Bruce many never saw and places his complicated life within a revolution from which it cannot be separated: the emergence of Asian America.
Jeff Chang’s first book, Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, was called one of the best nonfiction books of the last quarter century. His latest, Water Mirror Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian America, was named one of 2025’s Best by Publisher’s Weekly, Alta, Vogue, Kirkus, and NPR. He authored the award-winning Who We Be: A Cultural History of Race in Post Civil Rights America, and We Gon’ Be Alright: Notes On Race and Resegregation. He has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, The Guardian, the San Francisco Chronicle, and many more. He is the host of the Signal award-winning podcast, Edge of Reason, and of KALW Public Media’s podcast, Notes From the Edge.
Bakari Kitwana an internationally known cultural critic, journalist, activist, and thought leader in the area of hip-hop, youth culture, and Black political engagement. Kitwana is the executive director of Rap Sessions, which for the last fourteen years has conducted over 150 townhall meetings around the nation on difficult dialogues facing the hip-hop and millennial generations. Kitwana is the author of Why White Kids Love Hip-Hop and co-editor (with David Orr, Andrew Gumbel and William Becker) of Democracy Unchained: How to Rebuild Government For the People (The New Press, 2020). His groundbreaking 2002 book The Hip-Hop Generation popularized the expression and has been adopted as a coursebook in classrooms at over 100 college and universities.
NYU campus access guidelines: This is an in-person event, open to the public. Registration is required. Non-NYU guests may be asked to present a government-issued photo ID. NYU guests must present their NYU ID.
Accessibility note: This venue has an elevator and is accessible for wheelchair users. There are single-stall, all gender restrooms and a lactation room available. If you have any access needs, please email cbvc@nyu.edu.