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Celebrate Amazingness!

Ice dancers Maia and Alex Shibutani wrote a book celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islanders.

A young woman and a young man smile and hold up two Olympic medals each.

© Maia and Alex Shibutani

Maia and Alex Shibutani are Olympic medalists and authors!

Maia and Alex Shibutani are amazing. The sister and brother won bronze medals in ice dancing at the 2018 Olympics. And now, they’ve written a book about other amazing people. It’s called Amazing: Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Who Inspire Us All.

The picture book tells the stories of 36 Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders who have done great things. (Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have ancestors from Asia or the islands in the Pacific Ocean. This includes more than 75 countries.)

Red book cover with the words Amazing: Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Who Inspire Us All and illustrations of seven people.

© Penguin Random House

Maia and Alex Shibutani’s new book features 36 Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

Some of the people in the book are athletes like Maia and Alex. Others are artists, actors, or scientists. And others worked to change U.S. laws that were unfair to Asian Americans or Pacific Islanders. Maia and Alex had a lot of people to choose from. They couldn’t fit everyone into one book, so they picked some of their favorites.

“Hopefully this will just be a wonderful introduction…to the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities,” Maia told CBS Mornings.

Why did Maia and Alex decide to write a book? Maia and Alex are Asian American—their family was originally from Japan. They didn’t see many Asian Americans in the books they read while they were growing up. There weren’t very many Pacific Islanders either. Maia and Alex hope that their new book will show kids that Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have made great contributions to the United States and the world.

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Fun Fact

Two Kudo Kids book covers featuring two kids against a background.

© Penguin Random House, Background: © Bakhtiar Zein/Dreamstime.com

Amazing isn’t the first book written by Maia and Alex Shibutani. The Shibutanis are the authors of a series of fiction books called Kudo Kids. The books are about siblings who solve mysteries together.

Greats From All Walks of Life

Maia and Alex Shibutani wrote a book about amazing Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Here are just a few of the people in their book.

A woman smiles in a spacesuit next to an American flag.

NASA

Kalpana Chawla was an astronaut for NASA, the U.S. space agency. Chawla was the first woman born in India to travel into space.

Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images Entertainment

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is one of the biggest movie stars in the world. Before he became an actor, Johnson was a wrestler. His mother’s family was originally from the Pacific island nation of Samoa.

A man wearing a suit poses in front of an American flag and two other flags.

Office of U.S. Senator Daniel K. Inouy

Daniel Inouye was a U.S. senator (a person who helps make U.S. laws). Inouye, whose family came from Japan, grew up in Hawaii. As a young man, he was injured in World War II and had to have his right arm removed. While in the Senate, he worked hard to protect the rights of people with disabilities and many others.

Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month

Portraits of people who have AAPI heritage flash on and off the screen.

© LeoPatrizi—E+/Getty Images, © Ashwin Kharidehal Abhirama, Xin Hua, Belnieman, Goncaloferreira, Wong Sze Yuen, Godsandkings, Imtmphoto, Mr. Namart Pieamsuwan/Dreamstime.com; Animation Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage (AAPI) Month in the U.S. You can learn more about this special month, and about some people who are celebrated in May, at Britannica School.

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Word of the Day

community

Part of speech:

noun

Definition:

 : a group of people who have the same interests, religion, race, etc.

Definitions provided by
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