1
“Asian American Youth and the Cyber Café Obsession”
Linda Trinh Võ and Mary Yu Danico
Contact Person:
Linda Trinh Vo, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of Asian American Studies
University of California, Irvine
Irvine, CA 92697-6900
(949) 824-3003
(949) 824-3885 (fax)
E-mail: ## email not listed ##
Office: 339 Murray Krieger Hall
www.humanities.uci.edu/aas
INTRODUCTION
In urbanized suburbs where there are limited alternative recreational spaces or
activities for youth, cyber cafés are attracting elementary to college age Asian American
youths. While “PC rooms,” “PC Bangs,” “Internet Cafés” and “Cyber Cafés” are
surfacing across the country, Southern California has the nation’s largest cluster of these
cafés. Located in mini malls or strip malls, they have become the fastest-growing
businesses in Asian ethnic enclaves, particularly Korean, Vietnamese, and Chinese ones.
These sites have become a social gathering place where youth, using the latest in
interactive networking technology, can compete in computer games with individuals next
to them or in another café. In these spaces, hip-hop music is playing on the stereo while
youths with earphones play on videogames in rows of state of the art computers.
In this chapter, we discuss the development of the cyber café culture in ethnic
communities and analyze its attraction for Asian American youth. This research is part of
a larger study of Asian American youths in Orange County, particularly at-risk youth and
Asian American youth culture. Our research is based on secondary resources;