Welcome to AAJA’s first national convention in the Motor City.
Detroit is significant in Asian American history, as a place that fights for civil rights and social justice. It’s also a place for celebration, and a little "R-E-S-P-E-C-T. The Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News – two of the nation’s top news organizations -- are eager to show you the community. So are the many television stations; radio stations; and major media bureaus that we have here.
Detroit is a hub for conventions — both the NAACP and NABJ have held national events here. Two Superbowls, and the Ryder Cup Matches, have been hosted here, too.
Detroit is an international gateway, with Canada on our border.
The city is home to Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul, and the Big Three: General Motors, Chrysler and Ford.
In the 1980s, the death of Vincent Chin, the victim of a hate crime, galvanized the Asian American community locally and nationally. Chin’s slaying at the hands of xenophobic workers sparked a movement for social justice and Asian American unity that continues today.
In 2005, the chapter remembered this with one of AAJA’s major endowment fundraisers. Journalists, including Helen Zia and Tihua Chang, recalled how they worked here to prevent this from happening elsewhere – and changed how Asian Americans are covered in the media, everywhere.
Today, Detroit has a thriving Asian American community.
As the home of the nation’s oldest and most concentrated Arab American population, a convention here could boost Arab American participation in AAJA for years to come – and be a way for attendees to cultivate sources, just before the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11.
You’ll be here to work, but you should experience the other aspects of the city, too.
August is a perfect time for you to ride the People Mover to the ballpark to hear the Tigers roar.
If art is more your thing, you can walk through the new Arab American National Museum. It is the first museum in the world devoted to Arab American culture. And there’s the recently renovated Detroit Institute of Arts, the nation’s fifth largest art museum.
If you’re a music fan, stepping back into time is as easy as "1-2-3." You can hear the legends of Hitsville, U.S.A, including Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder and Diana Ross, at the Motown Historical Museum.
You can also spend hours at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, the world's largest institution dedicated to the African American experience.
If you love cars, 
you can visit The Henry Ford, an attraction filled with automotive history, including the actual bus that Rosa Parks rode.
And if you’re the type who gets so busy that you don’t have time to leave the hotel, don’t despair. We have the three casino hotels, two of which recently opened; and a hotel in the Renaissance Center, GM’s world headquarters. It is filled with shops, elegant restaurants and a movie theater.
Whatever your interest is – journalism, culture or cars – we’ve got something to fuel it.
