Heathens: Chinese Religion and American Exclusion
Summary
Under the backdrop of our nation’s 250th anniversary, Our Seven Neighbors, season 5, explores the long, contested history of religious diversity in the United States—not as a feel-good celebration of pluralism, but as a hard-won achievement forged through conflict, exclusion, resistance, and moral struggle. Episode 6 features host Reza Aslan in conversation with Dr. Jonathan Lee.
Meet The Guest
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Jonathan H. X. Lee
Jonathan H. X. Lee, Ph.D., is a professor at San Francisco State University who specializes in history, religious studies, Asian studies, and China studies. His family survived the Cambodian genocide and arrived in the United States in 1981, when he was five years old. He identifies as Chinese-Vietnamese-Cambodian American. He received his doctorate in Religious Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara, in 2009 and has since published several books, along with numerous articles and essays, on Asian and Asian American histories, folklore, cultures, and religions. His publications include Asian Americans and the Law: History Through Primary Sources (2027); Southeast Asian Americans: A Social and Historical Introduction (2026); and many others. His scholarship focuses on Chinese, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Chinese–Southeast Asian, and broader Asian American histories and religions. He is frequently interviewed by news publications such as ABC News, Axios, History.com, National Public Radio, National Geographic, The New Yorker, The New York Times, Vice, and many other local, national, and global media outlets. In 2026, he launched a Substack where he explores insights in higher education, with a focus on the impact of artificial intelligence and generative AI.
Straight White American Jesus
The flagship show examining Christian nationalism and democracy.
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