American Born Chinese

The landmark graphic novel about racial identity — Spiegelman uses animal metaphors for ethnic groups, Yang uses caricature; both make racism visible through the medium itself

Another graphic memoir of cultural displacement — Satrapi navigates Iranian-European identity as Yang navigates Chinese-American, both finding the graphic novel form essential to their argument

The foundational Chinese American identity novel — interlocking stories of mothers and daughters negotiating between Chinese heritage and American assimilation

The great American novel about racial identity and visibility — Ellison's narrator is unseen because of his race; Jin transforms himself because he is too visible

Another illustrated YA novel about navigating between two cultural worlds — Alexie's protagonist leaves the reservation for a white school, facing the same belonging/betrayal calculus as Jin

A graphic novel that uses literary allusion and structural complexity to explore identity — Bechdel's closeted self mirrors the Monkey King's hidden feet