Malaysian Americans

Americans of Malaysian birth or descent

Malaysian Americans are Americans of Malaysian ancestry. Rather than a single ethnic group, Malaysian Americans descend from a variety of ethnic groups that inhabit the Southeast Asian country of Malaysia, all of which speak different languages and profess different cultures and beliefs, including Malay, Chinese and Tamil, as Malaysian is primarily a national identification. According to answers provided to an open ended question included in the 2019 US Census, 38,227 people said that their ancestry or ethnic origin was Malaysian.

The Malaysia Association of America, based in the area of the Chinatown, Flushing in New York City, was credited by the Consul General of Malaysia in New York for getting the New York State Assembly to declare August 31, 2008, to be "Malaysian American Day". In 2018, Jocelyn Yow, at the age of 23, became the first Malaysian American to be elected to public office in the United States. She is currently serving as the Mayor Pro Tem for the City of Eastvale in Riverside County, California.

The Malaysian Islamic Study Group (MISG) was founded in Peoria, Illinois in 1976 with the main objective to assist the Malaysian students in walking the path of success while they are in America/Canada, fulfilling their responsibilities as students, as members of their communities and as servants of Allah. After more than 30 years of its establishment, MISG has a sizeable number of members in almost each university in America which has Malaysian students. In relation to all the other Islamic organizations in America, MISG is viewed as a foreigners based Muslim student group that emerged from the Islamic Society of North America. Despite claims that MISG's founding was influenced by the ideology of Abul Ala Maududi, no evidence indicates such opinions. MISG is by and large an independent organization without binding allegiances to any other organizations.