Asian American attorney launches anthology to document AAPI legal trailblazers

A senior associate at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in Los Angeles is building a first-person record of Asian American legal achievement, launching a project that aims to document gaps in leadership across the profession.

Kelly Hope Yin, an internet litigator for clients including TikTok, ByteDance, Hulu and Disney, launched Breaking Bamboo Boxes in January 2025 with a goal of publishing in 2027. As her practice grew, she said she watched colleagues leave large law firms or the profession altogether, prompting her to create the site.

"Many of my friends are quitting. The naivete melts away and you realize: big law is really hard. It's not kind to many people," she said.

The volunteer-run project features first-person narratives from AAPI legal leaders, including a judge on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and a former general counsel of Bristol Myers Squibb.

Yin said that Asian Americans remain underrepresented in large law firms.

"Not everyone's trying to make equity partner... But Asian people are facing a unique box," she said. "Justice Goodwin Liu of the California Supreme Court and a group of Yale law students published a study called the Portrait Project back in 2017. It opened this inquiry: what is actually going on?"

Inspired by that 2017 attrition study, Yin said the effort carries urgency as earlier generations age.

"The purpose is not to divide us from the rest of the world, but to amplify individual voices within the community," she said.

She described the initiative as a speech-based response to underrepresentation.

Breaking Bamboo Boxes accepts submissions through breakingbambooboxes.com.