Story highlights A casting director's insight into casting Asian actors in Hollywood is stirring backlash

Twitter is firing back with a new hashtag to raise awareness

(CNN) Social media is not happy about a quote regarding Asian-American actors not being expressive enough.

At the heart of the controversy is a story told by Nancy Wang Yuen, sociologist and author of the book "Reel Inequality: Hollywood Actors and Racism."

In the book, published last year, Yuen quoted an unnamed casting director who provided an explanation behind the challenges of casting Asian actors.

"Asians are a challenge to cast because most casting directors feel as though they're not very expressive," the casting director said. "They're very shut down in their emotions."

The quote showed up in an article published last week by Paste magazine pegged to the lack of choice roles for Asian actors in Hollywood.