Uncle Dan’s Notes: Asian Americans and TCKs
I’m going to the reference of my own experience in this post, namely being a TCK, and being (technically) an Asian-American. Hopefully it can relate to some of your experiences.
I never thought that much about being Asian American. It had occurred to me that people didn’t take me that seriously as an American growing up, because I looked Asian, but then most of my friends weren’t exactly what they said they were either. Lots of Eurasians, who had a strange, mixed loyalty to both their birth nationalities/races. And it was perfectly fine to us, so I fit in that category, in a way.
Coming to the US was an education in itself, for all the reasons I think American TCKs are familiar with. Race is a big thing in the US, for good and ill. It’s so recognized that people define themselves by it. This holds true for Asian Americans.
Second, third and later generations of Asians in the US stick together out of a shared sense of confusion about what they should be. Older, more traditional family members, do all those lovely Asian things to the younger ones: inputting values of family loyalty, career security, and ALWAYS, some kind of musical instrument.
At the same time, they get institutionalized by the world outside, which is American culture. Independence, self-achievement and freedom of opinion are things which tend to clash. As such, Asian Americans tend to have a lot in common. They can, and sometimes do, stick together because they feel that the others know what they’re going through.
I took a class when I was in Michigan, which was probably my most interesting class ever. “Chinese Culture as portrayed through American Film.” It was fascinating. I was learning about a whole new world of the way Asians were portrayed in popular culture in the US for the last century. From Fu Manchu to Bruce Lee to Lucy Liu. Something about the portrayal was never right, but always slotted neatly into the minds of “normal” Americans. It leads to the “Lotus Blossom” idea of the purty and simplicity of Asian women, which is misleading. Not to mention the whole Femme Fatale thing of the 20’s movies, and Lucy Liu’s whole Dominatrix-Charlie’s-Angels thing.
It’s amazing Asians haven’t rebelled in the US considering all the blatant racism in the younger years, and the more subtle kinds you might still see, but that too, is part of the difference between older and younger generations.
It more or less splits into two groups. The whole thing is based on the idea of the “ideal citizen” which traditional Asians are seen to be: hardworking, unquestioning, and usually no trouble.
One side argues that this is bad, because while African-Americans and Hispanic-Americans were marching for Civil Rights in the 1960s, Asian-Americans were keeping their heads down and making no trouble: doing your laundry, washing your dishes, and smiling over a pot of rice. They think that the example of William Hung (the Asian guy who sung terribly in American Idol to earn millions of dollars for his good attitude) was disgusting, and showed that they still weren’t taken seriously.
The other side argues that they don’t get in trouble (they’re never pointed at when things go wrong the way that African-Americans and Hispanics are), and that all in all it’s not a bad thing to be model citizens. We’re happy and get on with our lives, right?
And the first side argues again that that is just being SO Asian, and accepting of the inequality that Asians get.
I remember that in this class I was encouraged to pick a side, because the young professor teaching it was interested in what we thought about it. Or at least having an opinion. And naturally, you can imagine that I really couldn’t. Up until that moment it wasn’t my battle.
How can you explain to someone that for all your life, none of that mattered? I had never even thought about it. I couldn’t come up with a good answer. NOW I can, but it’s been a long while.
The funny thing is that there were people who thought it WAS my battle. Because I am, technically, a second generation Asian-American. I just didn’t live in the US. So I was offered by the Asian fraternities to join them in their brotherhood of Asians which felt so, so weird. So naturally I didn’t join them.
Most Asian-Americans I meet these days are very Americanized. It’s not something I relate to. Interestingly though, one of the friends I made in Michigan was a Korean who had only spent his high-school years in the US, and as such was very in-between. In hindsight, I think he was influenced by so many people to call himself Asian-American, but at heart still felt different. I think that people wanted to call him Asian-American, because that’s what Asians WERE to most Americans. They were either that, or under the lovely umbrella term of “FOB”.
Which is sad, because one thing that seems consistent with a lot of Asian-Americans is that sense of rebellion, of saying “We Are Not Our Parents!” You shouldn’t really rebel based on what you’re not, but what you are. And Asian-Americans are far from figuring out what they are.
In this, I think TCKs face a similar issue. I think that instead of declaring what we’re not, we should be trying to discover just what it is that we are. Rebelling for the simple satisfaction it brings isn’t the answer. Just having the term “TCK” makes it a lot easier, but it’s a start and a stepping stone.
Let’s think outside the box.
June 1st, 2008 at 2:15 am
Can we do a TCK song?
Though Makiza does a good job:
It’s in Chilean Spanish which should provide only mild problems for you Ayako.
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June 1st, 2008 at 4:01 am
My Spanish is terrible Dan, so I won’t give myself a headache by trying to understand the lyrics! :p
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June 1st, 2008 at 5:13 am
Wow, haha, the whole Asian stereotype!! =) I’ve kinda been following your thread, Uncle Dan, without commenting just cause I was thinking about it.
Well, as was already stated, I guess being “asian” depends on where you are, so the “stereotype” changes =) Which is good in some cases…
Thing is, Asia is so huge and has so much variety that it doesn’t really matter what the stereotype is.
Anyway, it seems to me that this is a very American type of “problem” if you can call it that. From what I have observed here in Europe, people don’t acknowledge their origins as much as Americans do. For example, if someone is of, say, Irish descent, they’d go “I’m Irish” even though they’re like 3rd or 4th generation Irish-Americans.
You don’t hear that as much here in France. The French are French, even though some of them are originally from Poland, or England or whatnot. That’s not to say that France doesn’t have race-related problems, they do, but race seems less important here (just check out the French national football team…almost all of em are black!!)
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June 1st, 2008 at 8:13 am
eish, i’m jumping into this pretty late but i think this entire discussion is very interesting. the issues faced by asian americans and ignored by mainstream culture were discussed by a class of mine recently, and one girl talked about her own experiences, which included her parents chinese food store being blown up (teenagers threw dynamite in). she also talked about how public protests against things like rosie o’donnell attempting to imitate a chinese accent by saying ‘ching chong ching chong’ are often decried as making a big deal out of nothing, and that protesters are told to get over it, often by otherasian americans. i suppose this falls in with dan’s second group of opinions but i think it’s more harmful in the long run to pass off ignorance or violence as not a big deal. anyways, youtube this guy, beau sia, he has a few videos up that feature really interesting responses to mainstream cultures portrayal of asians. (sorry, cant post the links on my crappy phone)
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June 1st, 2008 at 8:53 pm
First of all, USA has had 140 years of race problems. The abolishment of racial segregation has only been around for less than a century. It took 200 years for the US to get where they are today. I would think it will take another 200 years for the people to finally see that skin color doesn’t matter.
When I first moved to the US I was very confused over the strong racial awareness in the country. People had to segregate themselves by skin color. And it irritated me to no end because 1) I never had to deal with it and 2) since when did I become so outwardly “Asian”? Being called “Asian” is like walking around naked. You feel very self-conscious.
And then I decided that I am going to take the Asian American studies class. Not to become more racially aware but to understand why Asian Americans act the way they do and why I am expected to act that way. And it helped and then I became a bit more tolerant of the “Asianness” I am expected. The only thing I can do around Asian Americans now is sigh and shake my head. I feel sorry for them and sorry for the none Asian Americans that only see them on skin level.
It doesn’t help that non Asian Americans can’t accept Asian Americans as just “Americans” but it also doesn’t help that Asian Americans are adding fuel to fire by declaring “Asianness”.
At first when I see these racial awareness months I think “Ooh that’s quite interesting, I want to learn what these different cultures are about.”
Turns out I was wrong. These so-called “awareness months” were more for those cultures to segregate themselves and show that they are just as “good” as the White Americans. To me, that’s just plain ridiculous. I always thought I should show them International Day. THAT’S true awareness. All cultures get together to share different things instead of separating themselves and only limiting to people of that particular culture.
In the end, it just takes time for people to get used to a new concept. In the end, it’s really nobody’s fault that this happened. History is to blame. Which leads me to my second issue regarding the time it takes for people to be aware.
This is off-topic but the mannerisms and behaviors in China is unbelievable. It will take many many years before people here exercise ethics, manners and politeness.
The point I am trying to make is, yes we can be sitting here discussing an issue that can irritate us to no end and we try to figure something out of something BUT one thing we need to remember is it takes TIME to change something. I am not saying that this cannot be changed, it can be but one must wait another 50 years to see it happen. In the mean time, we just need to tolerate tolerate tolerate and tolerate. That is one most important thing that no single human being can find easy to do. If we all learn to tolerate these issues wouldn’t happen, right?
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June 2nd, 2008 at 12:50 am
Let me quote Cynthia:
“Turns out I was wrong. These so-called “awareness months” were more for those cultures to segregate themselves and show that they are just as “good” as the White Americans. To me, that’s just plain ridiculous.”
I think we really need to keep this in mind when we do anything with TCKs. I think most of us knew this instinctively already but we need to consciously not make this same mistake.
I think one of our assets is that we are the ‘invisible minority’. Perhaps there are more subtle ways of empowerment than the method minority races in the US resort to?
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June 2nd, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Ayako,
I think you are raising a very important point. We may know instinctively that TCKs should not show that we are as good as or sometimes better than nonTCKs. That will only fuel division and segregation among people. As you said, I wish we could find “subtle ways of empowerment”!
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June 30th, 2008 at 7:07 am
I LIKE THIS POST ALOT BECAUSE I CAN TECHNICALLY BE CLASSIFIED AS BOTH!
yah well I am Asian Canadian but that’s really pretty much the same thing as Asian American.
So most of my friends in Canada are either fobs or Asian Americans.
Except I am not exactly the same as them. I find they are more oppressed than I am in some ways but go through way less trauma/drama than I do.
They are oppressed because they are given all the Asian ideals without even ever lived there and being able to read/write their own language. It just feels like a forced identity. And worst of all, my Asian American friends tend to go extreme. They are either the nerdy good boys and girls, or the completely messed up bad child whose parents just wanna disown them. I know the good boys and girls don’t really want to be that way, and I know the messed up kids do it to escape the forced identity. Well obviously the messed up kids go through lots of drama but to be quite honest a lot of them are self-imposed… But i don’t think it’s their fault. As for the good boys and girls, they don’t have drama, they are just traumatized inside from being so robotic.
However I have drama and trauma. The drama is obvious, the trauma…Not as much. because there’s no point of showing it to them. They have no idea how my situation could be any different with theirs.
but yah talk about what we are instead of what we aren’t…
I think everyone is just themselves, an individual, even if you are not a TCK/Asian American or anything multicultural in the tiniest sense, you are still yourself, you are just the single unit that makes up the world.
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November 17th, 2008 at 10:41 am
I revisit this post because of some recent events.
A few weeks back I went to visit my old college here in Switzerland to meet some friends. It was the time of the year that a group of American study-abroad students come, and I met some of them. I had to admit I was surprised by the number of Asian-Americans in the group. Being from Washington State, most the time they’re just white people looking to get to Europe to drink legally and travel.
So when at least 8 Asian-American girls were asking for directions to the nearest pub, I was (then, pleasantly) surprised. I feel that TCKs have generally unique experiences and bond through that shared uniqueness, and that part of what made my experience unique was having felt like an immigrant, AND a TCK at the same time. I like Europe, but I can’t help feeling a small bond at being Asian-American too. What the hell, I’m a TCK, I’m allowed to look for my shared experiences.
So I was unpleasantly surprised and, I have to admit, a bit offended, when the Korean-American girl I was talking to was insisting emphatically that no, I was not really Asian-American, because I hadn’t been there to experience what Asian-Americans had. The years I had spent there could not possibly allow me to understand their position.
… I admit to not always being ready to admit the American in me, but dammit, I should be allowed to when I want to. It’s one of my irrational desires.
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November 17th, 2008 at 10:54 am
I’ve never understood why people turn their suffering into a contest. My pain is greater than your’s because I’ve been through this–it’s like a sick Olympic game.
P.S. Understand what position?
P.S.S. I can’t believe you owned up to being American. Whoa.
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