"What are you?" - guy
"Um...a person?" - me
Seriously, some guy at a dinner here once asked me that. I think he was just socially challenged and what he actually meant to ask was: "what is your major?" or "are you a grad student or working professional?"
But, it's an interesting question, especially applied to ethnic identity.
I'm Chinese. I'm also American.
So, I'm Chinese American. Asian American. (What does that even mean? A politicized term that only recently came into being...but more on that later.)
A "banana"—yellow on the outside, white on the inside?
No. Just as I used to dislike people calling me "Hana Banana" in grade school, I started to dislike that racial term. It's too simplistic.
I've always felt like I never fit in. Too geeky for the "cool" Asians. Too Americanized for the FOBs. Too Chinese for the Caucasian children. The closest thing I can define myself racially is ABC: American-born Chinese.
I'm not white inside. I'm just me, informed by both cultural influences, the percentage depending on how much I accept from my parents and how much I accept from American society. There are plenty of Chinese and Asian people who act more "American" than me. There are also plenty of Caucasians who may act more "Asian" than others.
What does it even mean to be white? What does it mean to be yellow? Or, to be more PC, Caucasian and Asian?
I had this conversation with my friend recently (who made fun of me for saying "Caucasian" all the time instead of "white", because I was being "too P.C." Any thoughts on that? Do you agree with him? Actually, I used to say "African American" until 5th grade, until another guy pointed out that I was weird. Sigh.)
Well, the rest of us probably can rattle off the generalizations:
Asian: collectivist, communist, more conservative, cheap, filial, beat around the bush/subtle, passive, shy/quiet, polite, values education.
White: individualist, democratic, more liberal, big spenders, rebellious, open, direct, active, outgoing, boisterous, friendly, values entrepreneurship and social skills.
Then again, I'm Chinese—maybe I'm even generalizing Asian cultures by extrapolating from my Chinese stereotypes?
What do you guys think? Did I answer his question correctly?
In future posts I'll deal with specific attributes and cases, but for now I just want to see if I represented my ethnicity well—or not. But you know, stereotypes are around for a reason!
I've also noticed that I've never had many Caucasian friends. Not because I'm racist, but just because it's what I was used to, growing up in one the U.S.'s areas of the largest Chinese concentration. Interestingly, the closest Caucasian friend I have is pretty much like me: conservative, Catholic (more so than me), and a sensitive writerly type. (but she has a great sarcastic sense of humor that I could learn a little bit more from!)
1 comment:
This is a great relection on cultural identity in today's complex world. I learned a lot about the writer through the question and answer style of the entry. The reader of this article starts to think about what 'categories' have been fabricated to define individuals who are in fact individual, and the final result is a recognition of how everyone is affected.
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