Teri Hu
MA Education in Language and Literacy
UC Berkeley, May 1999
Continued...
Molding Minorities:
Asian American Youth Respond to Images in Popular Culture and Literature
Stella and Kelly
Although I am very aware that identical twins, although they look alike, are unique individuals, I’d like to discuss Stella and Kelly’s stories together because their experiences are inextricably intertwined. While that may seem obvious, it is actually more complicated than you might think. Even though they are twins, they were not raised together, as their parents were unable to support both girls at their birth and the younger twin, Stella, was born underweight and needed medical attention. Kelly, the older and healthier of the babies, was sent to live with their paternal grandparents in another province. Because she required more intensive care, Stella remained with her parents and maternal grandparents in Tianjin, a city near Beijing. They did not live together until they were twelve years old, although they did visit each other several times a year, usually for the holidays. They have no other siblings. Their father is an engineer, which allowed them to enjoy a rather comfortable lifestyle by Chinese standards. In fact, Stella says their standard of living in the U.S. is much lower than it was in China, where they had servants and a large house and yard. Here, they live in a two bedroom apartment.
I spoke with Stella mostly during lunch since she was in the habit of eating in my classroom, we would talk whenever there was no one else in the room. We never had a formal interview, as such. With Kelly, we actually scheduled an interview after school, and focused more strongly on her post high-school plans. It is interesting to note their differences, which can be easily overlooked given their physical similarities, as both girls are very attractive young women, with bright intelligent eyes and charming smiles. The only way to tell them apart by appearance is that Kelly has longer hair and prefers to wear it down while Stella’s hair is bobbed shorter and often in a ponytail. In some ways, this minor difference epitomizes their personality differences, as Kelly is the stronger student of the two, and has a certain cool poise that Stella lacks. However, Stella has the warmer personality between them, and seems more comfortable taking conversational risks. She is also much more open in terms of discussing her hopes and dreams for the future, often punctuating her remarks with hand gestures while Kelly maintains a certain elegant reserve at all times.
These differences could easily be attributed to their childhood environments, as Kelly’s separation from her parents may have caused her to develop a more distant demeanor in response to feelings of abandonment. On the same note, Stella’s effusiveness may be rooted in her security at having closer relationships to her parents than her sister. It is interesting to note that the girls do not move in the same social circles at school. Kelly’s friends tend to be the more recent immigrants while Stella associates with many assimilated Chinese. Both are surprisingly bold participants in classroom discussions, and both of them have a strong command of spoken English despite some self-consciousness about their accents. In this, they are quite good at shattering the stereotype of Asian women as silently submissive, even if their academic prowess and motivation would appear to mark them as stereotypical model minorities.
The girls came to the US only two years ago, at the age of 16. They spent their sophomore year at Kennedy High School, in the ESL program. Although they were not mainstreamed, they chose to come to Mission for their last two years of high school and have done quite well academically despite the language barrier. Even though their grades are high, their test scores prevent them from applying to four year colleges. Stella still has not passed the district writing competency test and is becoming increasingly anxious about her ability to graduate. Both girls plan to attend the local junior college, Ohlone, which is just a few blocks from their home. In fact, they are already attending Ohlone, taking night courses in English to enhance their language skills.
Apparently, they have no trouble attracting the junior college boys, but both girls are hesitant to establish any serious romantic relationship. They say their number one priority at this time is to get an education, that marriage and family can wait, although Stella joked that she would need to settle down before the age of 30 or else no one would want her. Their parents discourage romantic inclinations as well, forcing one girl to accompany the other on dates as chaperones.
Both girls say they would like to major in business and become successful entrepreneurs. Kelly has decided that she would never return to China to live, that there is nothing left there for her. Her desire to remain in the U.S. is strange given the definition she gave for Asian American: “Asian American means a person technically called American but can never be part of America.” Stella speculated that she would like to take her American education back to China and use her bicultural knowledge to open trade between the China and the U.S. She was adamant, however, that her children would be raised as Americans, even though she did not feel she would ever fully understand this country. This is especially interesting given her understanding of what an Asian American is: “It means people that are really “messed up” because they have both Chinese and American cultural background.”
Kelly cites the Chinese folk heroine, Mulan, as her fictional and literary role model; and the actor Brad Pitt, as well as a couple of handsome Chinese popstar actors, Jet Li and Andy Lau, for movie and television models. She did not list a real life role model. All of the figures she mentions, except Brad Pitt, are Chinese. Stella, on the other hand, says her dad is her role model in real life; cites the Great Gatsby as a literary influence; Superman as the fictional character with whom she identifies; a Chinese actress, Gong Li, as a television role model; and Brad Pitt as a movie idol. It is interesting to note that both girls cite Brad Pitt as a movie role model…and while it’s possible that they do aspire to be like Brad Pitt, I suspect it has more to do with his boyish good looks than any desire on their part to emulate his lifestyle. Perhaps they watched a Brad Pitt movie just before completing the surveys.
I was also intrigued by their mentioning Chinese celebrities in addition to American pop culture icons. Because the girls spent the greater part of their youth in China, they were exposed to battalions of Chinese actors, musicians, comics, and other media images that American teens never see. For Kelly and Stella, coming to America and not seeing Asian faces on television, not reading about Asian characters in books, not hearing Asian voices on the radio is alien. They did not need to search the pages of celebrity magazines for a glimpse of a face that looked like theirs because their environment was full of these faces. They’ve already been exposed to positive images of Asians before they arrived in the U.S., adding American cultural influences only enhances their existing identities.
It is interesting to compare their lists of role models to Art’s, as his is conspicuously devoid of Asians. I would tend to think that is related to his sexual orientation and the treatment homosexuals receive in the Chinese media. Kelly and Stella, as attractive heterosexual females, are not subject to the same marginalization.
Howard
I met with Howard on a Saturday, for lunch at a Shanghai café in the Warm Springs area south of town. This was the only interview that did not take place in my classroom; it turned out to be the longest one conducted in a single sitting as well. He showed up right on time, with his trademark white baseball cap and a stylish nylon pullover on top of baggy jeans. Contrary to the stereotype of an academically successful Asian male, Howard is definitely not a nerd.
Howard was the youngest immigrant of my subjects, having come from Taiwan to the U.S. with his parents when he was only two. This would tend to make him the most assimilated of my subjects, which might have something to do with the fact that he is the only one who will attend a four-year university in the fall. His family moved around for a few years before settling in Fremont when he was nine, and Howard remembers living in Seattle, Colorado and Ontario. He says both of his parents are overeducated for their jobs, and recognizes the language barriers that have hindered their ability to work in their chosen fields. He is very aware of their sacrifices, how hard they work to support him and his older sister, and to provide them with the opportunities they have enjoyed. Howard also expressed that he feels a deep need to take care of them when he is older. This is typical of sons in Chinese culture, they are raised to assume the responsibility of caring for their parents even if there are other, older female siblings who are available.
Although he has been accepted to, and would like to attend, U.C. Santa Cruz, his parents are reluctant to allow it because UCSC offers an unconventional program that does not encourage traditional letter grades. It is also not as prestigious an institution as Berkeley or UCLA, and does not carry the name recognition that is so appealing to many Asian parents. They are pushing him to go to San Jose State University as a matter of practicality, which he is resisting because he does not want to go to a re-entry, commuter school. Howard is eager to experience college life as he envisions it: dormitory friendships, all-night philosophical discussions, group study sessions in local cafes. His goals and his parents’ goals for him seem to be diverging at this point, and he feels some resentment and frustration that they are not able to see the validity of his desires on this issue.
I suspect that the cost differences between UCSC and SJSU may also be relevant, but did not feel comfortable asking Howard about that. If he goes to SJSU, he could commute from home, thus saving their family on housing and food costs, not to mention the serious difference in academic fees. His older sister currently attends a community college, but will be transferring to a four-year institution in the fall, so the family’s college costs are going to take a big leap in September. This combination of familial expectations, filial piety, and financial responsibility may push Howard into accommodating his parents’ wishes over his own. While this may be admirable on one hand, it is also a sad sacrifice of a young man’s dream. Such difficult decisions are an inevitable part of the immigrant experience.
Howard teaches a Chinese yo-yo class for elementary age children at the local Chinese school on Saturday mornings, where his father is one of the principals. My sister and son attend the same Chinese school so I’ve seen him in action, helping the kids balance the yo-yo on the string, retrieving runaway yo-yos, encouraging beginning students. The job suits him well, in that he is a playful, fun, energetic guy who gets along well with most people, and he seems to enjoy being with his students. He is one of the few Asian students in my four senior English classes who is comfortable being the center of attention, and is able to carry off a joke in class. He generally has a happily bemused, slightly impish look on his face, so it is particularly striking when he becomes serious, his face seems to harden, the crinkly laugh lines smooth out and he becomes…well…inscrutable. This makes me wonder just how much of the cheerful joking around is a mask, put on during school hours to protect him from the painful realities of being an teenage Asian male in America.
The night before our interview, Howard saw The Corruptor, a cop movie about organized crime in New York’s Chinatown starring Chow Yun-Fat, a Hong Kong actor who has recently caused a sensation in Hollywood. He said he liked the movie, but was angry that Chow’s character died in the end. Howard does admit to feeling more of an affinity towards Asian celebrities, describing it as “a sense of closeness.” We talked a bit about why Chow and Jackie Chan have recently become big Hollywood stars when Asian American actors such as Russell Wong or B. D. Wong still have to struggle for recognition despite critical raves. When I suggested that mainstream Americans were still not comfortable seeing Asians who seemed too American, that we’re still seen as foreigners by most people in this country and the success of our media stars reflect this bias, he readily agreed, adding that many students at our school also seemed to feel this way. His playful demeanor became noticeably subdued when the conversation took this direction, and it was interesting to see that he was much more focused on what was said during this part of the conversation than when we discussed other things, such as his family background. The topic of prejudice against Asian Americans definitely seemed to strike a chord within Howard.
He is an officer of Asian Outreach, the student cultural association at Mission, so he is more aware of Asian cultural issues than many other Asian students. However, his definition of an Asian American was the most optimistic and most unabashedly American of all my subjects; he considers them “Asians who live in America and demonstrate American values.” We also talked about the film version of The Joy Luck Club, and how the Chinese husbands were depicted even more unfavorably than they were in the book. I asked him how he felt about the seeming acceptance of Asian females by mainstream society compared to males, and whether or not this affected the way Asian girls saw Asian guys as romantic partners. Howard has not yet had a girlfriend, at the age of eighteen, and seemed to become slightly uncomfortable when the conversation took this turn, so I did not pursue it further. His discomfort indicates just how volatile this issue can be, however, and I suspect that if he had not known my partner was white, he may have been more forthcoming with opinions on this issue.3
Howard adamantly denied being able to identify any role models in the media, but named his parents and other real life role models readily. This would indicate that he feels dissociated from the available Asian celebrity role models even though he identifies with them on some level, perhaps because there are so few that reflect elements of his own personal experience. That is, the Asian celebrities that appear in American cultural offerings tend to be from Asia, they are not Asian Americans. Howard, having grown up in the States, cannot fully connect to a foreign celebrity even if they share a cultural heritage. In this he is noticeably different from Kelly and Stella, who do identify with Asian stars.
It’s interesting to note that the fictional character he identifies with most is the time travelling Trunks from Dragonball Z, a Japanese animated cartoon show. Perhaps Howard senses his own cultural identification as a form of time travel, straddling multiple worlds but not fully present in any of them, carrying within him the knowledge of an alternate universe.
Although he is a solid student, with competent writing skills, he does not have a lot of confidence in his language abilities. In April, an essay he wrote for my class was published in Mission San Jose’s Multicultural Week handbook (Appendix B). When I showed it to him, his eyes lit up and he expressed his disbelief and pleasure that the handbook committee thought his work was worth printing. He was eager to have a personal copy to show his parents. The experience seemed to be quite an ego boost, and I hope it will encourage him to continue writing for personal expression. Howard does seem to be more socially aware of race and ethnicity than my other subjects. Perhaps this is because he has been exposed to American culture the longest, and his status as a “cool Asian guy” has given him entrée into social circles shut to other students.
Howard has many friends—he belongs to the AP (not Advanced Placement, but Asian Pride) clique at Mission—but he does not seem at all concerned about leaving his large group of associates behind upon graduation. If anything, he says he is looking forward to going someplace new and starting over. He believes he will stay in touch with his close friends, and the others will not matter much in the long run. His casual dismissal of the relationships he has developed over the last nine years seems hard to accept, especially given the strong physical presence his clique has on campus. He has a prominent position within the group, and it has clearly endowed him with a good deal of social confidence, as demonstrated by his comfort level in class and with his peers. It will undoubtedly be difficult for him to go into an alien environment, where Asians have a lower profile and renegotiate his standing in the social order, but his social awareness will be an invaluable asset to him in understanding the social dynamics of any group he encounters.
I-Chieh
Of my five subjects, I-Chieh is the most “alternative,” which immediately tells you she does not fit neatly into the model minority stereotype. A small, quiet, thoughtful girl with long straight brown hair, highlighted with streaks of gold or red, she has a penchant for unique, vintage-style clothing. Although she hangs out with the “goth” crowd (kids who tend to wear long flowing black garments), I-Chieh’s style is actually quite colorful and she tends to favor luxuriant fabrics like silk and velvet in shades of lavender and gold. She is an average student, capable of sharp insights, but not terribly focused on or confident in her schoolwork. She will be attending Ohlone, our local junior college, in the fall, mostly, she says, because it’s the most affordable option and she wasn’t focused enough during the fall semester of her senior year to go through the application process for a four-year university.
Our interview took place during lunchtime, over two days, the first of which she was accompanied by her friend Heather (also a student of mine), a pale redhead draped in a gauzy black dress. Heather is a very vociferous young woman, and during the first interview, I did not get much information from I-Chieh as she allowed Heather to dominate the conversation. I found this both frustrating and interesting, in that I-Chieh was behaving as a stereotypically passive, silent Asian even with her female friend. It made me wonder how she presents herself in other social situations, whether she resorted to this behavior naturally or if it was a manifestation of cultural stereotypes.
I-Chieh came to the US in 1987, when she was five and a half, from Taiwan. She has one younger sister and one younger brother, her father is an engineer and her mother is a housewife who baby-sits small children. She is a strong photographer, and tends to write thoughtful, albeit brief, personal essays for class. She is currently enrolled in a clothing class and has found it to be extremely enjoyable, and she has learned she is quite good at making her own clothes. She designed and sewed the gown she wore to the Winter Ball, and her friends were duly impressed. This newly discovered talent has given her the first inklings of a direction in life, she is considering studying Fashion Design. It is important to note that very few Asian students at Mission take vocational courses such as Clothing or Woodshop. If a class does not have a college prep or honors designation, the Asian enrollment falls drastically. This means that many Asian students may never have a chance to find out whether or not they have a talent for clothing design or woodworking because they are so focused on “purely” academic courses.
Perhaps because of her awareness of personal expression through fashion, I-Chieh was the only one of my subjects that acknowledged the issue of appearance and how standards of beauty are propagated by the media. In response to the question about her reaction to Asian celebrities, she wrote, “When I see an Asian actress or female model, my reaction is very different than if I saw a non-Asian or male character, because I like to see that Asians are considered beautiful. It’s definitely a change as opposed to blond hair and big bosoms.” I found this to be a particularly powerful statement, as well as surprisingly honest. Asian cultures do place a high priority on modesty, and generally shun vanity. To admit to being influenced by perceptions of physical appearance is almost shameful in Chinese culture, as I experienced it, and to openly desire a “beautiful” designation is virtually unheard of. I-Chieh’s willingness to acknowledge those desires is definitely a sign of her assimilation, and, I would argue, a healthy one. It is natural for teenaged girls to want to be considered attractive, a culture that forces young people to deny such impulses will inevitably force them to deny other needs.
To I-Chieh, being Asian American means “not being truly Asian, but not really fully accepted as Americans.” Most of her friends are white, and she has been romantically involved with her white boyfriend for nearly two years, quite an impressive commitment for any high school couple. Perhaps it helps that they attend different schools. From the photos she has shared with me, it is obvious that her boyfriend is also an alternative type. He has long, curly, brown hair and appears to wear “grunge” style clothing: jeans, flannel shirts, workboots. Her choice of a romantic interest also reflects her rejection of conventionally acceptable social parameters.
Even though she has clearly broken free of the most restrictive aspects of the model minority stereotype, I-Chieh still holds some of the same attitudes demonstrated by the more traditionally identifiable subjects. For instance, she considers herself a “not very good student” despite the fact that she has a solid B average. She also mentioned job security as an issue that concerns her, “being an Asian American, I feel that I need more financial security, I feel that I have to be more valuable, more needed in the workfield.” This is clearly a theme that has run throughout every one of my subjects’ interviews.
Conclusions
Some educators might argue that students are not prevented from exploring ethnic literature on their own, that there is usually room for independent reading within the curriculum. That, ostensibly, would be the appropriate place for students of color to study their literary heritage. Classrooms should be reserved for works with "proven literary merit," "classic literature," and books that will give them a "better understanding of American culture." Because Asians have not been considered an integral part of this country's history, works by Asian American writers are thought to have less to offer the student body as a whole.
These same educators might also argue that popular culture, given its fleeting and ephemeral nature, is not a subject worthy of academic study. Instead of encouraging students to make relevant connections between the mass culture of their everyday lives, they believe it’s more important to expose them to a steady diet of high culture in school, to raise their awareness of their cultural heritage.
I would counter with the observation that popular culture is often a stronger influence on young people than the canonical works that we force-feed them in our curriculum. If educators are unaware of these factors, they run the risk of being out of touch, and therefore unable to make the necessary connections between universal themes and modern life that give fictional works their power. Ideally, we should incorporate elements of current popular culture and relate them to the canon so that students can see the thematic threads that run throughout human history.
However, it is also clear that popular books by and about Asian Americans do not necessarily offer the kinds of images for which Asian American youth hunger, either. Without systematic evaluations and discussions of the themes and ideas in the book, many inexperienced readers may not understand or appreciate these books and choose not to avail themselves of this resource. Again, keep in mind that the students' exposure to such works is sporadic and haphazard at best. In not being able to share these works with classmates in a classroom setting, with supervised, moderated discussions, Mission's students are not benefiting from the full literary study of such books, even if they do read them independently.
Although I had originally considered my research separate from my teaching, as I listened to my students relate their experiences, I began to see how my findings could serve as a means of demonstrating the importance of accessible ethnic literature in the English curriculum to the district administrators and school board members. I hoped that with my students’ input and my own background and research, I would be able to convince the powers that be to take a closer look at the literary offerings we provide our students and how they might be enriched for everyone’s benefit. This, coupled with a stronger awareness of the outside social influences of television and film, would help any educator better serve his students. There is no room for intellectual snobbery in a diverse comprehensive high school. By expanding our curriculum, we will be better able to expand our students’ minds. By raising our own awareness of the world, we will be better able to guide them through the difficulties of negotiating a rapidly shifting culture. By being open to their thoughts, we will learn more about ourselves and how to better influence the generations to come.
Footnotes:
1 University of California, Berkeley, Graduate School of Education Brochure for 1997-1998
2 Mission San Jose High School Blue Ribbon Application Package for 1997-1998
3 I have run across several tense situations with my male Asian students regarding my own relationship with my partner of nearly ten years. One day in April, as my seniors were finalizing their college decisions, one Chinese male commented that Berkeley was a good choice because there were so many “hot Asian chicks.” Another Chinese male—who has recently broken up with his girlfriend, also Chinese—responded, “Yeah, but they’re all with white guys.” When I jokingly said “HEY, what is THAT supposed to mean?” the student turned bright red and ran out of the room. He came back a few minutes later, grinning sheepishly. Although it’s understood that we’re just kidding each other, it’s clear to me that there is an underlying element of resentment and confusion as to just why it’s easier for Asians to be accepted if they are female. Clarifying these reasons is a major goal of this paper.
posted on March 1, 2003.