I’m an Asian-American. In theory, I should be as American as any other. But when I’m asked, “Where you from?” I answer, “I’m from Hawaii.” Then I get the response, “No, man, where are you really from?”
Since I was born in Hawaii, I’m really from Hawaii. The last I heard, Hawaii is one of the fifty states.
Sometimes I get, “What’s your nationality?” Of which I respond, “American.” Then they ask, “No, [dummy], I mean, where you really from?”
The question is: Why is my ethnicity so important? When I meet Americans in general, I don’t immediately ask their ethnicity. “Hey, man, what are you, German, Irish, Italian?” I mean, what gives?
Beeruser, you are suffering from the fallout of the belief that respect for one’s heritage can only be expressed by maintaining a tribal identity within the dominant culture. It is a rather insidious myth that has been propogated by both the political left (driven, of course, by concern for minorities and historical inequities) and the political right (driven, of course, by patriotism and regional pride). Taken to the extreme, this attitude results in balkanization and violence. In smaller doses it results in the type og ignorance and rudeness that you have encountered. BTW, I was also born in Hawaii, but I am caucasian. When I tell people where I was born I get, “oh, but where is your family from?” It is a slightly different reflection of the same attitude. I usually respond, “what family?” and stare intensely. It has an interesting effect.
The best lack all conviction
The worst are full of passionate intensity.
*
Well, Beer, Margaret Cho has had some funny things to say on that topic, being of Korean ancestry but having been born and raised in San Francisco. “The best thing is you can pretend not to be able to speak English!” she says.
Well, of course identity is important to us. It used to really mean something to be a Kentuckian or Texan or Pennsylvanian, but state identity is much less important with the increasing dissolution of state borders and ease of travel. An awful lot of people move from state to state. Even town identity is falling by the wayside–only in high school sports is there any inter-city rivalry anymore.
National identity is good, but when you’re surrounded by other 'Mercuns it’s kinda silly. So a lot of folks have taken to a real or perceived ethnic heritage for a sense of belonging, of membership in a larger club.
I suspect some of the people being rude to you, Beeruser have an inflated sense of their own “cultural background” and expect you to have one as well. Screw 'em–I like the staring blankly idea, myself.
(As a MPSIMS aside, I’m from New Mexico. I moved to North Carolina and actually had someone tell me I didn’t look Mexican and ask if I needed a green card to work in the States, even though my parents were anglos. I confess to laughing in his face, long and loud.)
Excuse me, I meant to say that national identity is popular and prevalent, rather than “good.” I didn’t mean to imply any value judgement of nationalism.
Yes, this is an interesting thing that seems mostly to just affect Americans. My fiancee is from Ireland and she would often get comments like, “Ohh, you’re Irish? Me too!” Initially she was confused by this and would ask me why they said they were Irish, because they were obviously Americans (well, she would say yanks ) - they had an American accent and had never even been to Ireland.
In the European countries, wherever you were born and grew up was what your nationality was. There were plenty of people in Ireland who’s family had come from England at some point, but they called themselves Irish. In England, I have met people of other descent who were now English (because their family had been there for a couple of generations. The closest analogy to the Americans would be the Australians, but they don’t call themselves Irish/British/Indian etc. They call themselves Australians.
I have some ideas as to why this is, but anyone else have an explanation?
Interesting question: My father’s parents were from Irkutsk, Russia, which is most definately on the Asian (sub-)continent. Does this make me Asian-American? (Funny, I don’t look Asian American. )
What would Brian Boitano do / If he was here right now /
He’d make a plan and he’d follow through / That’s what Brian Boitano would do.
This reminds me of this scene from Short Cirtuit, between Steve Guttenberg (Crosby) and Fisher Stevens (Jabituya):
Newton Crosby: Where are you from, anyway? Ben Jabituya: Bakersfield, originally. Newton Crosby: No - I mean your ancestors. Ben Jabituya: Oh, them. Pittsburgh.
What would Brian Boitano do / If he was here right now /
He’d make a plan and he’d follow through / That’s what Brian Boitano would do.
Before we get into a rousing rendition of “white people aren’t concerned about that kind of thing,” I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve had the derivation of my last name questioned. There seems to be an inordinate amount of curiosity as to what part of the world my ancestors came from, despite the fact that I look so White-Anglo-Saxon-Protestant that one friend once referred to me as “white bread with lips.”
So what’s the difference between asking me where my name came from, and asking Mrs. Kunilou (who was botn in Cleveland but whose ancestors came from Japan) where her family came from?
PeeQueue,
My wife is also from Ireland. (It’s true, the Irish aren’t very discriminating.) She too, finds it preposterous that someone born in the United States can claim to be Irish. More than once, I’ve seen her rip into uninformed Americans (of Irish desent) who start spouting off about Northern Ireland, the IRA, St. Patricks Day. leprachans, etc.
I can’t wait for the day when “American” is considered a nationality like any other. IMO, Americans have created a culture that meets every qualification needed to be considered an “ethnicity”. It’s time to add another box to the forms for people who wish to be identifted as simply “American”.
Bill Mauldin raised some eyebrows with a 1944 cartoon in which one dogface points to another and says “Without allies like Texas and Ireland, you guys from Brooklyn would o’ lost this war.” The Irish consul saw a copy and was upset that their neutrality was being dismissed. An explanation of the humor resulted in a hearty laugh and a request for several copies to be sent back home.
There’s not a lot you can do, Beeruser, I’m also Asian-American and get the same tiring questions. I was born and raised in the South, not South Vietnam or South Korea, just plain Dixie, USA. Despite all that, our ethnicity will always be a fact of life in contemporary America. Asians are still a small minority and we stand out like Rosie O’Donnell at the Ironman Triathlon.
I guess people that ask want to be told of stories of our descent from the Great Khans of the Mongol steppes or the Shoguns of medieval Japan. It really bums out people when I tell them that I am a humble descendant of simple folk that served in the US Army Cavalry and the US Pacific Fleet.
I was headed back to Tokyo from my mid-tour leave, Stateside, and was flying back on a commercial flight (no uniform required). A nice elderly American lady asked me, slowly in English (so I could keep up!)if I was glad to be heading back home after my visit to America. I feigned a look of horror in my face and replied, in my twisted Texan drawl, “You mean I got on a flight to San Antonio??!!” The look of embarassment (and hopefully enlightenment) on her face just made my day.
There is phenomenon known as the “ex-pat” syndrome. People thrown into a foreign culture naturally seek out others of their own kind whom they can talk and relate to, complain about the locals, get food they recognize, etc. People emigrating to a new land do the same. Such communities often retain ties to the homeland, or at least develop some sense of identity.
Now, for my WAG: America is a nation of immigrants. (I 'spect that applies to all nations on our two continents.) The Irish, Italians, Germans, Poles, etc. entering WASP USA were ghettoized by the dominant culture, reinforcing the “ex-pat” syndrome. Reliance on family and community were very important, and what do family and community have in common but heritage? Maintaining a sense of ethnic identity became a means of maintaining a sense of self-worth: in this vast, uncaring and anonymous land, I know what I am.
Within a few generations the children and grandchildren of European immigrants become assimilated. They nevertheless pick up a sense of “who we are.” It’s pretty meaningless as a matter of daily consequence. Still, in a nation that is both very young and very large, it helps us sort out who we are and where we fit.
And like all people everywhere, we assume everyone else feels the same way we do.
“The dawn of a new era is felt and not measured.” Walter Lord
I do this now, and teach my children to do so. I tell them that you fill out a form which requests such information by stating that your nationality is “American” and your race is “human.”
JillGat once persuaded me, in the-thread-that-shall-not-be-named, that certain ethnic and racial information may be necessary for medical purposes, particularly for identifying what groups may be more at risk than others for illness or genetic disease, and so I now make the single exception that when the information is being collected for medical tracking purposes we will write “Northern European” (I mean, are the kids Scottish, Irish, French, German, or Cherokee Indian?? They got bits and pieces of 'em all!) and “white.”
But I agree that we need to define ourselves as Americans, and as people. Period. That doesn’t mean that you should or must ignore your own cultural and ethnic heritage, just that we need to focus on our commonalities, not our differences.
BTW, one of my favorite stories was the white woman from South Africa who, on applying for admission to a university in this country, inidcated that she was “African.” She was admitted, and when the university discovered that she was white, apparently it attempted to dismiss her; I’m not clear why, perhaps for “fraud” on her application or some such. There was a lawsuit about this that made the papers sometime last year, but I never heard anything more about it (and it does smell like an UL). Anybody know anything more about it?
I think the point is, you’re NOT an American. You’re a sub-American, in this case of the Asian variety. Your quaint “theory” aside, of course, only the European-descended among us are true and complete “Americans.” Hell, even the ‘aboriginals’ among us are ‘Native’ Americans. And that is, I believe, what you were driving at: that this suspect, quasi-alien status is how you are made to feel by such ignorant questioners.
For the record, no one ever asks me where I’m from, here (Northern California). I think that is a difference, indicative of unstated privilege, that the US majority enjoys, regardless of internal identification with a given European heritage. But in Taiwan, the consensus was that I “couldn’t” be American, I was so “obviously” French. “Americans” don’t look like me, apparently. (All known ancestors from Germany and various parts of Great Britain, mostly England, BTW.)
My Chinese ex-pat acquaintances (here) all use “American” as the common and preferred synonym for “Caucasoid” or “white person.” Latinos are all “Mexican.” Etc. In those circles, it is my experience that (pretty much) only ‘Mongoloid,’ or ‘East’ Asians get described by nationality/culture - and that applies to those who are multi-generational, Made in USA Americans of Asian descent. The exception to that would be the compliments I sometimes receive when my heritage is discovered, for “everyone knows” that the Germans are easily the smartest of the Caucasoid peoples. As smart as the Chinese, even - and more technologically advanced to boot.)
I used to work with a light-skinned American of African descent from Louisiana. While he looked “ethnic”, he didn’t look “black”. He liked to wear a T-shirt that had bandoleers, hand grenades, etc. silkscreened on it. (He was an odd fellow who would salute people in our office, but a nice guy.)
As it happened, he was also a flight instructor. Shortly after the U.S. raid on Libya, he flew an instructional mission to San Francisco with his Egyptian student. Security spotted him, and through the binoculars his T-shirt made it look as if he were armed. Since this was so soon after the Libyan raids, Security was a bit jumpy.
They asked his nationality and he replied, “American!”
“No, I mean where are you from?”
“The United States!”
“No, what’s your ancestory?”
“Oh! I’m black!”
Of course, then he had to explain that Hussein, the Egyptian flight student, was from the Middle-East…
Not really making a point. The OP just reminded me of it.
I once had an argument via a community newsletter about the perceptions of Caucasians and Asians, specifically in the gay community, although some of what he says can certainly spill into heterosexual non-sexual situations. His argument was that all white men who are attracted to Asian men “exotify” Asian men for their sexual fantasy/pleasure, and don’t really care for whatever culture they may come from (we’re talking foreign-born Asian men, not American-born, but, again, I could see it applied to Asian-Americans). I objected to his blanket generalizations and pointed out that, first, you can’t help what you’re attracted to, and second, not every white gay man is out there just to lay every Asian man he sees. His tone was rather insulting and offensive, but I could definitely see how being treated the way he had been in the past would put him that frame of mind.
I guess its the difference between your nationality and your heritage - I’m definitely an ignorant 'merican (as my Canadian friends so aptly put it), but I’m very proud of my family’s Scottish heritage. However, the way the Great American Melting Pot has played out, white is still predominantly assumed to be “American,” and everything else must therefore be “foreign,” and I agree this should change; I, for one, revel in the diversity of this country.
There is another very, very funny comedian whose name escapes me at the moment, but he is also Asian-American (Korean?) and grew up in Texas - the southern accent is so perfect.
Esprix
Next time I want your opinion I’ll beat it out of you.
It sounds to me like some of you are taking the “where are you from/what’s your nationality” question as something to be insulted by, when in fact the majority of people asking the question are simply curious and are actually simply trying to be friendly and make conversation.
I’m mostly Italian, but I am often asked if I’m Jewish (I am, 1/16) , Iranian, Greek, and others. Excluding very rare cases, I have never felt that the question was anything but friendly conversation.
) - they had an American accent and had never even been to Ireland.
)