Chinese Americans Creating Identity
While studying in Tianjin, pre-food-poisoning episode, I’d begun to occasionally stop by the little breakfast stands before class in the morning. People would be making jianbing right outside the main gate of the school, and it always smelled so tasty. Yet I’d previously resisted in fear of ingesting some malicious bacteria and having to drink Pepto Bismol for a week.
The day I gave up my street food ban, a woman and her husband had waved at me and asked if I wanted something to eat. She’d just scooped a fried egg off of her pan and put it inside a green onions pancake, with cucumber slivers and pickled radish. I eagerly said, "YES, PLEASE!" in Chinese. She asked if I was huayi, or ethnic Chinese.
"Ah, ni shi meijihuaren!" You are Chinese American!
Yes! I said. Yes. She'd guessed that I'd come to study Chinese.
"Women dou shi zhongguoren," she declared. We are all Chinese people.
They smiled and said to enjoy the breakfast, and I smiled back, SO HAPPY!
After many weeks of navigating life in Tianjin, trying to be brave but still confusing people with my hesitant, not-very-fluent Chinese, it was a relief not to be asked where I was from.
A week later I came across the couple again at the gate. They waved and gave me some food in a plastic bag and asked if I wanted soy milk. When I shook my head, they started speaking more slowly than before and asked if I knew what "soy milk" was, saying "soy milk" a few times, then offered me cow’s milk and tried to explain to me what cow’s milk was. I was so flustered and just said "no thank you" through everything, finally paid, thanked them, and ran away.
Breakfast was lukewarm that time, and overly salty.
That was totally the day that I got food poisoning.
And admittedly became emo. And wanted to punch the Wang Leehom Coca-Cola ad on that one guy’s giant ice cream bar cooler on campus. Stoopid Leehom! Stoopid wanna-be Chinese try-hard! I’m going home to THE UNITED STATES, and you suck for even wanting to stay here for ten freakin’ years!
Later I got some Chinese medicine, slept, calmed down, and mentally apologized to Leehom.
And I thought about it some more. Why do ABCs like Leehom go to Greater China to make a living? It’s an interesting question.
One reason is that there really are unparalleled opportunities in East Asia for Asian people who want to go into the music and entertainment industries. While the focus of this blog is on Chinese Americans who reach renown in Greater China, there are also many Chinese Canadians (Henry Lau of Super Junior M, for example) (not to mention quite a few Japanese and Korean Americans/Canadians, in their respective mother countries) who cross the globe and enter one of the various auditions and contests held by one of the Chinese record companies and TV stations.
The likelihood that they’re picked up by one of these talent searchers is pretty considerable, especially in contrast with their prospects in Hollywood and American pop music where Asian representation is growing but still extremely small, unlike that of other American minorities such as African-Americans and Latinos, who are also of course much larger populations in the United States. [Check out the post on Coco Lee and the discussion of her “incomplete crossover” as well as the post on MC Jin and his reasons for starting a new career based in Hong Kong.]
Another major factor is the self-search. Just like how NY-born-and-raised J. Lo did her way cool going-back-to-my-Puerto-Rican-roots thing, these ABCs want to find their connection with the language, culture, and home of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so forth. Interestingly, though not actually important, all of the ABCs covered here—Kaiser Kuo, Daniel Wu, MC Jin, Van Ness, Leehom, and Will Pan—happen to be second-generation Americans, i.e. the children of immigrants to the Land of Opportunity.
So then there is the other side of "Chinese American": people born and raised in Greater China who at some point go to the United States, as my own parents did. Many of the huaqiao or overseas Chinese covered in this blog are of a different generation from the younger ABCs; they came to the U.S. for opportunities, whether partially in exile / out of the political turmoil at home (Eileen Chang, Bruce Lee) or for the purpose of higher education (Bruce Lee, Ang Lee).
*Coco Lee is special in that her family spent just a few years in the U.S. before moving back to Hong Kong, enough for Coco to attend middle and high school in California. Meanwhile, Yo-Yo Ma’s parents had gone to France for their higher education and ended up later in the U.S., where the whole family would stay and where Yo-Yo would base himself and raise his own family. Whatever the circumstances, these people have all at some point experienced life in America and are straight-up Chinese Americans.
*There are also several covered in the blog who actually have recognition and substantial presence not just in Greater China but in both countries (and beyond)—Yo-Yo Ma as a prodigious classical musician, Ang Lee as a maker of both Chinese and American films, Bruce Lee as a kungfu star who began by establishing his fame in the U.S., and Coco Lee through her crossover efforts during the American pop era. Chinese people are especially proud of these high-profile people such as Ang Lee and Yo-Yo Ma whom they feel represent huaren and their achievements.
For all of these individuals who have realized their careers through both directions of border-crossing, there are shared challenges, and we will take a look at them in the eleven profiles of Hangin’ with the Huaren. We’ll see how each meijihuaren of fame has chosen to negotiate his or her identities as members of two (or more) countries and cultures, how their experience of living in both Greater China and the United States has shaped their approaches to and creations within their particular art forms, as well as their views of themselves, the world, and themselves within the world.
Each profile contains an overview of their background and accomplishments, with a weird special focus on their identity, relationship with the U.S./Greater China/home, and border-crossing decisions. Post tags sort them by home state/country/city and career area (movies, music, and writing).
Enjoy, and feel free to comment with your opinions, deep feelings, questions, information or links that you’d like to share, and most certainly corrections to any info that I might have incorrect!
Gracias :)
-- Allie
---------------------------------------------------------------------
P.S. Happy Asian American Heritage Month!
This blog is my final project for the class 039:032 Chinese Popular Culture taught by Prof. Jennifer Feeley.
While studying in Tianjin, pre-food-poisoning episode, I’d begun to occasionally stop by the little breakfast stands before class in the morning. People would be making jianbing right outside the main gate of the school, and it always smelled so tasty. Yet I’d previously resisted in fear of ingesting some malicious bacteria and having to drink Pepto Bismol for a week.
The day I gave up my street food ban, a woman and her husband had waved at me and asked if I wanted something to eat. She’d just scooped a fried egg off of her pan and put it inside a green onions pancake, with cucumber slivers and pickled radish. I eagerly said, "YES, PLEASE!" in Chinese. She asked if I was huayi, or ethnic Chinese.
"Ah, ni shi meijihuaren!" You are Chinese American!
Yes! I said. Yes. She'd guessed that I'd come to study Chinese.
"Women dou shi zhongguoren," she declared. We are all Chinese people.
They smiled and said to enjoy the breakfast, and I smiled back, SO HAPPY!
After many weeks of navigating life in Tianjin, trying to be brave but still confusing people with my hesitant, not-very-fluent Chinese, it was a relief not to be asked where I was from.
A week later I came across the couple again at the gate. They waved and gave me some food in a plastic bag and asked if I wanted soy milk. When I shook my head, they started speaking more slowly than before and asked if I knew what "soy milk" was, saying "soy milk" a few times, then offered me cow’s milk and tried to explain to me what cow’s milk was. I was so flustered and just said "no thank you" through everything, finally paid, thanked them, and ran away.
Breakfast was lukewarm that time, and overly salty.
That was totally the day that I got food poisoning.
And admittedly became emo. And wanted to punch the Wang Leehom Coca-Cola ad on that one guy’s giant ice cream bar cooler on campus. Stoopid Leehom! Stoopid wanna-be Chinese try-hard! I’m going home to THE UNITED STATES, and you suck for even wanting to stay here for ten freakin’ years!
 |
| Ughh. Gross. |
Later I got some Chinese medicine, slept, calmed down, and mentally apologized to Leehom.
And I thought about it some more. Why do ABCs like Leehom go to Greater China to make a living? It’s an interesting question.
One reason is that there really are unparalleled opportunities in East Asia for Asian people who want to go into the music and entertainment industries. While the focus of this blog is on Chinese Americans who reach renown in Greater China, there are also many Chinese Canadians (Henry Lau of Super Junior M, for example) (not to mention quite a few Japanese and Korean Americans/Canadians, in their respective mother countries) who cross the globe and enter one of the various auditions and contests held by one of the Chinese record companies and TV stations.
The likelihood that they’re picked up by one of these talent searchers is pretty considerable, especially in contrast with their prospects in Hollywood and American pop music where Asian representation is growing but still extremely small, unlike that of other American minorities such as African-Americans and Latinos, who are also of course much larger populations in the United States. [Check out the post on Coco Lee and the discussion of her “incomplete crossover” as well as the post on MC Jin and his reasons for starting a new career based in Hong Kong.]
Another major factor is the self-search. Just like how NY-born-and-raised J. Lo did her way cool going-back-to-my-Puerto-Rican-roots thing, these ABCs want to find their connection with the language, culture, and home of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so forth. Interestingly, though not actually important, all of the ABCs covered here—Kaiser Kuo, Daniel Wu, MC Jin, Van Ness, Leehom, and Will Pan—happen to be second-generation Americans, i.e. the children of immigrants to the Land of Opportunity.
So then there is the other side of "Chinese American": people born and raised in Greater China who at some point go to the United States, as my own parents did. Many of the huaqiao or overseas Chinese covered in this blog are of a different generation from the younger ABCs; they came to the U.S. for opportunities, whether partially in exile / out of the political turmoil at home (Eileen Chang, Bruce Lee) or for the purpose of higher education (Bruce Lee, Ang Lee).
*Coco Lee is special in that her family spent just a few years in the U.S. before moving back to Hong Kong, enough for Coco to attend middle and high school in California. Meanwhile, Yo-Yo Ma’s parents had gone to France for their higher education and ended up later in the U.S., where the whole family would stay and where Yo-Yo would base himself and raise his own family. Whatever the circumstances, these people have all at some point experienced life in America and are straight-up Chinese Americans.
*There are also several covered in the blog who actually have recognition and substantial presence not just in Greater China but in both countries (and beyond)—Yo-Yo Ma as a prodigious classical musician, Ang Lee as a maker of both Chinese and American films, Bruce Lee as a kungfu star who began by establishing his fame in the U.S., and Coco Lee through her crossover efforts during the American pop era. Chinese people are especially proud of these high-profile people such as Ang Lee and Yo-Yo Ma whom they feel represent huaren and their achievements.
For all of these individuals who have realized their careers through both directions of border-crossing, there are shared challenges, and we will take a look at them in the eleven profiles of Hangin’ with the Huaren. We’ll see how each meijihuaren of fame has chosen to negotiate his or her identities as members of two (or more) countries and cultures, how their experience of living in both Greater China and the United States has shaped their approaches to and creations within their particular art forms, as well as their views of themselves, the world, and themselves within the world.
Each profile contains an overview of their background and accomplishments, with a weird special focus on their identity, relationship with the U.S./Greater China/home, and border-crossing decisions. Post tags sort them by home state/country/city and career area (movies, music, and writing).
Enjoy, and feel free to comment with your opinions, deep feelings, questions, information or links that you’d like to share, and most certainly corrections to any info that I might have incorrect!
Gracias :)
-- Allie
---------------------------------------------------------------------
P.S. Happy Asian American Heritage Month!
This blog is my final project for the class 039:032 Chinese Popular Culture taught by Prof. Jennifer Feeley.
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