Tragic news out of Townsville
Note to the members of Reddit sub r/hapas/:
Please don't try to further this idea that half-Asian men are prone to being violent as a result of structural conditions without mentioning that "Eurasians" get killed too.
For all that you may want to read into murderous denouements of the Elliot Rogers of the world, humor us with some intellectual honesty and acknowledge that random, bad shit happens to everyday mixed people, all the time.
It is easy to cherry pick cases.
As I have had a couple days to reflect since launching my book Beyond Eurasian and Hapa: Bridging a Chinese-Western Identity, I'm stuck ruminating on East vs. West.
But not the East-West axis you're thinking about. Not the East-West or Chinese-Western that I write about.
I've been reflecting on the fact that I may have written my book from more of non-Western perspective than I realized. In other words, I wrote and continue to write from a position not aloof to "systemic racism," but certainly not fixated on "white power structures" in the West, whereby the very prerequisite to my own personal development/empowerment/sense of worth/ability to seek meaning is to upend said power structures. No.
Read MoreI was browsing the WSJ, on its very capable iOS app, and came across the headline: “Why I Can’t Just Become Chinese” by Eric Liu. A headline like that jumps out at you, especially if you are writing an upcoming book on Chinese and Western culture as I am. So, naturally I clicked on it.
I didn’t know what to expect, really, but I think Mr. Liu gets it wrong. I think he gets both China and the U.S. wrong.
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Poster for HK
Bo is referred to as 番仔, meaning "foreign kid." "番" is the character that precedes Potato 番薯 and Tomato 番茄, making new nouns out of "Foreign Tuber" and Foreign Eggplant," to describe the curious produce that the Portuguese had originally introduced to China via Macau a few centuries ago. Bo, it turns out, is half-Chinese. A mild spoiler: Bo discovers late in the movie his mother (played by Josie Ho) was raped by a British Seaman (pun not intended). That biological mother tearfully gives him up for adoption. A family of fisherman, who ply the waters of the South China Sea, living and fishing on/off their vessel adopt Bo and do their best to give him whatever attention and care is possible, amidst some rather hardscrabble circumstances.
Read MoreMost importantly, "Hapa" is in decline because Gen Z is rising, fast. And they have a different take.
"Hapa" is the ultimate "Millenial" term. It is cheerful. It is "multicultural." It is "here and now."
Generation Z is entrepreneurial, and they want to be experts. They have lived the Great recession; they understand that to get a job they have to think about the future- they need to anticipate where the jobs are going to be, what the challenges and opportunities of the global economy mean to them. They are the types that know that conversational ability in five languages is less valuable than dual fluency. They know that to survive they have to be resourceful- they have to have solid skills and knowledge, that is going to facilitate critical cross-functional work. In all of this, they want to be impactful. And any way you slice that- it means global.
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Mixed people have to deal with “bouncing around.” There are different terms that folks use, but “bouncing around” to me includes both (1) others pushing you around such that they would restrict your identity, and (2) you yourself making near-sighted choices about your identity, for example, embracing “exotic” when it is cool, while being outraged by “exotic” when it doesn’t suit you.
This old yarn exemplifies the first half of “bouncing around:”
The white man said, "Colored people are not allowed here."
The black man turned around and stood up.
He then said: "Listen sir....
when I was born I was BLACK,"
"When I grew up I was BLACK, "
"When I'm sick I'm BLACK, "
"When I go in the sun I'm BLACK, "
"When I'm cold I'm BLACK, "
"When I die I'll be BLACK."
"But you sir."
"When you're born you're pink, "
"When you grow up you're white, "
"When you're sick, you're green, "
"When you go in the sun you turn red, "
"When you're cold you turn blue, "
"And when you die you turn purple."
"And you have the nerve to call me colored?"
The black man then sat back down and the white man walked away....
The Black man is Black, and proud, and steady, and resolutely Black. There is something so poignant about this joke- such an indictment, told, of course, in jest. The White man has all these things he is allowed to be, all of these changing identities- this sum of power- the power to re-mold one’s identity, change it by fiat, and expect others to adjust their schema immediately.
Ludacris alludes to this idea in his song "Hopeless"
Ludacris "Hopeless"
We realize that the Black man in the joke has to both adjust externally, and be restricted internally- hyprocrisy; utterly a bum deal it is, meaning little means to negotiate one’s identity.
Has Chinese and Western, it is never as stark as described in the joke- neither in Greater China, nor in the West, but that is not to say that bouncing around is not an issue.
The second half of “bouncing around,” I’d describe as follows.
While working in Mainland China- there was perpetually an issue of “what approach should I take to this hour’s problem?” I had to compute on an ongoing basis, “well, this would be more of a Chinese approach, yet this is a Western supplier, so is he going to assume his classic, go-to approach, or is he going to adjust for the circumstances, namely- is he posturing for how I’m likely to act?” Everything becomes an exercise in game theory. Could I not go to a golf game or other social function or would the implicit task related to “task A” actually be bloody important? I mean, how should I craft business correspondence: “do I make it direct or more obtuse and/or flowery? Do I come out of the gate with the main point in the first line, as every American English teacher will tell you for your tenth grade thesis, or do I bob and weave and leave it out till the end?” How do I handle negotiations, or negotiate the expectations of business favors from suppliers or vendors? There is rarely any absolute truth in the business world, no matter the country, no matter the culture. But what happens when your sensitivity is used against you? These are the types of cultural claims a mixed person has to deal with. They are relentless. They come at you in such a way that if you pay them the wrong type of heed, you’ll have narrower and narrower bandwidth to ponder the bigger picture.
And that is the issue with “bouncing around.” Sometimes you want to just fall into someone else’s stereotypes. You can’t be bothered. You take the easy road. I know, I know. It’s tiring otherwise, and people can be rude, and obnoxious, and seem racist even, at times.
But. Avoiding “bouncing around” is the only way to really negotiate your identity.