In a stunning revelation, the Committee of 100 just published a report about Chinese Americans and Asian Americans stating that Americans who aren’t Asian can’t tell us apart. What’s interesting to note is that this group had done a similar study back in 2001 and found that the findings in 2009 were almost identical to the ones in 2001.
Among the surprising findings is that 74% of non-Asian American survey respondents believed that Asians comprise more than 8% of the American population, with 40% of those respondents believing that we are more than 16% of the American population. We’re actually only 5% of the population.
Another incorrect belief is that 51% of respondents believed that 25% or less of the Asian American population is American born. The correct percentage is only 30%.
It points to a classic theory in Asian American studies called the “perpetual foreigner”, which has its roots in an 1897 case of United States vs. Wong Kim Ark, where the judge ruling against a Chinese immigrant fighting to obtain naturalized American citizenship stated that Asians are “strangers in the land … incapable of assimilating.” It’s a belief that has persisted today, and which was one of the reasonings behind many of the exclusion acts that prohibited Asian immigration before World War II, including Chinese, Japanese and Korean, and ultimately with Filipinos as well. It also spurred the anti-miscegenation laws which prevented Asian men from marrying non-Asian women pre-World War II in a blatant attempt to remove Asians from the United States by stopping them from having legitimate children, with legislators knowing that the differential ratio between Asian men and women often was 15 to 1 or more in some places.
To help white Americans tell Chinese and Japanese Americans apart after the attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese, Time Magazine wrote an infamous article in 1941 entitled “How to Spot the Japs from the Chinese.”
Unfortunately, it seems non-Asian Americans still can’t tell us apart and they actually might need this article.
After North Korea fired a missile over South Korean and Japanese airspace, angering the United States, this far-right “Christian” blogger somehow manages to conflate geishas, “immoral sperm banks” and the attack on Pearl Harbor, blaming this on the Chinese. Mind you, Christwire is widely known as a satire website, but the reference hits home. And the Chinese were the ones trying to stop the North Koreans from doing this, lady.
Almost makes me wanna go wear my coolie hat, strap on a queue, and start singing “Turning Japanese” while cooking adobo just to confuse the hell out of everyone.
(Image via HOW TO SPOT A JAP (1942). Hat tip: Erin Skinner, via twitter)
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8 Comments to “Newsflash: Non-Asian Americans Still Can’t Tell Us Apart!”
atlasien wrote:
Just to add one note… speaking purely in terms of physical features (discounting names, body language and so on) it’s not possible to tell many Asian-Americans apart in terms of ethnic origin. Japanese, Koreans and people from the north of China look especially similar. My Japanese father has been mistaken for a Korean by Koreans, for example.
It’s always irritated me when certain armchair Orientalists decide they’re experts at telling Asians/Asian-Americans apart, and use you to demonstrate their dubious skills. “Let me guess… you’re __!” That’s part of the same arrogance that produced the 1941 Time Magazine article.
This looks like a very interesting though depressing report.
One of the most depressing aspects is how lumping Asian-Americans together and associating us with positive stereotypes means that the Asian-Americans who are vulnerable due to poverty or other issues don’t get their problems taken seriously… it’s like they don’t even exist.
Posted on 22-Apr-09 at 5:10 pm | Permalink
Daniel W. wrote:
That’s American society for you. Not just Asian Americans but many other groups like Latinos get irritated when they can’t separate Ethnicity and nationality. All they (general population) care about is the superficial features. Well, actually most societies around the world are sort of that way.
Here’s something ironic to think about. Considering how hard it is for many others to tell the different groups apart, it might encourage many people (at least the ones who care) to have closer interactions. To able to view things beyond what they appear to be, like not to be too shallow. It’s quite cynical but oh well.
Posted on 22-Apr-09 at 6:50 pm | Permalink
julia wrote:
I’m Asian, and I can’t tell (a significant majority of) Asians apart.
By the way, I skimmed the report and it doesn’t say anything about not being able to tell the difference between Asians in terms of physical characteristics. The fine text for that key finding says :
“For a few survey questions, 609 non-Asian respondents among the general population were asked their opinions about “Chinese Americans”and 598 non-Asian respondents among the general population were asked about “Asian Americans.”The results are nearly identical. The similar approach was used for the 2001 C-100 survey.” (13)
Stereotyping Asians as a group is pretty silly, but I’d attribute the results to widespread use of Asian as synonymous for China-Japan-Korea, which have relatively similar cultures compared to, say, Pakistan or Indonesia.
Posted on 22-Apr-09 at 7:32 pm | Permalink
Erik wrote:
I always found it weird when people get offended that someone couldn’t tell someone who was, say, Chinese, apart from someone who was Korean or Japanese.
I mean, for the most part, I doubt any of us could tell someone who was Polish, or German, or French apart, yet they don’t seem to mind.
Or Mexican, El Salvadorian, Spanish, etc.
What’s with the double standard?
Posted on 22-Apr-09 at 10:48 pm | Permalink
Michael wrote:
Efren,
You should not be too quick to criticize the relative inability of non-Asian Americans to distinguish between various Asian ethnic groups.
A simple explanation of this is that most Americans are simply not exposed to people of Asian descent since Asian communities, with the possible exception of Filipinos, are extremely concentrated in large cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York (and Hawaii). Combined with the sparse representation of Asians in the media, it is not unreasonable to conclude that most Americans have little, if any, regular exposure to people of Asian descent.
Furthermore, the distribution of various Asian ethnic groups in the United States is not by any means uniform. Specifically, Chinese and Filipino-Americans vastly outnumber Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese Americans by two or even three to one. So not only are most Americans not regularly exposed to people of Asian descent, but when they are, it’s most likely someone of Chinese or Filipino descent, so it’s very rare to find someone who has been regularly exposed to a diverse range of Asian ethnic groups and would therefore be in a position to make a distinction between them. I should also say that I am sure this argument extends even to Asian-Americans who are brought-up in places outside of the areas I mentioned above.
I grew up in San Francisco and therefore have the privilege to encounter many Asian ethnic groups, so I am more easily able to distinguish between them. Therefore it’s presumptuous to go to, say, Miami, and expect someone there to distinguish a Korean person from a Chinese person from a Japanese person.
Best,
Michael
Posted on 22-Apr-09 at 10:56 pm | Permalink
Daniel W. wrote:
I went through the report (slide show) and after thinking about it, have a some opinions.
First, the Committee of 100 is Chinese-centric in terms of their goals and activities. They are pretty active with that specific group in many areas mainly politics but branch out to whereever Chinese American individuals have hold a high status. Which is almost every industry. so there’s going to be a lot of issues which may seem particular and unique which other Asian Americans may or may not relate nor care about. Everyone has a variety of opinions regarding this group but it’s just one out of several that is focus on this topic.
Second, the report doesn’t mention about physical traits, however, it does implied many characteristics involving external appearences. Not necessarily how one’s body looks, but cultural activities and articifacts, language, events that involved any physical description, generalized images, etc. It mentions other Asian American groups (not just East Asians) more as a comparison group to Chinese Americans rather than a genearl study.
Third, I think the author of this blog entry did what many others have done;which is to post a link to a study or article and take it as a reference to another issue which may or may not be related. IMO, it sort of is related because it’s true that several Asian Americans get annoyed when getting mixed up on ethnicity/nationality. How they react to it is up to the individual. There’s no collective consensus type of deal. However, I think it would be best whenever someone posts a link as a reference to make a more detailed, brief description to it.
The reactions people have regarding this topic is quite mixed. Some are offended, some are just plainly annoyed (irritated) others don’t care. All of them have valid points in their opinions. I’m not sure if it is accurate to take one set of feelings to generalized how an entire group of people are and ignore the others. A lot of times, it really depends on what you’re talking about. So many issues one can take lightly, no big deal, others a bit sensitive. One example is conversations involving the Pacific theater of World War 2. That’s still a sensitive topic to talk about for many reasons. A big problem people can have, as mentioned in other threads is how we often take the extreme or more well-known examples to justify our generalizations and aboslute opinions.
It’s really not just Asians who feel such sentiments but there are other groups out there who get annoyed. I interacted with several people in person and online. It’s just the degree and individual reaction is different in each case. Some Persians get upset when being mixed with Arabs, some Peruvians do get upset when mixed with Mexicans, and yes some light-skin Caucasians do get upset when mixed with another group. Some of it is pretty silly, some are taken lightly, but a few are quite serious, especially if it involves international politically-related activities.
The world is much bigger than what happens in America, also there is a significant amount of natural-born citizens of any background, who have deep feelings and opinions regarding issues outside what mainstream culture cares about. Again, really depends on what exactly people are talking about and from what perspective.
Posted on 23-Apr-09 at 10:59 am | Permalink
ed wrote:
Perhaps it would not be an issue if Americans weren’t so racist.
It’s just ironic how everything has to be based on race since race is irrelevant in so many things.
They don’t need to sort people according to facial features, they just have to be informed that there are differences. Sometimes asking might be more polite than assuming.
Americans feel they should have to tell the Japanese and the Chinese apart during the war is also pretty ignorant since some Japanese were fighting on their side too.
Posted on 23-Apr-09 at 3:46 pm | Permalink
joe wrote:
The real crime is Asians who try to pass as other Asians. Koreans, anybody? I can spot you all trying to pass as Japanese (sushi bars), Viets (pho joints), Blacks (Slauson Swap Meet), Hawaiian-Asians (Couple of hawaiian joints I know)
All I got to ask is… WHYYYYY????
Posted on 24-Apr-09 at 4:33 pm | Permalink
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