Pawan Dhingra - Asian America

Within institutions we come to learn about ourselves and develop our self-identities. How one sees oneself as an Asian American is her identity (or more accurately, one of her identities). Identity is a significant issue for all persons because everyone is a member of multiple sets of social groups (e.g. a family, school, workplace, political party, church, etc.) but has special relevance for racial minorities because of the ways US society has long categorized them. Asian Americans can identify with their ethnic group (i.e. Filipinx, Indian, Japanese, Vietnamese), their pan-ethnic (i.e. Asian-American) group, a religious group, and more. We develop our identities based on influences from our families, the media, schools, and other social institutions. So it is necessary to know how these institutions refer to Asian Americans. Other social categories, such as sexuality or gender, also shape our identities. Queer, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Asian Americans understand what it means to be Asian American differently than do straight Asian Americans. Our self-identities are central to our major lifestyle decisions, such as whom to befriend, where to live, how to raise our children, what rituals we perform, and so on.

Various complications arise in the identity development of racial minorities. How much choice do visible minorities have in their identity selections? For instance, can a Chinese American choose not to identify with his Chinese background if others keep referring to it? How do people of multiracial background choose to identify and form relations with others? Similarly, how do adopted Asian Americans make sense of their race if it differs from their adoptive parents and if they are not fully accepted by other Asian Americans? Can people (people who are non-Asian as well as those who are) bring together conflicting identities, such as “ethnic” and “American,” or are these kept apart? Do Asian Americans identify with only their ethnicity or also pan-ethnically? Answers to these questions inform what motivates individuals and how racial dynamics are shifting. While one chapter in this book concentrates on identity, the issues surrounding identity permeate multiple chapters.

Use your “sociological imagination” about some of the social institutions that have influenced your life and some of your group identities. What are some of the inequalities and/or privileges you encountered? On a sheet of paper, write a personal reflection and/or draw an image that represents these institutions, group identities, and inequalities and privileges. Make connections between them.

Either in a group or individually, pinpoint a type of inequality, institution, or identity and then suggest how quantitative and/or qualitative methods can shape analysis of this object of study.

The three key elements of social life – inequalities, institutions, and identity – comprise the major parameters of the sociological study of Asian America. This book will examine how Asian Americans negotiate with and make sense of institutions (like the media, schools, global markets, the government, the family, etc.) while positioned as an immigrant minority group in American society. As the book explores these elements, two main dimensions of Asian America will receive priority: race and culture. Race and culture shape the context through which Asian Americans (and others) experience inequalities, institutions, and identities. Such an examination shows how race works beyond the black–white binary that currently defines race in the United States. That is, though racial power inequalities are typically discussed as only between blacks and whites, in reality race is more complex. This book aims to broaden our understandings to illustrate how race implicates people who are and who are not black or white. This is not to suggest that race more than other factors (e.g. class, gender, etc.) shapes the lives of individual Asian Americans. But across Asian America, a common racial background leads to some degree of shared experiences. Elucidating those experiences informs the power of race as it intersects with other social categories.

Tied to race is colonialism and empire. The United States historically and currently has been a colonial or neocolonial state. This is seen in a series of historical acts, including the genocide of Native Americans, slavery of Africans, wars with Latin Americans, recruitment and mistreatment of Asian labor, internment of Japanese Americans, and wars and active colonization abroad (e.g. Philippines, Puerto Rico, Hawaii). While US laws and institutions have become more equal and facilitated the great achievements of many minorities, including of course Asian Americans, this current of state-driven inequality remains relevant.

Also, cultural differences matter greatly within the three topics of inequality, institutions, and identity. Asian immigrants make up the majority of contemporary Asian Americans. They and their descendants often have distinct cultural sensibilities and practices. Culture also matters because the nation is a cultural, not just legal, entity. As such, not all groups find equal acceptance of their cultural backgrounds, especially as they stress transnational cultural ties (e.g. in terms of religion or rituals). Culture also informs the extent to which “Asian American” exists as a meaningful entity. While the term “Asian America” suggests a single entity, it is important to keep in mind the significant differences within the population. There are not only ethnic cultural differences but also differences of generation, income, citizenship status, and more. To what extent does “Asian America” really exist, or is it more appropriate to speak of a variety of groups with only a little in common? This book examines this question rather than takes for granted a cohesive population.

Today, the government has a massive surveillance network and detains children at the border. How does that connect with the issues discussed here?

Online resources: Learn more about state practices at https://www.theverge.com/2013/12/12/5200142/end-the-nsa-nightmare; https://time.com/5678313/trump-administration-family-separation-lawsuits/

In studying how Asian Americans and others experience these topics, scholars have devised certain theories to piece together observed trends. The theories explain how the three major topics of inequality, institutions, and identity relate to one another. Reviewing these theories elucidates what kinds of information scholars look for and what assumptions they bring to the study of Asian Americans. This book draws extensively from these theoretical approaches in order to explain the causes and consequences of the experiences of Asian Americans.

Within sociology, a prominent perspective on immigrants’ adaptation to a new environment has been assimilation theory. Assimilation occurs when an immigrant group’s differences with the mainstream dissipate. This can happen as ethnic items become popular in the nation (e.g. “Chinese food”), so that consuming them does not appear foreign to most residents. More often, assimilation occurs as immigrant communities lose their distinctiveness and become more like the majority as they adopt dominant culture and social structure, akin to Anglo-conformity (Gordon 1964). They become socialized (or re-socialized as adults) within mainstream institutions, such as schools, popular media, civil society, and religion. As immigrant groups learn English, shop at popular clothing and grocery stores, befriend people outside their group, and so on, they gradually assimilate. Descendants of immigrants start to see mainstream culture as “normal” and may conceive of their ethnic background as strange or inferior. This assimilation need not be intentional. Instead, it occurs as immigrant groups seek better opportunities for themselves and their children, which are believed to be outside of one’s ethnic group and within the mainstream (Alba and Nee 2003; Salins 1997).