Fusion or confusion:
Asian Americans in multiracial families

By Todd Lee

(This article was written for Asian American Resource Workshop ï AARW ï and appeared in its February Newsletter. It is reprinted with permission of the author and edited for the web.)

The AARW's last discussion topic was the experience of Asian Americans growing up in multiracial families. The discussion featured speakers representing Asian Americans of mixed racial background, Korean adoptees and parents in interracial relationships touched on topics of great resonance to all Asian Americans, including the definition and self-definition of ourselves; elimination and "otherness:, and the generational divide. In many ways, the contradictions of Asian American identify were illuminated by these multiracial experiences: the societal dynamics borne out in the microcosm of the family.

The speakers from our membership and friends spoke about their personal experiences and how their family has dealt with issues of race and identity. MaryAnna Ham spoke about her experience growing up biracial. She contrasted the intensity and conflict of her developing racial identity with the seemingly easy and proud multiculturalism of her daughter. Judilee Reed spoke of her desires to fit in, her isolation as a Korean adoptee, and her recent embrace of her Asian American identify as a young post-college adult. Dana Oshiro expressed the dynamics of marrying a non-Asian, the subtle and not so subtle racial dynamics with her husband's family and the upcoming challenges facing her pre-school age children.

Search and Tension
The presentations and discussion touched on quests and clashes that resonate deeply in the Asian American experience. For Asian Americans raised in multiracial families, the alienation and sense of experience. For biracial individuals, the sense of "otherness" can become a built-in schizophrenia of not belonging in either your mother's or father's racial community. In response to this confusion and pain, some children of multiracial families have chosen to visit and/or embrace the home country of their Asian parent or their own original ancestry. This has often produced mixed results. For some, this has been a way to connect to their ancestry and culture and has been helpful and enlightening for them. Others have found that the experience of "going back" has been alienating and disappointing. They have sometimes found that the reaction of the native Koreans or Vietnamese or Chinese, etc. has been negative, and that some of the values of the home cultures are oppressive or limiting (e.g. the inferior status of women). They have found that as Asian Americans, their American experience and ways have them out of synch with their Asian counterparts, and that among Asians in Asia sometimes they are looked down upon, unable to spea] their native language and American in their ways and sensibilities.

These themes: isolation and "otherness" in America and alienation and "otherness" in Asia, seem to point to two things. First, that being Asian American means being a distinct animal - not Asian, not mainstream American, but a hybrid experience of a minority in the U.S. And second, that racism and oppression is much of what defines and unites that distinct Asian American experience. While there are certainly some common elements in Asian culture that come from the history of the region (e.g. Asian language characters; imperialism by Europe, Japan and the U.S.) that linked Asian countries, I would argue that the experience I share with Filipino American rappers and Japanese American congressmen has more to do with our experiences facing American racism than a common culture as Asian Americans. The diversity and complexity of Asian American culture grows as our immigrant populations increase and the number and diversity of Asians in America also increases. But our disenfranchisement from the mainstream culture and society remains. Racism remains, and in a sometimes perverse way (e.g. white America's tendency to confuse different Asian nationalities) has united us together in this country. Not to say that I am belittling the importance of culture. I do believe that there has been and is now a sector of Asian American artists and people in other fields that are helping to define an emerging conglomerate culture that is distinctly Asian American. And, to the extent that they are able, they will help define the direction as well as the texture and flavor of Asian American life. I would argue that today, its' that inequality and institutionalized racism, and the struggle for us to define ourselves and live our lives despite that racism, that is one of the strong defining themes among us. Otherwise, different would not have to be so painful and the cause of alienation. Our continuing experiences, and that of our African American and Latino and Native American brothers and sisters, belie the myth that Dr. King's dream has been achieved. We will not all be "free at last" until the equality that underpins that dream is achieved ... and we are still a long ways off.

Hybrid