The Triangulation of Asian Americans involves being both a model minority and a perpetual outsider. Find out more about the unique position of Asians in this episode about Race in America.
Transcript: Asians in America. Triangulation.
Penny: Asians are always considered outsiders like you can never be an insider, you're always asked. No, where are you really from?
Eric: There’s the suspicion that if you are Asian, you are not from here. You're still considered to be, quote unquote, foreign. It hurts all of us, us. It still hurts all of us. And it's been painful historically to all of us.
Will: This is not history. This is within living memory of lots of people. Categories like white, non-white, they break down when you start to look at them closely.
Penny: It's not just: we're in the middle of black and white. That's too simple.
Welcome to the Diversity and Inclusion for All project supported by Calvin University and the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship. Together, we'll listen to key perspectives, build our knowledge, inform our thinking, and get a little better equipped to engage our world.
So one of the things that has helped me understand kind of the Asian-American experience broadly in the United States is this idea that there's there's kind of two hierarchies, two kinds of systems of assigning value to people. And one is this hierarchy where honestly whites are at the top and the darker your skin, the farther down the list you are. So in in that hierarchy, that sort of skin-color-based, you could call it race-based, Asians tend to be somewhere in the middle.
Will: Mm hmm.
Penny: I identify as Asian-American. And we're just going to say “we”. So sometimes we're sort of elevated like we were …was a little better than some others. But we're not as good as, you know, others on this hierarchy from very white at the top to very dark at the bottom. But there's a second way that we think about people and categorize them. And the second way is sort of an insider-outsider hierarchy. And in this hierarchy, actually, African-Americans are insiders along with whites, because they kind of have a claim to being United States American. Right. But Asians, no matter where from in Asia, all over parts of Asia. Asians are always considered outsiders. Like you can never be an insider. You're always asked. “No. Where are you really from?”
Blair Jean Kim writes about the triangulation of Asian-Americans, where on one side we're sort of in the middle of a hierarchy from good to bad, or most desirable, to least desirable. But on another hierarchy, we were at the bottom. And this puts us kind of in a weird triangulator situation where we're sometimes lifted up as a model minority, but we can never be insiders and never be, you know, like truly Americans somehow, because even if we're a model minority, the thing that makes us a model minority is somehow the noble pieces of an Asian character and not the fact that we've assimilated or really embraced all the ideals that would make for a good American.
Eric: Going back to the point regarding African-Americans being insider, quote unquote. Yeah, I mean, definitely that you have the struggle for the abolition of slavery and the Civil War and the aftermath of the Civil War. So you have the reconstruction amendments, particularly the 14th Amendment, which grants African Americans citizenship as very key in this. But at the same time, in talking about assimilation or talking about degrees of assimilation, when Asian populations are coming into the country late 19th century, early 20th century, they figure out quickly that it's much better to assimilate toward white ideals in terms of what's expected of an American than down the ladder toward blacks. So that that causes wedge in communities, especially out West. We have African-Americans who are migrating out west and coming and coming in contact with with with Asian Asian-Americans. So it's it's a it's a complicated dynamic.
There's a situation that is created not not not by blacks, not by is this this is a situation that's been created by Europeans who racialized enslavement from the 1660s, articulating these these these ideas of race and hierarchy. It hurts all of us. It still hurts all of us. And it has been painful historically to all of us.
Penny: I think in some ways, the model minority myth and that triangulation of Asian-Americans has put a wedge between Asian-Americans and and other groups, African-Americans in particular, so that those two minority groups were sort of dis-incentivized or discouraged from forming strong partnerships and relationships that could have been even more powerful political force, especially in the mid 20th century, in the 60s with the civil rights movement than it already was.
Another important thing to recognize in terms of understanding the history of Asian and Asian Americans is that at different points in time, different Asians have attempted to gain certain rights and privileges that were part of the ruling people-- mostly white at the time, by actually going to the courts and saying we either want to send our children to a certain school or we want to have our testimony recognized in court. And those were systematically denied for different and various, sometimes questionable reasons. I'm wondering if we can piece together some of that history for our listeners so that we can see how whiteness was defended and how in these different cases, any kind of Asian-ness was definitely and purposefully excluded from policies and laws and privileges that were reserved for whites at the time.
Will: Whites wanted to force Japanese Americans or Japanese immigrants to go to the segregated schools, segregated schools that Chinese Americans and Chinese immigrants went to. Japanese Americans saw themselves as distinct from Chinese Americans, and they didn't like this. And so part of that gentlemen's agreement between the United States and Japan, where Japan would restrict immigration to the United States, was that the United States would prevent California from forcing Japanese immigrant children or Japanese American children from going to the segregated schools that the Chinese American children went to.
In general, I think it's fair to say that in common, the courts refuse to recognize non-white people as having standing in court in cases against white people. And there's a long history of this, that a person of African descent who was a slave, for example, could be used to testify in court for some purposes. There are limitations on their ability to testify on their own behalf against a white person. The same thing was true for people of other racial minorities. That they're standing in court was not equal to that of a white person.
Eric: Yeah, there's an interesting case, Supreme Court case that was decided in 1923, and had to do with a man from India who was Sikh, S-I-K-H a religious Sikh. And he wanted to become a naturalized citizen and was denied because he was considered not white. And now that those decisions about by the court, that even even though he applied for citizenship and put down he was Indo-Aryan, the Supreme Court said, you as an indo-Aryan, you are not a white person. So you cannot become a naturalized United States citizen. Even though he he wanted to claim at least someone who who is Aryan in the sense that, you know, the know the heritage of of Indo-Europeans, as does go into region of the world, that that that he was he was from. So in that that's that's a case that, again, throws down the racialized halo of citizenship that would exclude people from India.
Penny: So in 1790, there's this naturalization law that says that immigrants who come here, only white immigrants, can be naturalized and become citizens. Their children born here --it's a different issue. But in terms of immigrants, 1790, the naturalization law says only whites who emigrate can become citizens. And then in 1870, I guess it was, they extend that right to African-Americans, basically the persons who who were brought here as slaves, that they could become citizens, naturalized citizens. But then we see in this 1923 case, right of this Sikh man saying I should become I should have the right to become a naturalized citizens because I'm actually white. I'm actually from this Indo-Aryan area. I'm actually from the Caucasus region where the word Caucasian comes from. And the court said basically, dude, you are not white, even though all these other things. And if I like this quote, it sticks in my mind that the the Supreme Court basically said something like, you are not white in accordance with the understanding of the common man.
So it's just an example in my mind where it doesn't matter what Asian-Americans do or where they come from or how they are really 100 percent for our American ideals or American ideals of democracy and patriotism or whatever. It's like we can never be insiders. And we can never be white so, at least the African-Americans got to be insiders, right? They got to be naturalized citizens eventually, and that just makes the the situation and the place of Asian-Americans inside of of the United States just different and unique. And worth…worth exploring a little bit, understanding just the complexity there. It's not just we're in the middle of black and white. That's too simple.
Will: The naturalization law that you mentioned, Penny, was only changed in 1952, if I remember right. There is a new immigration act in 1952. And that one got rid of the exclusion of non-white immigrants from naturalization, and instead said simply that natural… naturalization required people to accept American law and be of good moral character. So that the history only begins to change legally for Asian-Americans and other non-white immigrants in 1952.
Eric: 1952.
Will: That's this is not history. This is within living memory of the lots of people. Yes.
Eric: There this suspicion that if you are Asian, you are not from here; you are still considered to be, quote unquote, foreign. And so that rides on this suspicion, I think some of this just definitely has has has been viscerally felt by by Asian, Asian, Asian Americans themselves in the recent year. With with all of the violence directed toward toward Asian folk. And I will say that some of these perpetrators have been African-American. And so, yeah, getting back to this inside outside uh dynamic. Yeah, here we have a group, African-Americans, who look upon Asian-Americans as suspicious. You don't belong here and we will take this out against you. Violently. And we’ll we’ll pick out the most vulnerable. Elderly people. We will pick out the most vulnerable among you and cause you bodily harm, and in one case in the Bay Area, murder, at least the person has been he's been arrested on and convicted or not convicted, but arrested of those charges. This is dangerous.
Will: Working class people were divided by race, and employers often used racial distinctions to divide their laborers. We see some of the same kinds of things in other areas. The example that came to mind was conflicts over how affirmative action policies might apply to applicants to universities. And there Asian-American students might well feel like, as Penny says, outsiders and not real Americans. They're from somewhere else, even if their families are for generations living in the United States and citizens. But from the viewpoint of affirmative action, Asian-American students are the model immigrants, right on the model of non-white immigrants. They're well represented in many universities, whereas it's Latino, Native American, and African-American students to whom those the affirmative action policies were meant to be applied. And so categories like white, non-white, they break down when you start to look at them closely.
Penny: Another thing that I think is important for folks to realize is that there's always there's always been a history of violence against Asians just because they're Asian. And of course, recently with what's been happening in the United States, we talk about violence, especially against African-American men. And I don't want to at all say that that's not an important conversation. But I think it's also important to recognize that this has also happened to Asians. Right, that I remember I think it was in the early 90s hearing on the news about a Japanese exchange student, I believe it was in Texas, who had was going to a party and it was a costume party. And I think he was dressed up like John Travolta. But he got the wrong address. So he ended up at somebody's house and rang the doorbell thinking he was going to enter into a party. Basically the owner shot him and killed him, thinking he was the owner, feeling said he, you know, he felt threatened. And I just was thinking, boy, you know, if it had been, I'm going to say five-foot-eight blond, white female who showed up by accident at the wrong door for a party, you wouldn't shoot her. Or at least you wouldn't be able to claim I felt threatened, so I shot her. But because it's an Asian, it's an outsider, that that stood up in a court of law. And and I just felt like that could have been me or or a child of mine. Right. And that a person can say I felt threatened and therefore I was within my rights to shoot you. Things like that have happened in other instances, too, right. Where because people associate something negative with some Asian country, it doesn't have to be mine. Like you can be mad at the Chinese government from something, or you can be mad at Japanese automakers or you can be scared of a threat coming out of, I didn't know, Vietnam. Then you can take it out on or you can be scared of the “Chinese” flu, right? You can be scared of COVID. Therefore, I can take it out on anybody who looks Asian, regardless of where in Asia. And you know, I've said this before, but “Asian” could really refer to maybe a third of the world. So it's a pretty broad category to be lumping everybody into. But we use this. Anytime, I'm afraid, or I'm mad about something that comes out or is associated, even if not correctly or fairly with something “Asian,” then I can take it out on anything that looks Asian.
If you'd like to continue hearing about Asians in America and learn a little bit more about Asian American experiences, I encourage you to listen to our podcast, Asians in America. The Stories We Tell.
If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe to our podcast to stay informed about future episodes. Do you have a friend who would be interested in today's topic? We'd love it if you'd share our work with them. Our hope is that this project will spark good conversations and provide learning resources that inspire diversity and inclusion work.
And all views and opinions expressed in our episodes are those of the individual and do not necessarily reflect the views and positions of Calvin University or the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship.