Culture | June 17, 2009 | Comment on this video (20)

Being Asian American

jadesun
Hapa is a Hawaiian term used to describe a person of mixed Asian or Pacific Islander ethnic heritage. Recently, its popular usage has been broadening to Asian-Americans in general and other mixed racial/ethnic backgrounds. In this pod, Hapa students at Wesleyan University discuss how their identity shapes their view on the world.
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20 comments // Being Asian American // Video

  • bellgodz
    • 0
      bellgodz  

    • HAHA I thought I was the only one who used the term "Hapa". I first heard it from someone who used it to describe me while on a trip to Hawaii.

      Filipino/Spanish/English/Scotch-Irish/Welsh

    • 2 years ago
  • Vrishchi_Kam
    • 0
      Vrishchi_Kam  

    • I guess it just shouldn't matter what nationality you are these days. Im Black / Cherokee/ Blackfoot/ Ojibwe/ Italian/ French/ Irish/ Indian/ Filipino ... soooo, let's chock it up to people as indivduals, not colors. (And asians/ hapas are usualy popular, maybe its just your location)

    • 2 years ago
  • Scarabus
    • 0
      Scarabus  
    • Vrishchi_Kam:

      Gotta be a good story behind that combination! :-)

      Seriously, it can matter. For example, some colleges have limitations on the number of Asian students they will admit. My granddaughter is half Caucasian, half Asian. How will such a quota affect her? Will she be eligible for a scholarship available only to Asians?

      If you can prove you have a biological connection with a particular Indian tribe, you can claim a share of casino profits from that tribe's reservation. And of course the biological connection to one race or another can affect genetic predisposition to disease (e.g. sickle cell anemia).

      During Reconstruction, a person could be considered Black in one state, but White in the neighboring state. (Depended on the % of Black blood … 1/2? 1/4? 1/8? 1/16? 1/32?) C. Vann Woodward's The Strange Career of Jim Crow is still fascinating.

    • 2 years ago
  • Vrishchi_Kam
    • 0
      Vrishchi_Kam  
    • Vrishchi_Kam:

      see, I just dont like that whole "scolarship for being ___". Get a scolarship for being good at something. Colleges shouldlook at statsand example of their aplicants art/ music ect. then decide. No pictures of the person, just the raw data.

      (my mix is from a long line of mixed people with mixed people with more mixed people. Though Im considered black,and so is most of my family.)

    • 2 years ago
  • TinyGrasshopper
    • 0
      TinyGrasshopper  

    • so i'm from the caribbean, and i'm half black and half chinese. do i get to attach the word hapa to myself or am I just a west indian?

      I think the crux of the matter for me is that, as an earlier commenter said, race and culture are not the same thing. I may be half black and half chinese but because the trini culture is a shared one I'd say that the racial influence over who I am is more subconscious. there are elements of the trini culture that are asian but there are just as many elements that are european, persian, african, spanish, amerindian and indian. This is geographical since Trinidad is such a small place so races have always mixed easily and also historical since most groups came as slaves or indentured servants during colonial times.

      This is very different from America however which is much larger so different races and their historical culture can isolate themselves and remain as fully developed as they are in their homeland, in addition to the fact that immigration is an ongoing occurrence. I feel this is a large part of why someone can feel displaced when their mixed in America, because you're not just mixed in race, but in culture as well and there hasn't been generations of time to pass and let all that diversity settle.

      I think that the concept of minorities also can contribute to this outsider feeling. In Trinidad as diverse as it may be we don't use the word minority because there isn't a dominate race perse in numbers or clout. I think that once that reaches America the same balance of diversity and unity can happen and people won't feel like their missing a sense of belonging. that probably won't happen for a long time because America is so huge.

      I think in some ways this close relation of race to culture in America might make it easier since you only have a few cultures to deal with, and you're familiar with all the aspects of the culture. I can call myself half chinese but because the chinese assimilated into the rest of trini culture, i don't fullly know how much the race side of things shape who I am. maybe it doesn't at all. Even though that heritage may be in me it's still lost because of the lack of cultural reinforcement.

      So I would tell all hapas to enjoy being different, because the alternative is not that great. I always had this self-image of being a mixed Trini, but I came to America and people just think I'm black. I don't have a strong association with African-American culture at all so it's not a perfect fit. I would prefer that people embrace how different they may be.

      In any case I'm getting the impression that the being racially mixed as the people in this video discuss is a just another way of saying of culturally mixed. If that does not apply can you still call yourself Hapa?

    • 2 years ago
  • Mobius2012
  • tcolberg
    • 0
      tcolberg  

    • Being hapa is pretty common here in CA, but I can see how it might be more difficult in other, more homogeneous parts of the country.

      What annoys me is when forms tell you to "choose only one", though I'm glad to see that forms that allow you to "choose any that apply" are becoming more common.

    • 2 years ago
  • Scarabus
    • 0
      Scarabus  

    • Mutts have evolved to be strong, resilient, and adaptable. Mutts rule!

      Pursuing the canine analogy, mutts have evolved on their own to demonstrate their resilience. Thoroughbreds might be pretty, but they're also vulnerable.

      I think the best thing that could happen on our planet would be for every inhabitant to blend into the same shade of yellow-red-brown-white-whatever tinted mocha latte.

    • 2 years ago
  • EmperorThan
    • 0
      EmperorThan  

    • She thinks Mutt sounds really bad?!?!!? I love calling myself a Mutt! My dogs are both mutts and they're the coolest dogs ever.

      Just wait till these people put Hapa on a Government Census form, they'll probably send it back with a warning "Lying on Government forms is a federal crime and punishable by up to 500 million years in pound me in the ass prison."

    • 2 years ago
  • TonesTestament
    • 0
      TonesTestament  

    • really interesting topic because i am not half but even thou i am a full korean i still feel the same way... however i just hangout with out i want to ..... yeah i have my korean group, american group, all sort of groups....

      just watch the Dave chappelle racial draft sketch which is really funny and looks at a perspective i never thought about.... a draft... hahahah

    • 2 years ago
  • Scarabus
    • 0
      Scarabus  

    • Really interesting to me that so many of the comments treat race and culture as being identical. That's obviously wrong (Fidel Castro is Caucasian, while many Cuban athletes we saw in the last Olympics are Black — but they're all Hispanic).

      But it's not just a pedantic quibble. I think failing to maintain the distinction leads to a whole lot of misunderstanding.

    • 2 years ago
  • TabulaRasa
    • 0
      TabulaRasa  

    • I can't tell if these kids are complaining, proud, or just expressing...... but apparently none of them are from CA. Hapa's are all over the place here and some of the most popular.
      If there is anything wrong with their social life it's because of their attitudes.

    • 2 years ago
  • swellh2o
  • Skyscraper08
  • Mobius2012
  • pusching
    • 0
      pusching  

    • hmmm.... growing up being hapa was never considered derogatory. and generally considered it as being white and ____ (insert any other ethinicity here) rather than specifically asian. in fact, being entirely asian myself, i grew up WISHING i was hapa.

    • 2 years ago
  • TheForeteller
    • 0
      TheForeteller  

    • Paternal Grandfather-
      Nationality:Brazilian.
      Ancestral blood:Dutch,Japanese and Portuguese.
      Paternal Grandmother-
      Nationality:Israeli.
      Ancestral blood:Palestinian, Saudi, Somalian and Afghan-Pashtun.
      Maternal Grandmother-
      Nationality:French.
      Ancestral blood:Greek, Ethiopian and Danish.
      Maternal Grandfather-
      Nationality:American.
      Ancestral blood:Irish, Scot, German, Italian, Spanish, Yaqui, Cheyenne, Navajo and Apache.
      F.Y.I about me........... now I'm a mongrel! hehehe.

    • 2 years ago
  • karikomi
  • bigloutech
  • Scarabus
    • 0
      Scarabus  
    • bigloutech:

      That's cool (though one expects to find more Japanese descendents in Peru than Colombia).

      But in saying "Japanese," do you mean you were born in Japan geographically? And/or of parents (whose race isn't specified) who lived there when your mom was impregnated? Etc.?

      Colombia! Culturally Hispanic, but with many Pre-Colombian cultural practices/influences. Farther you get from the big cities, the more the balance tilts. All good. All to be respected, admired, and treasured. But by no stretch of the imagination identical.

      We have to get over classifying and sub-classifying, and hyphenating, and hyperventilating.

      We're all lost in space aboard a lifeboat called "Earth." The more we respect difference and the less we focus on it, the better. Are you old enough, nerdy enough to remember the movie The Day the Earth Stood Still?

      A ship sent from a morally more sophisticated and technologically far advanced (space) alien civilization has sent an emissary to warn us: "As long as you were fighting with sticks and stones and TNT, you were pathetic," their spokesman says. "But now you're developing nuclear technology that makes you a danger to other planets."

      Choice we're offered? Join together in peach and constructive unity … or put your respective heads between your legs and kiss your respective asses goodbye.

      Just a science fiction flick, of course. But imagine how this planet, this nation would be perceived in the terms projected by that flick. Nuclear proliferation is a fact. Racial hatred is a fact. National hatred is a fact. Religious hatred is a fact. Etc.

      If I were Gort, the interplanetary robotic policeman, I'd have my robotic "finger" on the "exterminate" button. [Reference to Joseph Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness. Hated by many high school students in advanced English classes, but still relevant.]

      * * * * *

      Apologies, Bigloutech. I do appreciate your comment, and I'm sorry for having been inspired by a weird mood to wander far astray.

    • 2 years ago
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