where are the 3rd+ genners?

[SunWuKong]

it seems to me most of the members on YW are either 1st generation AAs or 2nd generation AAs. where are the people whose families have been here longer?

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1st generation being that you're an immigrant
2nd generation being that you're a child of an immigrant

[Hiroshi2]

Eh, I'm confused. I always thought that 1st generation meant you were the child of an immigrant. So if you're 1st-gen does that mean you were an immigrant or the child of one? Which one do the vast majority of people consider to be correct?

[Napoleon Chynamite]

yea, 1st gen means ur the son or daughter of someone that was born in another country and immigrated.

[YuheiCarreau]

A little vocabulary for the unfamiliar:

1st Gen - You are an immigrant.
1.5 Gen - You were born elsewhere, but came to the US at an early age and grew up here.
2nd Gen - Your parent(s) immigrated.

You can figure it out from there...

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by YuheiCarreau@Mar 22 2003, 04:19 PM
A little vocabulary for the unfamiliar:

1st Gen - You are an immigrant.
1.5 Gen - You were born elsewhere, but came to the US at an early age and grew up here.
2nd Gen - Your parent(s) immigrated.

You can figure it out from there...
yeah that's my impression of what those terms stand for.

[thaite]

seems to me that "You were born elsewhere, but came to the US" means that you immigrated.

[moJo]

Originally posted by thaite@Mar 23 2003, 09:11 PM
seems to me that "You were born elsewhere, but came to the US" means that you immigrated.
Technically that is true. But I think 1.5 was coined for better clarification. In my case, I was born in HK but came here when I was a year old. There's a huge difference btwn me and my parents, who came when they were 40.

[kitty]

i dunno... it's odd since most of the 3+ genners I've met are so much more political...

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by Sportie@Mar 24 2003, 01:11 PM
Technically that is true. But I think 1.5 was coined for better clarification. In my case, I was born in HK but came here when I was a year old. There's a huge difference btwn me and my parents, who came when they were 40.
yeah the 1.5 gen label was coined because these people spent a good deal of time growing up in the US and can't exactly be thought of as FOBs. yet at the same time, they've experienced life in asia.

[kasia]

Originally posted by kittygirl@Mar 24 2003, 10:40 AM
i dunno... it's odd since most of the 3+ genners I've met are so much more political...
it's the 3rd generation syndrome!

[amietron]

I'm 4th generation, I think. :D

[Napoleon Chynamite]

My parents came to the University of Washington for grad school and had me like 2 years after they arrived, I was born at the UW hospital...for them it was either go to school here or New York. I coulda ended up growing up there...

[thaite]

Technically that is true. But I think 1.5 was coined for better clarification. In my case, I was born in HK but came here when I was a year old. There's a huge difference btwn me and my parents, who came when they were 40.


yeah the 1.5 gen label was coined because these people spent a good deal of time growing up in the US and can't exactly be thought of as FOBs. yet at the same time, they've experienced life in asia.

Okay, well. Of course, you are not the same as your parents or other immigrants -- people's experiences are different. But the word immigrant simply means that a person has moved into one country from another. Most immigrants have had a FOB period, some never discard it. Is a person who has been here 20 years any less 'immigrant' that a person who has been here for 5?

Personally, now that I understand what 1.5 refers to, the term seems a bit silly and to be splitting hairs.

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by thaite@Mar 24 2003, 03:25 PM
Okay, well. Of course, you are not the same as your parents or other immigrants -- people's experiences are different. But the word immigrant simply means that a person has moved into one country from another. Most immigrants have had a FOB period, some never discard it. Is a person who has been here 20 years any less 'immigrant' that a person who has been here for 5?

Personally, now that I understand what 1.5 refers to, the term seems a bit silly and to be splitting hairs.
yeah that's very true.
but it's just easier sometimes because the word immigrant (at least for me) conjures up images of being fobby. and 1.5 genners aren't really fobby.

[amietron]

Some say that this generation things goes through both parents, others say that it's strictly mother or father. Which is it?

[Hiroshi2]

Originally posted by amietron@Mar 24 2003, 03:11 PM
Some say that this generation things goes through both parents, others say that it's strictly mother or father. Which is it?
I would've guessed whoever had been here the longest...... ;)

[kasia]

Originally posted by amietron@Mar 24 2003, 01:11 PM
Some say that this generation things goes through both parents, others say that it's strictly mother or father. Which is it?
i usually just take the average.

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by kasia@Mar 24 2003, 04:52 PM
i usually just take the average.
and you'd have to do it recursively as well. :lol:

[Arex]

I guess one might favor determining generation using either the mother or father as the basis versus averaging depending on which parent (if any) took a greater role in dictating the family structure and your upbringing. My parents had a pretty even hand in how that all went down so I'd say 2.5 generation makes sense. If my dad (1st gen) ruled the household with an iron fist and my mom (2nd gen) didn't really have any kind of say and had only minimal influence, then maybe I'd be closer to a second generation.

Alex

[MellowDrama]

It's weird. We have such a huge family with over 100 somehthing members in America, but no 3G members. Even the great grandkids (of my grandma and deceased grandpa) had immigrants for parents. But they came when they were young, so I guess you could say the most "Americanized" of our family is the 2.5G great grandkids.

[moschikat]

i don't know what i am.

great great grand parents and all the others came here for school, lived here for a while then went elsewhere . . .

i think they advocate living in older countries, "more cultured" they keep telling me :blink:

[AliBabaIncorporated]

Originally posted by kasia@Mar 24 2003, 04:52 PM
i usually just take the average.
meaning the hapa kid of a native American married to a Taiwanese foreign student will be 300th generation :P

I'm either 6th generation, 3rd generation, or 1.5 generation, depending on how you look at it.

[DonDaBomb2]

Originally posted by kasia@Mar 24 2003, 11:06 AM
it's the 3rd generation syndrome!
I've heard that the 3rd generation tries to go back and learn the culture more than the 2nd gen. The 2nd generation tends to make a greater effort to "assimilate".

It makes sense to me but has anyone factually proved this?

[kasia]

Originally posted by DonDaBomb2@Mar 25 2003, 03:59 PM
I've heard that the 3rd generation tries to go back and learn the culture more than the 2nd gen. The 2nd generation tends to make a greater effort to "assimilate".

It makes sense to me but has anyone factually proved this?
alibaba! a living example!

[AliBabaIncorporated]

Originally posted by kasia@Mar 25 2003, 07:02 PM
Originally posted by DonDaBomb2@Mar 25 2003, 03:59 PM
I've heard that the 3rd generation tries to go back and learn the culture more than the 2nd gen.  The 2nd generation tends to make a greater effort to "assimilate".

It makes sense to me but has anyone factually proved this?
alibaba! a living example!
i was raised by an immigrant rather than by my mother so it's not really an example.

most of the 3rd gen kids will usually focus on the "asian american issues" and political activities instead of hanging out with FOBs and learning the language. easy way to prove your general racial clique credentials.

one thing i'll never understand is a 3rd-generation Chinese who thinks he's "getting closer to his roots" by joining the Asian American Students Association to engage in joint political action with Filipinos and Bangladeshis ...

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by AliBabaIncorporated@Mar 26 2003, 12:19 AM
one thing i'll never understand is a 3rd-generation Chinese who thinks he's "getting closer to his roots" by joining the Asian American Students Association to engage in joint political action with Filipinos and Bangladeshis ...
err... please tell me you're kidding...

[artsfartsyjanet]

my parents are immigrants, but they really didn't want to come to the US. They just took refuge here b/c of the political turmoil in Vietnam. Plus, my dad would be dead if he stayed in Vietnam. So, it was pretty much a life or death situation.

[kimpossible]

A little vocabulary for the unfamiliar:

1st Gen - You are an immigrant.
1.5 Gen - You were born elsewhere, but came to the US at an early age and grew up here.
2nd Gen - Your parent(s) immigrated.

You can figure it out from there...

That can't be right. That would make me 2nd gen. Or maybe that is right and I don't really see myself as 2nd gen.

[Chester]

That can't be right. That would make me 2nd gen. Or maybe that is right and I don't really see myself as 2nd gen.

My father always counted this way:
You were born someplace else: Immigrant Generation
You were born in the United States: First Generation
Your parents were born in the U.S.: Second Generation

That's always been the taxonomy I've used.

[ChinaLama]

yuhei is right. the standard definition for first generation is the immigrant generation. i'm not sure where the definition got morphed into 1st gen = 2nd gen, but it seems the more commonly understoood def is increasingly becoming the latter. i guess that makes that the standard def then. :P but if that WERE, "1 1/2 generation" would have no meaning.

[deez nuts]

yuhei is right. the standard definition for first generation is the immigrant generation. i'm not sure where the definition got morphed into 1st gen = 2nd gen, but it seems the more commonly understoood def is increasingly becoming the latter. i guess that makes that the standard def then. :P but if that WERE, "1 1/2 generation" would have no meaning.

so the 1.5 genners gets reduced to .5 genners.

i don't like it. i don't wanna be half the man. i wanna be one and a half the man like he-man.

[YuheiCarreau]

yuhei is right. the standard definition for first generation is the immigrant generation. i'm not sure where the definition got morphed into 1st gen = 2nd gen, but it seems the more commonly understoood def is increasingly becoming the latter. i guess that makes that the standard def then. :P but if that WERE, "1 1/2 generation" would have no meaning.

I think the confusion over what to classify immigrants as comes from the fact that a lot of today's immigrants don't naturalize. I can see how a person whose immigrant parents have only green cards would think that he's the 'first generation' American.

[amietron]

I thought 1.5gen= 1 parent born abroad & 1 parent born in US