How many of you think of yourselves as American?

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by AliBabaIncorporated@Apr 17 2003, 10:53 AM

oh yeah, a law, like that's gonna stop anyone. We're talking about Chinese people here. :P

:dance:

hehheh yeah that's why i mentioned you can't legally do it.

[BeTheReds]

Originally posted by Uncle Tat@Apr 17 2003, 02:01 PM
White Americans will never accept Asians as Americans.

I think that depends on the person. Plenty of Whites will accept the idea that Asians can be Americans. But of course, there are some who won't.

We need to change this.

In order to do this, we should at least persade Asian-Americans to consider themselves Americans.

[YuheiCarreau]

Originally posted by Hello_Hapa@Apr 17 2003, 09:36 AM

I find it really tiring when people ask the background question. I noticed this cropped up more in the early 90s - political correctness? I prefer a straight up "What are you?" I'm beyond getting offended. I'm moved on to getting it out of the way as quickly and efficiently as possible.

I used to get that all the time. But doesn't it make you think they're asking about your criminal record, like how you have a 'background check' when you want to buy a gun?

"What's your background?"
"57 arrests, no convictions."

[BeTheReds]

How about..

From what language does your last name originate?

[AliBabaIncorporated]

Originally posted by BeTheReds@Apr 17 2003, 11:17 PM
How about..

From what language does your last name originate?

Sanskrit. Everything comes from Sanskrit. At least for white people, middle easterners, Malaysians, Indonesians, plenty of Northern Africans, some central Asians, etc. We're all really Indians. Except for y'all, who are really Chinese :lol:

[SunWuKong]

Originally posted by AliBabaIncorporated@Apr 18 2003, 03:25 AM

Sanskrit. Everything comes from Sanskrit. At least for white people, middle easterners, Malaysians, Indonesians, plenty of Northern Africans, some central Asians, etc. We're all really Indians. Except for y'all, who are really Chinese :lol:

i was reading my singtao daily on the train once, and this middle aged indian lady sitting next to me suddenly starts pointing to some of the simpler words and telling me what they mean. i kept asking her where she learnt them, and she just kept just doing what she was doing. it was starting to get annoying, so i took the paper away from her and asked her again. she said she never learnt chinese but she knows sanskrit, and that chinese came from sanskrit. she said that the chinese people just changed it. which doesn't make sense whatsoever seeing how sanskrit is a phonetic language and chinese is not. she was also trying to tell me that cantonese has 4 tones, despite my insistence that it has 9 tones. she was also trying to tell me that chinese characters are called kanji. basically she was full of shit. she was annoying as hell.

[AliBabaIncorporated]

Originally posted by SunWuKung@Apr 18 2003, 03:59 PM

i was reading my singtao daily on the train once, and this middle aged indian lady sitting next to me suddenly starts pointing to some of the simpler words and telling me what they mean. i kept asking her where she learnt them, and she just kept just doing what she was doing. it was starting to get annoying, so i took the paper away from her and asked her again. she said she never learnt chinese but she knows sanskrit, and that chinese came from sanskrit. she said that the chinese people just changed it. which doesn't make sense whatsoever seeing how sanskrit is a phonetic language and chinese is not. she was also trying to tell me that cantonese has 4 tones, despite my insistence that it has 9 tones. she was also trying to tell me that chinese characters are called kanji. basically she was full of shit. she was annoying as hell.

hmm ... weird. Sanskrit writing has nothing to do with Chinese writing, though it is the ancestor for almost all the pre-european contact systems of writing in S. Asia and SE Asia.

As far as I know no linguist has tried to advance the theory that Chinese is related to Sanskrit. However, the whole thousands of years of history of the field of Chinese linguistics owes its existence to Chinese contact with Sanskrit inspiring them to try to analyze the sounds of their own language.

However, I think there are examples of tonal languages developing from non-tonal ancestors, though.

And actually I sometimes call Chinese characters "kanji" if I'm speaking in English and I don't feel like saying "characters" cuz it would be confusing. English has no real specific single word to refer to Chinese characters (I remember suggesting "sinograph" or something one time and getting laughted at), so might as well take a Japanese loanword for it like we do for everything else Asian.

[angel nympho]

Originally posted by Uncle Tat@Apr 17 2003, 02:01 PM
White Americans will never accept Asians as Americans.

Don't you notice when someone is talking to you, they ask "Are you Chinese?"
not "Are you American?" or even "Are you Chinese American?"

Yet when they talk to white/black people, they ask "Are you American?" they don't ask "Are you Irish?"

And no I don't consider myself American even though I was born here.

I think it's an easy and reliable assumption to make that if one lives, works, and generally seems permanantly placed in America.... that they are in fact American. Why would I go up to a random person and ask if they were American?

[Craig]

Originally posted by angel nympho@Apr 18 2003, 05:01 PM

I think it's an easy and reliable assumption to make that if one lives, works, and generally seems permanantly placed in America.... that they are in fact American. Why would I go up to a random person and ask if they were American?

I don't know about your situation, but because most of my Asian friends get asked if they are American, while I used to hang out with some Europeans here in the US who never got asked. One of the guys went out of his way to point out that he wasn't American when he thought it would benefit him and still nobody believed him. I remember him vividly joking about it in class when we should have been listening to the professor.

[razorw]

As for being an American, I don't like many aspects of American "culture." I put it in quotes, because it's so largely undefined, is American culture defined as BBQs and baseball games? Or the marble statues in DC? Or even rap music? The part I don't like is that mentality that the American way is the right way, cow-boy politics.

I'm a Canadian, but I do see the same thing. Though, I don't think you can classify certain 'events' as culture, I believe North American culture, is more dictated by choice than certain characteristics. Stereotypes such as the 'cowboy mentality', only continue to exist, because it is perpetuated as such. Stereotypes generally are formed from a strand of truth stretched and distorted that the truth no longer exists. Being Canadian is who I am. Having a Chinese heritage, that's also part of me too. Chinese-Canadian, Canadian, its who I am.

But if anyone asks, I'm a proud Canadian. --Ray

[Faithless]

Originally posted by AzNBuffGrL@Mar 23 2003, 12:35 AM
How American do you consider yourselves as Asian-American? Do you hold loyality to this country? Culturally?

Being born and raised in the states, I'm American no doubt. Asian-American at that. Since I have foothold in two cultures, it's hard to call myself Chinese-American over Japanese-American (or vice versa). Is there such a thing as a ChinJap-American? :!

[maldito]

I always thought the whole "-American" thing was silly. It seems to be used more with Asian ethnicities than others that I noticed. I don't hear of so many Ukranian-Americans or Armenian-Americans.

I also find that it causes divisions among the same groups of people. And how does one actually define what a ____-American really is? When you become a legal resident? An American citizen? Someone born in the country after 1 or 2 generations? Just a bit redundant to me.

I was born knowing what ethnicities I were and it is given that where I was born that I am an American as far as my nationality goes. So why do we have to bother saying it all the time?

[maldito]

Originally posted by BeTheReds@Apr 17 2003, 05:09 PM

I think that depends on the person. Plenty of Whites will accept the idea that Asians can be Americans. But of course, there are some who won't.

We need to change this.

In order to do this, we should at least persade Asian-Americans to consider themselves Americans.

But then again, it's probably where I grew up that we assume everyone is an American regardless of their ethnicity.

[maldito]

Originally posted by BeTheReds@Apr 17 2003, 08:17 PM
How about..

From what language does your last name originate?

Hmm, that wouldn't work for me. My surname is of Basque origin, yet I'm not Basque.

Plus it seems that Basque people do not carry my surname. If you have my surname, you're either Nicaraguan or Filipino.

[purezero]

There's a hypen? :blink: What the? Where was I when this happened? :lol: I don't know. I think I've always left them like Asian American. I just like it better that way.

Could one say that they're American-Asian then?