Monday, 5 June 2006: Asian American Immigrant Literature

Text-objective discussion leader: Daniel Robison

Objective 1:  The immigrant narrative and the American Dream

If we see the American dream as one of hard work and ingenuity leading to riches and the good life, then we can see how this is attempted in several of the readings, but with dramatically different results. 

In the selection from America Is in the Heart, Bulosan’s narrator tells us:

My first sight of the approaching land was an exhilarating experience.  Everything seemed native and promising to me.  It was like coming home after a long voyage, although as yet I had no home in this city.  Everything seemed familiar and kind—the white faces of the buildings melting in the soft afternoon sun, the gray contours of the surrounding valleys that seemed to vanish in the last periphery of light.  With a sudden surge of joy, I knew that I must find a home in this new land. 60

This joy, though, is soon destroyed as Allos is soon forced into virtual slavery and winds up wondering up and down the West coast looking for work and running from trouble.  With forced serendipity, he runs into his brother who tells him that he “’shouldn’t have come to America’” (72).  By the end of the story, Allos can only pray, “’Please, God, don’t change me in America!” (73).

            This is in huge contrast to that of the Chang family in Jen’s “In the American Society.”  This family attains the American Dream.  The father runs a pancake house so well that the family “got rich right away” (158).  They can buy cars and furniture and never, even when the restaurant is obviously faltering, seem to have monetary problems.  This is not a family that represents America or the white people who live here, but seem more concerned with fitting in than where the next meal is coming from.

1. What accounts for the huge difference in the experiences between Allos and the Changs?
2. Which experience is more typical?

Objective 2: Assimilation of the immigrant.

            In Bulosan’s America Is in the Heart, we see largely a lack of assimilation.  There are two sections where Allos sees some kind of assimilation.  On page 68, we learn that he “had not seen this sort of brutality in the Philippines,” but he does become “as ruthless as the worst of them.”  On page 69, he longs to be able to speak English so that he can communicate with some hoboes.  For the most part, however, he and the other Filipinos and Chinese remain among themselves, living in one ghetto after another, always making friends with other Filipinos and being abused and used by other Filipinos.

            In Jen’s “In the American Society,” we get a much clearer image of assimilation.  Ralph Chang, who runs an extremely profitable restaurant, and his wife, who had become manager of a grocery store, are clear pictures of the “Model Minority.”  Their neighbors seemingly accept them, and the daughters do not appear to have any of the conflicts that oppress characters in the other stories.  The only real lack of assimilation is a source of humor as the mother, who desires to join the WASPish country club, must deal with her husband who “doesn’t believe in joining the American society,” and refuses to wear nice clothes (159).

            Hong Kingston’s take on assimilation in the selection from The Woman Warrior, is a little different.  Here, her concern is not wrapped up in being accepted by the Americans.  We can see the Model Minority when she routinely brings home straight A’s.  She is able to turn herself “American-feminine” in order to get dates (196).  And her sense of strength in her femaleness is essentially American, but this story is more about a woman seeking the love of her family and an acceptance within her own culture than Hong Kingston attempting to assimilate herself into her new country and its culture.  And much like the Asians in Bulosan, these Asians seclude themselves into ghettos and have little to do with dominant culture.

1. Would Allos have had an easier time if he had been more assimilated?  Was it possible at that time for him to be more assimilated?
2. Why do the Changs have such an easier time of assimilating into America?
3. Why do you think Hong Kinston refers to the Chinese living in America as emigrants rather than as immigrants?

Objective 3:  Immigrant narrative (American Dream) versus minority narrative (American Nightmare).

            Jen’s “In the American Society” presents the clearest picture of the immigrant narrative.  The Changs come to America with a dream to make it big, and they do, and have no direct racism or roadblocks to achieving that dream.

            However, both Far’s “In the Land of the Free” and Bulosan’s America Is in the Heart both demonstrate the flip-side of the American Dream.  In the former, the family is taken advantage of by the white lawyer who feeds on their desperation and lack of understanding of America, the government, and the English language.  In the latter, Allos learns the underside of America and no recourse from the predatory oldtimers.  Both of these stories are about people in stage 3 of the immigrant narrative.

1. How much of the American Dream do the immigrants bring with them to America?
2. How much of the American Nightmare do the immigrants bring with them to America?