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Asian Identity
See art: Personal Explorations on Asian Identity
Read words:
I used to hate being Chinese. I hated Asian culture, I hated the people, I hated everything. I wanted to be whitewashed. I used to only like being Asian because I thought it was a privilege (the assumption of intelligence… stereotypes).
Then I began exploring my triggers when I worked at the Multi-Cultural Center (MCC) at my school. I thought back to my experiences with racist childhood bullying. That led to the realization of my internalized racism. And then I didn’t really know what to do from there. (I haven’t had time to see a therapist)
As an intern at the MCC, I decided that my semester-long project would be to collect and compile a sort of storybook of childhood struggles together. (It’s a pretty penny here, but you can message me your email address here if you’d like me to send you the PDF.)
The experience of creating that book was amazing. Reading the stories. Seeing how willing people (even strangers) were to share their personal stories of struggle. Creating a space that allowed them to let their stories out.
But I still didn’t understand where I was. Actually, I still don’t. Which is why my art is currently filled with anger, frustration, and confusion. Probably misdirected at best.
I’m trying to figure out how I feel and where I am… amongst the stereotypes, the exoticism and hypersexualization, the pressure from the assumption of intelligence, how I act in relation to how I was raised…
I went from blaming white people to calming the fuck down to being depressed to still being depressed to being passive aggressive to…?
I want to eventually get through all this angry stuff and come to some realizations that will be positive. I mean, I love angry art. I fucking love that shit. But I don’t want to be angry about my racial identity forever. I want to figure out what is good, what is bad, and how to get past it all.
How to move beyond, rather than perpetuate the negative messages…
That’s the big fuzzy question I’m working on. I think I’m more frustrated than angry now. Because I still don’t understand. Maybe I’ll never understand.
If you’ve got any advice for me, then it’d be greatly appreciated.
