In the graphic novel American Born Chinese,  Gene Luen Yang does a great job both introducing the audience to the many stereotypes surrounding Chinese immigrants and, in the case of cousin Chin-Kee, exaggerating them to the point where it seems ridiculous that the stereotype even exists, because to imagine someone of any nationality acting that way is absurd.

One theme I would like to further explore is the idea of dual, battling identities, which is present most prominently in the chapters about Jin Wang. In the beginning of the first chapter, we see no signs of Jin being uncomfortable with his identity, or feeling out of place. That quickly changes when he is introduced to the class on his first day of school. When the teacher introduces him, she first says his name incorrectly, telling the class his name was Jin Jang instead of Jin Wang, a mistake based off of stereotypes. After this mistake, she goes on to tell the class that he moved here “all the way from China” (Yang 30), another, more obviously stereotypical mistake. Later on in the chapter Jin is seen eating his lunch of dumplings, when he is confronted by a group of boys who ask “what the hell is that” in regards to his food, and when he replies, the boy says only “stay away from my dog” (Yang 32). On page 34, Jin is seen having a sandwich for lunch, on the day he makes his first friend. I did not think of it while I was reading it, but I am beginning to believe that the timing of these two events was more relevant than I thought. It appears that on the day he takes a sandwich instead of dumplings, revoking his traditional culture for the one that wont get him in social trouble, he made a friend. This is significant to me because it represents a choice, hold on to what he is comfortable with, what he knows, who he is, or give it up so that he can fit in and not be ridiculed.

The theme of dual battling identities can also be seen in the case of the monkey king. In the beginning of his chapter, he was confident and content with himself.  It was not until later, when he is rejected from the dinner party, that he has a negative self image. When he returns to his royal chamber, he noticed the smell of monkey fur for the first time, then “he stayed awake for the rest of the night thinking of ways to get rid of it” (Yang 20). This is relevant because it was not until after he was shunned for being a monkey that the smell of monkey fur, a distinctive sign of his monkey-ness, bothered him and he wanted to get rid of it. In his second chapter, he changes his appearance to look more like a man, and tells all of his citizens to wear shoes, similar to the way men do. No matter how many arts he mastered or skills he perfected, he was still viewed as a monkey, so he did his best to change that. The thing he was so proud of in the beginning, erased to the best of his ability because he wanted to be viewed as more than what his physical shell was.

In Gene Luen Yang’s novel “American Born Chinese,” he tells many stories, all of which deal with themes of assimilation into a dominant culture. The driving force for this assimilation, as presented in Yang’s novel, is the feeling of being an outcast, and the shame felt over one’s heritage. For example, the first tale told by Yang centers around the Monkey King, a deity who rules a kingdom of monkeys. He tries to attend a party of the gods, but is rejected by the bouncer because he is a monkey, and because he doesn’t wear shoes. After this rejection, he returns to his kingdom with a newfound shame in his monkey identity. Yang writes of the Monkey King’s return, stating “when he entered his royal chamber, the thick smell of monkey fur greeted him. He’d never noticed it before. He spent the rest of the night trying to get rid of it” (Yang 28). In this quote, the Monkey King begins to have doubts and shame about his identity, doubts he did not have until he was rejected by members of a more dominant culture.

Later, the Monkey King orders all monkeys to wear shoes, and meditates to learn new powers. He learns how to shapeshift into a human, and declares that he is no longer a monkey. He continually exclaims “I am not a monkey” (Yang 67), much to the amusement of other gods. They continue to mock him despite his new identity. The Monkey King then meets a very powerful god who tells him that he cannot escape his identity, no matter the effort he makes to hide his heritage. This story emphasizes the importance of identity, and the harmful effects that stereotypes can have. The Monkey King was content with his identity, but after being derided by others, tried desperately to cast off all signs of his culture. This theme is continued by the other stories in Yang’s novel.

Another story deals with an Asian-American boy named Jin Wang. As a child, Jin went to an elementary school that had only two Asian students, Jin being one of them. The other was a girl named Suzy Nakamura, who Jin avoided. He tried to be more like his peers, and so rejected anything that had to do with his Asian roots. Despite this, he still encountered racism and stereotypes. The other students accuse him of eating dog, and use racial slurs when referring to him. Over time, however, Jin becomes more and more like the other students. This is exemplified when a boy from Taiwan transferred to Jin’s school.

The boy’s name was Wei-Chen Sun, and he would later become Jin’s best friend. But at first, Jin was reluctant to associate with Wei, as he personified the identity that Jin was trying to distance himself from. When Wei first arrived, for example, Jin states “two months later, Wei-Chen arrived. Something made me want to beat him up” (Yang 43). And, when Wei initially talks to Jin, Jin says “you’re in America, speak English” (Yang 44). In these two quotes, it is clear that Jin is trying to distance himself from any identity that isn’t even slightly foreign in an attempt to relate to his peers. In summary, Gene Luen Yang’s stories deal heavily with themes of assimilation, and the shame of not belonging to the dominant culture. This shame is often amplified by stereotypes and discrimination, both of which are felt by the Monkey King and Jin Wang.

In the graphic novel, American Born Chinese, by Gene Luen Yang, has three stories in one book. The stories of the Monkey King, Jin Wang, and Chin-Kee are all based around social stigmas and racial differences of Chinese Americans and the Americans. A common theme shown in all three stories is the idea of separation and discrimination of the main characters of each story because of their differences and the social stigmas surrounding them. In the story of the Monkey King, the heavens were having a dinner with all the deities and the Monkey King who rules the Flower-Fruit Mountain waits his turn to be allowed into the dinner. At the door, he was denied entry of the dinner because he “is still a monkey” (Yang 15). This shows both separation and discrimination because he was different. The guard at the door even acknowledges the fact that the Monkey King is a king and even a deity, but that does not change the fact that he is a monkey. This shows discrimination because the guard is judging him and not giving the Monkey King equality since he is a monkey. This also shows separation because the king is being separated from the other kings and deities. In the story of Jin Yang, Jin is a knew student in a 4^th grade class that just recently moved from San Francisco.  He has a rough time at the beginning of the chapter when the students were making jokes about him eating dogs and the teacher miss pronouncing his name and where he was from. It was noted that him and Susie (another Asian in his class) “avoided each other as much as possible” and a similar action took place with Wei Chen-Suh (boy who moved from Taiwan) was told by Jin that he already had “enough friends” and that he does not want to be friends with Wei (Yang 31-38). All three of the Asian American children purposefully discriminated each other and showed signs of separation. This shows that the effects of their own discrimination when they first arrive carry over towards their own actions towards separating from each other. In the third story of Chin-Kee, he visits his cousin Danny who lives in America. Right away Danny is showing expressions of fear and uneasiness because of the news of the arrival of his cousin. Chin-Kee shows inappropriate manners and large buckteeth and large hands that right away cause a sense of awkwardness and unwelcoming from Danny and his friend he is studying with (Yang 50). This shows discrimination and separation through means of short response towards Chin-Kee and facial expressions of disapproval and not wanting him there. Danny never makes any rude remarks or uses discriminating or racial slurs towards Chin-Kee, but it can be easily seen that Danny does not want to be around him, this showing separation. In all three stories, the characters experience the harsh effects of discrimination and separation for who they are. The sad part for all three of the characters is that they are not even aware of their flaws or differences until they are called out for it by others.

 “American Born Chinese,” by Gene Luen Yang does a great job displaying a variety of themes. I’m going to talk about how it brings light to the idea of assimilation. In all three of the stories in this book, the main characters seem to assimilate in one way or another. In the story about Monkey King, he ends up assimilating to be more like the real kings and such that are allowed to enter the gates of heaven. After being denied from the dinner party in heaven, he returned to Flower-fruit mountain and fell victim of self-hate and was disappointed in his identity as a monkey. He talked about how for the first time he noticed the smell of monkey fur when he arrived back on the mountain and he wanted to get rid of it. The guard in heaven had told Monkey King, “You may be a king- you may even be a deity- but you are still a monkey” (Yang 15). In other words, the guard was saying that because Monkey King is a monkey, he will never be accepted as a king or allowed into the dinner parties in heaven. This made Monkey King fall victim to self-hate, and so he wanted to get rid of his monkey identity. This is why he wanted to get rid of the monkey fur stench, and he also told all of the monkeys that he ruled over that they must start wearing shoes. These are both types of assimilation. Monkey King was trying to fit the criteria that was necessary to be accepted as a true king.

            Another example is when Jen Wang begins to assimilate to the expectations of his white classmates. When he first started school, he would bring dumplings for lunch. His classmates, then began to make fun of him for eating what such an alien food to them. The next day he brought a sandwich to school instead. This was his way of assimilating to society because he knew if he ate the typical American lunch, his classmates would have no reason to make fun of him. Another example of assimilation is when Jen Wang begins to like a girl in his class. He sees the girl talking to this other boy who has longer, curly hair, so then he goes home and changes his hairstyle to resemble that of the other boy. This is assimilation because he is changing his hair to make it more like what he thinks a white female would like. He is assimilating to give him a better shot at winning over the girl he likes. One last example of assimilation is when Jen Wang tells Wei-Chen Sun to speak English. Wei-Chen Sun transferred from Thailand to the same school as Jen Wang. When Wei-Chen Sun saw Jen Wang for the first time, he immediately noticed he was Chinese, so he went up to him and spoke Chinese. Jen Wang snapped back, “You’re in America. Speak English” (Yang 37). This is such an example of assimilation because of how over time Jen Wang has been told that he must speak English since he’s in America. It shows how much American society has played a role in shaping a young Chinese boy’s mind. At one point, he was in Wei-Chen Sun’s shoes, but he’s accepted the white expectation that while in America, everyone should be speaking English, so now he too fights for that expectation.

In conclusion, I think society’s intimidating expectations make many people go down the road towards assimilation. America has all of these expectations of its citizens, and if you don’t meet them then you can’t be a true American. Life is really hard for those who fall short of these expectations and still try to live in America, therefore this leads a lot of people to assimilation and the urge to fit in. This is why so many immigrants strive to learn English to the best of their abilities when they get to America because it’s easier to get a job, make friends, etc. This is a way of assimilation. People often assimilate so that they no longer have to deal with the consequences of being different in a harsh American Society.

American Born Chinese explores the many ideas and themes that we have discussed thus far in class. Some themes that has stuck out to me throughout the first three chapters of American Born Chinese is discrimination, assimilation and stereotypes. The first chapter, The Monkey King is primarily about a monkey who was a great ruler and was respected by all the monkey’s at the four corners of the earth. The great monkey king decides to veer away from the kingdom and goes to a party, but is unfairly rejected by the guards men off the basis that he is a monkey. The guard says he was rejected because he was not wearing any shoes, but that is unsettling for the monkey king. The monkey king then proceeds to attack and beat up every god and/or goddess at the party and vows from then on to find ways to be anything or than just a monkey. For me, the theme that is prevalent throughout this chapter is discrimination. To the guard and probably the vast majority of the audience reading, the monkey will always just be a monkey. Being labeled as just a monkey is shown at the end of the chapter to bring the monkey down and make him feel less than. Once he got back to his chambers, he wished that it smelled of anything other than monkey fur. The way that the guard treated the monkey king made him feel as though being a monkey is all he will ever be. He can be no one else, which is what really rocked him to the core. This reminds me a lot of when someone has a family name and when they can never truly get away from the family name and they will always have to identify with the family name, whether it is a positive or negative one. When the monkey gets back home and wishes that his chambers smelled of anything other than monkey fur it, it is really sad to see that discrimination because he is a monkey has lead him to want to be anything but who he is.

In the following chapter of American Born Chinese, The theme that is most prevalent to me in this reading is stereotypes. On page 30 Jin Wang is introduced to his new third grade class first as Jin Jang which is so obviously racist of the teacher to say that even though Jin Wang said multiple times that his name was Jin Wang. Then she said proceeds to say that he came all the way to China, even though he is from San Francisco. This is an example of how stereotypes play a role in society even today. It is not uncommon for things like this to happen especially in a classroom setting. Coming from a once predominately white school, there has been an increase in both the Asian and Indian population. The teachers in the beginning would make somewhat stereotypical comments and assumptions of the new kids that came in. Just because they are Asian and or Indian does not mean that they are fresh off the boat from China or Japan or even India. Honestly, a lot of the time these students are just from another state within this country. Nonetheless, comments and assumptions whether they are or aren’t from these places are hurtful and unnecessary. You should not make comments like this as it makes the students uncomfortable and even judged by the rest of the class. When the section comes back, Jin Wang is now in the 7th grade and feels weird about his hair so changes it to be just like Greg’s hair. Then, the student stops eating his dumplings, which in his old school was probably very normal to eat, but the students at this school didn’t like that he was eating the dumpling. He stops eating the dumplings and starts to eat sandwiches. This is seen as assimilation because to feel as though they belong and are accepted they have to change who they are, which is why so much of identity is lost. As we talked about in the past, that forcing people to assimilate takes away from their culture and their traditions and forces them into a live that they don’t formally agree with completely and even when they want to hold on to their cultures that may have had to leave behind to start a new life and it’s very hard to do so when you are constantly being judged or the foods you eat or the clothes you wear.

I think that this class has done a great job of exposing all of us to stereotypes, themes, and ideas and makes you think twice about what you say or even what your peers are saying. I found that while I was reading American Born Chinese that a majority of the topics and ideas that we discussed not only just in class but also in our various other readings were seen through this one. I saw the ways that the author made his voice seen and important ( Like from they say I say) and that he added specific things to make you uncomfortable or to make you think a little harder and a little deeper about what you say about people or the stereotypes you might have heard in the past that you continuously hear.

Choose one of the following prompts as your guiding question for your journal:

1) As you read the chapters from American Born Chinese, keep a list of words, phrases, visual elements or concepts. These can be recurring culturally specific images, ideas or words (such as frequent references to American and Chinese culture). Very briefly, look these words/phrases/visual elements up on the internet, dictionary, or another source, to find at least a partial definition. From this list, choose one word or concept to focus on in your journal.

2) Discuss the chapters focusing on a singular theme that you have identified. Think of how previous readings and/or concepts that we discussed in class help you understand the meaning of the plot, themes, characters, and visual/textual details in the novel.

• Be sure to make at least two references to the text.
• 500-word entry
  

After reading the piece from Gloria Anzaldua’s “Borderlands,” i have a newfound respect and interest in the variety of languages and dialects that exist within the United States. Throughout high school and even now in college i have taken Latin which is a dead language. Many languages, most notably the Romance languages find their roots in Latin. That being said, i have always had a great deal of interest in origins of language and the structures and differences between languages and even within one language itself. This “Chicano Spanish” that Anzaldua spams about is beyond intriguing. I also believe that her insertion of the dialect intermixed with proper English in her book is meant to make one feel as if they are the ones struggling to grasp the concept of being different and possessing a native accent that makes life difficult in the eyes of people who aren’t the same. I wasn’t able to translate any of the Spanish she used but it did make me feel the way i just described. Anzaldua writes, “En boca cerrado no entran moscas,” which she then translates to mean “flies don’t enter a closed mouth.” This speaks to the struggle she endured even as a child coping with sounding different. I could only imagine what it would be like to speak a dialect so different from your native home and so different from the land in which you live that you are literally stuck at the “border” in the middle. While her struggle is immense and very interesting, i am still just as much, if not more interested in the evolution of the Chicano Spanish that people in her region have come to speak. Not only does the dialect use derivations of Spanish, it also “uses anglicisms, words borrowed from English” to structure or even replace some Spanish words. To conclude i can see how something like this would create a struggle on both sides that oppose the Chicano’s. The Texan most likely doesn’t respect the foreign language that doesn’t sound any different to pure Spanish. The Mexican might see the Chicano dialect as a pollution of their own tongue which therefore makes the “polluters” different and beneath them. By far my favorite read of the semester so, far i will forever be intrigued by the essence and evolution of langue as is presented by Anzaldua’s piece.

“The actual physical borderland that I’m dealing with in this book is the Texas-U. S Southwest/Mexican border. The psychological borderlands, the sexual borderlands and the spiritual borderlands are not particular to the southwest. In fact, the borderlands are physically present wherever two or more cultures edge each other, where under, lower, middle and upper classes touch, where the space between two individuals shrinks with intimacy.” (preface) In this passage, the author clarifies that even though there’s a physical between the US and Mexico, there’s still a psychological border existing. This reminds me the border between Hong Kong and mainland China. Hong Kong was colonized by the British government for almost a 100 years since the 19^th century. There’s still a borderline between mainland China and Hong Kong even though Hong Kong has been unified with China. Hong Kong was originally in the province of Guangdong. Then a lot of people especially the rich from Guangzhou, a city that has great economic influence to the world at that time and the capital of Guangdong, moved to Hong Kong. That’s why Hong Kong nowadays speaks Cantonese (the language of the province Guangdong) and share the same culture as Guangdong. However, because of the colonization of the British government, Hong Kong has changed into a more western influenced society. China was once poor and under-developed. It makes Hong Kong people feel superior to the people from the mainland. However, in the past couple decades, China has grown to the second largest economy in the world. Hong Kong people started to realize their superiority is disappearing slowly. This causes some types of frictions happened between them. But in an ideal world, both of them should treat each other nicely since they are of the same culture.

“I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess—that was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler. I remember being sent to the corner of the classroom for ‘talking back’ to the Anglo teacher when all I was trying to do was tell her how to pronounce my name. ‘if you want to be American, speak American. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.’ (page 75) In the passage, the author describes a piece of her memory where she got punished for speaking Spanish in school where only English is allowed. It is also quiet the same in my primary school in China when the country first started to regulate students to mandarin instead of their dialects. There will be organization consists of students to monitor us to see if we speak any Cantonese if so our class will be deducted points and we will lose the competition of the most ‘civilized’ class. But the reality is only 2 out of 52 students in my class speaks mandarin others all from the Canton area, so naturally we like to speak Cantonese. But nowadays, more people from other province flooded into my city, Guangzhou, causing the ratio of locals to non-locals to be around half to half. More kids in my hometown now speaks mandarin now even though they are actually from my hometown. It is a disgrace. It is a shame to see my language could be dying because of that.

In Borderlands /La frontera: The New Mestiza by Gloria Anzaldúa, many languages were present such as Chicano Spanish, Angl-American English, Tex-Mex, etc. She talked about the borderline between multiple languages and cultures on the U.S Southeast and Mexico border. Some people in the environment were forced to make up their own language and culture when they can’t find their voices among the rest of the other people. The difficulties that many faced living on the border occurred in daily basis, from having to know multiple languages to having an anarchy of the “superiority” of languages. The native English speakers look down to everyone else whose speak more than one language and/or not knowing English. The Mexican-Spanish speakers look down to the other dialects as being not pure Spanish. And like that, people are categorized and ranked based solely on what language/dialect they use and it stole the person’s identity; one was not free to identify his/herself but was put on the ranking system. Anzaldúa proved her point, stating, “because we internalize how our language has been used against us for the dominant culture, we use our language differences against each other” (80). People that have slightly different dialects are turning against each other since that’s what was done to them by the dominant language speakers. She also said, “Living on borders and in margins, keeping intact one’s shifting and multiple identity and integrity, is like trying to swim in a new element, an ‘alien’ element” (72). It is extremely difficult to identify as one identity only while living on a border, where every cultures and languages are not original.

Some of them was translated for comprehension but most of them were not and since I have not taken Spanish in a long time, I did not understand what Anzaldúa was trying to say. I tried to use context clue but it’s more difficult when it’s not in the same language as the sentence. I recognized some word with my limited Spanish but not being able to understand a lot of the non-English narrative made me feel frustrated as a reader. I think the way that she purposely did that was to show how frustrated it is to not understand a language when you have to, to be able to make sense of something. Every immigrants and people whose first language was not English feel this frustration on a daily basis.

I admit, I am a nosy individual. I love looking over people’s shoulders at what they are doing on their phones or listening to conversations that I am not a part of. Having Swedish cousins has brought to my attention that I am often annoyed when people speak in a language that I cannot understand as a way to encode their private matters. Why should I be left out? What gives them the right to speak in a language I cannot understand, when they can understand me all the time? My mother is to blame for my prying disposition, but I believe that growing up American is to blame for this entitled feeling. This country is grown on the idea of multiculturalism, yet we are very quick to label something or someone as “un-American” if they are not using English. This outsider label is reinforced through many aspects of our daily lives. For example, actual labels on food packaging or cleaning supplies or instruction manuals for furniture usually contain directions and warnings ordered with English first, followed by other languages. It was not until very recently resulting from the influx and our heightened awareness of Latin American immigrants, that signage began containing Spanish in places such as grocery stores. That is understandable as we are an English-speaking country, yet, we also expect other countries to accommodate our language when we visit.

               The integration of poetry throughout Gloria Alzandua’s memoir Borderlands lends it emotion that can only be achieved through prose. The catch is, much of her emotion is channeled through her connection to her Mexican roots which leads her to write large sections of poetry or emotional memories in one of her many dialects of Spanish. One thing that was profound to me was the way she went about explaining all of the different forms of Spanish she used in a variety of situations, even within her family between siblings. On page 78 she casually refers to her “home” languages on the list as the ones she speaks with family and friends from the same area as her, “My ‘home’ toungues are the languages I speak with my sister and brothers, with my friends. They are he last five listed, with 6 and 7 being closest to my heart.” To me, it is almost un-imaginable for someone to speak so many languages under one roof. While it may seem like a foreign concept, America is a land of dialects. I grew up speaking a different dialect of English from my Midwestern peers, our friends from Georgia speak another dialect, our friends from the east coast speak yet another. There are often terms that differ, but normally we can effectively communicate. This is unlike Mexican dialects, as they are considered different languages and take much longer to learn and remember. And although I did not understand all of the Spanish she used, the essence of the emotion could be inferred based on the words I knew.

               Her focus of what she called “linguistic terrorism” on page 80 also resonated with me greatly as it is the same phenomenon that was experienced by black people in America who spoke “Ebonics”. She says,” Chicanas who grew up speaking Chicano Spanish have internalized the belief that we speak poor Spanish. It is illegitimate, a bastard language.”