Michelle Ling asks Bill Moyers:
"You and George W. Bush are both white, and from Texas, Are you guys the same?"
Bill Moyer produced an excellent documentary in 2003, "Becoming American: The Chinese American Experience-No Turning Back" and portions of it can be viewed online on YouTube.
One part deals with the issue of Chinese, and other Asian Americans, being viewed by non-Asians as 'model minorities,' a view that is a double-edged sword. But what are the ethnic identities that Chinese themselves hold?
In a brief interview with Michelle Ling, a Berkeley student, she uses an ingenious approach to convey the idea that we Chinese do not all think alike or see ourselves as homogeneously as non-Asians do. During her interview, Ling poses a rhetorical question to Moyers about his own identity as a white person that questions facile generalizations of many non Asians about Asians. In another exchange, Ling poses a zinger to Moyers (which has been edited out of the revised posted segments) in which she points ou to Moyers: "You and George W. Bush are both white, and from Texas, Are you guys the same?" The edited version omitted that exchange but did include a brief few seconds (3;47-3:57 )in which Ling states : "I AM an American but I have to... become an American to everybody else....all the time" Somewhat puzzled, Moyers responds, "Why,...Why?" Ling adroitly tosses the ball back to Moyers with her reply: "I don't know why....You tell me, you're the white guy" |
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Chinese May All Look The Same to You, But We Chinese Don't See Ourselves As The Same
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