Joanne Chang

A collective healing by sharing our scars

Revisado: 05-25-23

My Life Growing Up Asian in America edited by CAPE (Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment) is a “collective healing by sharing our scars.” I applaud the widely diverse collection of stories, expressed effectively and artistically in a variety of ways, that share the common thread of the traumas of growing up Asian in America.

The stories in this book were cathartic- they created a sense of community and belonging that so many of the authors talked about craving as they grew up as one of the few or even the only Asian Americans they knew. They articulated the things that so many of us experienced- the shame felt at having immigrant parents who didn’t know the “rules,” the humiliation of having food or a home language different from everyone else, the microaggressions, the outright racist bullying, the constant striving to assimilate, the rejections when trying to assimilate, the self-hatred, the betrayal of other Asian Americans in the quest for “white adjacency,” and then finally the realization of what you have been doing to yourself, your family, your culture, your race. The power of finding a community to support a strong, proud identity as an Asian American, and finally making the conscious decision to no longer make yourself smaller to appease the white people in the room.

While listening to the audiobook version I found myself tearing up quite often as a feeling of deep connection to an author’s experience seared through me. And when there was a story that I was not able to relate to as easily I felt like a new window was opening to me, showing me the perspectives of other Asian Americans that I may not have considered before.

This book is a must-read, but not a must-listen. As poignant and engaging as I thought the writing in this book was, the narration of the audiobook could have been vastly improved. Much of the narration was quite good, until ethnic words were introduced and it became apparent that the narrator of a story was not of the same ethnicity as the original author. While narrating in itself is a skill, correct pronunciation of ethnic words is a matter of respect. I can live with some occasional bad phrasing or monotone reading, but the mispronunciation of ethnic words that are representative of something important in a specific culture is close to unforgivable, especially when we know better. This is not a book written about Asian Americans by white people. It is written by us and for us. It should not be too much to ask that the person reading the story of a Taiwanese American be able to correctly pronounce the phrase “chi (1) ku(3)” or that the person narrating the story of a Korean American be able to accurately pronounce the Korean words for “mother” and “father.” To have these important words be mispronounced in a book meant to lift the voices and validate the experiences of Asian Americans is insulting. We can, we have, and we must do better.

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Important book, but read the print version

Revisado: 04-19-23

The content of this book was eye opening for me in many ways and is important and interesting to know, since Asian Americans don’t generally see information about ourselves in mainstream books and media. I really want to finish reading this book for the content, but at about the fifth mispronunciation of Asian terms, I could no longer tolerate the audible version.

It seems ironic that the book is attempting to cast light on the artistic and creative achievements of Asian Americans and to have them be respected, but yet there is so little respect paid to pronouncing names and terms correctly. I did not even get halfway through and already the surnames Liu, Hwang, and Leung were mispronounced, as were the words Sikh and kalbi. These are in no way esoteric words- most Asian people would know how to pronounce all of these correctly. Some of the contributors to this and other books about Asian American identity have articulated how hurtful it is to constantly have their names and other words from their culture mispronounced, so to hear them mispronounced by the narrators of a book that is supposed to lift up and bring positive awareness to Asian Americans is completely unacceptable to me.

There is much in the book about all of the overt and casual racism Asian Americans have endured and still endure, and not bothering to get pronunciations correct in a book ABOUT Asian Americans seems like another added slight.

In addition, some parts of the book are in list format. Reading a list is very different from listening to someone read a list (or many lists) to you. Same with the conversations on the book, and especially the narration of the quotes from Asian American comedians- the narrations were painful to listen to and should have been recordings of the actual comedians. They made for very awkward listening and would be better read.

I will finish this book, but I will read the print version instead. Whoever oversaw the audio version of this book messed up pretty badly.

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Refreshing Take on AAPI Coming of Age Story

Revisado: 03-12-23

Patricia Park’s young adult novel, Imposter Syndrome and Other Confessions of Alejandra Kim, was a refreshing, unique take on an Asian American coming of age story. The protagonist, Ale, is the daughter of Spanish-speaking Korean-Argentinians and faces unique challenges as a scholarship student at an elite private high school in downtown New York City. Ale is a senior and applying for colleges, and at the same time dealing with the suicide death of a parent, microaggressions at school, overt racism, friendship issues, and finding her own voice. Other themes that emerge are classism, the model minority myth, white privilege, white defensiveness, and cancel culture.

This book fleshes out a lot of misunderstandings, harsh realities, and crises of identity that not only young adults, but anyone might relate to and gives the reader much to contemplate. It was well-written and narrated spectacularly on Audible- I highly recommend it.

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Powerful commentary on white privilege

Revisado: 02-18-23

Disoriented by Elaine Hsieh Chou left me…disoriented. This book was a reckoning of a most uncomfortable kind, the kind of uncomfortable that makes you avoid thinking or talking about it because when you do, you realize how deeply it affects and hurts you. Ingrid Yang, the Taiwanese American protagonist, grows up in a white town and does everything she can to be accepted and fit in. To do that, she ends up being complicit in the racism that is exhibited towards her, casual or otherwise. She tries to be as white as she can and as she grows older, only dates white men.

Chou brings up the idea that there are two kinds of Asian Americans- the self-hating ones that try their best to “be white” (Ingrid) and the Asians who take pride in their Asianness, seek out connections with other Asians and POC, and are aware and critical of the white privilege and racism in American society (Vivian). I feel like this has always been obvious, but no one ever really talked about it. To speak it out loud in the form of this book seemed cathartic.

Ingrid is pretty unlikable throughout almost the entire book. She is completely oblivious to how she enables and participates in the racism around her. She evolves slowly, with pieces of herself being revealed to her like the squares in Minesweeper…sometimes small revelations and sometimes huge bombs that shatter her reality. By the end of the book, though, I found myself cheering her on and laughing with her. And while the ending was not ideal, it was sadly realistic.

Overall, this book was a blistering commentary on the power of white privilege, the model minority myth, and cultural appropriation. Of course, it is meant to be satirical, but it sadly seems more like reality than satire in many ways. I had to keep going back and relistening because I was often lulled into thinking it was a straightforward story, but then was hit over the head with these deep ideas that I had to go back and listen to again to process. If you want to be given a lot of things to think about, read this book.

The performance overall was good, except for the parts where there were Mandarin Chinese words to pronounce. The narrator is not a Mandarin speaker and was not able to authentically pronounce those words. She did a great job with the rest of the story, though, and her voice had a soothing, calm quality.

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Moments of Briliance

Revisado: 11-13-22

This book was really funny if you don't get easily offended by crass behavior. It definitely had its high and low points.

Jimmy O. Yang reveals himself as both a neanderthal and a pretty brave (and lucky) person. Like some other readers, I found his aspiration to be a strip club DJ and to have a white girlfriend distasteful, but that wasn't really the point of the book. The point seemed to be that in America, you are free to dream your dreams, whatever they are. He was brave enough to pursue his, and I applaud him for going for it and achieving what he set out to do. The stories he tells about how he got there are pretty hilarious, and although it did sound like he was reading it at some points, overall his delivery was pretty natural and easy to listen to.

What I appreciated about it besides the laughs was the reminder that Asian Americans have such different experiences, even though we are often all lumped together. Specifically, when he talked about other Asian American actors refusing to even audition for a part that would require some kind of Asian accent, but that he could easily play that role because he had been in that character's shoes...that made me see that perspective. As an Asian American born in the US, I couldn't understand why anyone would want to play someone with an accent, but he made me see why. I don't think his pipe dream of Asian accents being viewed as sexy is going to come true anytime soon (aside from Asian women being exoticized), though I see where he's going with that.

I also got pretty emotional when he spoke about not having to try to fit in when he returned to Asia, how he could just be himself and not the Asian guy. He said it was like a huge weight had been lifted from him and he felt at peace. That really resonated with me, that we have been fighting to be treated like everyone else and trying not to stick out for so long that we forget that there are places where we blend right in. And then despite the struggles we face in the US as Asian Americans, there really is no place quite like it.

I was expecting the humor, but I wasn't expecting the new perspectives. Thanks, Jimmy!

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