Hello all, So I have a character of Chinese-Australian immigrant background, I think maybe the grandparents were immigrants so third generation? (this story is set in essentially-real-life modern Sydney by the way, it's an urban fantasy and most of the characters are centered in university). I wanted to consciously avoid some of the stereotypes I see with asian male character. There's the nerd loser/unpopular kid sort, gangster/businessman/political type with is usually quite negative and genericised, the ninja/samurai/kung-fu master type, and the mystic, and the later two often overlap with mystical kung-fu mentor types like in Kill Bill. I have also seen commentary pointing out that asian men rarely get to be sexy, particularly relevant to the nerd loser type portrayal but still somewhat true with the other archetypes. Even when ninjas are cool it's usually the western hero that gets to be portrayed as actually attractive and having romantic interactions. So I made Kenny somewhat athletic, popular and attractive, academically competent but not a math or computing nerd, and he's not associated with any foreign-culture exoticism. He's also the oldest (23) and generally most mature of the group, but also fun and casual. However, one stereotype I am still worried about is the "why u not doctor yet?" archetype. In my current design of things, Kenny's parents are fairly upper-middle professional types with a formal, competitive sort of nature. I wanted to avoid the most obvious manifestation of this trope, so Kenny does not have any major differences over career choice with them or intensive competitive pressure placed on him. It's more just he doesn't care about that sort of thing and enjoys hanging out and being more casual. But it does still sort of fit the stereotype. It stills fits with the broader trend of associating asians with formalness and competitiveness, and Kenny being the exception doesn't disprove the rule. What do people think? I would be particularly interested in asian perspectives on this, obviously.
I don't have an answer, but am interested in this. Is the term 'tiger mom' offensive? It has a totally different meaning than 'helicopter parent' which has no racial connotations.
Only you know your character right now, but I'd just make sure not to let stereotypes define what the character isn't. By that I mean that actively subverting each stereotype is still letting the stereotypes take the steering wheel. Stereotypes shouldn't have any influence either way; the character should be their own person. It is worth noting: A. Each culture is unique. Cultural ideas themselves are not stereotypes. This character and their family's attitude towards different cultures will definitely be their own, and they will experience many different cultural influences coming also from their community, etc. B. People believe in stereotypes, so they do have some impact on the real world. Each generation has different attitudes towards stereotypes, so make sure that if you make any reference to them in a 2021 context, that the dialogue isn't written like it's the 80s. People are fairly sensitive about them today, but nobody's perfect.
Absolutely. Kenny's character isn't just the avoidance of stereotypes, there are other facets, his friendship with Marcus (the MC), his leadership of the social circle (the five mains are connected by mutual friendship with him and they hangout at his house where Marcus also rooms), his bisexuality and romantic relationships, and him learning he is a spiritual medium. But I do want to generally avoid stereotypes because the depiction of them over and over again reinforces the idea they are how people commonly are, and the way those archetypes are often played out is quite reductive (e.g. Yakuza and Triad gangsters commonly occur as generic token ethnic gangsters). And the parenting and class stereotypes are related to genuinely harmful views of asians, particularly as they relate to "they took ur jerbs" rhetoric (Pauline Hanson is shaking). I also don't want him to feel too daddy-issues-y, in the same way I want to avoid too much of Marcus' story being about transness, even though it is a significant part of his character nonethless. Given there is an emphasis on a reasonably diverse cast, I don't want the characters to feel consumed by angst and drama in relation to those identities. The whole point is showing them growing up and working together at a more developed semi-adult stage of their lives and the fact the world has somewhat moved in the right direction to allow people to just enjoy diverse living (while acknowledging the problems). So given that, I wouldn't be averse to removing the parental issues, or making them about something different, because I don't want Kenny to be the "ah, asian parents" characters.
Chinese-American here with some Chinese-Australian family (not that it makes me any special authority)… There are stereotypes and then there are stereotypes, I guess. Meaning, some have a basis in real cultural attitudes in communities (eg the obsession with academics) and others are just racist (eg Asian men are wimpy). Not that it's always easy to distinguish the two. But I can say, for instance, that the "tiger mom's" obsession with her kids' academic performance is at leastly partly rooted in the history of the pre-modern Sinosphere where a son passing the civil service exams and landing a coveted position as a salaried bureaucrat was the obsession of countless families for whom it was their only hope of escaping poverty. It was a brutal situation of nonstop pressure and tedious studies for young men in that region, There are many cases of brilliant men who failed the exams again and again, or who did not pass until middle age or later. A lot of the most popular items found in Chinese households are oriented toward wealth (the god Cai Shen, three-legged money toads, Budai sitting on a pile of gold ingots, etc) or academic advancement (the god Wen Chang or his various symbols). So there is that cultural background. Of course obsession with wealth, status, and academic achievement is hardly unique to Asian families; a lot of people have come to similar attitudes through different routes. Among immigrant populations the pressure to get established is always pronounced, often as a matter of sheer survival, so I'm not surprised to hear about Somali, Nigerian, or Indian immigrant parents who behave similarly to "tiger moms". I believe this attitude has done a lot of harm but it's not hard to understand why people come to think and act that way. Another factor nowadays is the rise of Sinophobia in Australia, the US, and other countries which has a correlation with the increasingly belligerent behavior of these countries toward the PRC, with frequent insinuations that every person of Chinese descent is potentially a spy or agent of foreign influence. The idea that East Asians behave as some sort of hive mind has long been around but it seems to be gaining more currency now. I think what I'm trying to say is that, yes, there are historic-cultural factors underpinning a lot of stereotypes, fair or otherwise. At the end of the day though people are going to do people things which means departing from, or conforming to, stereotypes in any number of ways. Maybe the question about your character should just be what you would ask of any character- is he human? Not a bunch of checked boxes to avoid stereotypes, not some distinctive but indifferent traits (I'm not saying that's what you're doing).
Many, if not all, societies are regarded as behaving "as some sort of hive mind." People perpetuate this without even realizing they're doing it.
True, but many Asian cultures actually are extremely collectivist, which is what makes them far more subject to that kind of Borg Collective characterization. I remember reading recently (and it was written recently too) that for instance a man is supposed to be a good husband, plus whatever his job is, and concentrate solely on those things, and it was considered shameful to his family and society for him to cultivate any personal interests. I don't remember what country this was though, I think Japan? This is the traditional way, of course in some areas people are more modern, but the traditionalists look down on them as some equivalent to 'dirty hippies'.
Individualism vs. Collectivism has definitely been studied in the context of culture, since understanding this dynamic is very important in business, international relations, psychology, etc. Here is one analysis: Source: here Certainly many Asian cultures are collectivist according to these data, but we can find both types of cultures all over the world. These are trends, so aren't universal. There will be some people in every country who go against the grain. And if we look at a third generation immigrant, they will be influenced by a lot of different cultures. Their family and community will be particularly important: is their community individualistic or collectivist? We could ask the same question for other cultural attributes as well. Consider locus of control. Someone with an internal locus of control believes that their actions influence their outcomes. Someone with an external locus of control believes that their outcomes are beyond their control, influenced by the choices of others or perhaps even the gods. This inclination has been studied across many different cultures. When comparing the US and China we find the below. Source: https://successacrosscultures.com/2019/11/29/how-culture-impacts-a-persons-sense-of-control-aka-locus-of-control/ We certainly see a difference here, but still, 35% of people in China, and 11% of people in the US, disagreed with the consensus in their country. This gets to the difference between a generalization and a stereotype. A generalization looks at the attributes that are most common in a population. It could have a statistical basis (or could just be observation). A stereotype is an offensive misinterpretation of culture ideas, physical features, etc. Stereotypes are to be avoided by definition. Generalizations can be used with very much caution and context. Statistics do tell us things about populations, when they are well founded and accurate. They don't tell us anything at all about people.
Precisely this, and when we're talking about character development we're talking about people, not populations. I remember a story someone on these boards told a few years ago, about writing a historical fiction piece about a fellow who comes to America as an indentured servant in colonial times. "Well, but your character is French and most indentured servants were British or Irish," was the feedback they got, "so this isn't historically accurate." Which is infuriating, because the story clearly isn't about most indentured servants, it's about one of them. And unless you're saying it's impossible that any indentured servant in colonial America was French, then you're really not even giving feedback on the story, you're just trying to enforce some weird idea of "accuracy" which doesn't really apply.
Part of the conversation above is about societies. But even if we're talking about individual characters, a member of a collectivist society will be very different from someone living in an individualistic society. Here's the beginning of an article covering some aspects of this: Most Asian cultures are predominantly collectivistic in nature. In collectivistic cultures, individuals are seen as embedded within their group identity, and the notion of a separate, autonomous self is deemphasized. Even an individual’s physical appearance is often seen as not only a reflection of the individual’s own internal self but also a representation of the family, extended family, and perhaps even the Asian community as a whole. Because of fluid personal boundaries, it is not uncommon for individuals to hear comments or even demands regarding their physical appearances, especially from family members. Individuals who ascribe to collectivistic values also tend to engage in social comparisons to ensure they are conforming to group norms. Standing out in a way that reflects poorly on the group, or causes the group to ‘lose face’, frequently leads to intense feelings of shame. Source As I understand it, collectivist societies tend to be shame-based. American culture has been characterized as guilt-based. Here's a brief breakdown: In a guilt society, control is maintained by creating and continually reinforcing the feeling of guilt (and the expectation of punishment now or in the afterlife) for certain condemned behaviors. The guilt world view focuses on law and punishment. A person in this type of culture may ask, "Is my behavior fair or unfair?"[citation needed] This type of culture also emphasizes individual conscience.[3] In a shame society, the means of control is the inculcation of shame and the complementary threat of ostracism. The shame-honor worldview seeks an "honor balance" and can lead to revenge dynamics.[citation needed] A person in this type of culture may ask, "Shall I look ashamed if I do X?" or "How will people look at me if I do Y?" Shame cultures are typically based on the concepts of pride and honor,[4] and appearances are what count. Source Anyone researching to write about Asian communities should be aware of this kind of stuff. Of course, not all Asian communities are entirely traditional, especially if the family is located in a non-Asian country. So there could be a mix of collectivist and individualist tendencies. That could be fun to play around with.
And not all Asian cultures have the same concepts of what is shameful. Even in the West though, aristocratic Victorian society and upper class Southern American society could be said to have characteristics of a shame society.
This character is very normal and real. I am Chinese. In fact, we think that competition and collectivism are not bad things in our culture, even pride, because we think it is a part of life. So others think we have competition and collectivism, we don't have negative emotions. There are only extreme stereotypes to worry about: long, thin eyes, and men's long hair braids, reminiscent of colonialism's cultural bias against East Asia. I hope can help you.
Speaking as a former Korean linguist and long-term resident of Japan, it's been my experience that those two populations are much more collectivist than the midwestern American one I grew up in. Case in point: When I was in the Marines and sent to Korea, a group of three of us Marines were posted at a small Korean Army site up near the border. Three Americans, twenty-four Koreans. Our command sent us with sufficient MREs for our two-week stay, but the Koreans made it clear that we should eat with them. This gave us a great opportunity to try really authentic Korean food as well as socialize with our hosts, but it also left us a whole lot of MREs uneaten. We were there over Christmas, so we decided to give each and every one of the ROK soldiers an MRE as a Christmas present. Naturally there were some of those guys who were friendlier/less shy whom we were more involved with, so we carefully chose the best meals to give them, with the local soldiers we interacted less with getting the luck of the draw. We gave them their presents. They were overwhelmed; MREs were pretty sought after and cool back then. And they all immediately opened them, dumped them on the kitchen table, and began to share. Didn't even notice who had been singled out or not. Another point is that Northeast Asian names are "family first." Our current prime minister, Suga Yoshide, is of the family Suga. Me, I'm Iain. Of the Aschendales, if you must know. But family or group coming first is burned into the culture here, unlike the Euro-West (to include Australia, culturally). That's my thoughts, hope they help.
