American Born Chinese: A Conceptual Analysis

Could you take a guess and tell from what culture a person is from by just listening to their voice? Could you also tell by looking to their appearance; The way they dress, the color of their skin, facial features? What about the way they carry their selves? Just like “The Chinese in All of Us” by Richard Rodriguez where he explains that he feels connected to all the cultures around America, with its “culture, a sound, an accent, a walk.” (Rodriguez 730). It does not mean and require that you must look a certain way to belong to a certain culture.

People always seem to be changing themselves because they want the approval of others and are worried what others think of them. They aren't happy about who they are, maybe its looks, or maybe its race that they are concerned about, either way people try to change who they are. In ABC, the author Yang reveals many common stereotypes about chinese people and the struggle they might have in fitting in. Chin-kee one of the main characters is very stereotypical and impacts Danny and Jin’s life greatly. Jin Wang the main character faces some problems fitting in because of his race and the stereotypes associated with it and changes himself in order to fit in.

Archetypes, in literature, represent a universal pattern through a character, symbol, event or situation. Many uses of archetypes are found in the graphic novel, American- Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang. Chin- Kee, the shadow, is the physical representation of what Danny/Jin Wang. Danny, the outcast, constantly has to move after his, very stereotypical Chinese- American, cousin Chin- Kee comes to visit, due to the embarrassment. The Monkey King, the hero, must go through a journey to find his identity and accept himself as a monkey.

The ability to recall the parts of a story and determine the main idea of a reading passage is the basis for skills such as inferencing, sequencing, and overall comprehension of what has been read. Based on this knowledge, this author would address Jose’s ability to recall main story elements and therefore understand the main idea of the reading passage first.

Stories and stereotypes make many people want to change themselves negatively and assimilate just to fit in with society. As time passes, society’s stereotypes for how people of each race should be, which race is more dominant than others, and which race you should be, all play a role in impacting someone’s self-esteem and their insecurities. This is portrayed through Jin Wang, a main character in Gene Luen Yang’s “American Born Chinese” when Jin Wang thinks his crush, Amelia, he instantly becomes happy. But then he thinks about Greg and Amelia together and gets mad. He finally zooms into Greg’s blond hair. The next day he goes to school with the same hairstyle. The hair symbolizes Greg’s all American identity because the stereotypical American is portrayed with blond hair and blue eyes. To Jin Wang, this hair symbolizes what he wants to be, so he changed his hair to an “American” hairstyle to get Amelia to like him. Due to stereotypes about how Americans are suppose to look like, Jin Wang feels insecure about himself and wants to change his identity and himself as well to assimilate into American culture and stereotypes. These stereotypes and the Anti-Asian stereotypes impact Jin Wang greatly and make him hate himself as well as his background and where he came from because he believes that in order to be AMerica, you have to be white. Another way that this is portrayed is from a personal experience I had as a kid. Growing up as an Asian kid in America, I didn’t really know

The Chinese Experience records the history of the Chinese in the United States. The three-part documentary shows how the first arrivals from China, their descendants, and recent immigrants have “become American.” It is a story about identity and belonging that is relative to all Americans. The documentary is divided into three programs, each with a focus on a particular time in history. Program 1 describes the first arrivals from China, beginning in the early 1800’s and ending in 1882, the year Congress passed the first Chinese exclusion act. Program 2, which details the years of exclusion and the way they shaped and distorted Chinese American

"Reading a text as pure description of an object, and undertaken to mechanically memorize the discrimination, it is neither real reading nor does it result in the knowledge of the object to which the text refers" (Freire 284). When a teacher gives a reading assignment, the students that read to memorize the text likely do not gain the significance of what that literary work contextually attempted to deliver, nor is it necessarily understood by the reader. If a student was really taught the significance and meaning of the text instead of mechanically memorizing it, the student should have better outcomes both with gaining the insight of the assignment and the memorization of key points. Mechanistically

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The tale “American Born Chinese” by Gene Luch Wang depicts the story of three characters, Monkey, Jin, and Danny. They all have the problem of fitting into their new environments. Jin Wang has to deal with Asian stereotypes. Danny has to deal with embarrassment of his cousin. Lastly, Monkey has to deal with the fact that there is no position for him in the heavenly ranks. However, over time, these characters have to come together to fit in. Yet the question remains: what exactly about fitting in is the problem? Although Jin Wang takes the form of Danny to reject his Chinese roots, the embarrassment of Chin-Knee shows he cannot hide behind a false American identity, thereby delineating that race is the source of his problem.

We are able to convey feelings, ideas and concepts through written language and visual images (Callow, 2013). The text and images in The Bad Guys let us laugh when we are reading it. Callow (2013), the work of linguist Michael Halliday suggests that each text, whether written or visual can be asked by field, tenor and mode. The three areas of register are written and drawn perfectly which in turn allows us to understand the text and images easily. (Callow (2013) also states that images give us more details on the situation. For example, page 108 of The Bad Guys, the text shows that Mr. Wolf is very excited about his plan but we do not know how Mr. Piranha and Mr. Snake feels about it. By looking at the image, we can see that they are not thrilled with the plan. The images provide us with information we cannot find out from written text.

The amount of mental processing power needed to absorb new content has a profound impact on a person’s ability to learn.

After the first wave of Chinese immigrants arrived in the United States in the early 1840s during the California Gold Rush, many Chinese people continued to travel across the Pacific, escaping poor conditions in China with hopes and ambitions for a better life in America. Many more Chinese immigrants began arriving into the 1860s on the Pacific coast for work in other areas such as the railroad industry. The immigrants noticed an increasing demand for their labor because of their readiness to work for low wages. Many of those who arrived did not plan to stay long, and therefore there was no push for their naturalization. The immigrants left a country with thousands of years of a “decaying feudal system,” corruption, a growing

All women are too sensitive! All Mexicans are illegal immigrants! If you’re from the South, then you are ignorant! Most people have heard at least one of these stereotypes pertaining to a certain group. Some people believe them whilst others do not. American Born Chinese illustrates three stories depicting the custom of stereotypes surrounding society: “The Monkey King”, the story of Monkey King’s thirst for infinite power, and his quest for atonement; “Jin Wang”, the story an awkward boy who tries to “fit in” the community around from but constantly fails; and “Danny”, the story about a high schooler who feels uncomfortable by his stereotypically negative Chinese cousin Chin-Kee. In this day-and-age, stereotypes are what bring people

     The focus of our group project is on Chinese Americans. We studied various aspects of their lives and the preservation of their culture in America. The Chinese American population is continually growing. In fact, in 1990, they were the largest group of Asians in the United States (Min 58). But living in America and adjusting to a new way of life is not easy. Many Chinese Americans have faced and continue to face much conflict between their Chinese and American identities. But many times, as they adapt to this new life, they are also able to preserve their Chinese culture and identity through various ways. We studied these things through the viewing of a movie called Joy Luck Club,

Stereotypes are strict believes ideas of a person based on their religion, ethnicity, and or social-economic standing. Throughout the graphic novel American Born Chinese, the main character is stereotyped since he is of Asian descent, main people insinuate that he is from China and incorrectly pronounce his name. More events like this happen throughout his childhood and inevitably, Jin is ashamed of his nationality. Stereotypes are negative thoughts and assumptions towards a person who does not have the same characteristics as the one who is judging. When being stereotypical towards a certain person or peoples, it forces the bullied person to question their life and want them to change certain characteristics to no longer be bullied.