Asian North American Identities Beyond the Hyphen

The nine essays in Asian North American Identities explore how Asian North Americans are no longer caught between worlds of the old and the new, the east and the west, and the south and the north. Moving beyond national and diasporic models of ethnic identity to focus on the individual feelings and experiences of those who are not part of a dominant white majority, the essays collected here draw from a wide range of sources, including novels, art, photography, poetry, cinema, theatre, and popular culture. The book illustrates how Asian North Americans are developing new ways of seeing and thinking about themselves by eluding imposed identities and creating spaces that offer alternative sites from which to speak and imagine.

Contributors are Jeanne Yu-Mei Chiu, Patricia Chu, Rocio G. Davis, Donald C. Goellnicht, Karlyn Koh, Josephine Lee, Leilani Nishime, Caroline Rody, Jeffrey J. Santa Ana, Malini Johar Schueller, and Eleanor Ty.

Illuminates recent transformations in views of national and racial identity.

The nine essays in Asian North American Identities explore how AsianNorth Americans are no longer caught between worlds of the old and the new, the eastand the west, and the south and the north. Moving beyond national and diasporicmodels of ethnic identity to focus on the individual feelings and experiences ofthose who are not part of a dominant white majority, the essays collected here drawfrom a wide range of sources, including novels, art, photography, poetry, cinema, theatre, and popular culture. The book illustrates how Asian North Americans aredeveloping new ways of seeing and thinking about themselves by eluding imposedidentities and creating spaces that offer alternative sites from which to speak andimagine.

Contributors are Jeanne Yu-Mei Chiu, Patricia Chu, RocioG. Davis, Donald C. Goellnicht, Karlyn Koh, Josephine Lee, Leilani Nishime, CarolineRody, Jeffrey J. Santa Ana, Malini Johar Schueller, and Eleanor Ty.

Eleanor Ty is Professor of English at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario.

Donald C. Goellnicht is Professor of English and Chair of the English Department at McMaster University.

Acknowledgements

Introduction-ELEANOR TY and DONALD GOELLNICHT

1. "Affect-Identity: The Emotions of Assimilation, Multiraciality, and Asian American Subjectivity"-JEFFREY J. SANTA ANA

2. "'I'm Blackanese': Buddy-Cop Films, Rush Hour and Asian American and African American Cross-Racial Identification"-LEILANI NISHIME

3. "'To Hide Her True Self': Sentimentality and the Search for an Intersubjective Self in Nora Okja Keller's Comfort Woman"-PATRICIA CHU

4. "Identities in Process: The Experimental Poetry of Mei-mei Berssenbrugge and Myung Mi Kim"-JEANNIE YU-MEI CHIU

5. "Asian America is in the Heartland: Performing Korean Adoptee Experience"-JOSEPHINE LEE

6. "'A task of reclamation': Subjectivity, Self-Representation, and Textual Formulation in Sara Suleri's Meatless Days"-ROCIO G. DAVIS

7. "The Transnational Imagination: Karen Tei Yamashita's Tropic of Orange"-CAROLINE RODY

8. "At the Edge of a Shattered Mirror, Community?"-KARLYN KOH

9. "Claiming Post-Colonial America: The Hybrid Asian-American Performances of Tseng Kwong Chi"-MALINI JOHAR SCHUELLER

Bibliography

Contributors

Index