Strangers from a Different Shore

While World War ll prompted the federal government to violate Japanese Americans’ rights, it also triggered a liberalization of immigration and citizenship laws since legislation that privileged white Americans was considered outdated and undemocratic. Presidents Roosevelt and Truman banned racial discrimination at work and advanced civil rights, while the Supreme Court struck down interracial marriage bans. In the late 1940s, the California Supreme Court ruled that people ineligible for citizenship must still be allowed to purchase land. Soon after, in 1952, the federal government passed an act which removed the racial requirement for naturalized citizenship. Asian immigrants, such as the Japanese issei, were thrilled to finally receive citizenship and vote in the US, where they had resided for decades and raised their children.

Working class protests also advanced such reforms. For instance, in Hawaii plantation workers unionized and successfully agitated for their right to bargain collectively. The members of this interethnic union used their new rights to strike for over two months, successfully securing historic wage and workday reforms from their employers. For the first time, all the ethnic groups represented among plantation workers had collaborated toward their shared goals.

In the late 1940s, communists took control of China, causing some Americans to view Chinese Americans suspiciously. To confront hysterical accusations, some Chinese organizations held public anti-Communism events in Chinatowns to display their communities’ political allegiance. The FBI investigated Chinese Americans, fearful that Communist spies were among them, something which spread suspicion and fear throughout the Chinese community.

The government kept immigration quotas from Asian countries low, but some Asians seeking to immigrate found other ways to do so. Filipinos could join the US navy, and then bring their families to the US. The “War Bride Act” allowed American soldiers to bring their foreign wives to the US; thousands of Asian American soldiers married abroad and made their wives new US citizens.

In 1965, the Immigration Act removed discriminatory quotas, allowing many more Asians to immigrate to the US than before. This second wave of immigrants included more professionally and nationally diverse individuals who tended to bring their families with them. Chinese and Filipino immigrants came in the largest numbers. Many Chinese immigrants fled poor living conditions and the violence and oppression of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Upon arriving, they faced many challenges; unemployment amongst Chinese Americans was high, and average incomes were lower than for other Americans. With limited English, many Chinese newcomers found themselves limited to low paying service jobs or garment factory jobs in Chinatowns. These workers, whose employers often violated basic labor laws, were often hesitant to strike against their Chinese bosses. However, some workers managed to unionize despite the social pressure not to. Even trained professionals worked in menial jobs if they did not have the language skills or accreditations to continue their professions in the US. These newcomers often began a “chain migration,” helping their spouses, siblings and parents emigrate too.

Filipinos also arrived in great numbers, becoming the second largest Asian group in the US in the 1980s. Many fled the oppressive policies of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, while others left the Philippines for better professional opportunities. Many of these immigrants were health care professionals, though some were unable to continue this work in the US due to bureaucratic requirements.

An influx of Korean immigrants in the 1960s and 1970s, mostly from middle class backgrounds with college degrees, has also changed the demographics of Asian Americans. During these decades, Korean immigrants fled the poor economic conditions created by dictator Park Chung-hee. Korean immigrants found many more jobs available to them in the US, though not always in their area of specialization. “Occupational downgrading,” or leaving professional work to do less skilled and lower paid work, was common among Korean immigrants in these decades, and self-employment was also common. Takaki reports that most Korean store owners worked grueling hours for poverty wages. Some chose to hire other immigrants and pay them low wages to try to make their small businesses profitable. Similarly, these decades saw an increase in immigrants from Pakistan and India who were also middle class professionals. However, many became entrepreneurs upon coming to the US, running restaurants, newsstands, and motels among other ventures.

In the mid-1970s, refugees from the War in Vietnam also began arriving in the US. As the Communist forces invaded the south, tens of thousands of people desperately fled on boats into the open ocean, where the American navy picked them up. 130,000 Vietnamese people moved to the US in 1975 alone. Most of them came as families and spoke some English. In the following years, thousands more Vietnamese people fled Vietnam, often undertaking dangerous voyages on boats which were sometimes attacked by local pirates. Some Vietnamese saw themselves as sojourners, hopeful to return to Vietnam one day and perhaps even participate in overturning its government. Like other newcomers, Vietnamese immigrants struggled to find a balance between cultures and establish themselves in careers, with many taking on menial work or becoming entrepreneurs. Young immigrants who arrived without parents faced enormous difficulty and sometimes turned to crime.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Laotians fled the chaos of war in Laos in the 1970s. These immigrants, who often came from rural backgrounds as independent farmers, struggled to adjust to a busy and high-tech life in the urban US. Many suffered from “relocation depression” and intense homesickness (465). Learning English was a necessary but monumental task to find work; the vast majority of Laotian immigrants were unemployed.

Similarly, in the 1970s over 100,000 Cambodian refugees escaped Pol Pot’s brutal dictatorship. Many arrived in the US with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), traumatized by the mass killings and torture carried out under Pol Pot’s murderous regime.

Takaki concludes this chapter by reminding the reader that Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian refugees were diverse in their ethnicities, professions, and languages, but united in that “‘necessity’ not ‘extravagance,’ has defined their lives” (470).

Takaki reiterates that Asian immigrants to the US were “pushed” by economic and political conditions to leave their countries, and “pulled” by a hopeful vision of the US as a land of wealth and freedom. However, because of their race, Asian immigrants were discriminated against by white American society, which generally limited them to the bottom of a “racially stratified labor structure” (472). However, Asians were persistent and creative in how they coped with racism and discrimination. Laborers in Hawaii built relationships across ethnicities and developed their own pidgin tongue. Chinese and Japanese people in the US developed their own communities which met many of their needs, while Koreans, Asian, Indian, and Filipino immigrants found other ways to survive in the US.

Over time, World War ll, the civil rights movement, and labor strikes eroded racist legislation and attitudes, and Asian Americans today are better protected and more represented in politics, education, and the media.

The author debunks the notion of Asians as a “model minority” and refutes the idea that Asian Americans out-earn white Americans, using census data (from the time of writing, the 1980s) to disprove this claim. Indeed, Takaki maintains that most Asians make less than their white counterparts, and attributes this to discrimination by white employers, arguing that educated Asians are underrepresented in top jobs. Moreover, there are many Asian Americans who live in poverty and without access to social services. Takaki worries that the myth of the model minority prevents Asian students who need help from accessing Educational Opportunity Programs. He also laments that stereotypes about high-achieving Asian youth are sometimes used to shame struggling students of other races.

The author connects this myth to anti-Asian racism, especially as seen on college campuses. The author claims that colleges are concerned about Asian “overrepresentation” in the student population, and that some white students resent Asian peers for their academic success. Takaki claims that the government, too, is anxious about rising numbers of Asians in the country, citing a 1988 bill that limited immigration from family members and made English language skills an immigration requirement. Takaki feels that these attitudes are also reflected in the media, referencing Hollywood movies that portray Asians or Asia negatively. The author is disturbed by hate crimes against Asians in cities across America, including the 1987 murder of Navroz Mody and the 1983 murder of Vincent Chin.

Asian Americans have not only protested such violent racism, but have also advocated educational curricula to include Asian American history, arguing that it would humanize Asian people and encourage others to recognize them as Americans. Leaders in these communities can clearly see the parallels between these murders and historical violence against Asians, such as the tendency for white working class men to blame Asians for unemployment.

Takaki reports that Asian Americans are becoming more open and outspoken about the discrimination they have experienced. For instance, members of the Japanese community who were imprisoned during the war have shared their experiences. Younger generations of Asian Americans have challenged Eurocentric American histories and are curious to understand their families journeys to, and in, the US. Takaki himself has learned more about his own family’s history, researching his father’s journey as a Japanese immigrant to Hawaii and discovering more about the plantations in Hawaii where his grandparents labored. Takaki reiterates that, over the last century and a half, many Asian immigrants have been “actors in history” as they pursued new lives in the US (491).

Takaki explores the traumatic events of April 29th, 1992, when Black protestors burned and looted Korean-owned stores in Los Angeles, California, in an uprising triggered the acquittal of the police officers who brutalized Rodney King. According to the author, Korean stores were targeted because of a history of tension and misunderstandings between Black Americans and Korean Americans in central Los Angeles. The author discusses each community’s perspective and their “mutual cultural ignorance” (494). These events financially and emotionally devastated many Korean store owners. The author claims that inner city poverty fosters the conditions for such violence.

Takaki argues that politicians have employed ethnic antagonism to pit Asian Americans against Black Americans to undo affirmative action in college applications. Takaki claims that white politicians such as President Ronald Reagan have exploited Asian anger at discrimination for their own conservative agenda to dismantle affirmative action.

The author reflects on Asian American identity, noting that this diverse community has forged a shared identity, or “panethnicity” due to their shared history of racist discrimination. In the contemporary US, Asian Americans feel more free to proudly celebrate their families’ ancestral cultures. Many Asian Americans are in interracial partnerships with members of other Asian ethnicities or other races. Takaki celebrates the “vibrant multiculturalism” which is emerging in so many cities and families across the country (507). He restates that Asian Americans helped to successfully dismantle exclusive and discriminatory legislation and create an “ethnically diverse yet united society” (508).