Australian, but never quite Australian enough...

[tielan]

on the politics of possession by glass_icarus: A crystal-sharp piece about Americanness, and how she, an American citizen of Chinese appearance and descent, will never be allowed to own the term 'American' - not unchallenged.

If my experience isn't anywhere near as painful as hers, it still has barbs.

I was born here. This is my country, my culture. I have no 'back home' to go to other than Australia. And yet, far and away the majority of people ask me, "So where do you come from?" And the answer of "Sydney, Australia" is not good enough. Oh, a few people see the pit they're at the brink of walking into and stop. But most people just plunge on.

But they're just interested in your background!

Maybe so, but it's my background. What if I don't want to share it? What if I want to be taken for who I am in the here and now, and not for my ancestry? What if I'm not comfortable with justifying my being here in Australia as chiroho or sharim or arabel or b36 will never have to? Or should my comfort zones be sacrificed for the right of the nice white person to know my citizenship and ancestry status to satisfy their curiosity?

And this is I, who was born in Sydney, grew up in Sydney, moved to Wollongong for eight years, and came back to Sydney. I speak Australian. I'm educated and middle-class. My parents have degrees. Both my father and stepfather were born here. My grandparents lived out here from the sixties onwards - in my paternal grandparents' case, they came here just after WWII.

I'm not even an immigrant!

And then it all becomes spectacularly ironic when you add in the cry for immigrants to 'become Australian'. (Whatever that means. Should they renounce their faith? Agree not to wear headscarves? Avoid fasting and feasting? Must they learn English and recite cricket stats? Drink Victoria Bitter and guzzle a meat pie? What does it mean to be Australian, anyway?)

They should become Australian, eh?

So how 'Australian' can they feel when the question of "So, where are you from?" comes up and "[Australian city]" is not an acceptable answer? When their citizenship is questioned - over and over again, with every new person they meet?

I'm one of the lucky ones as it goes. I don't have that cultural conflict pulling at me. I know my rights as an Australian born and Australian bred citizen. Someone trying to tell me to go 'back' to China will get an earful and a half. Nobody with half a brain cell would even try.

Still, I doubt I'll ever be allowed to 'own' my Australianness completely. Someone will always question my ancestry as they'd never question, say, sharim's.

The truth is that our broader cultural understanding of 'Australian' really means 'white Australian' - and I'll never pass as white.

ETA: This isn't a 'sympathy' post. I don't want you to feel sorry for me or pat me on the back. I'd rather you thought about what I'm saying and whether you've been in the position of putting someone in the spot for not being what you expect of [insert nationality here]. If you haven't, would you intervene for someone else who is being put on the spot, but who couldn't express the conflicts within them? Would you challenge someone else's expectations of what it means to be of your citizenship? Or is someone else's trouble none of your business, none of your problem? This isn't about me-and-my-pain; it's about people-like-me-and-their-struggle-for-acceptance and how I/we can respect them and their boundaries in future.

Comments

[thothmes]

I always find it ironic that in both your country and mine, the only people who can stand up and say that they are not decended from immigrants are the native populations, and yet neither population is seen as being either truly American or truly Australian. That belongs to those of us who happen to be born white.

Yet there is also this odd reaction among white folk when they hear that I may be decended from Pocahontas. They look at my high cheekbones, my long straight dark hair, and my hazel eyes that the unobservant often "dismiss" as brown, nod sagely, tell me I "look Indian" and view me as more American! I have a good laugh, because this is sheer snobbery. An ancestor of mine claimed the descent from Pocahontas to prove his bona fides as an eligible for membership in the First Families of Virginia to my ancestress, whom he was courting, and her family (they were eligibles). We think he was lying. My college roomie, who is a full-blooded Navaho does not get viewed as more American for saying that. It makes her exotic, almost foreign.

Some of my ancestors came over on the Mayflower. Others were indeed among the first settlers of Virginia. Some were the first white settlers of Virgina. I am no more American than my paternal grandfather (a naturalized American born in Canada) or my stepfather (a naturalized American born in Palestine). That's the point of citizenship.

Still, I have yet to be pulled out of line for "random extra screening" at the airport. This was a common experience for my little sister born here to citizens, who had an Arabic first and last name, and a Middle Eastern look. That is until she married and took her husband's German last name. Now she cruises through. My other sister, who also has an Arabic first and last name has never been pulled out. She takes more after the Northern European side of the family, and yet is a full sister to the other sister. So much so that she was sitting in the teacher's lounge and another teacher went on a rant about the "filthy A-rabs" that live in the apartment next to her. She smiled sweetly, and said "My name is ArabicFirstName ArabicLastName, and I'm an Arab. I have excellent personal hygiene. It runs in the family."

My mother (in her 70's) has a friend of her own age, born to American-born parents, and raised in Phoenix, Arizona. Her name is, and always has been, Jane. Because her ancestry is Chinese, she gets asked where she is from. "Phoenix, Arizona" is the only answer she will give. "No!" they say. "Where are you from?" She continues politely and firmly with her (true) answer. She gives a small stiff smile. Usually folks get the point, but if they are especially obtuse, she will ask them where they are from. From there the conversation can go many ways, depending on her whim of the day.

"Oh, really? Ireland? But you don't have an accent... Oh. Three generations. Kind of like my family."

"Ah. I've been to San Francisco once. I prefer Phoenix. It's drier."

"I don't have any ancestors from that far west, but my daughter lived in California for six years."

Honestly. People who make assumptions about you or judge you for your genetically determined appearance (in contrast, say, to a choice to forgo clothing for woad, or go adopt an Amish dress code) or your food choices (I used to love dim sum before I had diabetic and heart considerations that forbad it, and I'm a WASP) and not by your words and actions are lazy-minded jerks, and don't deserve kid glove treatment, especially if you have tried to warn them off politely!

[tielan]

"No!" they say. "Where are you from?" She continues politely and firmly with her (true) answer.

Oh, yeah. I love the "but where are you really from?"

Someday, I'll just lose it and say, "I'm from Mars, okay? I've been lying to you all this time. I'm not from Sydney, I'm actually from Mars..."

Ultimately, though, this story isn't about me and my pain. It's about societal perceptions and how they affect the people who end up on the receiving end of bigotry and prejudice. And how they do so in subtle ways that the well-meaning people on the giving end of bigotry and prejudice would never notice until someone points it out.

The thing is, it's not even my job to edumacate such people; better people than I have tried it and burned out in the trying. But if you don't at least try to whack them upside with a cluebat, the bigotry and prejudice just keep going.

And maybe someday, a cluebat will land on a brain cell and activation and understanding will happen. It might even be before the Second Coming. If we're lucky.

[glass_icarus]

*hugs* &hearts Thanks for sharing this (and for linking!). Belonging is such a complicated mess, isn't it?

[joannkatana]

Sometimes, I like to make the people who ask 'Where are you from?' sweat.

I say "US".

They pause, and say, "No, I mean, where did you grow up?"

I mention the (US) city I grew up in. (though, sometimes this step is skipped)

They doggedly say, "No, I mean, where were you born?"

I reply back with the (US) state where I was born.

They are frustrated, but keep asking (sometimes), "No, I mean, where are your parents from?"

Sometimes I give in and give them what they're asking for. Sometimes I may reply with the (US) state my parents are currently living in.

And then I get "No, I mean, where were your parents born?"

By the time this dance is through all the steps, the more aware people may mention that they adopted an Asian child, or once I had a someone who had sent time in Korea and therefore was curious, and some people start mentioning their family history, after they've gotten a 'satisfactory' answer about mine.

[tielan]

I've done that a few times. Although, usually, when someone wants to know because they adopted a child from another country or lived elsewhere, they usually add, "I'm asking because..."

Actually, I had a guy today ask me where I was from, and although there was a moment of readjustment when I said "Well, Sydney, actually," he didn't push it.

Something that I noted after, though: I felt slightly guilty, as though I'd somehow been dishonest about my background. Except that I'm not dishonest about it any more than someone from a white Euro background would be dishonest for not saying that their family came from out Ireland way or something.

[sami]

*waves* Here via, uh, a chain of links.

The thing that really struck me, reading your post, was when you said China. Chinese people have been in Australia in significant numbers for about two hundred years, afaik.

You're absolutely right that it's racist, though. The reason I know is this:

I am white. I am not Australian-born, but I've lived here since I was 18 months old. Due to the mingled influences of my parents' accents and some accent hints I've picked up here and there along the way, though, I have an odd accent myself; to non-Australians I sound Australian, but to some Australians I sound faintly foreign.

On the rare occasion when someone asks about it, the question I get is: "Where does your accent come from?"

Which is a rather different question, one that nonetheless seems to imply an acceptance that I'm obviously Australian now.

It's sort of bitterly ironic, really, since if "being Australian" was measurable on a scale, you're clearly much more Australian than I am, since, you know, I'm an immigrant and all, and yet...