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GOLDSEA |
ASIAMS.NET |
ASIAN AMERICAN ISSUES
WHAT FOBs THINK OF AMERICAN-BORN ASIANS
y FOBs we mean anyone who has ever been called an FOB. -- "fresh-off-the-boat", anyone not born here. In other words, half the AA population. Even the 2 million AA who immigrated as kids and speak English like -- or in some cases, better than -- native-born Americans rarely escape the sting of being dismissed by American-Born Asians (ABAs) based on real or imagined differences.
The stereotype of the hopeless FOB who just doesn't get American culture is all too familiar. But intra-Asian prejudice is a two-way street.
No less insulting are the images held by FOBs. ABAs are the descendants of the lowliest of peasants forced to flee their homelands to become indentured servants, sniff some FOBs. Born and bred to accept second-class status in a white society, sneer others. Slackers who don't know the meaning of ambition and sacrifice -- and who lack the guts to do anything about it in any case.
FOBs run the socio-economic gamut. A significant minority (perhaps a tenth) are highly successful trans-Pacific business families seeking a safe haven for their fortunes. The vast majority are engineers, scientists, physicians and academics braving the uncertainties of new lives for a chance to work hard for more money and better opportunities. A few are refugees and illegals risking their lives to escape hopeless, grinding poverty.
It's safe to say few FOBs feel in any respect disadvantaged relative to American-born Asians. In fact, given a dozen years most do as well or better than ABAs financially, if not socially. They can be excused, then, for harboring some less-than-flattering assessments of ABAs. By the same token, in their struggle to acculturate, FOBs often come to appreciate the trails blazed by the ABS, or at least, by their ancestors.
Assuming you're FOB or straddling the FOB-ABA fence, what's your image of ABAs? Let's hear the good as well as the bad.
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WHAT YOU SAY
[This page is closed to new input. --Ed.]
(Updated
Tuesday, Apr 1, 2008, 06:03:29 PM)
Chinaman:
Lots of words are just lifted from Japanese and the characters read off in Cantonese. For example, the Japanese word "ninki" (meaning popular, written "¤H®ð", in Cantonese "yun hei"). There's also direct phonetic borrowings which sometimes people will still insist on writing in Chinese characters, making it damn near impossible to understand (mostly for words Japanese wrote only in kana).
Also I think everyone in HK can recognize the Japanese kana "no" and understand it's meaning (even if they don't know how to pronounce it).
Also virtually all of Chinese economics vocabulary was invented in the 1890s by Japanese translators.
T.H. Lien
Wednesday, March 27, 2002 at 21:19:05 (PST)
Chinaman,
They are slang terms used by the kids in HK. From Ichibon to So des.
If you did not notice the English used by HK kids in slang talk....oh well.
T.H. Lien,
As long as everyone speaks and learns some sort of Mandarin, I'm sure the PRC and HK will be fine. There a whole province call GuangDong where the populace speak both perfect Mandarin and Cantonese. One reason for the whole 50 years rule on HK, is to make sure a whole generation of will get use to this, and that the whole generation who is not use to this just die of natural causes.
But animosity of the different Chinese in HK, I think is somewhat exaggerted. The only animosity I ever really heard on the island were towards Viet boat people, A'cha (indian), Guei Lo, and illegal mainland immigrants.
HK natives are somewhat inclusive in the fact that even if you where brought up in HK and go abroad for a short time (i.e. study). If you did not keep up with the latest slangs and fads, your just considered an outsider.
AC Dropout
Wednesday, March 27, 2002 at 13:05:21 (PST)
T.H. Lien
Like I said your opinions means nothing at all.
hapa .
Wednesday, March 27, 2002 at 12:11:16 (PST)
hapa:
Yeah, I hate HK and HK people. That's why I am studying in HK right now. Please stop spouting the same tired old ABC rant about "we have been in the US for 160 years, we know better than you non-Cantonese," and learn the difference between criticism and hatred.
AC Dropout:
Well, that's what happens when there's no government bureaucrats with too much free time telling you how to speak your own language (e.g. France). I guess we forget that change is the natural state of a language and that governments arrest this process in order to maintain national unity.
T.H. Lien
Tuesday, March 26, 2002 at 22:38:21 (PST)
"-Second, HK doesn't speak real Cantonese. It's HK'ese. little bit of English, little bit of Japanese, lots of Cantonese holding it together."
Japanese? For example?
Chinaman
Tuesday, March 26, 2002 at 21:34:25 (PST)
Beyond Fan,
Actually, I recently read this article showing evidence that the Hakkas and the Hokkiens are closely related (contrary to conventional wisdom that the Hakkas are northern migrants into the south). According to the article, the Hakkas and Hokkiens were assimilated into the Han culture at different times which may explain some of the differences in their languages. Also, the Hakkas were more concentrated on the highlands, while Hokkiens were more coastal.
The article also stated that in Taiwan, many Hokkiens (Hoklos) may actually be Hakka or have Hakka in them, just that the Hokkien language and culture was the dominate one- that they quickly forgot their Hakka language, in order to be assimilated. The article also listed the similarities in various areas of both groups. I will dig it up and can post excerpts of it (I actually did, but some reason goldsea.com never posted it).
Hoklo & Hakka
Tuesday, March 26, 2002 at 12:15:42 (PST)
[We don't allow posting of plagiarised excerpts beyond brief passages permitted under the "fair use" doctrine. --Ed]
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