Yes, even though my last
opinion didn't go over so well, I dared to do it again!
I was on the PBS Newshour last night, talking about why "Why Our
Culture is a Seed, Not a Treasure."
Of course, some people are already misinterpreting it, saying I want immigrants to assimilate by forgetting their culture--which, hopefully, long-time readers of my work know is not true. Like the stories in my books and myself, I believe we need flexibility--that we need to use our past to grow from, not as something to cling to.
But you are, of course, welcome to your own humble opinion!
Transcript:
Many of my books integrate Chinese traditions and adapted
folk tales, so Asian parents with American-born children often ask me, how can
I make my child be Chinese?
And I have to tell them, your child will never be Chinese.
By being born here and living here, your child will always be Chinese-American.
And that is hard for those who are afraid of losing their culture.
And I completely sympathize, because I feel the same way.
It’s why I write the books that I do. Our culture, our heritage is a part of
who we are. We use it to claim our identity, so we can find true belonging in a
group.
It’s why I let my child believe that Santa might be wearing
red because it’s a Chinese lucky color.
But if we treat our cultural heritage as something that
can’t change, if we feel threatened when time and other cultures rub against
it, we make our lives smaller.
An Italian-American friend of mine once told me how her
relatives ostracized her when she divorced, because they believed Italians
don’t get divorced, oblivious to the fact that, back in Italy, divorce was
acceptable.
We cling to a culture that is part of our past, freezing it
in our minds, instead of the real flexible culture of our time. This is
dangerous, for us as individuals and for our society.
At its most extreme, it leads to clashes, like the violence
inflicted on women who resist arranged marriages, or riots over the removal of
Confederate statues.
So, let’s stop thinking of our culture as treasure we need
to cling to. Instead, let’s think of it as a seed, as something to nurture and
cultivate. We should respect and honor it, but we should also let it adapt to
its time and surroundings.
When we do that, we allow for unique creations, like black
Storm Troopers in “Star Wars” movies, and fortune cookies, which, by the way,
do not exist in China. It’s a completely Asian-American invention.
Because the truth is, time and change will always win. And
when we cling to our culture to keep it from change, we are, in fact,
strangling it to death.
We can’t live forever, but, if it is nurtured, our culture
can.
