Asian American Culture: The Living Lie

The Living Lie of Asian Americans

Did you know that there is a common stereotype about how if you are an Asian American, you are smarter and have a better life than the rest of the races in society? This stereotype is what Ronald Takaki proves wrong in his essay, The Harmful Myth of Asian Superiority. The title of Takaki’s essay has a dark meaning to it. My understanding of this title is that the dominance of the Asian American race is nothing but a dangerous fairy tale. The author of this essay is Ronald Takaki who is a former professor of ethnic studies at the University of California Berkeley and has written many pieces about Asians in past and present societies. Takaki argues that Asian Americans are not as successful than what many people believe. Takaki’s thesis is that most Asian Americans do not deserve the amount of success that is given to them and the ones that do deserve it have worked hard for their accomplishments.

Before I started to evaluate Takaki’s essay, I first did a little analysis. I noticed that Takaki uses a couple different types of evidences in his essay to help support his argument. Throughout Takaki’s essay, he gives all sorts of statistics. For example, Takaki explains that the Asian Americans have hit the glass ceiling, which is a barrier that effects the advancement in a profession. He states that “In 1988, only 8 percent of Asian Americans were “officials” and “managers,” compared with 12 percent for all groups” (p 125 par. 10). This is a statistical data evidence because he is using percentages to compare Asian American managers to all the other groups in 1988. These percentages show that Asian Americans have a less chance of becoming managers or officials than any other racial group. Takaki also uses testimonial evidence when he interviews a Chinese immigrant that is trying to get a job in America. This can be classified as testimonial evidence because he is using someone else’s experiences to help support his claim. There are some methods of persuasion that I identified in Takaki’s essay. The first method of persuasion that Takaki uses is an emotional appeal. He uses this persuasion by having more of a sad tone throughout his essay. Takaki gets upset at the fact that Asian Americans are found to be more successful than other races. This is easily proven when Takaki whines about how “Japanese American men in California earned an average income comparable to Caucasian men in 1980, they did so only by acquiring more education and working more hours” (p 124 par. 5). You can tell that there is a bit of sadness in his tone because he is acting like it is not right for Asian Americans to have a higher or equal income than Caucasians. This uses pathos because Takaki is using his emotions as a way to convince the audience to support his argument. In Takaki’s essay, there is actually a lot of ethos going on because he does a good job on degrading Asian Americans' ethics and I will be giving many examples of how Takaki shames Asian Americans throughout my evaluation essay.

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Takaki starts supporting his argument by explaining how Asian Americans are considered to be a “model minority”. However, Takaki claims that this is not true because most Asian Americans work hard by getting better education and putting in more hours. He also mentions how this image is what tends to hide the differences between Asian Americans and other races. Takaki supports this part of his argument by giving the example of, “while thousands of Vietnamese American young people attend universities, others are on the streets. They live in motels and hang out in pool halls in places like East Los Angeles; some join gangs” (p 124 para. 7). Takaki is showing the readers that there are Vietnamese Americans that do not have it all and he is pointing out a common flaw found in many other races.

The next evidence that Takaki uses to support his argument is about the Chinese Americans who live and work in the Chinatowns of New York and California. The problem with Asian Americans living in New York and California is that these states have a higher cost of living and higher incomes than the national average, which will make it harder for Asian Americans to adjust. The majority of the Chinatown workers in San Francisco and Los Angeles are working in crowded environments and getting paid low amounts in industries such as factories and restaurants. Takaki also explains that the immigrants who move to Chinatown do not know how to speak English, creating a barrier that prevents them from getting good income jobs in the American industry. Takaki interviewed a Chinese immigrant that is experiencing these struggles and he said “Before, I was a painter in Hong Kong, but I can’t do it here. I got no license, no education. I want a living; so, its dishwasher, janitor, or cook” (p 125 par. 9). Takaki uses this interview as an example to show the reader that without the skills required, Asian immigrants do not have many options for jobs in America. As a result of these factors, Takaki gives a statistic that states “Twenty-five percent of the people in New York city’s Chinatown lived below the poverty level in 1980, compared with 17 percent of the city’s population” (p 125 para. 8). Takaki is trying to show that these hardships are causing the Asian Americans to be unemployed and even go into poverty.

The last evidence that Takaki uses to support his argument explains how there are Korean entrepreneurs that have their own shops in America but do not make as much as non-Asians. Most of the Koreans that come to America are greengrocers that have a college education. However, they’re only earning between $17,000 and $35,000 a year from shopkeeping. Being a greengrocer simply means that you sell fruits or vegetables. Some Koreans with high-paying jobs such as administrators, teachers, and engineers became shopkeepers when they got to America. Takaki points out that “In 1988, Koreans in the New York Metropolitan area earned only 68 percent of the median income of non-Asians” (p 125 para. 12). Takaki does a great job explaining to his audience the struggles that Koreans have on trying to maintain their income when moving from Korea to America. He also wants to let the Asians know that starting a business in America will not be easy. Koreans should think before coming to America about whether or not they want to make a good living in Korea with their college education or face many difficulties while owning a shop in the states.

My response to this argument is that no matter what your race is, there is nothing wrong with people portraying you as being a know it all or simply having it all. I do not think it is right for Takaki to, in a way, downgrade the Asian Americans and act like they have little to no success in America. For these reasons, I disagree with Takaki’s argument even though he does defend the Asian Americans at some points, but he mostly points out their flaws of them being in America. An example of Takaki defending Asian Americans is when he gives them credit for having a good education and jobs in their countries. However, it only seems as if Takaki defends the Asians when it deals with them being in their home country not when they move to America and become Asian Americans. I do not think this is fair to the Asian Americans because just like any other race they deserve an equal amount of respect, no matter where they are living. Takaki also admits that there are Asian Americans who are hard workers that put in a lot of time into their jobs and those workers end up having an equal amount of income compared to Caucasians.

In conclusion, Ronald Takaki believes that people have get a misunderstanding when it comes to Asian Americans. At the end of the essay, Takaki explains that even Asian Americans themselves know that their success in America is a lie. The three main flaws that Takaki pointed out in his essay about the Asian Americans were that they do not stand on a pedestal like what people think, they receive lower pay in American industrial jobs, and they find it difficult to regain their Korean income in America. Unlike Takaki, what I hope people get from reading my evaluation paper is that no one should criticize a race for trying to make a better life in America but cannot because of all the hardships and obstacles in the way.

Works Cited

1. Takaki, Ronald. “The Harmful Myth of Asian Superiority.” Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing: A Brief Guide to Argument, 9th edition, Sylvan Barnet, Hugo Bedau, and John O’Hara, editors, Bedford/St. Martins, pp. 124-5.

End Sheet Attachment

Rhetorical Situation

1. My central message of this essay was to analyze and evaluate Ronald Takaki’s essay and then inform my reader what his argument is.
2. My target audience is whoever is interested in reading my evaluation essay about Asian Americans.
3. My goal was to clearly evaluate each of Takaki’s claims that he uses to support his position.

The Writing Process

1. I did not make many changes to this essay. The only thing that I changed was instead of having my opinion at the end of each paragraph, I just made a couple longer paragraphs explaining my view of Takaki’s argument.
2. I learned how to thoroughly analyze and evaluate Takaki’s position in his essay.
3. The strongest aspect of my paper is when I talked about my own position on Takaki’s argument. The weakest aspect of my paper is my introduction because my attention getter could be better as well as the thesis.
4. Writing this essay did not bother me much. It was tough trying to fill the five pages because the essay that I wanted to evaluate was the shortest out of the bunch.