assimilating into different more public identities to ensure political visibility. This idea could be individualized and applied to other groups, but is explored here in relation to Asian Americans and their search as a racial group for political voice.
However, Racial Identity Realignment unsurprisingly has consequences. Yes, it allows for different individual identities to be explored
and elevated, but perhaps it is symptomatic of
a larger problem. While voters by no means vote solely on race, nor should they, race is an identity that matters. Race is oftentimes a visual justification for how society interacts with the individual, and therefore results in a unique racial perspective and experience that is then translated into the political realm.
The problem is that the realm doesn't adequately recognize space for the identity, Asian-American author Cathy Park Hong writes “Asians [in America] are next in line to
disappear. We are reputed to be so accomplished, and so law-abiding, we will
disappear into this country’s amnesiac fog.” We have forsaken and dispersed our Asian identity in exchange for what we think is political survival, because if politics refuses to recognize our heritage, at least we can matter in numbers in other areas. While that might seem harmless, practical even, it is also incredibly close to the surrendering and assimilation of identity that betrays the Asian American challenges and experiences. Without the ability to politically express Asian American challenges and experiences, political progress cannot be made in those areas.
As a message for both America and for the Asian Americans out there, don’t let us disappear and don’t let the Asian in Asian American fade into the amnesiac fog.
1 The Census Bureau
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