An ad for the movie Pitch Perfect. Is this how Americans think of Asians?

Recently I went to see a movie called “Pitch Perfect” with Emanuele, one of my best American friends.

“How did you feel about that?” she asked me on our way to the parking lot. We pushed the door and walked into freezing wind.

“Well, yes I think that is pretty much it. It’s true,” I said.

I knew exactly what she was asking.

In the movie there are two Asian girls: One speaks in a really quiet voice and has a weird accent; the other only hangs out with people from her own country and hates American food and culture. It feels like they are so different and somehow crazy.

“That is how some Americans think of Asians, right?” I asked.

“Well, to some degree, yes,” my friend Emanuele said. She said some Americans don’t like Asians because they don’t understand them. “Sometimes they don’t even know anybody from Asia,” she said. “They learned it from movies and other pop culture.”

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Imagine the scene:

“This group of boys, dressed in silk gowns, their queues flapping, was too much for New Englanders, be they small-town folk or city dwellers, to ignore. In Springfield, for example, the boys’ dinner at a local hotel was interrupted when an American woman, dining at a nearby table, stood up and wordlessly approached the Chinese youths an started dreamily fondling their queues … They were less amused a few days later when, while visiting Hartford, American children chased them down the street, pushing and shoving each other for a better glimpse of the strange, new breed of humans that had arrived on their shores. … The more fearful among them recalled the horrific stories circulated back home about Americans and their desire to turn the Chinese boys into sideshow curiosities.”

In 1872, when 30 Chinese students arrived on America’s east coast as part of an educational program sponsored by the Chinese government, they attracted quite a bit of attention.

Yung Wing in his Yale College class album (Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University)

They weren’t the first to study in the area though.  The first Chinese student ever to receive a degree in the U.S. was Yung Wing, who came to America for high school in 1847 and received his diploma from Yale University in 1852.  Yung then spearheaded an educational mission to send 120 Chinese boys to study in the U.S. for 15 years, arriving in dispatches of 30 per year.

What would it have been like to be one of those Chinese students in the 1800s?

Part of the answer can be found in letters and diaries kept by the students, which authors Leil Leibovitz and Matthew Miller used to write a book called Fortunate Sons: The 120 Chinese Boys Who Came to America, Went to School, and Revolutionized an Ancient Civilization.

“We were amazed to find how meticulous these men had been about documenting their lives,” Leibovitz said about writing the book. “So you really just had to open the boxes, which to my amazement and great fortune, no one had thought of doing in the century that passed.”

Yung Wing also published a memoir recounting his experience, as did Li En Fu, one of the 120 to participate in the educational mission.

Here, in their own words, is how Chinese students experienced 19th century America.

How did they apply?

Here’s how students apply today.

Yung Wing wrote in his memoir, My Life in China and America, that he was attending the first English school in China when he got a unique opportunity:

“[Schoolmaster Rev. S.R. Brown] left China in the winter of 1846.  Four months before he left, he one day sprang a surprise upon the whole school. He told of his contemplated return to America on account of his health and the health of his family. Before closing his remarks by telling us of his deep interest in the school, he said he would like to take a few of his old pupils home with him to finish their education in the United States … When he requested those who wished to accompany him to the States to signify it by rising, I was the first one on my feet.” 

The 120 boys who followed him in 1872 had rather a different experience.

Six boys from the first detachment in 1872, shortly after arriving in San Francisco. From left to right: Chung Mun Yew, Liang Tun Yen, unidentified, Sze Kin Yung, unidentified, New Shan Chow. (Public domain photo)

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If you speak Chinese, this video that came across our Twitter feed today is well worth watching. An American Fulbrighter in China, Daniel Tedesco, speaks (to an audience including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and State Councillor Liu Yandong!) about the challenges of building connections in another country.

“…too many of us spend time mostly with our country-mates,” he says.  ”It’s easy for a Chinese student in the U.S. to eat Chinese food and go karaoke.  It’s comfortable for an American in China to eat pizza and hang out in cafes.”

He explains:

Spending time with local people throws us into a world of potential misunderstanding. We struggle to explain simple things. We don’t know when to laugh at jokes. It’s often hard just to keep up with the conversation. We might look silly and get laughed out.

But concludes:

Chinese and Americans abroad are putting aside what’s comfortable in order to do what’s meaningful. And we’ve reaped big rewards for doing so.
…
A single friend can change an experience abroad. A few more can change a life. But a great many can fortify and enrich U.S.-China relations for decades to come.

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I met Diane Paik, a student at Michigan State University, because she was in a journalism class that was assigned to report on the increase in the Chinese student population at MSU (you might remember the class’s work from this post). As the year came to a close, I asked her what she had learned from doing the assignments. This was her response.

The recent influx of Chinese students in the United States has caught the attention of the press, and at Michigan State University, where I go to school, Chinese students are streaming into the university. Comparing my freshmen year to my current year (junior), the increase in Chinese students is noticeable just walking around campus. In some classes, I’ve even realized that my American classmates no longer dominate the international ones (depending on the class).

I received the opportunity through a journalism class this semester to report about the Chinese international students at MSU and to find out more about them.

Some of the other American students in my class seemed quick to attach stereotypes to the Chinese students when they learned about the assignment, and some even grouped any Asian as being a Chinese international student.

“They only hang out in groups and with each other” and “they drive really nice cars” were some of the comments I heard from American students.

[Blogger Qian talks about the tensions between Chinese and American students on her campus]
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We’ve talked a lot about why Chinese and American students often don’t form close relationships on campus.  We’ve asked whether one side or the other is to blame, which cultural differences might have an impact, and even whether the admissions process has a role to play in improving relationships.

Dandan, who is from China and coming to the end of a one-year exchange program in the U.S., has her own opinions on the matter.  Her close friendships at school have mostly been with other Asian students, but its her close relationship with American friend Maya that is most revealing as to where some of the cultural differences lie.

Listen to our candid discussion as Dandan discusses why she prefers the concept of friendship in China, and what she’s learned about friendship in America.  Do you agree with her ideas on friendship? Can the cultural differences be overcome?

Or listen to the mp3
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My best girlfriend, who is Chinese, is dating an American classmate.  If you’ve been reading this blog, you already know that I am also dating an American, so she has been using me as her own personal relationship coach (which I am more than happy to be!).

I guess other foreign students might have similar situations if they are dating Americans, so I want to share our discussions with you guys.  Also, the advice I would give if she was in China asking about a Chinese guy would be very different, so I’ll highlight the different reactions in China and the U.S. for the same situation.

Have you had any of these problems? Do you agree with my answers?  Let me know in the comments!

Problem 1:

“We had a very romantic and intimate second date, but after that, he did not call or text me for three days! What is going wrong? Will he contact me again? If he won’t call me, should I call him?”

American answer: It depends on how much you like him. If you like him and want to hang out again, just call him and ask him out. Who cares!
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Earlier this week we posted a video in which Chinese and American students talked candidly about some of the problems they encounter in forming relationships on campus. It generated a lot of discussion about the source of these tensions and what needs to be done about them.  In this article, Qian looks at the situation on her own campus, discussing why such tensions are suddenly so prominent.

After spending a summer in Israel and the fall semester as an exchange student in Washington, D.C., I finally came back to Syracuse University to finish my last semester before graduation. However, walking around this campus that was once so familiar, I can see that one thing has changed rapidly – the presence of Chinese students.

Besides the fact that the library is nearly “occupied” by Chinese students, when I walk through campus, every few minutes I see a Chinese face or hear someone speaking Mandarin. In some engineering and finance classes, the majority of students are Chinese.

I was even shocked one day after having just finished talking to my friend on the phone in Chengdu dialect (a Chinese dialect used in the southwestern region of China, which is different from Mandarin), someone came over to me and asked, “Are you from Chengdu? I just recognized your dialect and I’m from there, too!
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Michigan State University very bravely posted this video, featuring a candid discussion among Chinese students and American students about the challenges in forming cross-cultural relationships. It prompted a lot of discussion among our bloggers over the weekend.

One person said that they agree that it can be difficult to form close relationships because Chinese and American students don’t always share the same interests (like American football). Someone else felt disheartened to hear some of the opinions from the American students, saying that it should be up to the American students just as much as the Chinese ones to open up communication and start building relationships. And a third said that schools don’t always do enough to facilitate this sort of relationship-building.

This question about the relationships between American and international students is something we’ve discussed before on this blog, and you may have seen in a recent post that we’re conducting a big survey on this topic (if you’re an American or international student, please TAKE THE SURVEY), so we’ll have a lot more insights to share soon.

In the meantime, watch this video and see what you think. Does it leave you feeling positive or negative about relations between American and international students? What do you think these students could or should have done to improve communication? Leave a comment and let us know!

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We’ve been hearing a lot about how studying abroad changes your definition of home.  Olena found it difficult at first to settle back into life in Ukraine.  For Sebastian, transitioning between Kansas and Bolivia is easy, but he struggled to accept that Kansas now feels as much like home as his birthplace.  Qian too feels she has two homes now, but going back to China is not exactly how she imagined it would be.

Photo by Shai Barzilay

For American college students, time off such as Thanksgiving week, winter break, spring break and summer vacation usually is a time to go home.  But for Chinese students in the U.S., myself included, the cost and distance to get home, combined with the requirements of school work and internships, can sometimes keep us away from home for quite a while.

As a result, the home we go back to is not always the same one we left, or that we imagine in our heads.

For example, I have a 9-year-old cousin, once my sweetest little angel, who I watched grow up. This winter when I went back to Chengdu, I bought her several child-size-10 dresses as Christmas gifts. However, as soon as I met her at the airport, I realized those dresses were too small for her; she was already in 5th grade and in the year since I’d seen her had grown to almost five feet tall!
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With the number of Chinese students in the U.S. continuing to grow, some recent news articles have turned a critical eye towards these students and their impact on U.S. colleges.

The Global Post wrote the controversially-titled, “Elite Asian students cheat like mad on US college applications,” reporting:

Among Asian high society, and particularly in China, parents’ obsession with sending their offspring to US colleges has given rise to a lucrative trade of application brokers. Depending the degree of assistance, families can expect to pay between $5,000 and $15,000. …

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Let’s talk about something fun! English names

I’ve noticed that most Chinese students have English names, like me (Summer), but this is not the case for international students from, say Japan, the Middle East or Africa (or many other non-English-speaking countries). While having dinner with my Chinese friend in Boston and her American friends, one of the American girls asked me, “Why does almost every Chinese student have an English name and where do you get it from?”

Okay, there’s an easy answer for why. “What’s her name?” I asked back, pointing to my Chinese friend. “Cassie,” the girl replied without hesitation. “What’s her Chinese name then?” “Ummmm…” See, that is why.

[Read more funny stories about having a non-English name in America]

There is another reason as well — our Chinese names are picked by our parents, some even before we were born (I don’t know if it is the case in America or other part of the world). I guess we just want to have our names as we like instead of as our parents like.

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Chinese students in the U.S. can be in for political clash as well as culture clash

For international students who are studying abroad in the United States, doubtless one challenge is culture clash. However, for Chinese students, me included, there is another crucial one – political clash.

Majoring in international relations, I have taken many courses that are related to Chinese politics. Tibet, Taiwan, human rights, freedom of speech and dictatorship are the top five issues that American students in my politics classes here in the United States tend to put on the table and criticize while talking about China. Sometimes, it can make things uncomfortable for Chinese students, who are extremely sensitive about those issues.

I still remember the first writing class in my freshman year, when a girl introduced herself by saying “I’m Taiwanese,” and another student from mainland China responded, “We are asking which country you come from, not which province.” Suddenly, the entire class was in a complete and embarrassing silence.

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“Professor, you write with your left hand!” In my professor’s office, seeing her working with her left hand, I can’t help screaming.

Since my first day in America, I have seen a great number of left-handed people: three out of my six professors are left-handed, and the left-handed amongst my classmates are more than I can count.

It is so common to see people writing with their left hands that people here regard it as normal and face it peacefully. Or, perhaps, being left-handed IS normal – but in my country lots of people will joke about it and many, including myself, will treat it as a kind of disability.

Is left-handedness really a disability as I used to think about when I was at home? Or is it just a common difference as is thought by people here?

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What's in your makeup bag? (Creative Commons photo by Flickr user Nikita Kashner)

I didn’t realize how easy it was to distinguish between real Chinese girls and ABC girls [American-born Chinese] until I came here—they don’t even have to speak a word, just from the appearance. ABC girls, most of them wear make-up like American girls do, and they dress differently from Chinese girls.

I heard American girls start doing make-up since high school, some as early as middle school; however, a lot of Chinese girls do not care about make-up until they realize they somehow have to, like to cover aging signs around 25.

Typical Chinese girls’ clothing: Hoodies, jeans, sneakers. Typical ABC/American girls’ clothing: Leather jackets, skirts, leggings, flip-flops/UGG boots. One interesting thing that I notice is that American girls can wear UGGs during summer weather and flip-flops under freezing temperature, as long as the shoes they choose fit the overall outlook. They look fantastic, but don’t they feel cold?

Well, Chinese girls’ take on fashion is changing, and I can see a lot of Chinese girls wearing more and more Americanized clothing – me included. But still, the line between Chinese girls and ABC/American girls is still distinctive. One thing I am sure about is that for Chinese girls, the utility of clothing hasn’t lost its meaning, yet.