Yeah, I can understand why some people might not like being associated with more radical members of their whatever, but I like to use my Christianity metaphor whenever possible.
Okay, a preface to the response to your comment on Chinese culture: I have a lot of things to say, or things I wanted to mention, but I'm not sure I have the information, brain capacity, or time to do it coherently. So this is just a fore-warning.
I think it's interesting that in your family the women tend to hold all the power, as it is radically different from my experience. This may in be because of our specific circumstances or may in part be because of where our families are from regionally. I do see a lot of the matriarch-ruling-the-family situations, but I think this is mostly because of the importance of age (i.e. the older generation has more say over the younger generation) combined with the fact that women tend to live longer than men. I honestly don't see a lot of women browbeating their husbands and/or new female in-laws, but that's very probably just a difference in community.
In terms of the next generation, I think that my experience with Chinese girls is that they tend to be meeker and milder than their American counterparts by far (which is probably in part due to the overall Chinese culture and perceived "quietness" of Chinese civilization), but also that they tend to tolerate certain brands of sexism more. I don't think this is true of Chinese American or Asian American girls however -- I know a lot of strong-minded Chinese American girls. Which is not to say that strong-minded Chinese girls don't exist, I just don't see them represented in Chinese culture as much. I don't know if I'm explaining myself very well.
And as a response to your aside, I think that for me, the sexism has always been most evident in the importance of having a son over having a daughter. My aunt told me people in China wants sons instead of daughters because sexism exists, and so sons can hold higher positions in companies/government/etc., whereas daughters can't. I know a lot of it has to do with passing on the family name. But most of it has to do with certain traditions.
I think that Chinese culture tends to be sexist, and when it comes to America, which isn't too faultless on the sexism front itself, the culture clash means what you teach your children is not necessarily what you mean to teach your children, and what Chinese American children take away is not necessarily what the parents intended.
I feel like everything I'm saying makes sense in my head, but I don't know how I'm doing at voicing it. I'm also sorry my response is so long! Feel free to completely ignore this if you don't have time/energy or something!
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2009-09-16 11:15 pm (UTC)Okay, a preface to the response to your comment on Chinese culture: I have a lot of things to say, or things I wanted to mention, but I'm not sure I have the information, brain capacity, or time to do it coherently. So this is just a fore-warning.
I think it's interesting that in your family the women tend to hold all the power, as it is radically different from my experience. This may in be because of our specific circumstances or may in part be because of where our families are from regionally. I do see a lot of the matriarch-ruling-the-family situations, but I think this is mostly because of the importance of age (i.e. the older generation has more say over the younger generation) combined with the fact that women tend to live longer than men. I honestly don't see a lot of women browbeating their husbands and/or new female in-laws, but that's very probably just a difference in community.
In terms of the next generation, I think that my experience with Chinese girls is that they tend to be meeker and milder than their American counterparts by far (which is probably in part due to the overall Chinese culture and perceived "quietness" of Chinese civilization), but also that they tend to tolerate certain brands of sexism more. I don't think this is true of Chinese American or Asian American girls however -- I know a lot of strong-minded Chinese American girls. Which is not to say that strong-minded Chinese girls don't exist, I just don't see them represented in Chinese culture as much. I don't know if I'm explaining myself very well.
And as a response to your aside, I think that for me, the sexism has always been most evident in the importance of having a son over having a daughter. My aunt told me people in China wants sons instead of daughters because sexism exists, and so sons can hold higher positions in companies/government/etc., whereas daughters can't. I know a lot of it has to do with passing on the family name. But most of it has to do with certain traditions.
I think that Chinese culture tends to be sexist, and when it comes to America, which isn't too faultless on the sexism front itself, the culture clash means what you teach your children is not necessarily what you mean to teach your children, and what Chinese American children take away is not necessarily what the parents intended.
I feel like everything I'm saying makes sense in my head, but I don't know how I'm doing at voicing it. I'm also sorry my response is so long! Feel free to completely ignore this if you don't have time/energy or something!