Race, Ethnic Options, and Ethnic Binds: Identity Negotiations of Second-Generation Chinese and Korean Americans

Abstract

This article examines the dynamics of race and ethnic options for those racially labeled “Asian” in U.S. society. Drawing on sixty-four in-depth interviews with second-generation Chinese and Korean Americans, I look at how Asian racial categorization and its dynamics shape informal, everyday social encounters between Asians and non-Asians. These dynamics suggest an ethnic bind — a sense of uncertainty and conflict about the meaning and significance of ethnic identity and practice, stemming from the multiple and contradictory pressures surrounding it. The second-generation Chinese and Korean Americans experienced pressures both to cultivate their Chinese and Korean membership and to downplay or minimize it. For those labeled “Asian,” the ethnic bind is part of the social terrain on which ethnic identity is produced, with ethnic options emerging out of the contests and negotiations surrounding them.