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The First Asian Man: The Story Behind the Jeremy Lin Story
March 13, 2012 in Uncategorized by The China Beat
By Yong Chen
There are good reasons why Jeremy Lin deserves the extensive news coverage he has received recently: a Harvard grad playing in the NBA, he had an indispensible role in the Knicks’ 9-2 run before losing to Miami on February 23, averaging 23.9 points and 9.2 assists in 11 games. Yet the extraordinary “Linsanity” displayed by the mass media seems to suggest that what makes Lin’s story so notable is what it says about perceptions of Asian masculinity. In Lin, the media has finally found an Asian man.
This is not an entirely incredible read of the overwhelming public reaction to Jeremy Lin. For decades, American society has refused to see Asian men in masculine terms. This is in spite of the fact that there have been many Asian men in America since the Gold Rush, when Chinese 49’ers established the first extensive Asian communities in the New World. In fact, for a long time the Chinese population in this country was predominantly male, as the Chinese Exclusion Acts made it difficult for men but nearly impossible for women to come to the United States from China between 1882 and 1943. Anti-Chinese prejudice has also historically made the presence of Chinese men invisible in American society. They have been feminized and relegated to jobs that were deemed fit only for women, such as in restaurants and laundry shops. The message was clear: Chinese men were not man enough for other kinds of jobs.
In reality, however, the Chinese had performed “masculine” jobs in areas like mining, manufacturing, and building the railroads before being driven into the service sector. But for many years, this fact was erased from American history books and the collective memory. For example, Chinese workers, a major force in building the first transcontinental railroad, were present at the celebration of its completion in 1869 at Promontory Summit, Utah. But looking at arguably the most famous photograph of the event by A. J. Russell, as generations of Americans have done, you will not find a single Chinese face.
More: http://www.thechinabeat.org/?p=4175
X-Posted to Good Reads
By Yong Chen
There are good reasons why Jeremy Lin deserves the extensive news coverage he has received recently: a Harvard grad playing in the NBA, he had an indispensible role in the Knicks’ 9-2 run before losing to Miami on February 23, averaging 23.9 points and 9.2 assists in 11 games. Yet the extraordinary “Linsanity” displayed by the mass media seems to suggest that what makes Lin’s story so notable is what it says about perceptions of Asian masculinity. In Lin, the media has finally found an Asian man.
This is not an entirely incredible read of the overwhelming public reaction to Jeremy Lin. For decades, American society has refused to see Asian men in masculine terms. This is in spite of the fact that there have been many Asian men in America since the Gold Rush, when Chinese 49’ers established the first extensive Asian communities in the New World. In fact, for a long time the Chinese population in this country was predominantly male, as the Chinese Exclusion Acts made it difficult for men but nearly impossible for women to come to the United States from China between 1882 and 1943. Anti-Chinese prejudice has also historically made the presence of Chinese men invisible in American society. They have been feminized and relegated to jobs that were deemed fit only for women, such as in restaurants and laundry shops. The message was clear: Chinese men were not man enough for other kinds of jobs.
In reality, however, the Chinese had performed “masculine” jobs in areas like mining, manufacturing, and building the railroads before being driven into the service sector. But for many years, this fact was erased from American history books and the collective memory. For example, Chinese workers, a major force in building the first transcontinental railroad, were present at the celebration of its completion in 1869 at Promontory Summit, Utah. But looking at arguably the most famous photograph of the event by A. J. Russell, as generations of Americans have done, you will not find a single Chinese face.
More: http://www.thechinabeat.org/?p=4175
X-Posted to Good Reads
