All-American: How to Cover Asian America
Addendum
Edited by Tony Ramirez
ASIA: Asia is more than 17 million square miles, the eastern four-fifths of the Eurasian landmass. The word "Asia" may be derived from the ancient Assyrian word "asu," meaning " to rise," as in the sun, and by extension, the east. The classical Greeks thought of everything to the east of Greece as Asia. Europeans have demarcated Asia similarly ever since, hence the Orient (from the Latin for "the direction of the rising sun" ), "Asia Minor" for Turkey, and the "Middle East" for such countries as Egypt and Saudi Arabia. East Asia has thus traditionally referred to China, Japan and Korea; Southeast Asia such countries as Vietnam and Thailand; and South Asia such countries as India and Pakistan. Similarly, Central Asia has referred to Kazakstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, all former Soviet republics. Afghanistan is sometimes included in this group. But see ASIAN.
ASIAN: Caution. Like "African," Asian is a term with cultural, historical and political overtones and is thus a term whose use is evolving. In American usage, Asian historically meant the countries of East Asia and Southeast Asia, such as China and Vietnam (see Chapter 6, "Asia and America: A Field Guide"). However, with the recent growth of immigrant populations from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, a growing number of Asian Americans define Asian to include the countries of East Asia, Southeast Asia and South Asia. (In British usage, Asian often means the countries of South Asia.) See also ORIENTAL, elsewhere in this glossary. See as well, "100 Questions and Answers about Arab Americans: A Journalist's Guide," by the Detroit Free Press, available on the Internet at http://www.freep.com/jobspage/arabs.htm. The Free Press guide notes, "The United States has, at different times, classified Arab immigrants as African, Asian, white, European or as belonging to a separate group. Most Arab Americans identify more closely with nationality than with ethnic group.
ASIAN ACCENTS, DIRECT QUOTATION OF: Caution. As in many immigrant communities, first-generation immigrants and naturalized Americans have varying degrees of proficiency with English. If an interpreter is used, then the reader should be informed of the fact as clearly and unobtrusively as possible. If a family member, especially a child, is used as an interpreter, the reader should also be told because a daughter may hesitate to fully translate a response from a parent. Paraphrase, in the service of clarity, may be preferable. It is fair to report that someone's English is halting or lately acquired or spirited, if not quite grammatical. It is also fair to note a non-native speaker's fluent English. But extended or selective quotation of a heavily accented speaker is distracting at best and at worst invites ridicule ("flied lice"). As with American Southern dialects, such exact quotation is rarely handled well.
JAP: Avoid. A slur under all circumstances and often applied to anyone of Asian heritage (see CHINAMAN, elsewhere in this glossary). Like other racial and ethnic epithets, it has a poisonous history but one that may be fading from memory. The disingenuous say it applies only to the brutal Japanese officers of World War II, rather than the entire Japanese people (compare "gook" under RACIAL SLURS). In John W. Dower's 1987 study of World War II racism called "War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War," Dower cites a British general, Sir Thomas Blamey, as typical in his view of the meaning of the word. In an interview in The New York Times, General Blamey said, "We are not dealing with humans as we know them. We are dealing with something primitive. Our troops have the right view of the Japs. They regard them as vermin."
A revised and expanded version of a current entry:
INTERNMENT: During World War II, the incarceration by the United States Government of 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry, two-thirds of them American citizens. They were ordered to sell their homes and businesses, usually at fire-sale prices, to whites and then move to "relocation centers " ranging from the California desert to the swamps of Arkansas. The last internees were released in 1946. Many Americans have said this episode would never be repeated. But immediately following the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, opinion polls indicated support for internment camps. A nationwide poll by the Pew Research Center reported that 29 percent favored detaining "legal immigrants from unfriendly countries." A New York state poll by the Siena College Research Institute reported that 34 percent favored detaining "individuals who the authorities identify as being sympathetic to terrorist causes." See also ANGEL ISLAND, EXECUTIVE ORDER 9066. (Footnote 7)
MUSLIM, MISUSES OF: Caution. The word "Muslim" refers to those who follow the Islamic religious faith, found in many countries and, increasingly, the United States. Most of the world's Muslims are found outside of the Middle East. Indonesia, for example, has the world's largest Muslim population. Nearly 90 percent of its 228 million people (July 2001 est.) are followers of Islam. The preferred spelling to use is "Muslim" rather than "Moslem." In the same way as the word "Hindoo" was used by the British to refer to Hindus, the word "Moslem" was used by them for Muslims. It was often used as a slur and therefore many Muslims consider "Moslem" to be a derogatory term. Under deadline pressure, American journalists sometimes use "Muslim" too broadly, as if it were a more specific official term, like Republican or GOP. Just as it would be a mistake to quote one Catholic group to represent all Catholic groups in Northern Ireland, it would be a mistake to say there is an overall Muslim position on any issue.
RACIAL PROFILING: Caution. Following the terrorist attacks of 2001, the police practice known as racial profiling gained some favor. Proponents said that because all of the airline hijackers in the World Trade Center attack were of Middle Eastern descent, it was fair to focus, at least initially, on the ethnicity of suspects (see ASIAN GANGS, ETHNICITY, elsewhere in this glossary). But critics said the tactic was invidious since it focused mainly on what a person is rather than what he does. Cultural ignorance was also a flaw in the approach, critics said. Indeed, some of the hundreds of "Arabs" who fell under police suspicion were, in fact, South Asians, especially Sikhs, who wear turbans as a matter of religious practice. Seasoned investigators reject profiles as misleading. Presidential assassins, for example, were once characterized as mentally disturbed loners who were always male. But in 1975, Sara Jane Moore attempted to kill President Ford. The Secret Service later concluded that there was no reliable "assassin profile" and that assessing behavior ---such as approaching targets, acquiring weapons, communicating intent--- was more useful.
Terms to avoid:
"ASIAN INVASION": Avoid using the term "Asian Invasion" as a headline. The phrase has historically been used to smear Asians and Asian Americans, evoking for some the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor in WWII and perpetuating the stereotype that Asians are sinister "others" who cannot be trusted.
"MUSLIM" AND "ARAB": Journalists should be careful to distinguish between "Muslim" and "Arab." The terms are not interchangeable although they often are misused, especially after Sept. 11. There is no accurate census, but it is estimated by several Arab and Muslim sources that there are 7 million Muslims in the United States. Only 22 percent of these Muslims are Arab. The largest majority are African American Muslims. And, there are about 4.5 million Arabs in the United States, almost evenly split between Christian Arabs and Muslim Arabs. (In addition to Christian Arabs, there are also many non-Arab Middle East Christians such as Assyrians, mainly from Iraq.)
"ORIENTAL": What's wrong with "Oriental"? Most Americans of Asian background prefer the term "Asian American." Many Asian Americans today are offended by the term "Oriental" when it is used to refer to people. Just as the word "Negro" was imposed on African Americans, the word "Oriental" was not a word chosen by Asian people to describe themselves and has not been in common use since the early 1960s.