I actually changed Asian to oriental as I wrote that, with purpose. My wife uses that word. When she first heard DWO (Driving While Oriental) she laughed as hard as she did the day that she discovered The Three Stooges slapstick comedy. I think it is her way of differentiating the round hair follicled, high cheek boned, epicanthic fold e…
I actually changed Asian to oriental as I wrote that, with purpose. My wife uses that word. When she first heard DWO (Driving While Oriental) she laughed as hard as she did the day that she discovered The Three Stooges slapstick comedy. I think it is her way of differentiating the round hair follicled, high cheek boned, epicanthic fold eyes subset of the Asian grouping (appearance) from those who don't have that look. When she first came to America, she looked for people who looked like her. They didn't have to be Thai or dark in what she called the land of the blue eyed blond, it was all in a specific set of observable features. I think it is also a distinction in the minds of many Americans when they think of "Asians" which is the word I normally use. "Oriental" served my purpose in that it led to this thought.
As a side note, my daughters, born in the USA, heard lots of "Where are you from?" coming up. Asians have been in America for a long time but are probably subjected to an attitude of foreignness to a greater extent than any other ethnic tribe.
We have friends (Vietnamese) who have 3rd generation in America children who speak English with a hint of a Vietnamese accent because they seem more resistant to giving up the mother tongue that other immigrant groups. My wife chatters away on the phone in Thai with her Thai friends daily. They all can speak English.
When we adopted my wife's niece after her mother (wife's half-sister) was brutally beaten to death in a drunken brawl we brought her to America at the age of 10 with no English. I gave her an ABC Elmo doll to play with on the plane since they don't share our alphabet. She got together with neighborhood friends who "looked like her" (Filipina and Chinese) to study after she reached functional communication level English. And yes, people in countries ranked as lower IQ have plenty of smart high achievers. Another reason to dampen ideas of race-based intelligence.
I actually changed Asian to oriental as I wrote that, with purpose. My wife uses that word. When she first heard DWO (Driving While Oriental) she laughed as hard as she did the day that she discovered The Three Stooges slapstick comedy. I think it is her way of differentiating the round hair follicled, high cheek boned, epicanthic fold eyes subset of the Asian grouping (appearance) from those who don't have that look. When she first came to America, she looked for people who looked like her. They didn't have to be Thai or dark in what she called the land of the blue eyed blond, it was all in a specific set of observable features. I think it is also a distinction in the minds of many Americans when they think of "Asians" which is the word I normally use. "Oriental" served my purpose in that it led to this thought.
As a side note, my daughters, born in the USA, heard lots of "Where are you from?" coming up. Asians have been in America for a long time but are probably subjected to an attitude of foreignness to a greater extent than any other ethnic tribe.
We have friends (Vietnamese) who have 3rd generation in America children who speak English with a hint of a Vietnamese accent because they seem more resistant to giving up the mother tongue that other immigrant groups. My wife chatters away on the phone in Thai with her Thai friends daily. They all can speak English.
When we adopted my wife's niece after her mother (wife's half-sister) was brutally beaten to death in a drunken brawl we brought her to America at the age of 10 with no English. I gave her an ABC Elmo doll to play with on the plane since they don't share our alphabet. She got together with neighborhood friends who "looked like her" (Filipina and Chinese) to study after she reached functional communication level English. And yes, people in countries ranked as lower IQ have plenty of smart high achievers. Another reason to dampen ideas of race-based intelligence.