The Emergence of American People by Helen Zia - Book Report/Review Example

The Emergence of American People by Helen Zia Introduction United States of America is the largest epitome for a paradigm of liberty, equality and fraternity. Asian, Hispanics and Negros comprise the lion’s portion in the entire demography of United States. They contribute equally to the development of the nation. And their transition and transformation into the unique divergent heterogeneous culture of the United States has always been full of sweet and sour experiences. All these people from the different edge of the world immigrated to the United States with a soaring dream in their eyes, and a vision to unite with the American Dreams brewed and sown in the eyes of millions of other people. Yet, there is an alien feeling that pervades the life of these Asian Americans or the immigrated people who have left their soil, root and culture and strive hard till their last day of life to accept, embrace the homogeneous culture which has its own entity. These feelings often generate some beautiful literary pieces and documentation which breed from life and for life. Helen Zia’s “Asian American Experience” is a first-hand experience and testimony from the daughter of a Chinese immigrant who documents the transition of a few bizarre Asian ethnic groups into a racial group with identity of its own that influences all the aspects of American society continuously. Thesis Statement This essay intends to explore the intricate transitions that small and disconnected ethnic groups undergo in American experience from the testimony captivated in the book, “Asian American Experience” by Helen Zia. Asian American Experience: A Review “Asian American Experience: The Emergence of an American People” by Helen Zia is not merely a book. It is an experience of a minority girl torn asunder between the identity which she possesses and the identity which she retains. And this is the story of every immigrant in the United States. The book “Asian American Experience” minutely observes the transition of the culture these small ethnic groups undergo from a close contour and documents them vividly in the pages of this enlightening book. Helen Zia, the eminent Asian American journalist takes back her readers to the nostalgic lane of her childhood where she grew up between a state of light and shadow learning her present culture and unlearning her roots. Before analyzing the content of the book, it is essentially important to comprehend the background from which the literary piece has evolved. The comprehension of the context for this epoch making document takes the readers back to the 1950s and 1960s when Zia was growing up like any other kids of an immigrant in New Jersey. In her school like a normal American student, she was taught a lot about the history of America, its evolution and the stories behind the framing of a great nation. However, back at home she was relentlessly injected with the history of her roots by her father which was all about China’s past. Eventually, Zia understood that there is a space in the history of the United States where there is no place for the thousand immigrants like her who relentlessly contribute in the development of the nation working hand in hand with the sons and the daughters of the soil. With this stark sense of Missing In History concept, Zia conceived the detailed and rich account for the formation of the Asian American community which contains the first extended wave from the community in the form of dubbing events of Chinese for the Americans during the gold rush to the very contemporary influx of the entire south east Asian community who have almost doubled their number since 1975. Zia starts filling the absences in the history of the United States when she starts to relate and to narrate a few of the events and their origin (Sengupta, “Visible and Invisible”; Zia 3-311). The book “Asian American Experience” in this way becomes one of the most vivid national histories that retain personal nature. In travelling this trajectory of the national history as perceived by Zia, she takes the readers through myriad recent flash points from a wide range. But all these events from past and recent past have actually conglomerated the Asian American community in the United States and help to learn its history (Sengupta, “Visible and Invisible”). The book captivates events like the brutal murder of Vincent Chin in the city of Detroit in 1982. It throws light on the horrendous and detrimental riots of 1992 where the damage of US$1 Billion is estimated and more than half of it is borne by the Korean-American shop owners of the town (Sengupta, “Visible and Invisible”). The book also highlights the pulling off a citywide strike in the year 1998 in the month of May when the besieged South Asian cab drivers of the New York City joined hands with the New York Taxi workers. The demographic assessment that in the 1950s the Asian American population was half a million but in the year 1990 it increased to 7.3 million indicates a population boom in the community assuring the safety and the security in the nation. Moreover, Zia presents a few of the recent events and perspectives from the Asian American community and the way they gaze at the American society which assures that their stories, struggle and history will no more lie missing in the great American national history. Zia rightly traces the development of the Asian American community as the coherent racial group with individual identity. She also minutely traces the transition that takes place within the community. The transitions that took place recently in the political and the cultural paradigm of the community which is shaped by some of the external events actually enabled these disjointed groups to appear in a galvanized realm. The incidents which according to Zia cemented the group consist of the murder of Vincent Chin to the boycott of the Korean American shops in Brooklyn. The events somewhere are personal and at other places public but the mention of such events brings the Asian American experiences to the surface and makes them more comprehensive (Zia 3-311). The book “Asian America Experience” is divided into four parts. The first part bears the title, ‘Beyond Our Shadows’ and contains two chapters bearing very sensitive titles, ‘From Nothing, a Consciousness’ and ‘ Surrogate Slaves to American Dreamers’. The second part of the book bears the title, ‘The Awakening’. It contains three chapters bearing the titles, ‘Detroit Blues: “Because of You Motherfuckers”’, ‘To market, To Market, New York Style’, and ‘Gangsters, Gooks, Geishas, and Geeks’. The third part of the book bears the title ‘Up From Innocence’. It contains three chapters ‘Welcome to Washington’, ‘Lost and Found in L.A.’ and ‘For Richer, for Poorer’. The last part of the book is titled, ‘Moving the Mountain’. And this final segment of the book contains three chapters ‘Reinventing Our Culture’, ‘The Last Bastion’, ‘Living Our Dreams’. There are twelve chapters in the book neatly distributed in four parts which imparts a great anatomy to the book (Zia 3-311). The book, “Asian American Experience” is lucid, coherent and also poetic at places. It is informative and worth exercising the grey matter. Published in the year 2001, this engaging Asian American experience of 368 pages which contains a very well defined bibliography and acknowledgements is an effective document that set the readers on a trajectory of Asian American history and the events that have resulted in their present activities within the nation. Conclusion The book bears universal appeal. It truly records the Asian American experiences and traces the events that have evolved the Asian American history. The book definitely acknowledges racism but that has been instrumental in framing the desolated ethnic groups into a self-identified community. However, all these events constitute the Asian American history and from individual experience to collective encounters, this book is very crucial to learn the history and condition of the Asian immigrants in the United States determining their future course of actions as well. Works Cited Sengupta, Somini. Visible and Invisible. The New York Times, 2000. Web. 13 Jun. 2012. Zia, Helen. Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2001. Print. Read More