The Vancouver Sun claims 43% of Metro Vancouver share an Asian heritage. I am one of those in that 43%. I am a Chinese-Canadian. In reading Fred Wah’s Diamond Grill I was pushed to reconsider my identity and place in Canada as a claimed Chinese-Canadian, and to question why can I do not simply claim to be a Canadian, alone?
Fred Wah Jr. of Diamond Grill is one fourth Chinese and “white enough to get away with it” (Wah 36), but he still identifies himself as a Chinese-Canadian. There is an obsessive need to identify the self as Euro-Canadian, African-Canadian, Japanese-Canadian, or (Insert Country Name)-Canadian because one can never be simply Canadian in Canada. I have been asked and caught asking the question, “What are you?” I considered the question of why do Canadians feel inclined to dismiss “I am Canadian” as a reasonable response? Logically, I Googled Canadian identity. Many of the search results simply reiterated a statement of how Canadians do not have an identity or that it is still in question today. The obsession with this question is a response to the unidentifiable Canadian identity.
Fred Wah calls his experience with the hyphen as “riding the hyphen,” and although I have no Caucasian heritage, I can say I ride the hyphen just as he does. Wah is able to slip between the two ethnicities unnoticed. Mixed-ethnic Canadians is a growing norm in Canada – there is even a blog dedicated to mixed Canadians – but what I am interested in is the growing number of second-generation Chinese-Canadians here in Canada. I ride the hyphen just as Wah does, because I am what Vancouverites call whitewashed. I believe it’s a crime to not use chopsticks when eating noodles, only stepped into Asia once, cannot speak, read or write Chinese, studies English Literature, am educated in a Western culture, understand both Western and Eastern ideals, and can easily ride the hyphen between Canadian and Chinese cultural practices. The hyphen allows mixed-racial and second-generation Canadians a claimed identity, but as Diamond Grill notices, there is no clear Canadian identity to be claimed; there is merely a hyphen to consolidate an unidentifiable identity.
Hey Leona,
It was great to hear from someone in our class who identifies as Chinese-Canadian. To be honest, I was actually surprised that comments like yours were not brought into class discussion during the past week. It’s true: Canada is a mosaic of cultures. However, it was interesting to hear you say that “there is no clear Canadian identity to be claimed;” I understand this in relation to mixed-racial identities but then I sat and thought about myself. Who am I? What am I? I’m Canadian. My paternal lineage comes from Saskatchewan…I am not familiar past my great great grandparents, but from them to me, we are Canadian. On my maternal side, we are also Canadian (although there are some questions around my mother’s birth family (she was adopted) and I believe there may be some traces of Scottish heritage from way back when). Alas, all I know about myself and my racial identity is that I am Canadian. Plain and simple. So what then, does that mean about my culture? What does it mean to be Canadian if you do not have another racial identity to combine with? While on one hand I feel that there obviously is a Canadian identity to be claimed (as I noted above about myself), on the other hand I agree in the questioning of this identity and what it truly means.
Often, I have felt “most Canadian” while watching a hockey game, putting syrup on my pancakes, drinking Tim Hortons, playing in the snow, and living in a tent in the woods. Now obviously these are all Canadian stereotypes; but I believe that people cling to them in order to feel a validation in their Canadian identity. The truth is, a Canadian identity is a social construction. It does not come from a long, historic, deep rooted culture. A Canadian identity is what we make it up to be. I wonder what it will look like 50 years from now? Will my great grandkids feel Canadian in the same way I do now?
-Brooklyn Kemp