Asian American Experience

Asian American Experience:
The History of Asians in America
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Asian American Experience:
The History of Asians in America
Transnational History of Asian American Racialization
The attached newspaper article, published on the 12th of March in 1899 in The Denver Post, discussed the protests against the annexation of the Philippines to the United States of America. In the said article, annexation was opposed because it was viewed by the Philippine laborers as the "white conqueror`s" pass for achieving cheaper labor costs and for a greater sense of impunity in the Asian islands. Indeed, the article discussed that with annexation, the working masses of the United States can be easily brought into the Philippines, and the said working masses can then enjoy higher pay with greater benefits, especially including immunity from Philippine laws. On the other hand, annexation would allow US employers to ship off cheap Filipino and Asian laborers to other US lands, at cheaper costs and salaries. Such a set-up would then destroy the balance that maintained the wages of the country on a living scale. More importantly, at the heart of the annexation lay the threat of a possible coolie trade in the Philippines, wherein millions of coolie laborers will be forced to compete with white American labor in their very own country.
The article mainly explored the context and complexities of the coolie trade. In a sense, the coolie trade became somewhat comparable to the apartheid of Africa, wherein laborers were either coerced or deceived into cheap labor. Indeed, although living and working conditions were now more acceptable as compared to the period of the apartheid, most coolie laborers were still deprived of their basic rights for equality and respect. Most coolies were paid beyond their real value, although such an unbalanced scale is most commonly attributed to the coolies` lack of any particular marketable skills. Coolie traders, including those in the Philippines, "compensated" these low wages with several benefits, including the promise of assistance for immigration towards the United States and other foreign countries. Although most of the promised assistance has been given top the coolie laborers, those who immigrated were later forced into poverty when their contracts ended because of the difficulty of acquiring work in the United States, as well as the difficulty of applying for a passage back to their countries. To make matters worse, shipping conditions for coolie laborers were sometimes so bad that millions of the laborers being shipped died during the trip CITATION Ron98 \l 1033 (Takaki, 1998).
The coolie trade, along with the annexation discussed in the article, was significant in the transnational history of the racialization of Asian American. Drawing from a long-ingrained mindset of "white supremacy", most Asian races allowed the white races to exploit their natural and human resources, under the façade of widely-acknowledged movement towards globalization and progress. Moreover, the racial and cultural stratifications created by the earlier years of colonization has carried on into the more civilized world even after the numerous revolutions carried out by the different Asian nations. In a way, the article demonstrates the increasing awareness of the Asian individual of his rights as an Asian American, but the strength of the possibility of the passage of the annexation also shows the said population`s recognition of the power held by the white races. This power, used by the developed countries as their major assets, serves as the main driving forces for capitalism and imperialism. In the heart of it, the said power held by the white races is actually maintained by racism, which has nurtured the stratification of the society and the working forces based on race and culture.
Triangulation and the Racial Formation of Asians
Racial triangulation is a form of social stratification that is based on racial or ethnic differences, and it involves an instance when a least favored racial group is put adjacent to a most favored cultural/racial group, and a third group is then "triangulated" between the said two groups. Racial triangulation takes place through the use of two linked and simultaneous processes. The first process involves the course of "relative valorization", and the second then involves the process of "civic ostracism". Under relative valorization, a dominant group, or the most favored group, valorizes another group and gives them the right to subordinate another lower group, or the least favored group. These stratifications occur on a racial or cultural basis, wherein the implied or relative supremacy of one race serves as the basis for their domination of the other racial groups. On the other hand, once relative valorization has occurred, civic ostracism then takes place. In civic ostracism, the dominant or most favored group establishes the second group as an immutably foreign group, which cannot be assimilated to the dominant group, and this structure then serves as the justification for the dominant group to ostracize the said second group. Ostracism occurs most commonly in the political aspects of living, as well as in civic membership.
This concept of racial triangulation is essential to the analysis of the formation of the Asian American identity in the United States. In the analysis of racial triangulation, two main authors can be used and contrasted: Maeda and Prashad. In their books, Prashad (2000) presented the concept of racial triangulation from the experience of Indian Americans who have migrated to the United States, while Maeda (2009) discussed the experience of Asian Americans in general. Both authors presented the concept of relative valorization and civic ostracism in the triangulation of Asian American. However, a major difference between the discussions on racial triangulation of these authors is their manner of presentation of the different facts on triangulation, as well as the way by which they treated the subject matter. Indeed, while Prashad ...