Ethnic Identity

Wow, it has been awhile. I've been so busy with my classes and life this winter. Time to update what's going on. I have one more week of classes left. I have three major assignments due soon. More on that later. This term in adolescent development, I learned a lot about the different crisis and identity seeking issues that young people have.

Just a few weeks ago, we chatted about two different topics on Moodle. We had some in-depth conversation on ethnic identity. Here is what I posted on February 25th:

When I headed off to kindergarten, I had to face my ethnic identity early in life. I noticed many of my classmates have different skin tones, language and culture than mine. Since I was young enough, we all just played together. In elementary school, I blended in as best as I could. Majority of my schoolmates came from White American culture from working class to middle class backgrounds. I mentioned in one of earlier posts that I became color-blind and try to believe whatever my white peers and teachers believed. I read books with white characters and wrote stories using white characters. At school, I think I pretended to be white and at home I was Chinese.

I never really thought about my differences until middle school. I met more students with diverse backgrounds even some like me who was born here with immigrant parents. In seventh grade, a white kid mistaken me to be Japanese. I was like, yes, Japanese culture is so neat but my family is Chinese. In seventh grade, I actually made a first friend from a Chinese heritage who actually immigrated to America a couple years before I met her. We would hang out during recesses. It was fun to just chat both in Cantonese and English and just relate with a common ethnic culture. By high school, I wanted to examine my ethnic background. I started to read more books about China and Chinese culture especially written by another Chinese-American like me. I started to enjoy watching Chinese movies and read fictional books by Chinese Americans. By the time I started college, I could say I am a second-generation Chinese-American who's parents are Chinese immigrants. I didn't need to say I'm American while keeping my Chinese heritage at a low level. I think I found balance between my Chinese background and my American cultural side from being born and raised here.

With working with youth, one must really listen and let them identify what racial or ethnic identity they want. If I sense there is a crisis or uncertainty, I would offer my assistance. I would ask questions for them to explore. I need to give these young people time and space to voice where they are at with their ethnic identity. If they need assistance and need an ethnic model, I will help them find an adult who has experienced similarly to what they are going through and this adult's ethnic and racial background is like theirs. If I can't find another adult to assist, I would provide books and other resources for the adolescent to explore. I will constantly be willing to explore this process with them too. I would be open with my own process if need be. Each student's need for ethnic identity is different. I will have to know this student better before I could really help.

Two classmates (of European ancestry) responded with how they appreciate my story and my advice in letting young students decide how they define their racial and/or ethnic identities. Robyn responded to my post beautifully:

Clearly from your story, one's ethnic identity can be seen as evolving over time for some adolescents where others may have foreclosed or achieved identities much sooner than we think. As you and Abi stated, it's important that we let them identify and tell us what they think of themselves rather than us or other students choosing for them or labeling them. These labels can be discriminatory and limiting and we should not allow them to be used in our classes.

What is interesting to me too is how we as educators are having our own ethnic identities constructed at the same time as our students sometimes. I know that learning about ethnic identity really helped me explore my own more thoroughly, and I think this will continue as I work with adolescents with a deeper awareness of what is going on for them and myself.

Yes, we also delve into racial identity on the third week of February. If you want to learn more about adolescent development, please read Understanding Youth: Adolescent Development for Educators by Michael Nakkula and Eric Toshalis. This book need to be read by everyone to fully understand what adolescent children goes through.