Jeffrey Paul Chan in the Past Couple

Jeffrey Paul Chan

In the past couple of decades, literature from cultural groups in the United States such as the African-Americans, Latinos and Native Americans have increasingly become more common. It is only recently that Asian-Americans have become popular writers. With expected population changes, decidedly this literature will become more widespread. According to the U.S. Census, Asian is the fastest growing racial group in the United States. Since 1980, the Asian population has almost tripled. It is expected to increase 213% over the next 50 years. It will be essential for Asian non-fiction and fiction works to be read by students and adults alike to better understand this growing American population.

Writers such as Frank Chin, Jeffery Paul Chan, Lawson Fusao Inada and Shawn Wong, who first co-edited Aiiieeeee!: An Anthology of Chinese-American and Japanese-American Literature in the 1970s, believe that most of the literature and films on Asian-Americans to date are stereotyped and mythical at best and bigoted at worst. Chan, who was hired to create the first university department for Asian-American studies in the U.S., also edited follow-up issues of this book including the Big Aiiieee! In 1991.

Chan and his co-editors of Big Aiiieee relate how such popular writers as Amy Tan are completely erroneous in their depiction of the Asian-Americans. Such works have completely biased the way that Anglo-Americans perceive the Asian cultures. These authors especially paint Asian-American men in a bad light, says Chan. "At worst, the Asian-American (male) is contemptible, because he is womanly, effeminate devoid of all the traditionally masculine qualities of originality, daring, physical courage, and creativity."

Although Chan's approach and comments are controversial, especially by feminists who dislike the sexist approach in some of the works chosen for the Aiiee books, he is well considered someone who has presented a completely different aspect of Asian life in America. His main goal was to introduce, he says, "a native-born Asian-American literary language and sensibility that was not Oriental or Western European, but a native development of American culture."

When reading Big Aiiee, one quickly gets immersed in the often distressing life that Asian-Americans have had since coming to the United States. One of the most powerful works is from the novel No Boy by John Okada, which was rediscovered by the editors when compiling their book. It clearly shows how Asian-Americans, in this case Japanese, are torn between the worlds of the past and present. The main character, Ichiro, was placed in a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" position. If he fought for the United States, he would be a hypocrite -- how could he support a country that did not support his own people?

If he did not fight, he was scorned by those same people he supported.

Another telling entry is from Louis Chu's novel Eat a Bowl of Tea, which is about the isolated, bachelor-dominated culture of New York's post-World-War-II Chinatown. Chan explains that the "bachelor society" was a community of old men trapped by racist immigration laws to live out their days in San Francisco, Seattle, Los Angeles, Boston, and New York City. With allegiances tied to wives and family barred from entering the United States, they found refuge in the back rooms of barbershops and restaurants, at the local tong, in the repartee and rivalries exchanged over a game of mah jong.

Author Sui Sin Far also gives insights into the Asian-American world, especially for that of women and children, in early China Town. Similarly, Toshio Mori's "The Seventh Street Philosopher" is about an old bachelor/laundryman named Motoji Tsunoda, a self-styled philosopher living in a Japanese-American community claiming to be in the tradition of the great philosophers. He is touching and real like a Don Quixote.