Last week, the Pew Research Center released a report called "The Rise of Asian Americans, " offering a portrait seemingly full o

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问题 Last week, the Pew Research Center released a report called "The Rise of Asian Americans, " offering a portrait seemingly full of good news. Asian Americans, Pew said, are on the whole more educated, affluent and happier than other Americans. They hew more strongly to family values and an ethic of hard work. And, quietly, these 17 million Asian Americans have surpassed Hispanics as the largest and fastest-growing cohort of immigrants to the U. S.
The report made headlines everywhere: "Asian Top of the Immigration Class" was a typical one. The leading advocacy groups for Asian Americans were silent for a beat. Then they decried the report. It was "disparaging, " "shallow, " "disturbing". It perpetuated a patronizing stereotype of Asians as dutiful nerds, a "model minority". It overlooked the true cultural diversity of the Asian population and obscured the struggles and pain of countless Asians.
Rarely in either the Pew report or in the advocates’ responses was this possibility raised: both the good and the bad could be true at the same time.
Welcome to race in America. It may be 2012, and we may have a black President, but public discussion of race remains inexorably, insanely binary. American race talk used to be literally black-and-white, leaving no room for other colors. Now the problem is it’s figuratively black-and-white. For all our rainbow multiculturalism, there are still basically two choices—in or out, mainstream or opposition, powerful or powerless. Sometimes the labels white and black are used, but they signify more than hue or actual demography—they signify polarity and any cognitive dissonance must be resolved to one or the other.
This is why those Asian-American advocates felt they had to blast the Pew report. When forced by the media to choose between telling an achievement story or an injustice story—Is yellow white or black?—they felt compelled to choose the latter. That’s understandable. There is privation and injustice in Asian America—from high poverty among Hmong(苗族)refugees to forgotten elders in Chinatown to the health struggles of Pacific Islanders—and if activists privileged enough to have a voice use it to express complacency or self-congratulation, then they aren’t doing their job.

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答案 上周,皮尤研究中心发布了一篇报道名为《亚裔美国人的崛起》,写得貌似还是好消息。该中心称:“亚裔美国人总体上比其他美国人接受教育程度高、更富裕而且更幸福。他们更注重家庭观念以及努力工作的道德规范。而且这1 700万亚裔美国人悄无声息地超过了拉丁裔美国人,成为美国人数最多、增长最快的移民群体。” 这篇报道成为各地的头条,其中一个典型的标题就是:“亚裔雄踞移民阶层榜首”。亚裔美国人的主要维权团体一开始都隐忍不发,接着他们谴责这篇报道,称它“诽谤”、“肤浅”、“令人不安”。它仍然持有一种高高在上的态度,刻板地把亚裔看作是本分的书呆子,称之为“模范少数族裔”,它忽视了亚洲人群的文化多样性,掩盖了无数亚洲人的辛劳与痛苦。 不管是皮尤报告还是维权团体的反应中很少出现这样的可能性:好的坏的可能同时都会有。 这就是美国的种族问题。现在或许是2012年,我们还可以有一位黑人总统,但是公众对于种族的讨论仍然冷酷而又无可救药,坚持非黑即白。美国过去都是在字面上讨论黑与白,毫无其他颜色种族的余地。现在的问题是象征性地在谈论黑与白。尽管我们有丰富多彩的多元文化,但基本上还是两种选择——流行或过时,主流或非主流,强势或弱势。有时也会用上黑白的标签,但代表的不仅仅是肤色或是人口划分,而是表示两种对立,必须解决认知上的误区,不是属于这一极就是属于那一极。 所以亚裔的维权团体认为必须批评皮尤的报道。媒体强迫他们讲述成功的故事或不公的故事——也就是回答黄色、白色还是黑色的时候——他们不得已要选择后者。这是可以理解的。在亚裔美国人中也有穷困和不公——在唐人街有极端贫困的苗族难民,也有被人遗忘的老人,还有为健康而挣扎的太平洋岛国的人们,如果享有特权的活动分子借此发表意见,表达自己的自满以及沾沾自喜,那么他们就是在其位,不谋其职。

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