“Asian+American”is a new campaign celebrating the beautiful complexity of Asian American Identity

Growing up in the United States I've had to grapple with growing up in two cultures, trying to balance being Filipino and being American.

I was not alone in that struggle. Being torn between two cultures is something familiar with every Asian American.

For decades, Asian Americans have been caught in a constant balancing act of being either too Asian or not Asian enough. We’ve felt pressured to hide our names, languages, and cultures just to fit in. It’s no wonder most of us feel like we don’t belong.

Eventually, I came to the realization that I don't have to choose to be one or the other, nor am I half-this and half-that. 

Instead, I tell myself that am 100% Filipino and 100% American. Two-in-one. Two times more interesting. Two worlds to enjoy. Double the enrichment. Twice blessed. Apples and mangoes. Hot dogs and adobo.

I'm pleased to see that more and more Asian Americans are taking this approach to self-identification.

The Asian American Foundation (TAAF) is unveiling the “Asian+American” campaign today. It is a national PSA initiative thal encourages Asian Americans to celebrate the complexity and beauty of their dual identities.

“For too long, Asian Americans have been made to feel like we must shrink, code-switch, or choose between identities just to be seen as American enough,” says Norman Chen, CEO of TAAF. 

“At TAAF, we are focused on building a future where our community can thrive in safety, prosperity, and true belonging—free from discrimination, slander, and violence. Belonging begins with being seen and heard, and we hope this campaign sparks the kind of honest conversations that help us own, and celebrate, every part of who we are. Our partnership with Right To Be goes a step further and empowers individuals to take an active role in creating belonging and safety for their own communities,” says Chen.

Created in partnership with the award-winning global creative agency Wieden+Kennedy New York, the campaign uses striking visual storytelling and imagery that will blanket everything from billboards to social media—all to foster pride in being both Asian and American.

Asian Americans are the least likely of any racial or ethnic group to say they fully belong in the United States, and this sense of exclusion is especially acute among younger generations. According to TAAF’s 2025 STAATUS Index, just 20% of Asian Americans ages 16–24 (and 23% overall) feel fully accepted for their racial identity. Following decades of being cast as perpetual foreigners caught in a balancing act of being too Asian or not Asian enough, many have felt pressure to abandon their culture, names, or languages just to fit in, often internalizing shame and self-doubt in the process.

The campaign’s centerpiece, a 60-second short film called Beyond, Together, explores this pressure to choose between identities and offers an intimate look at Asian American individuals embracing their full selves without limits or compromises. 

Narrated by award-winning actor/producer Sandra Oh and directed by Academy Award–nominee Sean Wang (Dìdi, Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó), who participated in the inaugural Sundance Institute | TAAF Fellowship cohort in 2022, the PSA is paired with powerful portraits taken by photographer Jingyu Lin that will roll out across digital, social, and out-of-home platforms.

Click here if unable to view 'Beyond Together.'

TELL YOUR STORY IN 'RIGHT TO BE'

As part of its commitment to lasting change, TAAF is also partnering with Right To Be to expand access to bystander intervention trainings that foster safety and belonging. 

A leader in anti-harassment education, Right To Be empowers individuals to safely intervene in moments of bias or harm, including instances of anti-Asian hate and xenophobic harassment. 

Together, TAAF and Right To Be will launch a national Train-the-Trainer program, with curriculum designed by Right To Be and Asian Americans Advancing Justice - AAJC, to equip local leaders to deliver these workshops in their own communities, with a goal of reaching up to 10,000 people in the first year.

        RELATED: Half of Asian Americans have experienced a hate incident

In the wake of the historic rise in anti-Asian hate in 2020, Asian American communities were galvanized into action — and what followed was a powerful cultural awakening. A new wave of pride is taking root, one that fully embraces the richness of being both Asian and American. 

For the first time, Asian American actors, chefs, athletes and musicians are commanding the world’s biggest stages and arenas. 

Across the country, people are reconnecting with their heritage — proudly speaking their languages, cooking family recipes, and reclaiming names they were once told to shorten or change. The “Asian+American” campaign is a celebration of this journey: a declaration that Asian Americans don’t have to choose between identities — they belong fully, powerfully, and proudly as both.

“The ‘plus’ is about turning a negative into a positive. It’s about disrupting judgement, perception, and ill-conceived notions of identity. It strikes down barriers and broadens our understanding of who Asian Americans are and who we can be,” said Kevin Kaminishi, Associate Creative Director at W+K New York. 

“We are a massive community, and it’s time that we celebrate in a way that carries the strengths of our heritage while embracing the freedom to redefine it.”

        RELATED: Study finds 1 in 5 Asian Americans hide their ethnic identity

“My own Asian American identity and sense of belonging are things I’ve attempted to define for myself through my work,” said Park Pictures director Sean Wang. “Through those experiences, I’ve connected with so many others who share the unique challenges of navigating multiple cultural identities. I’m thrilled to have partnered with TAAF, W+K, Sandra Oh, and our team at Park Pictures to build on that and make something that celebrates the beauty and complexity of our community."

“Lending my voice on a message so close to my heart—one that represents my community—has tremendous meaning for me,” said Award-winning Actor/Producer Sandra Oh. “Working with TAAF to highlight the intersectionality of our identities and cultures has been a project made out of love by everyone who has touched it. I’m so honored to be part of giving this message to the AAPI community and with the world.”

The short film and out-of-home creative will be distributed nationally, culminating in an invitation to the public: “What is your Asian+American story?”

ASIAN+AMERICAN

TAAF is encouraging Asian Americans and allies across America to join the conversation by sharing their stories on social media using #AsianPlusAmerican and tagging @TAAForg. The campaign aims to amplify the diverse voices, experiences, and identities that shape the Asian American community—and to show the world what it truly means to be both Asian and American.

“The plus in Asian+American is a broad celebration of identity—the plus is for everyone,” said Sheila Lirio Marcelo, Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Ohai.ai and Co-founding TAAF Board Member. "The heart of this campaign speaks to something universal: the richness of being more. 

"No matter our background, we all live at the intersection of multiple cultures, stories, and communities. This is a reminder that our stories, while unique, are deeply connected—and that there’s power in embracing every part of who we are as Americans. And that the richness and abundance in each of our backgrounds should be celebrated and honored."

The truth is, we don’t need to forfeit our Asian or American identity to belong. Our complexity is our superpower. And across the country, people are honoring their roots and showing the world who they are—fully, powerfully, and proudly as Asian+American.

        FYI: Click here to learn more about the “Asian+American” campaign 

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news, views and chismis from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X or at the blog Views From the Edge. Now on BlueSky.

Pew Study: 1 in 5 Asian Americans hide their ethnic identity

YOUTUBE

ANALYSIS

One of my pet peeves about some AANHPI of mixed race heritage, especially Filipino Americans: When asked the inevitable question, "What are you ... really?" The response I decry lists part this, part that, this and that, and then at the very end, as an afterthought, they'd add, "... and Filipino," even though one of their parents is full-blooded Filipino.

It is as if they were ashamed to admit that part of their racial make-up. Apparently, this desire to fit in is common beyond Filipino Americans and afflicts many in the AANHPI communities, according to a new survey by the Pew Research Center.

“[It] was kind of that stigma when you were little, a teen, or you were younger that [you] don’t want to speak Chinese … because people would think that you’re a FOB [fresh off the boat] or an immigrant,” said one respondent, a 2nd generation Chinese American in his early 30s.

RELATED: How Asian Americans identify themselves

Many recent Asian immigrants said they have tried to fit into the US and fear that others may judge them negatively for sharing their heritage. US-born Asian Americans with immigrant parents often said they hid their heritage when they were growing up to fit into a predominantly White society.

FYI: For the complete Pew survey

In it's wide-ranging survey, which Pew teleased earlier this year, the research center learned that 1 in 5 Asian American adults say they have hidden a part of their heritage – cultural customs, food, clothing or religious practices – from non-Asians at some point in their lives. 

Fear of ridicule and a desire to fit in are common reasons they give for doing this, according to a Pew Research Center survey of Asian adults in the United States conducted from July 2022 to January 2023.

Why some Asian Americans hide their heritage

Pew analysts found tht Korean Americans are more likely than some other Asian origin groups to say they have hidden part of their heritage. One-in-four Korean adults (25%) say they have done this, compared with smaller shares of Chinese (19%), Vietnamese (18%), Filipino (16%) and Japanese (14%) adults.

Asian Americans who said they have hidden part of their heritage also shared why they did so. Some of the most common reasons were a feeling of embarrassment or a lack of understanding from others.

However, different immigrant generations also cited various other reasons for hiding their culture:

• Many recent Asian immigrants said they have tried to fit into the US and fear that others may judge them negatively for sharing their heritage.

• US-born Asian Americans with immigrant parents often said they hid their heritage when they were growing up to fit into a predominantly White society. Some in this generation mentioned wanting to avoid reinforcing stereotypes about Asians.

• Some multiracial Asian Americans and those with more distant immigrant roots (third generation or higher) said they had at times hidden their heritage to pass as White.

Birthplace and immigrant roots play a role in who is most likely to hide their heritage: 32% of US-born Asian adults have done this, compared with 15% of immigrants. 

Interestingly, second-generation Asian adults born in the US and whose parents were immigrants were more likely to hide their cultural heritage than their own children by almost a 3-to-1 margin (38% vs. 11%). It is as if after the desire for identifying with one's roots became stronger after a generation of denial. 

Complex struggle for identity

The generational see-saw battle between ethnic assertion and assimilation is not new. In the turbulent civil rights battles of the 60s and 70s, young Asoam adults and students found affinity with the manongs and manangs of Manilatown and Delano, in direct opposition to their parents' strategy to become more "American." 

It will be interesting to see the results of this back-and-forth pattern for identity continues. Will the fourth generation reject the third generation's search for ethnic identity or choose to become part of the American melting pot, the goal of their  grandparents?

The surge of anti-Asian hate appears to have galvanized the Asian American communities and united the generations in asserting their racial and geographical  roots. 

The same Pew study also found that Asian Americans identify more closely with their own subgroups, ie. Filipino, Chinese, Vietnamese, Indian, Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, etc. before their identify "Asian American."

Complicating matters is that the struggle for identity is constantly being stirred because of the ongoing influx of immigrants from Asia, who have to ask themselves the same questions that faced previous generations, starting the cycle anew.

For Asian Americans, the search for self-identity is an ongoing quest with many variables. There is no one answer and there is no start and finish.

A young Korean American second-generation man told the Pew researchers: 

“(T)here are going to be ups and downs. Definitely one of the downs is being labeled by other people for our differences. But one of our ups is that we have culture and language that we can always rely on; we have some diversity in customs and cultures that we could go back to. And if people are willing to experience these new differences, we can definitely pass it on and spread awareness of different cultures.” 

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow me at Threads.net/eduardodiok, @DioknoEd on Twitter or at the  blog Views From the Edge.

AANHPI Heritage Month: How Asian Americans identify themselves is, well ... complicated

It can all be very confusing: Asian. Or, American. Or, Asian American. Take your choice. There no right or wrong answer. There's a multitude of ways to identify oneself for US residents who trace their family lineage from Asia.

To make it even more complicated, throw in nationalities, ethnicities and how long one has lived in the US. Are you Filipino or Filipino American? Indian or Indian American? Chinese or Chinese American? With over 20 Asian countries of origin, it can leave one's head spinning.

A new report from the nonpartisan Pew Research Center shows that being Asian in the US, is far more complicated than a simple either/or answer. The wide range of experiences in the US offers up more options, blur distinctions and opens up to the wider question: Who is American?"

There are other ways in which Asians living in the US describe their identity. About half (51%) of Asian adults say they use American on its own (10%), together with their ethnicity (25%) or together with “Asian” as Asian American (16%) when describing their identity, highlighting their links to the US.

The United States’ Asian population is fast growing and diverse. Numbering more than 23 million, the population has ancestral roots across the vast, ethnically and culturally rich Asian continent. For Asians living in the US, this diversity is reflected in how they describe their own identity.

Immigration experiences, connections with home countries, and how long someone has lived in the US. shape many Asian Americans’ identities. Among Asian adults in the US, immigrants are more likely than those who are US-born to describe their identity most often with their ethnic labels, either alone or together with the label American (56% vs. 41%).

According to Pew's new, nationwide, comprehensive survey of Asian adults living in the US, 52% say they most often use ethnic labels that reflect their heritage and family roots, either alone or together with “American,” to describe themselves. Chinese or Chinese American, Filipino or Filipino American, and Indian or Indian American are examples of these variations.

And while pan-ethnic labels such as Asian and Asian American are commonly used to describe this diverse population broadly, the new survey shows that when describing themselves, just 28% use the label Asian (12%) on its own or the label Asian American (16%).

Asian adults see more cultural differences than commonalities across their group as well. When asked to choose between two statements – that Asians in the US share

a common culture, or that Asians in the US have many different cultures – nearly all (90%) say US Asians have many different cultures. Just 9% say Asians living in the US share a common culture. This view is widely held across many demographic groups among Asian Americans, according to the survey.

The view that Asian Americans have many different cultures is also one held by the general public, according to another Pew Research Center survey of US adults, conducted in December 2022. Among US adults of all ethnicities, 80% say Asians in the US have many different cultures, while 18% say they share a common culture.1

Though Asian Americans’ identities reflect their diverse cultures and origins, Asian adults also report certain shared experiences. A majority (60%) say most people would describe them as “Asian” while walking past them on the street, indicating most Asian adults feel they are seen by others as a single group, despite the population’s diversity. 

One-in-five say they have hidden a part of their heritage (their ethnic food, cultural practices, ethnic clothing or religious practices) from others who are not Asian, in some cases out of fear of embarrassment or discrimination. Notably, Asian adults ages 18 to 29, (those still trying to "fit in" at their school or work) are more likely to say they have done this than Asians 65 and older (39% vs. 5%).

Growing sense of an 'Asian American' community

Asian adults in the US also feel connected with other Asian Americans. About six-in-ten (59%) say that what happens to Asians in the US. affects their own lives, at least to some extent. And about two-thirds (68%) of Asian Americans say it is extremely or very important to have a national leader advocating for the concerns and needs of the Asian population in the US.

The new survey also shows that large majorities of Asian adults share similar views on what it takes to be considered truly American. And they consider many of the same factors to be important in their views of the American dream.

These are among the key findings from Pew Research Center’s new survey of Asian American adults, conducted by mail and online from July 5, 2022, to Jan. 27, 2023. This is the largest nationally representative survey of its kind to date that focused on Asian Americans. The survey was conducted in English and five Asian languages, among a representative sample of 7,006 Asian adults living in the United States.

Asian Americans are 7% of the US population, according to the Pew analysis of the 2021 American Community Survey. The six largest origin groups (Chinese, Filipino, Indian, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese), a focus of this survey and report, together account for 79% of all Asian Americans.

Overall, about 34% of Asian Americans are the US-born children of immigrant parents, and another 14% are of third or higher generation (meaning their parents were born in the U.S. as well), according to a Pew analysis of the 2022 Current Population Survey, March Annual Social and Economic Supplement.

This survey and report focus on Asian adults in the US. The six largest origin groups together account for 81% of Asian adults. And 68% of Asian American adults are immigrants, according to Center analysis of the 2021 American Community Survey. Additionally, 25% are the US.-born children of immigrant parents and 10% are of third or higher generation, according to Center analysis of government data.

In most cases today, someone is considered Asian or Asian American if they self-identify as such. But Asian Americans do not necessarily agree on which regional or ethnic groups from the Asian continent they consider to be Asian, according to the new survey. The vast majority of Asian adults say they consider those from East Asia, such as Chinese or Koreans (89%); Southeast Asia, such as Vietnamese or Filipinos (88%); and to a lesser extent South Asia such as Indians or Pakistanis (67%) to be Asian.

But Asian adults are split on whether they consider Central Asians such as Afghans or Kazakhs to be Asian (43% of Asian adults say they are). While about half of Indian adults (56%) say they would include Central Asians in the category Asian, fewer than half of Filipino (40%), Chinese (39%), Japanese (34%), Korean (32%) and Vietnamese (30%) adults consider them Asian.

Few say they are knowledgeable about US Asian history

Asian Americans have a long history in the United States. From Chinese laborers who helped build the first transcontinental railroad, to Japanese immigrants who arrived as plantation workers in what is now the state of Hawaii, to the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, to Filipinos being treated as US nationals while the Philippines was a US territory, the Asian American experience has been a part of US history.

With the passage of the landmark Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, a new wave of immigrants from Asia began arriving in the United States, creating a new, contemporary US Asian history. The Vietnam War and other conflicts in Southeast Asia brought Vietnamese and other Southeast Asian refugees to the U.S., first with the passage of the 1975 Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act and then with the Refugee Act of 1980. 

The 1990 Immigration Act raised immigration ceilings and set in place processes that allowed the flows of Asian immigrants, particularly of high-skilled immigrants, to continue and expand. The US technology boom of the 1990s and 2000s attracted many high-skilled immigrants, particularly from India and China, to tech centers around the country.

This rich history, however, is little-known to Asian adults, according to the new survey. One-in-four (24%) say they are very or extremely informed about history of Asians in the United States, while an equal share (24%) say they are little or not at all informed.

The majority of those very or extremely informed about the history of Asians in the US say they learned about this history through informal channels: internet (82%), media (76%) and family and friends (70%). In contrast, 49% learned about it from college or university courses and 39% from elementary through high school.

Immigrant ties shape Asian Americans’ identities and their life in the US.

Meanwhile, Asian immigrants are less likely than US-born Asians (46% vs. 65%) to say they most often describe themselves as American in some way – whether by their ethnic label combined with American, as Asian American, or simply as American. Still, nearly half of Asian immigrants describe themselves in one of these three ways.

When it comes to identifying with the label Asian – either alone or as Asian American – immigrant and US-born Asians are about equally likely to say they do so (28% and 29% respectively). Immigrant Asians are less likely than US-born Asians to identify most often as Asian American (14% vs. 21%).

On the question of seeing themselves more as a “typical American” or “very different from a typical American,” Asian immigrant adults are far less likely than those born in the US to think of themselves as a typical American (37% vs. 69%).

Nativity is also tied to how Asians in the US develop their friendships. Those who immigrated to the US are more likely to have friends who are Asian or of the same ethnicity as them than are U.S.-born Asians (56% vs. 38%).

Asian immigrants (15%) are also less likely than US-born Asians (32%) to have ever hidden a part of their heritage from people who are not Asian. When asked in an open-ended question to explain why they hide aspects of their culture, some U.S.-born respondents mentioned phrases such as “fear of discrimination,” “being teased” and “embarrassing.”

Asians in the US share similar views on what it means to be American

The new survey also explored the views Asian Americans have about traits that make one “truly American.” Overall, Asian Americans and the general US population share similar views of what it means to be American. Nearly all Asian adults and US adults say that accepting people of diverse racial and religious backgrounds (94% and 91%), believing in individual freedoms (92% and 94%) and respecting U.S. political institutions and laws (89% and 87%) are important for being truly American.

Similarly, Asian Americans and the general population share in their views about the American dream. They say having freedom of choice in how to live one’s life (96% and 97% respectively), having a good family life (96% and 94%), retiring comfortably (96% and 94%) and owning a home (both 86%) are important to their view of the American dream. Smaller shares of Asian and US adults (30% and 27%) say owning a business is important to their view of the American dream.

FYI: Click here for a more detailed look at the Pew Research Center analysis.

Here are other survey findings highlighting the diverse views and attitudes of Asian adults living in the US:

• Indian adults are the most likely of the six largest Asian origin groups to say they most often use their ethnicity, without the addition of “American,” to describe themselves. About four-in-ten Indian adults (41%) say they do this. By comparison, smaller shares of Korean (30%), Filipino (29%), Chinese (26%) and Vietnamese (23%) adults do the same. Japanese adults (14%) are the least likely among the largest groups to use their ethnic identity term alone.
• For many Asian adults, where they were born shapes friendships formed in the US. Overall, about half (51%) of Asian Americans say all or most of their friends in the United States share their own ethnicity or are otherwise Asian. However, this varies by nativity. Those who immigrated to the US are more likely to say that all or most of their friends in the US are the same ethnicity as them or are otherwise Asian (56%). This compares with the 38% of U.S.-born
  Asian adults who say the sam
• Japanese adults are the least likely among the largest Asian origin groups to say they have friendships with other Asians. About one-in-three Japanese adults (34%) say most or all their friends share their own ethnicity or are otherwise Asian. By contrast, about half of all Indian (55%), Vietnamese (55%), Chinese (51%), Korean (50%) and Filipino (48%) respondents say the same.
• One-in-four Korean adults (25%) say they have hidden part of their heritage from people who are not Asian. Some 20% of Indian, 19% of Chinese, 18% of Vietnamese, 16% of Filipino and 14% of Japanese adults say they have done the same.
• Across the largest ethnic groups, about half or more say that what happens to Asians in the US affects what happens in their own lives. About two-thirds of Korean (67%) and Chinese (65%) adults say this. By comparison, 61% of Japanese, 54% of Filipino, 55% of Indian and 52% of Vietnamese adults say they are impacted by what happens to Asians nationally.
• Most Asian adults among the largest ethnic origin groups say a national leader advancing the US Asian community’s concerns is important. Roughly three-in-four Filipino (74%) and Chinese (73%) adults say it is very or extremely important to for the US Asian community to have a national leader advancing its concerns. A majority of Vietnamese (69%), Korean (66%), Japanese (63%) and Indian adults (62%) says the same.
• About half of Vietnamese registered voters (51%) identify with or lean to the Republican Party. In contrast, about two-thirds of Indian (68%), Filipino (68%) and Korean (67%) registered voters identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party. And 56% of Chinese registered voters also associate with the Democratic Party.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news and views from an AANHPI perspective, follow @DioknoEd on Twitter or at his blog Views From the Edge.

Kamala Harris' vice president candidacy forces a new definition of what an American should look like

When Kamala Harris first appeared with Joe Biden as his running mate last Wednesday, she said: "Joe Biden had the audacity to choose a Black woman to be his running mate. How incredible is that?"

She could just as well have said Biden had the audacity to choose an Indian American woman.

Nevertheless, Asian Americans and Indian Americans, in particular, appear to be willing to let that faux pas slide because they are aware of the social and political forces that are playing out in front of the television cameras.

The daughter of a father from Jamaica and a mother from India, she is not shy in talking her Indian heritage. "I am the daughter of Shyamala  Gopalan," a single mother who raised Harris and her sister Maya.

Growing up in the black community of Oakland and Berkeley, California, Harris mother had the foresight to know that her daughters would be perceived as African Americans and prepared the two girls for that. In the summers, she often took her daughters to the southern Indian city of Chennai to spend time with her extended family. 

"I grew up with a great deal of pride and understanding about my Indian heritage and culture,"Harris said.

Kamala and Maya Harris grew up well indoctrinated in the trials and tribulations of being of mixed race. Often, they were described as half-Indian and half-Black. 

"My mother understood very well that she was raising two black daughters," Harris writes in her recently published autobiography, The Truths We Hold. "She knew that her adopted homeland would see Maya and me as black girls, and she was determined to make sure we would grow into confident, proud black women."

People who grew up with mixed racial  or cultural identities were often forced to choose one over the other. In wasn't until the 1990 Census that people could check off more than one race.

Its a category that is rising the fastest, according to the U.S. Census. It shouldn't surprise anybody that 44% of infants in Hawaii are multiracial or multiethnic. Shares are also high in Oklahoma and Alaska (28%).

About 14% of newborns in the U.S. have one parent who is non-Hispanic white and another who is Asian.

In California, where Kamala and Maya Harris were born, one in five babies have parents of different races. Not scientific but by observation, I'd venture to guess that Berkeley and Oakland are hotbeds of interracial families.

Born in the Philippines but raised in the U.S., like many immigrants, I wasn't biracial, but I considered myself bicultural, a product of two cultures. Brown as I am, I chafe at the purists who say I'm "not Filipino enough," because I don't speak a Filipino dialect. Equally, my blood boils when a racist who says, "Go back to your country."

Through the years, I've arrived at a conclusion that ahs helped calm the struggle over self-identity. I am not half Filipino and half Filipino. I am the sum total of both worlds; not less, but more. All the love, traditions, superstitions, pigmentation, family and tribal history of one, PLUS, the ideas, dreams and possibilities, biases and opinions of another. 

I can draw from two worlds instead of one, therefore I'm richer and more complex because of that.

Golf star Tiger Woods may have been ahead of his time when in 1997 he was widely ridiculed for saying that he didn’t consider himself as Black but “cablinasian,” referring to the Caucasian, Black, Indian and Asian, that represents the entirety of his racial identity.

Harris, likewise, can draw from the African American and the Indian American experiences. Instead of weaving in and out of those worlds as if they are separate, she embodies both identities all the time.

Harris has grown up with people questioning her identity. When young people ask her about living with her duality, she told the New York Times, “I will say to them that you will often find that you are the only one who looks like you in the room, be it around the conference table or in a meeting or wherever you are,” she told reporter Lisa Lerer. “But the thing to remember is you are never in that room alone. We are all in that room with you, expecting that you will use your voice, and use it with pride and use it in a way that represents all of those who are in the room with you but not physically there.”

Harris' duality confuses people who insist that you be one or the other; not considering that someone can be both at the same time. Indian Americans and Blacks are right to claim her as "one of our own," but its wrong to erase the other part of her in order feel more comfortable.

It is easier for most people to identify Beyonce as a Black woman even though she sings about being Creole.

When Kelsey Merritt was chosen as the first Filipina to model for Victoria Secrets, she was hit be critics because she wan't Filipina enough, she hit back. 

"I was born in the Philippines and I grew up in Pampanga. I finished my school in Manila before I moved to the US l... My blood is more Filipino than the 'pure' who have never set foot in the Philippines," Kelsey tweeted in Tagalog.

Because her mother is Filipino and father is white, Merritt had features that one can say are Caucasian but under a different light and different makeup, you can see her Filipino features come to the fore.

Any confusion about Senator Harris' identity is a problem Americans continue to struggle with. It is easy for journalists to label her one or the other, but that shouldn't be done by erasing the other part of Harris that completes her. 

Americans should get used to multiracial and/or multicultural people because that is what America is becoming. With immigrants coming from all over the world; the Asian American community is the fastest growing ethnic group and Whites will no longer be the majority race by 2040, predict demographers from the Census. 

As a Vice President candidate for the Democrats, Harris' complex heritage will force voters to grapple with who she is and that is a question that all Americans will have to face.

“There are people who will say, she isn’t Black enough. There are people who will say she’s not Indian enough,” the NY Times quotes Shekar Narasimhan, the chairman and founder of the AAPI Victory Fund, a group focused on empowering Asian American voters. “But she brings all that to the table, which is why I just think she’s a true American.”

The question about her dual heritage is not new to Harris. "So much so," she said, "that when I first ran for office that was one of the things that I struggled with, which is that you are forced through that process to define yourself in a way that you fit neatly into the compartment that other people have created," Harris said in a Washington Post interview.

"My point was: I am who I am. I'm good with it. You might need to figure it out, but I'm fine with it." 

Question of Identity: Who has the right to call oneself Asian?

Mixed cast of 'Crazy Rich Asian' left to right: Chinese/Brit Gemma Chan, Malaysian/Brit Henry Golding, and Chinese/American Constance Wu.

Originally published Dec. 6, 2017

WHO IS ASIAN? What makes someone Asian? How much of you have to be Asian to be able to call yourself Asian? Three-fourths? One-half? One-eighth?

Do you have to look a certain way in order to call yourself Asian?

In any of the dozens of countries that make up Asia that is not a question they have to grapple with because they are mostly homogeneous. However, polyglot America is built  on the back of immigrants from every country in the world. With the United States' myriad number of racial interactions, it is a question that comes up frequently and how you answer defines your sense of "just-who-the-hell you are."

Of course, it would be wonderful if the question never was asked, but the U.S. is not at the stage where it can ignore questions of race.

Most recently, the question arose in a little Twitter spat between actress Jaime Chung and Henry Golding, who was cast in the lead male role in the upcoming movie Crazy Rich Asians, based on on the best-selling novel of the same name.

When Golding, who is half-white (Malaysian British) but born and raised in Malaysia, was awarded with the pivotal role of Nick Young in the movie, Asian American actress Cheung threw some shade in his direction because of his mixed heritage and he wasn't Chinese enough as described in the novel.

Jaime Chung

Golding was reportedly hurt by the comments. “There are many arguments, for and against. Am I Asian enough? he told Variety from Singapore. "I was born here, I have lived 17 years of my life here, so for me, I feel more Asian than anything," . 

The two have apparently made up. Chung, who's plays Blink in the TV series The Gifted, apologized  last week for her earlier comments against Golding's casting.

The question, who can claim to be Asian, is not going away, especially in the U.S. as members of the AAPI community, especially among the youth, struggle with identity.

 In response, Golding accepted Cheung's apology.

Asian Americans are not the first to face this dilemma. It is a question that  African Americans have struggled with for centuries and continues even today.

The universal answer has long been that an African American, or black, is any person with any known African black ancestry. 

From slavery and into the Jim Crow era, it became the "one-drop rule:" if a person has a single drop of "black blood," it makes a person black.

The question, "Who is Asian?" can have many answers, but Asians and Asian Americans are not the first to have to face this question of identity. One way it can be answered is to see how the African American community handled the question 'Who is black?" 

This definition reflects the long experience with slavery and later with Jim Crow segregation. In the South it became known as the "one-drop rule,'' meaning that a single drop of "black blood" makes a person a black. It is also known as the "one black ancestor rule," some courts have called it the "traceable amount rule," and anthropologists call it the "hypo-descent rule," meaning that racially mixed persons are assigned the status of the subordinate group. This definition emerged from the American South to become the nation's definition, generally accepted by whites and blacks.

Still it is a question raised whenever an African/American reached a level of prominence.

There was never any doubt that Beyoncé is black, but the question arises, is she black enough?

She shouldn't have to answer but in her private life of activism in her support of Black Lives Matter and other issues and, most notably, in her music, there is no doubt where she stands. 

It is not the first time she has declared her blackness, but when something like her song  "Formation" comes along — unapologetically black, proud, Southern, political — everyone, even those ignoring her identity as a black woman and not just some post-racial music star, has to take note. There's nothing shy or subtle about it. She proclaims:

My daddy Alabama, momma Louisiana 

You mix that negro with that Creole 

make a Texas bamma 

I like my baby hair, 

with baby hair and afro,

I like my negro nose with Jackson Five nostrils

Beyoncé uses "Formation" to remind listeners and viewers that although she's a wealthy entertainer, and she has mixed roots, she's still very much aware of and involved in the struggles faced by people who resemble her. 

Our last president, Barack Obama -- raised in a predominantly Asian American culture of Hawaii and spending a few years in Malaysia, the stepson of a Malaysian man, whose sister is half Malaysian, whose nephews, nieces and in-laws are unquestionably Asian American -- faced the question when he began his campaign for presidency.

He wasn't raised in the "African/American experience," said some members of the black community. His early critics said: He doesn't speak like us. He's doesn't know what it feels like to  be raised as a black man in America.

Beyoncé

In his eight years as president, he answered the question again and again. Now he is revered within the African American community as the first black man to be elected POTUS.

As Asian Americans -- a term new Asian immigrants must learn to understand -- if not embrace, we have distinctions between East Asians, South Asians, Southeast Asians, and even more if you break down into the  subgroups.  What we can conclude is that nobody can claim to be the "true" Asian.

To add to the debate, there is the question of Asians of mixed heritage, like Golding. Is he Asian enough?

In the early days of the Asian American civil rights movement, the question arose among some Chinese and Japanese activists, whether or not Filipinos are Asian. A new version of that debate continues today as new immigrants from South Asia try to figure out if they fit in with the more established East Asian community and as new immigrants from China question the motives of those who consider themselves Asian/Americans.

Is it enough that Hailee Steinfeld doesn't run away from the question, "Are you Filipino?" In an interview with a Manila newspaper, she said: “Very early on, I was made aware of how much passion and pride Filipinos put into anything. I feel so connected to the people and the culture."

Even though they proudly state they are Filipino, can the general Asian American community accept public figures like Steinfeld, Vanessa Hudgens, Bruno Mars, apl.de.ap, Enrique Iglesias,  Darren Criss or Lou Diamond Phillips as fellow Asian/Americans? Are they Asian enough?

Should we have a racial litmus test for other Asian Americans of mixed race such as California Sen. Kamala Harris, Virginia Rep. Bobby Scott, actors Keanu Reeves and Sharon Leal, Lakers guard Jordan Clarkson, Cubs shortstop Addison Russell or Seahawks wide receiver Doug Baldwin? Are they Asian enough?

Asian Americans don't have a Beyoncé or Obama to represent them. They can settle questions such as that being posed here. The aforementioned Asian American celebrities who have made their individual marks on U.S. society don't have the powerful media platforms of celebrities like Beyoncé or Obama, whose actions and prominence resoundingly answer the "who is black" question.

The "one-drop rule," adopted by African Americans, seems like a worthy example for Asians and Asian Americans. Likewise, if someone says he or she is Asian and there is a tiny iota of DNA evidence to confirm that, why should we question how that person perceives himself or herself no matter how they might appear? Why should that person be denied his or her self identity, especially when there are some "full-blooded" Asians called "bananas" or "coconuts" who try to not own up to their Asian roots? 

Asian Americans don't have the luxury to argue among themselves whether one is Asian enough to call themselves Asian. Mainstream America still sees Asians as one amorphous "inscrutable" mass made up of "others," foreigners or outsiders.

If an Asian American is fortunate enough to rise up and make a name for oneself -- mixed heritage or not -- to be noticed, praised or admired by the rest of America, we should see that as a door opening.

(And, to be clear, nor should those passing through that door, slam it shut behind them.)

"I was proud to be able to represent Asia," said Golding of his role in Crazy Rich Asians. "There are some sour people out there, but we should be getting together and fighting for something bigger, rather than Asians against Asians.”

The Twitter feud between Golding and Chung may be over, but the debate will certainly continue as we seek to find ourselves in this multi-racial country and as we inevitably interact with other races in a pluralistic America.

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Edited throughout for clarity on Dec. 6, 11 a.m.)

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