As long as there have been teenagers, the search for identity has been an integral part of the human experience. This was true in ancient literature, as Telemachus had to carve out his own individuality in the giant shadow of his father, Odysseus – and it is true for every boy moving from the world of comic books and baseball cards to the concerns of adulthood. In the case of a young man growing up in a culture in which he is not the ethnic majority, developing identity can be even more complicated, as he has his own cultural identity to contend with, while growing up in a milieu where expectations and mores can be completely different than what he encounters at home. Such is the case in works like Gene Luen Yang’s American Chinese Boy. The tales of the two young men, Danny and Jin, intermingle with the adventures of the Monkey King and vibrantly express the confusion of growing up in a culture where dress, behavior – and even the alphabet – are completely different.
Jin Wang and Danny are both caught in this identity struggle. Danny has a cousin, Chin-Kee, who is Chinese, and he comes to visit Danny every summer – usually to Danny’s utter humiliation. Jin Wang is a teenager of Chinese descent who wants to assimilate into American culture and be accepted by his peers. Both of their struggles are symbolized by the experiences of the Monkey King. Once he’s learned the principles of kung fu, he goes to a dinner party in the heavens. However, because he is a shoeless monkey, he does not get to go inside (Yang p. 14). As one might expect, the Monkey King becomes very upset. This symbolizes the anger that adolescents feel when they are insufficient in some way, particularly in a way that is unavoidable because of their cultural background. Monkeys don’t have feet; they don’t know to put on shoes. People who are Chinese have unique customs that can appear unusual in an American context, and going into social situations without knowing those customs would appear unusual can be humiliating – both for the person from the foreign culture, and for that person’s family and friends, as Danny discovers through his annual adventures with Chin-Kee.
Jin Wang, predictably, wants to be a Transformer, when he gets the chance to be anything he desires from an elderly woman – the price, however, is his soul. For many people moving from one culture to another, the price of assimilation often feels as heavy as the surrender of one’s eternal destiny. One common experiences that immigrants from many countries into the United States has to do with “Americanizing” their name – either changing it slightly, to make it easier for Americans to pronounce, or just taking on an American “name” as a sobriquet to go by, even if it has nothing in common with the person’s actual name. Jin’s experiences trying to date Amelia not only include an awkwardness that affects every young man who wants to date but does not have a car (he ends up pedaling her to the movies on his bike), but when Greg asks Jin not to date Amelia anymore, there is a cultural element to remark that Amelia “has to start paying attention to who she hangs out with” (Yang p. 179). Jin complies but is clearly bothered; instead of recognizing that Suzy is merely venting about her bad day, Jin thinks that she is turning to him for romantic attention. When he kisses her, though, he finds out that this attention was the very last thing she wants (Yang p. 187-188). This confusion comes to a head when Jin wakes up and looks in the mirror, only to see Danny looking back at him. While most teenagers would indicate that they have a hard time figuring out who they are – and who they are going to be – the fact that Jin must also deal with being Chinese in a mostly white social group adds to his dismay – and his disorientation.
In Danny’s strand of the tale, the struggle for identity also takes on a romantic hue. When he finds out that his cousin, Chin-Kee, has returned for yet another annual visit, he is on the verge of asking Melanie out for a date (Yang p. 46-47). Things go downhill quickly from that point, because Chin-Kee angers Melanie and she ends up storming out. Then, Chin-Kee goes on to embarrass Danny in every way possible: he carries a dead cat in his lunch – as the Chinese are reputed to do, according to the prejudices in Danny’s society – and even urinates in Danny’s friend’s drink. The relationship between Danny and Chin-Kee is analogous to the relationship between Jin and his own Chinese heritage: both Danny and Jin find the cousin and the heritage to be sources of humiliation, which they cannot find a way to escape. When Danny (Jin) hits Chin-Kee in frustration, Chin-Kee’s head goes flying, revealing the Monkey King beneath. The moral lesson taught by this is that trying to escape one’s cultural heritage is an act of treachery toward, ultimately, oneself. The Monkey King had sent Chin-Kee to act as Jin’s conscience in this matter. In the final analysis, Jin learns what every adolescent learns, once he is through trying to match the expectations of everyone around him: there is only one way to be, and that way to be is yourself. Everyone around you will see through your attempts to be anyone else.
Works Cited
Yang, Gene Luen. American Born Chinese. New York: First Second, 2006.
