What do Asians have in common??? What really is/makes one Asian??? Are you "truly" just Asian just because you are ethnically?

Lot of things esp here made me wonder this....

A thread that debated whether or not western asia/middle-east should be a forum here- for that matter other parts of non-idealistic Asia (e/se Asia) such as South Asian inc India, Asian Russia, etc. Not to mention the controversy over adoptees and "whitewashed" (or "whateverwashed") Asians.... Most importantly, in an older thread here talking about racism toward Asians someone (a non-Asian as if this makes a difference).... said in not in any kind of way that appeared to intend to insult or provoke or anything, how he thought Asians were not united as a race (most likely he said this because he seem to observe the various cultural groups tended to prefer to look after their own cultural/ethnic interests rather than others). And you hear so much about the differences between the different Asian groups, perhaps more than similarity; and there is so much bickering between even those in the sub-groups (eg e/se asian- chinese, korean, japanese, vietnam, etc etc) it made me think about this....
So cause of this, I'd like to hear for once and I'm curious how others think Asians are similar, what do they have in common? In some cases popssibly not like physical facts in and of themselves that don't say much eg most use chopsticks, don't wear shoes in house etc (unless they do), I'm referring more to mindset, eg in a east "vs" west comparison what tends to be the eastern mindset. Even when you come on af assuming there's more "Asians" here than any other group... what do you expect they'll all have in common apart from being "Asian" if anything??

shared confusionist culture

things Asians have most in common (according to me lol):

1. the fact of saying "maybe" or not giving a straight answer when they actually mean "no"

2. the concept of losing (and keeping) face

3. the aspect of smiling, substitute to express embarrasment rather then happiness
(Westerners do that too, but there seems more concensus abt this among Asians)

4. in general hard working and responsible with money

5. eating habits, most Asians usually eat all day long

6. emphasis on family, grandparents and/or other relatives who live together with family

7. a sort of obsession with white washed, lol <- j/k

azns like linkin park

racist and prejudice.

more rice, please

besides the concrete aspects, without considering the less tangible, you are missing what 'culture' is. there is a difference in quality or texture etc of cultures. a lot of it is subtle and i notice a difference in vibe, ways, manners, thinking etc which makes every race or culture or ethnicity unique and thier own particular 'fingerprint' so to speak.

i like the diversity of different cultures.

Only NEAsia

Mainland SEAsia and MAritime SEAsia were influenced more by India

"Asian" just means a non-European person living in the continent of Eurasia

lol

I shink it means someone who has black hair, black eyes, and mongoloid face.

It is from NEA down to SEA.

I would not include Papua New Guineans as Asians.

Aside from physical characteristics, fivers has given a wery good social analysis, and I would agree with her wholeheartedly, and also it includes Asians are more traditional, conservative, and collective.

Of caourse, I dont agree with including Indians and Arabs inside. We just claim NEA and SEA.

Specially the 2nd one, made most of the Asian countries have low risk-avoidance rate.

RICE
BRAND NAME CLOTHING
MONEY

We eat any animals that move on Land or in Water.

It just goes to show the subjectivity of the label, like most academic terms, the label of Asia is incredibly vague and superflous because it virtually ignores the incredible distinct, diverse and complex developments of each society-civizilation in this continent. At other times, it almost reeks of the "Orientalism" discourse of brushing off each unique society in the continent with a such a brisk terminology that Edward Said was warning Western scholars to be careful of.

The long held Western scholar perception of Asia (probably going back to Classical Greek antiquity) was originally merely a geographic term, defining the land mass beyond the Greek Bosporus and the Ural Mountains. However the "lines" have always been constantly shifting in definitions. The problem with defining the East and Asia actually comes from the inability of Euro-American societies themselves to define what the West is.

For example, where exactly was the focal point of the "West" anyway? Was it Greece? In particular Classical Greece? Certainly many Greeks never saw themselves as a "Western" civilization just Greek. While there is a general belief consensus that Greece was the cradle of the West, many Western pundits in America and Western Europe would also usually object to say being called say a ..."neo-Greco civilization" because while they are inspired by Classical Greek civilization, they view themselves as the inheritors of Anglo-Germanic cultures, laws, societal norms etc. and for centuries, they were outside that cultural sphere. In medieval times, Byzantium was also viewed as an "Eastern" culture different from Europe and this terminology was used in the modern period. Some scholars like Samuel Huntington and similarly the Scottish economic historian Niall Ferguson (inspired by Huntington) even believed that Orthodox Christian societies were "Eastern" cultures closer to the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia than to Europe. Is it then fair to call the West, the "North civilization" perhaps?

"TruthDoesntHurt" said that he doesn't think Papuans are Asians. But technically, they very well are or could be in certain actual academic definitions since the various Melanesian and Negrito peoples have had a very long history and presence in the region. For example, Polynesian peoples and the peoples of Madagascar are two groups of people (both technically regarded as seperate continental peoples respectively) who actually have a very close genealogical relationship and very close cultural ties to Asian peoples (particularly to Taiwan and SEA) more than any other peoples elsewhere. Henceforth the linguistic definition of Austronesian or Malayo-Polynesian. Yet why are they not usually classified as Asians? (Note: Some other scholars and pundits do however, henceforth the modern political and geographic term of Asia-Pacific even though that can be perceived by some as subjective). Likewise are or aren't indigenous Asiatic peoples in the Russian Federation "Asian" peoples as well? Ditto for Middle Eastern societies and South Asian societies. You see how all these terms and labels are incredibly complex and interchangeable with no fixed meaning whatsoever and how to construct some perceived "Asian" identity is fraught with ambiguity and conceptual problems and word acrobatics? It's all subjective.

Whatever the case, the truth of the matter is the term of Asia is exclusively a concept of Western civilization. To quote Tom Reid's analysis in wiki, the peoples of ancient Asia (Chinese, Japanese, Indians, Persians, Arabs etc.) never conceived the idea of Asia simply because they did not see themselves collectively. In their perpective, they were vastly varied civilizations, contrary to ancient European belief. Each groups of peoples saw their own domains and regions as the collective sum and composite of their identities and civilizations. And with the sole exception of trade and exchange of ideas, culture etc, it is incredilby difficult and quite irreponsible to link all of them into one cogent piece called an "Asian identity". In fact with such huge cultural, social, racial diversity going on this large continent, it would be meaningless to do so.

. There's the one that unites us all.

In general the image people have of "Asians" is not that of Middle Easterners and Arabs.. lol far from. Maybe in more ancient times they did, but not for the moment being.
I'd say it's not all that subjective, as most people will think "China & co (Japan, Vietnam, Thailand etc.) when referring to "Asia"

Furthermore, the term of "Western civilisation" is not all that subjective either, considering most people will think "Europe/America" when referring to "the West" I don't think the majority of people will have the image of "New Zealand and Australia" coming up first in this context, same goes for "South Africa and its white population" ..
No, the terms "Asia" and "the West" are not that subjective when you take into consideration the "very unique image" they both use to convey in peoples mind. (of course I'm not talking abt ivory tower history and sociology related in depth point of views, lol)

Well, appreciate the light discussion.

But it confirms the point though. Popular perception IS indicative of a subjective view of what or who Asia and Asians are. It's neither definitive nor is it factual. That's important to take note of.

You need to explain what this "unique image" is, then. What criteria is used to judge this "unique image"? Is it a body of basic facts or is it something else? Or Perhaps simply based on popular sentiments or with a degree of imagination?

Furthermore the subjectiveness cuts across many angles that you have ignored. Such as the well-known fact that the general image of Asians as "China & co (Japan, Vietnam, Thailand etc.)" is only the perception of North Americans and Australasians. In the other "West" most notably Britain and Europe, Asians is the label referring to South Asians (India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka in the case of the UK) and the Middle East (Turks, Kurds, Lebanese etc) for the rest of Europe. In that continent, East Asians are relegated with yet another superflous and probably more derogatory term of "Orientals".

Sorry, point still stands. The term Asia is very subjective.

and it's better if its peoples do not buy into such a conceptual trap.

Whereas in the UK a lot op people will refer to Indians as Asians, they will of course also include Chinese under this label and I'd even say the most spontaneous image most UK folks would have when asked abt an Asian person is that of a Chinese. (here proximity influences terminology rather then perception, likewise in the USA a South American will usually be called a Latino, while in Europe they will most likely say Brazilian) In the rest of Europe however most people will link Asian to Chinese, and they will say Indian to refer to Indians.

On the other hand I don't see why you say mainland Europeans refer to Middle Easterners (Turks, Kurds, Lebanese etc.) when labeling Asians, that's really strange, usually they refer to Turks, Kurds, Lebanese as Arabs (not saying they are all Arabs, but most people in Europe will (think) say so)



I wouldn't say it's a body of basic facts that explains this "unique image" .. rather a body of (basic) visual facts, that's why I said it isn't that subjective because the image most people will have coming up spontaneously of an Asian, is that of a Chinese person. Here the visual facts (slanted eyes, black hair, yellow skin etc.) play a major role in labeling the person as such, next come the various stereotypes, and here it becomes more subjective as everybody's perception of a so called Chinese varies.

Something about rice, noodle, and curry...

Yes, fiwers is wery correct actually.

Obwiously, as EA is the most populated region, EA (both NEA and SEA) will be the most prominent and representative region.

It is not wrong for practicality purposes, to associate Eastern Asians with "Asians" since that is the biggest constituent block.

So "Asians" = Eastern Asians (informally and practically)

Simple.

Southeast Asians and East Asians aren't the same race.

Haux, please elaborate. I thought all of us came from Adam and Eve?

Try:

Try this:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/20...man/photo2.html

this is what i don't understand. asians have had plenty of thier own geniuses in the past and the present yet they didn't make a lot of strides even in basic living improvements such as modern sanitation etc compared to today's standards. a genius with an iq over 150+ can easily know or even figure this out themselves and there are asian geniuses that have iq's over 200, today and in the past. this is why i don't understand why asia was so stagnant for so long. it doesn't make sense. even now, there is a korean guy with an iq over 200 and he really hasn't done much. he's rather a recluse. it's probably a complicated subject and issue but it does seem to raise questions and an eyebrow because the resources intellectually were there within the society. the citing of creativity is not really relevant because smart people do tend to think innovatively anyways and can figure this out for themselves easily or notice where or how things can be improved etc even if they can't get others to understand or cooperate.

I think he meant majority of South-east Asians are of Austronesian origin whereas East Asians are Mongoloids.

Austronesian is a linguistic term denoting the general language relations of the peoples of SEA, the Pacific, Madagascar etc. It addresses cultural composites not physiological features or anything of that sort.

While Mongoloid is a rather archaic term used by anthropologists in the past, to detect racial/physiological commonalities between the poeples of East and South East Asia/Polynesia/Arctic etc. The term is pretty much defunct and no longer used much at all as it does not accurately assesed the complex diversity going on in the continent.

You need to check up and get the facts straight on that terminlogy.



They are of different ETHNICITIES, which is a more varied term taking into account cultural, social, genealogical, geographic factors etc. But racially, especially when scientists talk about phenotypes et al., they are pretty much the same and closely related to each other.

You can check up an interesting hypothesis. In that famous (rather controversial) book Guns Germs and Steel. This was the question that the American geographist Jared Diamond tried to posit an answer for in his book.

While the factors in the book are too long to draw out clearly and in which case one has to read it, Diamond bascially states that it was primarily a cultural issue with certain considerations to geographical barriers. He states that because of certain geographical features Asian societies (mainly East Asia but also to a large degree, SEA, India, Middle East) formed large, stable, but isolated empires which faced no external pressure.

In such cases, heavily centralized political entities in Asia created heavily bureaucratic systems that did not have the initiative to correct policies for technological and scientific innovation nor encourage it among the populace (esepcially among the vital classes such as the learned and the merchant classes), thereby leading to stagnation. Diamond did mention for example the 1432 banning by Ming China on ocean going ships whic brought an end to the Empire's capacity for global trade. and discussion like this creates more room for that thesis. By contrast, Europe's many natural barriers allowed the development of many competing nation-states. Such competition forced the European nations to encourage innovation and avoid technological stagnation.

That is Diamond's thesis anyway. Of course there is a lot of flaws and there are alot of his ideas which are in most likelihood inaccurate in assessment. But there is some room to inquire into that line of inquiry due to the historical evidence that we have available. And perhaps this thesis does shed some light as to why Asia's modern societies are following that same cultural train of thought to this day.

It's an interesting discussion and will be happy to talk more about it later, if u want to.

No, and in that case nearly all living creatures on earth descended from the same ancestors.



Sorry but that's completely wrong. There are four major clusters- Caucasoids, Africans, Oceanians and Northeast Asians.

Even within the Northeast Asian cluster there is a divide between Tibetans + North Chinese and Altaic-speakers.

The Southeast Asians, like Viets, Thais, Filipinos are loosely related to each other along with "Polynesians" and form their own race. The genetic distance between North Chinese and Southeast Asians is huge.

North Chinese are most related to Athabaskhan speakers in the Americas, then to Caucasoids, then to Southeast Asians. The difference between N Chinese and Southeast Asians is greater than the difference between Africans and White Europeans.

There are the

East Asian Sprachbund

''These features strongly contrast with major language groups bordering East and Southeast Asia such as Australian languages, Indo-Pacific languages, Paleosiberian languages, and Indo-European languages, as well as Afro-Asiatic languages.''

features can be found here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Asian_languages

and the Mongoloid race that both (North-)East Asian and Southeast Asian people share.

It's language contact, and the "Mongoloid race" is poorly defined in an anthropological sense. To Europeans it's just "every ugly trait we can think of".

Sino-Tibetans and Altaics differ from each other physically but are genetically related.

Southeast Asians differ with other Southeast Asians greatly but are genetically related.

We're all different.

Morals and values are completely different.
Traditions are different.
Clothes, languages and etc... are different.

We're not the same family. There are bitterness between all Asian groups.
No such thing as Pan-Asian or Asian.

A cultural self-asserted identity is way more important than an ascribed identity.