Habitus realisation: negotiating identities through Chinese looks and

Chinese language

Presented at the BAICE 2014 Conference 9 September, Bath

Dr. Michael Mu (mgmu@ucaglary.ca)Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary

How do Chinese Australians negotiate their Chineseness and capitalise on resources through learning Chinese in Australia and beyond?

Age

119, 51.7%95, 41.4%

16, 6.9%

born in Australia

born in China

born in other countries

111, 48.3%

73, 31.7%

31, 13.5%

15, 6.5%

first generation

second generation

thrid generation

fourth generation and further removed

Residence

• 230 survey participants

• Five interview participants

Heritage Language denotes a language that is associated with the cultural background of ethnic minority people and is different from society’s dominant or official language, and may or may not be spoken at home or used in the ethnic community.

Estimated overseas Chinese population: 50 million

112; 48.7%

64; 27.8%

51; 22.2%

3; 1.3%

both English and Chinese

Chinese only

English only

other languages or other languages mixed with English and Chinese

Social psychological perspective Draws on individualistic frameworks Uses quantitative methods Considers the predictable, linear relationship between ethnic identity

and CHL Overlooks the complexities of the external social structures

Poststructual perspective

Uses qualitative methods Contends the contradictory, multiple, and fluid identities constructed

through CHL learning Runs into problems when faced with the durability of internal schemata Internal schemata refer to the bodily attributes produced through

kinship and blood (Luke, 2009).

Chinese identities & Chinese Heritage Language (CHL)

Race & CHL learning

• The Chinese body in the west may contribute to CHL maintenance (Rosenthal & Feldman, 1992).

• CHL may contribute to a healthier racial awareness (Wang, 2008).

• HL gives children a “protective shield of a sort to rely upon when dealing with racial identity issues” (Jacobson, 2008, p. 67).

• ‘Looking Chinese but not speaking Chinese’ generates a sense of alienation (Ang, 2001).

• “I am not like Chinese, but I am not like American. Well, I mean, I look Chinese, or whatever, there’s something, you know, different.” (Shin, 2010, p. 203).

The qualitative study (interviews with five participants)

Contexts: from ‘White Australia’ policy to ‘multiculturalism’

Participants:

These five cases offered maximum-variation (Patton, 1990) in

CHL proficiency (from very limited to highly proficient), age (from

18 to 28), birthplace (HK, Taiwan, Indonesia, or Australia), current

resident city (Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Canberra),

language use patterns at home (from English only through a

mixture of English, Indonesian, and Chinese to Chinese only), and

years of formal CHLL (from 0 to 15).

As far as I know, all my grandparents are Chinese. Of course, I will look like Chinese anyway. If I try to speak Mandarin, they (grandparents) don’t say, “Wow, you can speak Mandarin.” They tend to go, “How come you can’t speak Mandarin?”

I had one of my Chinese teachers tell me that she holds me to a higher standard, expects more of me, etc. and that's because of the way I look. Of course this is racism but I think it's something that is incredibly common.

So I guess people around me tend to say, “Oh, if you look like a Chinese, you can speak Chinese.”

Race as a readable and semiotic dimension of habitus (Luke, 2009)The ‘seen but unnoticed rule’ (Garfinkel, 1967, p. 36)

Even in Singapore, the taxi drivers sometimes looked at me and said …what are the words…I tried to copy what they said in Mandarin…“ 你是华人么 (Are you Chinese)?” If I said yes, they said “ 你说你是华人，为什么你不可以讲华语 (You said you are Chinese, why you can’t speak Chinese)?” It’s embarrassing to be Chinese physically while find myself in a situation where I can’t speak the language.

Definitely there have been times that I am very conscious about the fact that I speak with a funny accent as opposed to the way I look…Sometimes like I’ve been to 食堂 (dining hall) with my friends and people will be looking at me because they are all talking Chinese but they can tell I have very funny accent. I had a strange feeling at that time.

when I’m out in China, I realise that everyone is constantly horrified at how bad my Chinese is and that’s simply because the way I look. They tend to wonder “ 你是什么样的中国人 ?”(what kind of Chinese are you?)

The breached and noticed rule

The rule can become visible when breached (Heritage, 1984).

For some people, they speak Chinese so that they can claim their Chineseness or something. And so do I…So I try to expose myself to Chinese language and force myself to learn Chinese as much as possible. I would feel like a ‘foreigner’ if I could not be able to speak at least some Chinese.

There were two Asian-looking girls in my grade, I think…At that time I felt how important (it was) to speak my own home language because the white girls said “if you are Asian, you should be able to speak your home language…If you can’t, it’s sort of a shame”. That’s one of the friends said at that time. I felt it’s important and it’s a pride to speak home language.

How difficult it is for a lot of overseas Chinese and how shameful it is! They look Chinese but they don’t speak Chinese.

The routinised and normalised rule:• ‘Internalisation of the external’ (Bourdieu, 1984)• “Cultural dopes” (Garfinkel, 1967, p. 68) with “a

correctly used proposition” (Garfinkel, 1967, p. 281)

The reason is the difference between a white person learning Chinese and the overseas Chinese learning Chinese…For Chinese Australians learning Chinese, learning the language immediately raises issues of identity, belonging, colour, culture, and history. I think this means we are often highly motivated because of the numerous factors driving us to learn.

Because of my Chinese heritage. French would be good but it’s nothing part of me. But Chinese is part of me…I think it’s a good opportunity to do that. I mean I look Chinese and I should speak Chinese.

‘Habitus realisation’ (Mu & Dooley, 2014)