Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- PART ONE CONCEPTS OF NATIONAL IDENTITY AND THE SYMBOLIC CONSTRUCTION OF NATIONS
- 1 National Identity and the Conditions of Tolerance
- 2 The Historical Invention and Modern Reinvention of Two National Identities
- 3 Segmented Politics: Xenophobia, Citizenship, and Political Loyalty in Germany
- 4 The Discoursive Construction of National Stereotypes: Collective Imagination and Racist Concepts in Germany before World War I
- 5 Integration and Fragmentation Discourses: Demanding and Supplying “Identity” in Diverse Societies
- PART TWO THE SOCIAL AND CULTURAL PRACTICE OF RACISM
- PART THREE RACE, GENDER, BODY, BIOLOGY
- Index
5 - Integration and Fragmentation Discourses: Demanding and Supplying “Identity” in Diverse Societies
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 January 2013
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- PART ONE CONCEPTS OF NATIONAL IDENTITY AND THE SYMBOLIC CONSTRUCTION OF NATIONS
- 1 National Identity and the Conditions of Tolerance
- 2 The Historical Invention and Modern Reinvention of Two National Identities
- 3 Segmented Politics: Xenophobia, Citizenship, and Political Loyalty in Germany
- 4 The Discoursive Construction of National Stereotypes: Collective Imagination and Racist Concepts in Germany before World War I
- 5 Integration and Fragmentation Discourses: Demanding and Supplying “Identity” in Diverse Societies
- PART TWO THE SOCIAL AND CULTURAL PRACTICE OF RACISM
- PART THREE RACE, GENDER, BODY, BIOLOGY
- Index
Summary
In the spring of 1995, Andrew Sullivan in the New Republic wondered about Phil Gramm's chances of winning the Republican nomination for president. Concluding his argument, he asked, “Is he too mean to win? Possibly. But on race, the issue where meanness most hurts, Gramm is inoculated. Thanks to his Asian-American wife and Amerasian sons, he's an archetype of this country's transracial, conservative future.” Some issues later, the New Republic published a letter to the editors saying:
Phil Gramm's Asian American wife hardly “inoculates” him on matters of race. . . .The dominant American cultures acceptance of Asian feminine sexuality has preceded acceptance of ethnic Asians as genuine Americans. Sullivan refers to Gramm's Eurasian American sons as “Amerasian.” This description is erroneous, since Wendy Gramm is just as American as Phil Gramm - but perhaps understandable, since Sullivan isn't.
Although neither Sullivan nor Andrew Chin, the writer of the letter, speaks of identity, they obviously refer to it - but in quite different manners. The writer of the letter rejects not only Sullivan's judgment of Gramm but also his semantics of ascribing group identities to individuals. Chin refers to Wendy Gramm as Asian American, as does Sullivan. But he rejects the notion that the offspring of a WASP American and an Asian American can be referred to as Amerasians, while himself referring to them as Eurasians.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Identity and IntoleranceNationalism, Racism, and Xenophobia in Germany and the United States, pp. 97 - 134Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1998