RYAN
HEAD-ROYCE SCHOOL
12TH GRADE
1. How do you identify? Have you always felt comfortable in this identity? Interpret this question however you'd like, whether it be your gender, ethnicity or nationality.
How I identify isn’t really something I think about often. I will always answer that I identify as Asian American, but it’s a little more complicated than that. I am second generation (parents born in the US) so relative to some of my friends I am very out of touch with my “cultural heritage”. My family doesn’t celebrate Chinese or Korean holidays, nor do we speak a language other than English in our house. We eat Asian food as much as we eat tacos and burgers, and chopsticks are a rarity in our kitchen. I don’t even know how to play the piano. So by traditional standards (or stereotypes), I’m very American, which is fine by me. I have never really felt that being Chinese and Korean constituted a large part of who I am, and it definitely has not made me uncomfortable. My identity is primarily influenced by the culture of the place into which I was born.
2. Talk about the environments and communities you've been a part of and the ways in which they've affected the formation of your identity. Tell your story!
I have spent my whole life in small schools so it’s difficult to compare my experience at Head-Royce to anything else. But I imagine at a much larger school I would unconsciously gravitate towards the people who look like me. Regardless of the student body size, making friends is easier when you have a place to start. Even though I’ve established myself as very American, I’m sure I would have turned out differently if I was at a bigger school. I don’t think I’ve ever had to overcompensate as a minority student at Head-Royce. But at a larger school, I think I would overcompensate to fit in and make friends more easily.
3. Where do you feel most safe as a racial minority at Head-Royce?
The café because everyone is overcharged equally. I don’t know. As a racial minority, I rarely feel unsafe at Head-Royce. In my experience, people are pretty good at either not being offensive or just keeping it to themselves.
4. How has being a minority student at a school like HRS affected the way you view yourself?
Other than its size, I don’t think there are any specific ways HRS has changed the way I view myself. I think a lot of the changes in the way I see myself are a result of growing up more than anything.
5. Do you feel as though individuals of your race are properly represented at HRS. Whether this is through the literature that we read, members of our staff etc...
Yes because there are a lot of us in the student body. No because the faculty has very few Asian teachers, and the literature we read rarely addresses the Asian American experience. I think the only time we read something about that was in 10th grade.
6. If you came back to visit HRS in 10 years, what would you have liked to see changed?
A more holistic approach to race that better addresses the spectrum of experiences would be nice. But that’s very difficult to do. Day of Dialogue could be a good starting point for this, but a single day probably isn’t enough to encompass everything.
7. Tell me about a time when you felt as though you didn't have a voice.
Ironically, the first Day of Dialogue on race. As an Asian American, I feel that I have little to nothing to add. In conversations about race, everyone knows their role, or where they stand in relation to the topic. As a minority who is assumed to never experience the consequences of being a minority, I always feel out of place when race is brought up. And this is because these discussions almost always occur along a black-white binary. Of course everyone is encouraged to participate, but it’s difficult when everyone also subconsciously makes assumptions about where to shine the spotlight. There is an unspoken rule that we are expected to focus on race relations between black and white folk. It doesn’t have to be this way, but taking a more holistic approach to race is hard. Essentially, it is an issue of space. We can’t talk about everyone’s experience with racism, and some are more urgent or tragic so others are pushed aside to make room.