| Chapter 2: | Asian American Identity: A Review |
This definition of panethnicity is grounded in contextual and cultural distinctions, and is an ascribed identity, rather than a prescribed or assigned identity as many scholars view the notion of race. Despite this empowering claiming or preference for the term panethnicity (as opposed to race), changing the terminology does not change the social experience attached to being racialized as Asian American in a society that uses racial terminology to define its citizens.
To reiterate, whereas many scholars reject the notion of race as a biological construct (which has been persuasively rejected in genetic research such as the Human Genome Project), this does not mean that race does not have real social meaning for racial group members living in the United States. For this reason, we choose to use the terms race and racial identity in the present study, as these terms represent the social realities that individuals of Asian descent must confront in their daily lives as members of American society.
Ethnicity and Ethnic-specific Identity
In contrast to race, ethnicity refers to one’s membership in an ethnic-specific group. Rather than a racial categorization, an ethnic-specific one entails a more defined category in which, rather than being Asian or Asian American (race) one can be further categorized based on one’s country of origin (e.g., Philippines, Malaysia: ethnicity). In the present study, the term ethnicity does not encompass one’s identity or feelings about being a member of the group; it merely serves as a categorizing function. Ethnic-specific identity is defined here as “a social identity based on the culture of one’s ancestors’ national or tribal group(s), as modified by the demands of the culture in which one’s group currently resides” (Helms, 1994, p. 293). This definition captures the experiences of immigrants by highlighting the notion of modification; identity is not only intrinsically developed but is also shaped by social and cultural forces that make demands on the individual within the newer society. Ethnic-specific categorization differs from a racial categorization in its level of specificity.