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[NQV] SF visit: 8/31/96 (5)


Saturday 8/31/96

(continued)

For the second part, the audience was split alternatingly into three
groups to discuss and write down responses to the following issues/
questions, which were then summarized and discussed jointly by all.
Some of the responses were sterotypical, some even banal, but most
were quite to the point, and stimulated much discussion which was
unfortunately curtailed for lack of time (just as it was getting
really heated/open/interesting!), alas.  But true to the spirit,
these exercises were meant to stimulate thinking/discussion which
would hopefully continue beyond the workshop/conference.  And in
that regards it was a success beyond d'estime.  Here are brief
summaries of the questions/responses provided by the three groups:

Sexual Identity: 
Group 1: How does your "gaydar" (a(ngten bo'ng!) register that
someone is gay? (ie. how do you define someone as gay?)
- ye^?u ddie^.u/e?o la?/mu'a may
- body gesture, laugh hi'ch hi'ch, femme
- ca'ch a(n ma(.c, expensive/stylish clothing
- hair style
- sensitivity in manners and spirit
- bitchiness
- gossipping
- fashion queen
- eye contact
- good-looking, well-groomed

Group 2: Characteristics of gay social culture as seen by others.
- feminine
- drag queen
- child molester
- promiscuous
- hair dresser
- people assume we'll jump on them
- entertainer
- a'i nam a'i nu+~
- woman hater
- physically ill/lack of penis
- vain
- it's a choice
- well-behave
- quiet/shy
- closeted
- male prostitutes
- fashion conscious

Group 3: Components of queer self-identity.
- sexual attraction
- emotional attraction
- sexual behavior
- arbitrary barrier
- rebellion against gender/sexual ideas
- self-designation/identification
- contextual
- political/social affiliation

Ethnic Identity:
Group 1: Peer definition of Vietnamese traits
- speak Vietnamese
- speak English with heavy accent
- ghetto locations (ie. Little Saigon)
- listen to Vietnamese music
- facial features
- hang out with Viet friends
- mu`i nu+o+'c ma('m
- hay a(n pho+?

Group 2: Ethnic values & traditional expectations for Vietnamese
- co' cha'u no^.i
- ba'o hie^'u (filial piety) -- obedient
- la^.p gia ddi`nh vo+'i ngu+o+`i VN
- tho+` o^ng ba`
- keep family good name
- speak Vietnamese
- celebration of Te^'t/customs

Group 3: Components of ethnic self-identity
- Viet soul
- Viet parents
- heritage/pride
- birth place
- choice/identification
- multiracial?
- culture/language
- foster parents
- religion/beliefs/rituals

Besides and beyond the point by point (and blow by blow) rehash
of each of the lists for larger group discussion, which took up
quite some time to warm up, the discussion took a more spirited
turn when people began to grapple with the tension between external
and internal standards/values that provides structure and yet also
allow for transformation and negotiation of individual identities
in terms of ethnicity and sexuality.  While most people seemed to
bemoan the rigidity/inflexibility of traditional ethnic and sexual
standards/values which often made for incomprehension, antipathy
and intolerance toward a hybridized form of a Queer Viet-American
identity, most also seemed to take hope in the mutability/fluidity
of traditions which can be revalued/reappropriated/reshaped for
all practical purposes.  As Viet (who should be credited for raising
a challenging point which prompted me into a tirade of quasi-lit-
crit mumbo-jumbo from which the audience was more or less saved by
the clock) pointedly questioned the free-wheeling notion of "fluidity"
when talking about what made for "tradition" and traditional values
as something given/preserved/transmitted "as is" to most of us who
happen to be born into them, I quickly argued back for a dynamic
notion of "identity as a process of becoming" which partakes in a
no less dynamic and fluid structural context that can be considered
an ever-transformative tradition, and cautioned against the static
perception of identity and tradition as given when seen not in their
dynamic processual nature but only in heuristically useful but often
misleading frozen-framed slices of arrested development.  As I took
care to undercore the dynamic interplay of coexisting structure and
agency, I was secretly grateful that nobody mentioned the ever so
fashionable word (which would make me scream) of "performativity"
(be it for a queer or, to a more limited extent, ethnic identity --
even though, jargon aside, I was glad to see that a few people had
their fingers on "identification" as an important aspect of ethnic
identity, and I'd say by extension, of sexual identity too; and
identification is a first and continual step in that process of
actualization of an identity through the self-aware and conscious
active process of becoming).  And so in some way, there can be no
real/full closure to this process of becoming an identity, just as
there could be no real/full closure of any of the workshops at this
conference: for they all are dynamic moments in an ever-tranformative
process of individual self-identification with an identity (be it
personal or collective) through constant questioning, affirmation,
exchange, and renegotiation with/between self and others.

At the end of the workshop, Clayton made an announcement about a
conference on bisexuality at UCLA next year; he also asked people
to fill out a study questionaire about prenatal (degree of stress
in the pregnant mother!) and childhood experience and some physical
traits (such as left-/right-handedness) and sexual orientation.

(to be continued)


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