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Identity In Wesley Yang's 'Paper Tigers'

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1.) What are Yang 's feelings about his identity as an Asian American? Does he feel connected to his cultural identity or alienated from it? How does he feel about the stereotypes attached to his cultural identity? The protagonist in Wesley Yang’s “Paper Tigers” feels disconnected from his ancestry. Wesley is labeled as an immigrant to outsiders on account of his race yet he feels like an outsider within his own race. Wesley was not raised with traditional Asian customs so he does aim to be the typical Asian-American. Wesley is portrayed to be as a typical Asian-American, but he is as different from the Asian-American culture as he can be. When Wesley looks in his mirror all he sees is a face and it baffles him how a simple face can lead to so much assumptions and social placements. People see Wesley and assume that he is the top of his class and wanted to be a lawyer or a doctor. …show more content…

At a young age, they have been taught to be the best and to excel at everything they do. With their classmates, that can cause a drift and make them standoffish. With constant competition, the child will surpass their classmates in everything and that becomes a priority. The classmates will envy rather than see the classmate as their equal and keep distance. The child will be focused on being the best at everything that they will not notice, or if they do they do not dwell on it too much. After the child is done being the best of their academic setting they graduate and find employment. They will still have the mindset of everything being a competition and will surpass their coworker where the trend will continue. In summary with the mindset that everything 's a competition, the child will focus only on being the best and that is all they will know. They will not have social skills because they would see no benefit of being friendly with their

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