All Around Asia

Music and Culture Across the Diaspora by Vivian Hoang

By definition, I am a second-generation Vietnamese immigrant. Internationally, however, I can’t help but feel disingenuous donning this title, as I grew up estranged from my own culture. Though my parents were traditional in certain ways —”No shoes in the house!” “No dating until marriage!”— they fully subscribed to assimilationist narratives of proximity of whiteness, fostering upward mobility. Thus, it felt it would be best to not pass on Vietnamese cultural knowledge to my brother and I. Because I grew up in a household devoid of culture in the traditional sense, I was always curious about how other people were able to forge connections to their cultures and to what extent. I especially wanted to examine culture through the lens of music as music has played an instrumental role in shaping my identity and growth as a person but less from a cultural standpoint. I wondered: how has music factored into my peers’ cultural journeys? For Andrew Chen ‘24, music plays a surprisingly minimal role in the closeness he feels with Chinese culture. “I don’t listen to Chinese music at all,” Chen said. “I personally just never really liked it that much because it’s so hard to sing it and still have the syllables be really clear.” Instead, Chen’s traditional upbringing in China allows him to carry the culture with him in everyday life without needing external practices — besides celebrating major holidays — to maintain this implicit connection. “I don’t think I do much, and I think one of the reasons I don’t feel the need to do much is because I was from [China],” Chen said. “So it’s like, I know what my identity is. And I don’t need to almost, like, prove it sometimes, so it’s okay with me to only celebrate the really important days.” However, Chen still acknowledged the formative influence of music on Chinese culture at large, especially during the celebration of Lunar Festival, which Chen fondly named as his favorite aspect of Chinese culture. “I think music is definitely a big part of Chinese history and culture. You know, we have different instruments, and that’s something that not a lot of different Asian countries have. You know, we made the guzheng,” Chen said, referencing an ancient Chinese plucked string instrument. “And on the big festive days, like Lunar Festival, people will play them. There’s this really big show every year that everybody watches when Lunar Festival comes around, and they always have some traditional instrument performances. So music is a really important way for Chinese folks to connect with their culture.”

However, for other students, like Vanessa Ma ‘24, they have seen a more direct linkage between music and their personal connection to their culture. On the other hand, Ma spoke about how music has played a crucial role in hardening the dichotomy between Vietnamese and Vietnamese American culture, an often overlooked yet important distinction as Ma underscored the striking differences in the experiences of first versus second generation immigrants.

Highlighting her dually intimate relationship to music, Ma discussed how she stays true to her traditional Vietnamese heritage through cải lương, a type of Vietnamese opera that her parents used to play throughout her childhood, while nurturing her ties to Vietnamese American culture by listening to Vietnamese American artists like thuy and MINH. For Ma, the sentimentality of traditional Vietnamese music reminds her of her family, who most embody what culture means to her, while the modernity of v-pop keeps her grounded in the newer Vietnamese American communities she strives to be a part of, such as the Vietnamese Student Association at the College. Ma then outlined yet another vital benefit of listening to music in one’s native language: gaining a greater command of said language, especially for those who are not naturally fluent in their mother tongue. Courtesy Image // Vanessa Ma

“I was talking with a friend about how, when they grew up, their Vietnamese wasn’t great. But music became a really good way of how they learned Vietnamese,” Ma said. “Because when you read the lyrics, when you do karaoke, it’s like, you’re connecting back with your language.” Eddie Choi ‘22 echoed Ma’s sentiments about the power of music in fostering a closer connection with one’s native tongue. As a Korean American singer-songwriter, Choi crafts his music in both Korean and English. Choi described how he allows himself to let loose and tap into either his American or Korean roots when writing lyrics, creating a unique and diverse portfolio of music that illuminates both sides of his heritage.

“Given that music is my creative expression outlet, I like to just be as genuine as possible, which is why I ended up writing whatever it is like in my most preferred language at that time being,” Choi said. “It’s how I’m feeling at the moment. I just like to be creative and make it concrete.” Choi further illuminated the influential role creating music in two languages has played in building his self-confidence as a bilingual speaker and Korean artist. “[Through music] I’m able to reclaim my bilingualism because honestly, if I were to admit, my lack of fluency in Korean is kind of like, an insecurity of mine that I feel self-conscious about,” Choi said. “But whenever I’m writing in my own words, I

don’t have that kind of fear and like, no one’s going to judge my Korean or anything. So I think in that regard, I am able to regain confidence in my Korean.” Tracing back the inspiration for his music, Choi credits the rapid growth of the K-pop industry for normalizing bilingual music within mainstream pop culture. “A lot of encouragement comes from modern day K-pop in that a lot of these artists are not shying away from being bilingual. Just being exposed to music like that just made me think, ‘Oh, I can probably do this too,’” Choi said. “So I think I got a lot of encouragement from modern music and how there’s less of a boundary in terms of culture and language and everyone’s just, you know, sharing each other’s thoughts and feelings.”

Alex Park ‘24, a fellow Korean musical artist at the College, similarly holds K-pop in food regard due to the exposure it provided her to Korean culture, allowing Park to begin developing curiosity about, and a connection to, Korean culture. “I got really into K-pop about my eighth grade year in around 2015, 2016 when K-pop started getting big internationally,” Park said. “That was kind of a way for me to jumpstart into experiencing more Korean culture, so K-pop has always held a special place in my heart because it was kind of like, the first time I would look at a lot of media, and I’m like, ‘Oh, these people that kind of look like me.’” However, though Park cherishes K-pop for the introduction into Korean culture that it provided her, she also recognizes that it is not fully representative of the Korean diaspora. In order to fill the gaps in her cultural understanding and connect with different aspects of Korean culture on a deeper level, she decided to learn how to sing a traditional Korean song when building her portfolio to apply into the College as a music major (once upon a time when her longtime involvement in choir led her to believe she would want to pursue a career in music; Park is now no longer a music major). “I was talking to my voice teacher at the time, and I was like, ‘I really want to do something in Korean.’ That was less about the college portfolio and more for me because I feel like when Korean culture is talked about, especially in media, you’re only talking about K-pop,” Park said. “And obviously, for me [K-pop] was how I sort of got in touch with my culture and became exposed to it and like, really wanted to learn more about it, but there’s so much more to Korean culture. So [learning a song in Korean] was a way for me to explore another type of Korean music and traditional Korean music.” Additionally, Park pointed to Korean artist Kim Sohyang and her cover of “Arirang Alone” as a major influence in her musical journey. “[Arirang Alone] was like, this Korean folk song, and so like, you’re looking at the audience of Korean people in their 50s and 60s, and they’re all singing it, and she’s, like, busting out a high C, and it’s beautiful,” Park gushed, visibly lighting up as she described the monumental performance. “[Sohyang] became a very large part of why I wanted to get better at singing. Like she was kind of the gateway for me to be like, ‘Okay, yeah, like I can learn more about these different styles of Korean music,’”

Park continued. “Because especially in my music theory classes or when we’re singing music in my choir, it’s mostly western music because that’s all that they focus on.” However, though Park has made great strides in reconnecting with her Korean heritage through music, she emphasized that this process is still ongoing and in its early stages as the circumstances of her upbringing denied her the opportunity to be raised in a culturally engaged context and as she is still learning to reconcile the halves of her biracial identity.

Due to this lack of early exposure to Korean culture, Park spoke about the agency she has to have in carving out her own connections to Korean culture instead of sustaining more of a tacitly ingrained connection to one’s culture like Chen does.

“I’m half Irish, I’m half Korean. So I sit like right in the middle of two, and I’m in America,” Park said. “I was mainly raised by my mom, and my mom’s white. And then I lived in Kansas for most of my childhood, so I was like, one of maybe two Asian people in my grade. And so it’s hard to connect to your culture when there’s almost no ways in which to do that, and you’re raised by a parent that doesn’t fully get that side of that culture. Like I didn’t grow up in a house that spoke Korean, and the Korean food we would have would be, like, bulgogi, and that’s it.” Due to this lack of early exposure to Korean culture, Park spoke about the agency she has to have in carving out her own connections to Korean culture instead of sustaining more of a tacitly ingrained connection to one’s culture like Chen does. “And so, it’s just been like, [my sibling and I] having to go out of our way to experience that culture when I feel like in a lot of other cases, it’s something that you do get like that experience with, and that’s how, like, a lot of culture is started and formed for people.” Park named college as the primary avenue through which she’s been able to grow closer to her culture, especially through her involvement in the Korean American Student Association and the Asian Pacific Islander American Studies department. “In college, I joined KASA, and that’s been [how I’ve gotten] involved with more Korean people,” Park said. “And then I’m an APIA major, so that’s been another way not just to [explore] my Korean culture, but just like being Asian American in general,” Park said. “It’s been a way for me to explore how I fit into that equation because it’s a weird place to be put for me personally, being mixed race. It’s like, I don’t want to reject an Asian side of me, but also I don’t want to take up all of this space when I still have privilege with being half white. It’s a weird dichotomy that I think being in college I’ve spent a lot of effort into thinking about especially because we’re at a PWI.” Though Myra Simbulan ‘25 does not share the same struggles as Park in coming to terms with a mixed-race identity, she and Park share an intertwined journey of reconnecting to their respective cultures through college as Simbulan was also raised with little exposure to her culture.

“At home, my parents never spoke Tagalog, so I never got that [cultural upbringing], so I’m trying to find my culture in college,” Simbulan said. Though her mother is still very much involved in Filipino culture, Simbulan’s father lost touch with his culture and language due to his immigration to America at a very young age, creating a disconnect in cultural engagement within their household.

For Simbulan, the chance to reconnect with her culture is also the chance to connect more closely with her parents.

Simbulan also similarly highlighted her involvement in the Asian Pacific Islander Studies program and the Filipino American Student Association as the main venues through which she is currently seeking to learn more about her culture. However, for Simbulan, the chance to reconnect with her culture is also the chance to connect more closely with her parents.

Courtesy Image // Myra Simbulan “I’ve been coming home and telling my parents all the stuff I’ve been doing,” Simbulan said. “Like I’m taking Filipino Diaspora Studies, and I told my mom about this book Courtesy Image // Myra Simbulan

we’re reading, and she got on Amazon, ordered the book, and she has come to William and Mary and did a book club thing with me where we get breakfast and talk about the book.”

After listening to such a vast array of students’ cultural experiences, Park’s and Simbulan’s accounts especially hit home with me. Knowing that others are also just beginning to forge their own paths towards a mastery of their culture provided me with the comfort I needed to continue pushing me down my own path because, sometimes, I really do feel like a lonesome sojourner in my journey to reclaim my Vietnamese identity. But now, I’m reminded that I’m a part of a beautiful, growing community of travelers on campus, each with their own unique story and journey that is valid in its own way.