An infographic quiz, ‘Who’s Your Token Asian?’, confronts Asian girls’ struggles in the west.
Reported by BuzzFeed, the Joy Li’s quiz has been shared widely in Asian diaspora groups. Li’s quiz is part of the 20-year-old Asian-Australian student’s school project series Living as an Asian Girl.
Speaking to BuzzFeed News, Li said her poster presents the “lose/lose situation that Asian women face as they must continually choose between different societal expectations or risk being isolated by both sides.”
“I had always considered myself as an ‘Australian’ without the need for the addition of ‘Asian,’ but I was perhaps ignorant to have thought that,” she said.
“Asian-Australian women — or from any Westernized background — need to be supported, and for them to understand themselves, they need to understand their own history, family structure, cultural background, as well as the gendered and racial structures that influence the way they see themselves and are seen by others.”
The series also includes two other posters. One is titled ‘Dear Joy, I____ You’. The poster shows everyday phrases spoken in Li’s household. The more frequently the phrase is said, the larger they are written. The other poster, A Sad Ballad for Asian Girl, collates Twitter searches related to Asian women and Asian girls. Her feelings towards the searches are represented on a scale of black to white.
“Something I’ve been working on is the importance on having an opinion and I hope in the future it will manifest into something greater,” Li said. “So all is good, except my parents still don’t understand it.”
