ive seen the first season of her show a long time ago, i dont recall her using aave in that, however there is a character in one episode named "shu shu" who uses slang, but in a asian foreign accent.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Awkwafina (Shang-Chi) is being accused of cultural appropriation by some, for previous use of a “blaccent” while she was rising to fame
- Thread starter Cheesebu
- Start date
- Entertainment
ive seen the first season of her show a long time ago, i dont recall her using aave in that, however there is a character in one episode named "shu shu" who uses slang, but in a asian foreign accent.
Hmm. The show seems semi-autobiographic. If she grew up talking in a blackcent you would think it would appear in the show.
oh you sweet summer child
reminds me of bill bellamy still making AOL jokes anytime past 2008
We are clearly aware of that.
BUT IN THIS CASE, THAT AIN'T THE STORY.
Read the thread fam.
its not like i was looking for it either, i mostly half paid attention to it. Just remember the shu shu episode the most
You're correct; I'm being flippant about the issue and experiences not of my own, and that isn't my intention. I do apologize about that.
Yes, she commented on it (in a normal accent).
It was basically a deflection.
User Banned (Permanent): History of disingenuous posting in threads about anti-black racism, including recent 1 month ban
I don't know about that. The long term chilling effect for one minority speaking about another is disturbing. For me at least, I'll be weary to comment on these kind of threads for fear upsetting people unintentionally.
I mean you're going to upset someone unintentionally most likely in any/most topics
Just a learning experience, just don't be a dismissive asshole*
*This part is extremely important, something the first few pages of people weren't aware of
Here's a lesson, don't dismiss other minorities' issues. If you're really that worried that you'll unintentionally break that rule, then you shouldn't comment on other minorities' issues.
Replace the song with one that has heavy usage of the N-word and yes.
This is all it takes and lots of people still just can't do it lmao
I'm a Konger, and I remember my initial reaction to seeing who she was for the first time was disgust(?). I didn't know who Awkwafina was, I've never seen her comedy or listened to her music, but the first time I saw the name "Awkwafina", I thought the person would be black.
I didn't care enough to look for more info about her or find a picture about her, but when I did come across a picture of her a few months later, the first thing I said was "for fuck sakes!" Even without seeing and hearing her body of work, I immediately knew what her schtick was and I laughed at how ridiculous she is.
I didn't care enough to look for more info about her or find a picture about her, but when I did come across a picture of her a few months later, the first thing I said was "for fuck sakes!" Even without seeing and hearing her body of work, I immediately knew what her schtick was and I laughed at how ridiculous she is.
As an Asian person who grew up in Queens, the cultures do mix a lot, especially amongst kids, who often go to very diverse schools.
It's also a thing that lots of Asian kids...tbh, every single race, adopted lots of AAVE/Blaccents, at least on a superficial level. Hip hop was big, especially in the 90's. She went to LaGuardia; for anyone calling out Forest Hill as being a "White neighborhood", I'm going to remind you that New York CIty is not your podunk ass town.
That having been said, I've never followed her work. But it's almost a given that her performance persona, being hip hop based, involved using AAVE/Blaccents, as accused. In a New York crowd, *maybe* that's ok amongst friends, no context. But now that the her influence and presence is bigger, she should address it publicly and speak up on behalf of Black culture and not dodge it, 100%.
The fun world of intersectionality. Something something start with common respect.
It's also a thing that lots of Asian kids...tbh, every single race, adopted lots of AAVE/Blaccents, at least on a superficial level. Hip hop was big, especially in the 90's. She went to LaGuardia; for anyone calling out Forest Hill as being a "White neighborhood", I'm going to remind you that New York CIty is not your podunk ass town.
That having been said, I've never followed her work. But it's almost a given that her performance persona, being hip hop based, involved using AAVE/Blaccents, as accused. In a New York crowd, *maybe* that's ok amongst friends, no context. But now that the her influence and presence is bigger, she should address it publicly and speak up on behalf of Black culture and not dodge it, 100%.
The fun world of intersectionality. Something something start with common respect.
I'm merely pointing out that it seems like mods unintentionally introduced something into the equation that is counterproductive.
I'm not alone either:
WarLox said:
As a black person, i dont agree with op but im not sure how to articulate my opinion because it seems like it's either agree or get banned for 2 weeks.
But i would say there's a discussion on black culture vs urban culture thats not being had.
----
Lady Gaga grew up in the UWS, blacker than Forest Hills and also went to LaGuardia. I haven't heard her blaccent yet. That alone ain't it.
Plenty of people have managed to have a discussion without getting banned.
Not really trying to defend her too much b/c I don't know if she's faking it or not, but just offering my own personal anecdotal experience as an asian american growing up in NYC. I'll say that Awkwafina's blackcent is not unique here among NYC asian americans. I know plenty of asian americans with blackcents, and I know plenty that don't have one. It's just such a melting pot here in public schools growing up that there's been a free for all in terms of appropriation and swapping b/w the black and asian communities. In all honesty, it just sounds like a Queens accent to me, but I haven't listened to her for more than for a few minutes. I never thought to bat my eye at it on first impressions though.
Last edited:
Read the thread. It's well documented that it's not her real accent.
Lady Gaga is also not a minority. I see the culture mixing alot more b/w asian and black communities.
The problem is that she does not use her "blaccent" during interviews. Not that she didn't grow up without exposure to AAVE.
User Banned (1 Month): Trolling a sensitive thread about cultural appropriation, backseat moderation over multiple posts
Nope. Don't do it dude. Walk away now or forever hold your peace.
I'm going to ignore how ignorant this post is for a second. So how do you explain her turning off her accent in interviews with other minorities?
I mean unless you're going to discount my personal experience here growing up in NYC as an Asian American and the generalizations I see, sure.
Not doing that. Your experiences are valid. Just tryna save you from a ban 🥰
Who knows? I'm not in her head. Personally, I sometimes turn off my NYC accent in the work environment so that I come across as more "professional." Which also might not be the healthiest thing to do, so who am I to judge. I'm also not saying Black communities shouldn't be offended by this. Just saying there's a definite and material culture mix in some parts of NYC.
No problem, I mixed another subject in while it was only slightly related. Sorry for that, was just trying to explain a bit of what the Asian American experience can be like and why some tend to try to blend into the major sub-cultures of the country (but not Nora specifically who should clearly stop). Not the place for it currently.
Thanks
we tried to say all this years ago, so imma just sip this here tea and be quiet
like people have literally been saying this since she appeared on the scene long enough for patterns to be noticed.
but she has defenders from all walks of life giving her the benefit of the doubt, and she's been stacking up fame too.
she may get her scooby doo mask moment, or she may not. she's already made it and all she has to do is be quiet
and people will be forced to do audio-forensics over her old interviews.
like people have literally been saying this since she appeared on the scene long enough for patterns to be noticed.
but she has defenders from all walks of life giving her the benefit of the doubt, and she's been stacking up fame too.
she may get her scooby doo mask moment, or she may not. she's already made it and all she has to do is be quiet
and people will be forced to do audio-forensics over her old interviews.
Last edited:
Sure. But this kind of interaction:
AnansiThePersona:
Nope. Don't do it dude. Walk away now or forever hold your peace.
Churrific:
I mean unless you're going to discount my personal experience here growing up in NYC as an Asian American and the generalizations I see, sure.
-----
sound like a healthy forum to you?
Couple of things here:
- I do not know that Lady Gaga went to LaGuardia. I DO know that she went to the Convent of the Sacred Heart, with Nicky Hilton. It is closely affiliated with Regis, the top ranked Catholic Boy's school in the country. My close friend went to Regis and did school activities with her.
- Following up to the above: if you are going to pull some off-the-shelf demographic numbers to suggest that culturally, an UWS upper middle class white woman born at Lenox Fucking Hill is comparable to a chinese woman raised by her grandparents in the middle of Fucking Queens, I'm going to suggest that you might not be qualified to talk about ANYONE's upbringing nor how cultures mix, especially amongst kids, in NYC.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I don't think any of this excuses Awkwafina from appropriating Black culture, and I think she should address it and try to build bridges, apologize, anything along those lines, instead of being defensive. But maybe, just maybe, don't read a couple of wikipedia pages and assume you understand how someone like her may have grown up.
And you see nothing problematic with a person that plays up their minstrel act only in roles and not any other time they're in front of a camera?
She's not code switching. That's what you're talking about.
yeah, the voice actor voices tendo in yakuza: like a dragon and he sounds way better when he's not talking like a church organ is playing after every line
Like I said in earlier posts, I'm not really defending her. I don't really follow her, and I don't know if she's faking or not. I don't really care about Awkwafina. I'm saying there are plenty of authentic asian americans in NYC with an authentic blackcent b/c of culture mixing. I also did NOT defend her there in my response. I gave my personal experience with my own accent.
Last edited:
I saw this on reddit and dug alittle bit because I have never seen her stand up or acting. In some videos she speaks in a different octave and to my untrained ears sounds completely different than the videos I saw of her doing stand up and in movie clips. She knows what she's doing and it's not a good look.
I get it now. She is a hypocrite. Read the entire article and it's a thing she turns off around her friends and family. Yeah thats not cool. Justin Bieber and cry me a river guy do it too.
I think the issue is a bit more complicated. It's easy to paint Awkwafina as a culture vulture since she is Asian and it's something that people just don't have tolerance for Asian-Americans picking up AAVE, regardless of their upbringing, because that's not "their culture". Like I see the discourse in this thread, and there is a lot of measuring how close the actual neighborhood she grew up in Queens is to more black neighborhoods, but it seems to me that is a much tougher thing to parse due to how much the New York City/Queens accents are seemingly pretty ubiquitous and how if you are hanging out in areas were people are speaking AAVE and around Hip Hop/youth culture, especially in an large urban area like NYC, it's something you are around and pick up. As someone who grew up with Hip Hop and in Hip Hop urban circles in LA (which is a bit different culturally and geographically) there are Asian-Americans who grew up in that environment that don't necessarily talk with an AAVE accent (some do), but Hip Hop influenced slang and accent is apart of codeswitching that I've noticed sometimes Asians just are considered imposters since they have their "own culture" and are more likely to get criticized than, say, white people in similar sort of circumstances, despite being part of the Asian diaspora in America trying to find their own Asian-American identity, that doesn't really exist for Asian-Americans collectively and being Asian-American means you aren't "white" or full Asian anyways. It's an odd place to be in culturally.
Now I can't speak on Awkwafina's background, and just knowing she is from Queens, maybe she has more legitimacy to claim that she's picked it up through cultural osmosis. I don't know her, but it's totally possible people are trying to pull a "gotcha" and aren't willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. That being said, she's carved out an interesting niche as the go-to "quirky urban Americanized" Asian in Hollywood that I totally understand it rubbing people the wrong way due to how much she has been typecast for that exact role. Like many Asian-American roles though, she actually gets work because she is a stereotype and a novelty, which is it's own sore spot in an industry that doesn't care to cast many Asian lead or supporting roles.
I don't think Awkwafina is a particularly good spokesperson from her quotes, and that is another issue in that she's attempting to be a voice for Asian-American issues (like very few Asian-Americans in the entertainment industry even get to a level of visibility to speak on stuff like that) and not everyone is going to be well-spoken or an expert, yet the expectations that someone like her will be perfect and speak for the experiences of the entire Asian-American diaspora as if we are a monolith. If she is speaking in ignorance, than it is fair to call that out. It's fair to be critical of the direction of her career of mostly playing some "urban Asian-American", even if white Hollywood execs are knocking down her door for her name recognition when casting Asian actors that aren't actually just big actors in Asia (of which there seems to be a small pool they seem to care to pull from).
I'm not going to defend her career in the general sense, since I feel it's always been tasteless to lean into these typecast roles with an exaggerated "blaccent", but at the same time, I've seen how Asian-Americans can't even make a career in Hip Hop without being considered an imposter by some (no matter where they grew up). Someone like Dumbfoundead grew up in Koreatown in LA, and when he blew up big, I remember seeing a lot of that sort of criticism, even though he has less of an AAVE "blaccent" like Awkwafina, and instead has an accent that I guess is kind of a mix of cultures in the area like Latino and black, but since he isn't speaking like some whitewashed Asian, some fresh off the boat Asian, or whatever a supposed "Asian-American accent" is than they are "faking it". I've seen how hard it is for Asian-Americans to have a career in Hollywood and the type of roles they actually get. I've also seen how the career of someone like Margret Cho can make someone become the default voice for Asian-Americans due to being one of the only visible Asian-Americans in Hollywood, and while I think she has spoke out a lot about issues in pop culture that I applaud her for speaking on and I do feel like she's become more educated in various issues over the years, she's also had some bad takes and things I disagreed with her on and that is kind of the problem with a broad group essentially having almost no representation; you have these imperfect vessels being the spokesperson for so many people or the representation of a group and it's not really fair to that person or the groups they represent for the expectations that creates.
Basically, it's fair to say she is a hypocrite for making a career off a exaggerated "urban" accent while saying she won't do stereotypical Asian accents, because it's a poorly phrased statement at best.....but don't reject that point she is making about Asian-Americans being expected to be cast in roles doing stereotypical heavy Asian accents. How many roles do you think that racist ass Hollywood is asking her to do sending her scripts to her door where she doesn't have an "Asian accent" but is asked to do one for the one token Asian role in a movie? Just saying. Being a PoC doesn't give someone an excuse to not be respectful of black culture when clearly taking from it at all, period, but I think there are more issues at play here that are also being glossed over by people who are ignorant or not sensitive to the Asian-America experience, and I'd never thought I'd be typing up something even tangentially defending Awkwafina, especially in regards to her cringeworthy "urban" characters.
Now I can't speak on Awkwafina's background, and just knowing she is from Queens, maybe she has more legitimacy to claim that she's picked it up through cultural osmosis. I don't know her, but it's totally possible people are trying to pull a "gotcha" and aren't willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. That being said, she's carved out an interesting niche as the go-to "quirky urban Americanized" Asian in Hollywood that I totally understand it rubbing people the wrong way due to how much she has been typecast for that exact role. Like many Asian-American roles though, she actually gets work because she is a stereotype and a novelty, which is it's own sore spot in an industry that doesn't care to cast many Asian lead or supporting roles.
I don't think Awkwafina is a particularly good spokesperson from her quotes, and that is another issue in that she's attempting to be a voice for Asian-American issues (like very few Asian-Americans in the entertainment industry even get to a level of visibility to speak on stuff like that) and not everyone is going to be well-spoken or an expert, yet the expectations that someone like her will be perfect and speak for the experiences of the entire Asian-American diaspora as if we are a monolith. If she is speaking in ignorance, than it is fair to call that out. It's fair to be critical of the direction of her career of mostly playing some "urban Asian-American", even if white Hollywood execs are knocking down her door for her name recognition when casting Asian actors that aren't actually just big actors in Asia (of which there seems to be a small pool they seem to care to pull from).
I'm not going to defend her career in the general sense, since I feel it's always been tasteless to lean into these typecast roles with an exaggerated "blaccent", but at the same time, I've seen how Asian-Americans can't even make a career in Hip Hop without being considered an imposter by some (no matter where they grew up). Someone like Dumbfoundead grew up in Koreatown in LA, and when he blew up big, I remember seeing a lot of that sort of criticism, even though he has less of an AAVE "blaccent" like Awkwafina, and instead has an accent that I guess is kind of a mix of cultures in the area like Latino and black, but since he isn't speaking like some whitewashed Asian, some fresh off the boat Asian, or whatever a supposed "Asian-American accent" is than they are "faking it". I've seen how hard it is for Asian-Americans to have a career in Hollywood and the type of roles they actually get. I've also seen how the career of someone like Margret Cho can make someone become the default voice for Asian-Americans due to being one of the only visible Asian-Americans in Hollywood, and while I think she has spoke out a lot about issues in pop culture that I applaud her for speaking on and I do feel like she's become more educated in various issues over the years, she's also had some bad takes and things I disagreed with her on and that is kind of the problem with a broad group essentially having almost no representation; you have these imperfect vessels being the spokesperson for so many people or the representation of a group and it's not really fair to that person or the groups they represent for the expectations that creates.
Basically, it's fair to say she is a hypocrite for making a career off a exaggerated "urban" accent while saying she won't do stereotypical Asian accents, because it's a poorly phrased statement at best.....but don't reject that point she is making about Asian-Americans being expected to be cast in roles doing stereotypical heavy Asian accents. How many roles do you think that racist ass Hollywood is asking her to do sending her scripts to her door where she doesn't have an "Asian accent" but is asked to do one for the one token Asian role in a movie? Just saying. Being a PoC doesn't give someone an excuse to not be respectful of black culture when clearly taking from it at all, period, but I think there are more issues at play here that are also being glossed over by people who are ignorant or not sensitive to the Asian-America experience, and I'd never thought I'd be typing up something even tangentially defending Awkwafina, especially in regards to her cringeworthy "urban" characters.
And people are still repeating the same bullshit going into page fucking 10.
You''re creating this giant fucking narrative that people aren't doing. Nobody is dismissing her stance on not wanting to play into Asian stereotypes for comedy. Just calling bullshit that she can say all of that while doing the exact same thing to black culture. And she's rightfully getting called out on that bullshit. This shouldn't require people finger-wagging at us for rightfully being pissed off.
I'm just addressing what I'm seeing, not creating a "giant fucking narrative". Also, my post isn't intended to finger-wag at people being pissed off, trying to turn that back around in a broad stroke aimed at everyone one who is "pissed off". I thought I had made that clear in my post, but given how you responded within a minute after I posted, I assume you didn't read what I wrote and reflexively and defensively responded.
They edited their response well after you posted your manifesto.