Asian Masculinity

My friends always say that I have an obsession with Asian people and their culture.
Ever since I was 10, I was obsessed with Anime and came back from school to watch hours and hours of Dragon Ball Z, Blade, Princess Sarah and Card Captor Sakura.

Maybe it was their lively dubbed voices or the really “princess” clothes that the female characters would wear or the how the heroes would always have stern, emotionless faces filled with ambition and courage.

And then I grew up. I went to high school where my best friend was a “non Asian” who was just as obsessed as I was- except she learnt the Korean language and was going away to college to learn arts there. I spent all my time with her. And then I graduated high school to go to the only University I ever wanted to go to. In my closest circle of friends were the only Chinese and Korean people on campus. My roommate was Chinese too.

Jean, the Korean friend I mentioned before, invited my roommate and I to dinner at an inn that her friend owned. The Korean inn served breakfast, lunch and dinner and lodging where Korean expatriates visiting Doha could come in and feel at home. I had never had Korean cuisine before and I couldn’t wait to know what the un-commercialized, authentic stuff tasted like.

The table was set when we arrived, a stove in the middle of the table with bowls of fish, vegetables, soup and pickle around it. Jean’s friend, “the woman of the house,” invited us to sit down and asked for us to be served. We began to eat once she did. All the servers in the dining room responded to her every command.

The hostess had us for guests but she also had another group of visitors at the table next to ours. Even while spending time with us at dinner, she monitored every movement at the tables- she knew when they needed more rice, more water or when something ran out. Her role as hostess changed to even something more motherly. Growing up I saw this happen when my mother hosted dinners and assumed that whenever I became an adult it would naturally just come to me. If there was any learned gender role that I picked up on as a child, it was this one. It is so part of me that I almost think it is natural that a woman should serve her guests selflessly, allowing her husband to do more of the entertaining.

Sure enough, her husband was sitting at the head of the table, engaging them in a conversation that they seemed to be enjoying. The men talked about business and their investment plans and the places in the world that they have traveled to. It was at this point that I realized that the definition of masculinity had not changed to these men. There was no “hybrid.” These men were tough and manly. They never talked to about their families or their “feelings;” to them masculinity was still traditional and aggressive. I saw this in the faces of my fictional characters in Blade and Dragon Ball Z but I also saw it when the hostess was talking about her husband.

I asked the Korean lady what she though the truest sense of a man is. She said that it was his ability to be strong emotionally. This left no room for any “pansy” feelings or gestures of emotional agony. That was an American concept. A true man is not Johnny Bravo, he is InuYasha or Blade- they right the injustice, save the world, protect their families and beat up the bad guys.

The definition of femininity and masculinity will change over time as different events happen and change our world. So many men like Bruno Mars and the One Direction Boys are so sensitive now, which would have not been acceptable in the past. Maybe the backlash of the traditional and aggressive masculinity is the sprouting up of K-pop bands and such.