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Not Quite Not White: Losing and Finding Race in America
A memoir manifesto about race, immigration and assimilation; how an Indian American woman navigated through her journey into the heart of "not whiteness"
When Sen emigrated from India to the U.S. in 1982 at the age of 12, she was asked to "self-report" her race. Never identifying with a race previously, she rejects her new "not quite white" designation, and spends much of her life attempting to become "white" in the American sense. After her teen years trying to adapt to American culture, including watching General Hospital and The Jeffersons and perfecting recipes with Campbell's soup or Jell-O, Sen is forced to reckon with hard questions: what does it mean to be "white," who is allowed to be white, why does whiteness retain the power of invisibility while other colors are made hypervisible, and how much does whiteness figure into Americanness? Exploring hot-button topics such as passing, cultural appropriation, class inequality, bias within Indian immigrant communities, and code-switching, Sen offers new angles to the debate on race and immigration with emotional honesty, humor, and thoughtful criticism. Sen discovers her eventual acceptance of her "not whiteness" is actually what makes her American, and as a mother of three not white American children, looking at their own possible future, Sen brings the reader of Not Quite Not White to imagine how America might, by the end of the century, end up being defined outside its borders, in a new diaspora.
When Sen emigrated from India to the U.S. in 1982 at the age of 12, she was asked to "self-report" her race. Never identifying with a race previously, she rejects her new "not quite white" designation, and spends much of her life attempting to become "white" in the American sense. After her teen years trying to adapt to American culture, including watching General Hospital and The Jeffersons and perfecting recipes with Campbell's soup or Jell-O, Sen is forced to reckon with hard questions: what does it mean to be "white," who is allowed to be white, why does whiteness retain the power of invisibility while other colors are made hypervisible, and how much does whiteness figure into Americanness? Exploring hot-button topics such as passing, cultural appropriation, class inequality, bias within Indian immigrant communities, and code-switching, Sen offers new angles to the debate on race and immigration with emotional honesty, humor, and thoughtful criticism. Sen discovers her eventual acceptance of her "not whiteness" is actually what makes her American, and as a mother of three not white American children, looking at their own possible future, Sen brings the reader of Not Quite Not White to imagine how America might, by the end of the century, end up being defined outside its borders, in a new diaspora.
224 pages, Paperback
First published August 28, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 97 reviews
August 10, 2021
As a Bostonian, a light-skinned Middle Eastern American, a grandchild (and great-grandchild) of immigrants, someone who had to “tell [my] teacher the correct way to pronounce [my] name at the beginning of each school year,” and as someone who was “once ashamed to call [my] parents Mama and Baba” who later “outgrew [that] shame,” SO MUCH of this book resonated with me.
Additionally, it was very cool to read a narrative in the town it took place in.
Notable quotations on pages XII, 147 and 175 (if I remember, I’ll type them out later).
Too bad the only Armenian reference in the book was the owner of the business where the author’s father was bullied! Unfortunate but accurate snapshot of the way many American Armenians have used our liminal whiteness to contribute to White Supremacy rather than fight against it.
I also very much enjoyed the Latin/Classics references, because they reminded me of the way which many of us who come from non-Western histories often know Western culture better than our white peers! More to unpack there.
Definitely a book I’ll revisit.
Additionally, it was very cool to read a narrative in the town it took place in.
Notable quotations on pages XII, 147 and 175 (if I remember, I’ll type them out later).
Too bad the only Armenian reference in the book was the owner of the business where the author’s father was bullied! Unfortunate but accurate snapshot of the way many American Armenians have used our liminal whiteness to contribute to White Supremacy rather than fight against it.
I also very much enjoyed the Latin/Classics references, because they reminded me of the way which many of us who come from non-Western histories often know Western culture better than our white peers! More to unpack there.
Definitely a book I’ll revisit.
June 8, 2018
In this memoir, Sharmila Sen uses her experience of immigrating from India to the U.S. to explore notions of race and whiteness. The strongest part of the book is the last chapter, where she solidifies her argument and broadens the conversation. Prior to the last chapter, it lacks an engaging arc or argument for me. She introduces a lot of interesting ideas, like white men "going native" and American vs. Americanized. However, I wish her perspective had been a little more contextualized and her arguments set up a little more clearly from the beginning.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.
October 29, 2018
A bold and candid 'immigrant manifesto'. Sen arrived the U.S. with her parents from India when she was twelve. Refused to be identified as a FOB, 'fresh off the boat', Sen cast off her Bengali self and immersed in striving to achieve 'whiteness'. She went to public school in Cambridge, Mass, aced it with much hard work and creative ways to learn American English, and was chosen class valedictorian the next year. Entered Harvard after high school, later got her PhD in English literature from Yale, then taught at Harvard.
A 'model immigrant'? Maybe, but Sen discovered the underlying problems with such a term. Through her journey of adaptation and assimilation, she had learned that she would always remain 'Not White', and that no matter how much she tried to transform herself, she would always be 'Not Quite'. The duality of being both an insider and an outsider prescribed her identity, amounting to tormenting contradictions and internal conflicts. Sen's 191-page book is daringly honest, risking accusations of being an 'ungrateful immigrant,' and laying out issues and questions that may be impossible to resolve.
But it's not all arguments, Sen's detailing her childhood years in Bengali and her later adaptation to American life is intimate and revealing. Once in America, the everyday challenges are like waves too strong for one to stay afloat. She had a hard time dealing with the bombardment of questions when she, as a newly arrived immigrant, went with her grade 7 class to see the movie "Gandhi". Here's an excerpt that further extends that conflicting voice as she became an adult:
"I avoided watching movies about India, such as Salaam Bombay!, Slumdog Millionaire, or The Lunchbox, with white Americans. The sincere conversations over a cappuccino or a glass of wine that inevitably following such movies were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. My presence completed the cosmopolitan experience for my white friends and reassured them of their own open-mindedness, generosity of spirit, liberal politics, and cultural superiority. And my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all."
In light of recent tragic events of racially-driven extreme violence and unreined expressions of hatred, it's crucial that we try to listen, if only just to make an effort to understand one person. And Sen is a most apt voice in articulating one immigrant's personal journey and the challenges she faces now that she's a mother raising the next generation.
A 'model immigrant'? Maybe, but Sen discovered the underlying problems with such a term. Through her journey of adaptation and assimilation, she had learned that she would always remain 'Not White', and that no matter how much she tried to transform herself, she would always be 'Not Quite'. The duality of being both an insider and an outsider prescribed her identity, amounting to tormenting contradictions and internal conflicts. Sen's 191-page book is daringly honest, risking accusations of being an 'ungrateful immigrant,' and laying out issues and questions that may be impossible to resolve.
But it's not all arguments, Sen's detailing her childhood years in Bengali and her later adaptation to American life is intimate and revealing. Once in America, the everyday challenges are like waves too strong for one to stay afloat. She had a hard time dealing with the bombardment of questions when she, as a newly arrived immigrant, went with her grade 7 class to see the movie "Gandhi". Here's an excerpt that further extends that conflicting voice as she became an adult:
"I avoided watching movies about India, such as Salaam Bombay!, Slumdog Millionaire, or The Lunchbox, with white Americans. The sincere conversations over a cappuccino or a glass of wine that inevitably following such movies were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. My presence completed the cosmopolitan experience for my white friends and reassured them of their own open-mindedness, generosity of spirit, liberal politics, and cultural superiority. And my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all."
In light of recent tragic events of racially-driven extreme violence and unreined expressions of hatred, it's crucial that we try to listen, if only just to make an effort to understand one person. And Sen is a most apt voice in articulating one immigrant's personal journey and the challenges she faces now that she's a mother raising the next generation.
June 26, 2021
5 stars
This brilliant part memoir part manifesto follows Sharmilla as she goes from being part of the majority religious ethnic group to a minority in the USA. What follows is 200 pages of what it means to be an immigrant, what it means to assimilate and the difference between a POC and "Not White". Highly recommend this to everyone.
I could write a review. But these quotes say more than I ever could.
Why do blackface and brownface bother me? Because I have been wearing whiteface for so long. (xii)
... I have spent many decades carefully arranging my words, my gestures, my clothes, and my surroundings so that I do not appear threatening, unnatural, or ungrateful. (xv-xvi)
I did not want to be perceived as the ungrateful immigrant who does not pass her naturalization examination, the unnatural woman who is never promoted at work or paid a salary equal to that of her white male counterparts. (xvi)
I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something new, something to be tried on for size, something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something. (xxvi)
A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag. (24)
Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color. When I first came to the United States and suddenly became a minority, I felt the weight of a peculiar kind of visibility. Now I could not shake my awareness of the constant expenditure of energy required in everyday life when social privilege is taken away. (145-146)
I avoided watching movies about India ... with white Americans. The sincere conversations ... were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play the native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. ... my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all. (159)
Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. (173)
Asian was a geographic term when I lived in Asia. In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness. (177)
Find me on: instagram
This brilliant part memoir part manifesto follows Sharmilla as she goes from being part of the majority religious ethnic group to a minority in the USA. What follows is 200 pages of what it means to be an immigrant, what it means to assimilate and the difference between a POC and "Not White". Highly recommend this to everyone.
I could write a review. But these quotes say more than I ever could.
Why do blackface and brownface bother me? Because I have been wearing whiteface for so long. (xii)
... I have spent many decades carefully arranging my words, my gestures, my clothes, and my surroundings so that I do not appear threatening, unnatural, or ungrateful. (xv-xvi)
I did not want to be perceived as the ungrateful immigrant who does not pass her naturalization examination, the unnatural woman who is never promoted at work or paid a salary equal to that of her white male counterparts. (xvi)
I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something new, something to be tried on for size, something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something. (xxvi)
A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag. (24)
Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color. When I first came to the United States and suddenly became a minority, I felt the weight of a peculiar kind of visibility. Now I could not shake my awareness of the constant expenditure of energy required in everyday life when social privilege is taken away. (145-146)
I avoided watching movies about India ... with white Americans. The sincere conversations ... were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play the native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. ... my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all. (159)
Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. (173)
Asian was a geographic term when I lived in Asia. In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness. (177)
Find me on: instagram
May 30, 2021
“Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color.”
In this book, Sen writes about her experience as an emigrant from Calcutta. A unique and clever look at race, privilege, and whiteness.
I really loved the beginning of this memoir. During the middle chapters, I thought her arguments weren't quite as focused, or engaging. The last chapter was my favorite of the entire book - incredibly well-written.
In this book, Sen writes about her experience as an emigrant from Calcutta. A unique and clever look at race, privilege, and whiteness.
I really loved the beginning of this memoir. During the middle chapters, I thought her arguments weren't quite as focused, or engaging. The last chapter was my favorite of the entire book - incredibly well-written.
April 16, 2020
HIGHLY recommended
This memoir/manifesto about race identity and immigration is so good, and I'm so glad I read it. The author's story is incredibly interesting because when she immigrated at the age of 12, she went from being part of the dominant culture in India to being a minority in the United States, and she had to learn about race as part of her assimilation process. There is a lot in this slim volume about the author's growing up in India, and it's really helpful context for how she then took in the complicated dynamics of suddenly being Asian in America. She talks about the model minority fallacy and what wearing whiteface meant to her on a daily basis. I put it up there with So You Want to Talk About Race, I'm Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, and White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism as a recommended book in this topic. You should definitely read this book.
---
Why do blackface and brownface bother me? Because I have been wearing whiteface for so long. (xii)
... I have spent many decades carefully arranging my words, my gestures, my clothes, and my surroundings so that I do not appear threatening, unnatural, or ungrateful. (xv-xvi)
I did not want to be perceived as the ungrateful immigrant who does not pass her naturalization examination, the unnatural woman who is never promoted at work or paid a salary equal to that of her white mail counterparts. (xvi)
I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something new, something to be tried on for size, something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something. (xxvi)
A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag. (24)
Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color. When I first came to the United States and suddenly became a minority, I felt the weight of a peculiar kind of visibility. Now I could not shake my awareness of the constant expenditure of energy required in everyday life when social privilege is taken away. (145-146)
I avoided watching movies about India ... with white Americans. The sincere conversations ... were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play the native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. ... my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all. (159)
Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. (173)
Asian was a geographic term when I lived in Asia. In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness. (177)
This memoir/manifesto about race identity and immigration is so good, and I'm so glad I read it. The author's story is incredibly interesting because when she immigrated at the age of 12, she went from being part of the dominant culture in India to being a minority in the United States, and she had to learn about race as part of her assimilation process. There is a lot in this slim volume about the author's growing up in India, and it's really helpful context for how she then took in the complicated dynamics of suddenly being Asian in America. She talks about the model minority fallacy and what wearing whiteface meant to her on a daily basis. I put it up there with So You Want to Talk About Race, I'm Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness, and White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism as a recommended book in this topic. You should definitely read this book.
---
Why do blackface and brownface bother me? Because I have been wearing whiteface for so long. (xii)
... I have spent many decades carefully arranging my words, my gestures, my clothes, and my surroundings so that I do not appear threatening, unnatural, or ungrateful. (xv-xvi)
I did not want to be perceived as the ungrateful immigrant who does not pass her naturalization examination, the unnatural woman who is never promoted at work or paid a salary equal to that of her white mail counterparts. (xvi)
I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something new, something to be tried on for size, something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something. (xxvi)
A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag. (24)
Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color. When I first came to the United States and suddenly became a minority, I felt the weight of a peculiar kind of visibility. Now I could not shake my awareness of the constant expenditure of energy required in everyday life when social privilege is taken away. (145-146)
I avoided watching movies about India ... with white Americans. The sincere conversations ... were dreadful for me. I was expected to discuss human rights, the poverty of slums, the plight of untouchables, child marriage, and widow burning. I had to play the native informant, as well as the assimilated immigrant. ... my cheeks hurt from smiling through it all. (159)
Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. (173)
Asian was a geographic term when I lived in Asia. In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness. (177)
May 24, 2022
This was a powerful memoir by an Indian woman who emigrated to America in 1982 but ended up an immigrant. She now lives with her husband and three kids in America itself.
I loved everything about this book, from little anecdotes in India to race culture in America. The part I liked the most was how the author didn't try to paint a perfect picture of India or Indians in the book. She gave due importance to casteism in India and compared it to racism. I was in awe upon reading such raw accounts of how India used to be in the late twentieth century.
I quite liked the final "Not white" stance of author as well and not just a word she chose to describe herself but the whole explanation about white being normative. It got me thinking and I realised we never do use "white man" as someone might use "Asian" or "Black" to describe people of different skin colors. And I just loved the concept of "Not White".
5 stars
I loved everything about this book, from little anecdotes in India to race culture in America. The part I liked the most was how the author didn't try to paint a perfect picture of India or Indians in the book. She gave due importance to casteism in India and compared it to racism. I was in awe upon reading such raw accounts of how India used to be in the late twentieth century.
I quite liked the final "Not white" stance of author as well and not just a word she chose to describe herself but the whole explanation about white being normative. It got me thinking and I realised we never do use "white man" as someone might use "Asian" or "Black" to describe people of different skin colors. And I just loved the concept of "Not White".
5 stars
June 13, 2022
3.5 stars.
Described as a memoir manifesto, this book is nothing like I've ever read before. Not so much a memoir as an academic essay with anecdotes peppered throughout. I wanted more of Sen's experiences growing up in Boston, more memoir. But I'm glad I read it.
I did struggle with fully grasping some of the more complex ideas about race and identity she tries to convey. She uses the same quote twice from Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, about duality, and I'm just not sure that I got it. I mean, I got the duality idea overall. Several times, I'd question something, and then think--that's just my gut reaction because I'm white.
Part of what I questioned and struggled with wasn't because I'm white though, I don't think. I know nothing of Boston in the 1980s. I'm upper-middle class from California. Not upper class Boston. I never saw The Economist and The New Yorker and whatever else she lamented that her parents never read in anyone's homes. We read Reader's Digest too. We never ate with the fork in the left hand and the knife in the right (or was it the other way?). I understand needing to learn to appreciate new cuisine, but I guess I don't understand it all the way because I would never force myself to develop a taste for rare steak, nor judge anyone else for preferring it another way, or being vegetarian. And I realize that I can say, "I'd never do that," because I'm white and I've always felt I've belonged and I can't know her experience.
The determination to emulate a very small population of people--when did Sen travel outside that privileged Harvard-and-Yale bubble and realize that the United States is way more varied and diverse and interesting than that? I wanted some of that.
"Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named" (173).
"When a person who is Not White names whiteness, ordinary talk turns into race talk" (174).
"By naming whiteness [identifying as Not White], I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all the other colors" (193).
Described as a memoir manifesto, this book is nothing like I've ever read before. Not so much a memoir as an academic essay with anecdotes peppered throughout. I wanted more of Sen's experiences growing up in Boston, more memoir. But I'm glad I read it.
I did struggle with fully grasping some of the more complex ideas about race and identity she tries to convey. She uses the same quote twice from Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, about duality, and I'm just not sure that I got it. I mean, I got the duality idea overall. Several times, I'd question something, and then think--that's just my gut reaction because I'm white.
Part of what I questioned and struggled with wasn't because I'm white though, I don't think. I know nothing of Boston in the 1980s. I'm upper-middle class from California. Not upper class Boston. I never saw The Economist and The New Yorker and whatever else she lamented that her parents never read in anyone's homes. We read Reader's Digest too. We never ate with the fork in the left hand and the knife in the right (or was it the other way?). I understand needing to learn to appreciate new cuisine, but I guess I don't understand it all the way because I would never force myself to develop a taste for rare steak, nor judge anyone else for preferring it another way, or being vegetarian. And I realize that I can say, "I'd never do that," because I'm white and I've always felt I've belonged and I can't know her experience.
The determination to emulate a very small population of people--when did Sen travel outside that privileged Harvard-and-Yale bubble and realize that the United States is way more varied and diverse and interesting than that? I wanted some of that.
"Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named" (173).
"When a person who is Not White names whiteness, ordinary talk turns into race talk" (174).
"By naming whiteness [identifying as Not White], I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all the other colors" (193).
August 4, 2022
I read Sen's book more as an intellectual biopic rather than a typical non-fictional book about race. It's not a large book, which further helps it to be a reasonably easy read. Sen constantly speaks not only through her knowledge and expertise, but moreover, through her direct personal experience, which makes this a fitting and thought-provoking book everyone should read. If humanity seeks to move forward to a future with more respect, honesty, warmth and kindness, then we need to read and better understand the perspectives of what our immigrants and refugees have gone through and are still going through today.
Not Quite Not White is certainly enlightening, especially the opening chapters. They were such a joy to read; engulfing myself in the shoes of Sen during her growing years in India. I'm a Bengali Indian diaspora myself, never having lived in India aside from family holiday trips, and yet I get this strange comforting feeling of relation and understanding when Sen speaks about obscure and personal aspects about her life in Kolkata as a child. Her descriptive writing of these moments are so vivid and beautiful.
Aside from her biography, she also provides simple guides and outlines e.g. 'Going Native' and 'Becoming an Ex-Indian Women'. Similar to other Bengali writers, such as Arundhuti Roy and Jhumpa Lahiri, she writes elegantly about South Asian class, race, literature and linguistics. Sen does an excellent analysis on the aspect of hypervisibility; how this is a stark side effect describing only a small portion of the difficulties experienced. She also critically mentions about unspoken whispers and words, segregation and racial categories which is interesting to read.
I wonder about Sen's use of the phrase 'whiteness' and 'Whiteface', as well as a few others. How often do we refer 'whiteness' as 'whiteness' nowadays? Within just a few years since the publication of this book, I feel the world has made small but drastic steps in the right direction to how e.g. immigrants, languages, and skin colour is perceived. How much has changed, and yet at the same time, how little. We've still got a long way to go.
Very often, spread out in random bursts throughout the book, Sen does repeat herself; her feelings and message. This is obviously important, but also a little bit of a drag at times which disrupts the flow of the book.
When I read this book it's always both a fascination, and also a returning sad realisation of what ethnic minorities, immigrants and diaspora alike, are going through in Western countries, what they've always had to painfully go through. The whole book reads almost like a soft rant, but an honest and very important one at that. In fact, it could well be called "Confessions of an Asian immigrant in America', but at the same time, it's much more than that. She continues, back and forth, repeating lines through different contexts, confessing her feelings as mere statements with no conclusion or solution to the inevitable and forcefully adaptive nature of an immigrant, but by the last chapter she finally comes to a conclusion of acceptance, speaking of her children and her children’s children.
Many quotes from this book have stayed with me, some I hope to further ponder on and share with others. Some are listed below:
. "Privilege is a peculiar possession... When I first came to the United States I felt a peculiar kind of visibility."
. "Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named."
. "In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness."
. "Whiteness meant distancing myself from my Indianness whilst never being fully tethered from it. Whiteface meant being Not Quite White, Not Quite Indian, Not Quite Black, Not Quite Asian. It pleased the Indian immigrants with aspirations of making it and leaving behind a world that stank of curry. It pleased middle class whites who glimpsed at my newfound tastes and habits buttressing of their many convictions."
. "The American-born child gives birth to the foreign-born parent."
Not Quite Not White is certainly enlightening, especially the opening chapters. They were such a joy to read; engulfing myself in the shoes of Sen during her growing years in India. I'm a Bengali Indian diaspora myself, never having lived in India aside from family holiday trips, and yet I get this strange comforting feeling of relation and understanding when Sen speaks about obscure and personal aspects about her life in Kolkata as a child. Her descriptive writing of these moments are so vivid and beautiful.
Aside from her biography, she also provides simple guides and outlines e.g. 'Going Native' and 'Becoming an Ex-Indian Women'. Similar to other Bengali writers, such as Arundhuti Roy and Jhumpa Lahiri, she writes elegantly about South Asian class, race, literature and linguistics. Sen does an excellent analysis on the aspect of hypervisibility; how this is a stark side effect describing only a small portion of the difficulties experienced. She also critically mentions about unspoken whispers and words, segregation and racial categories which is interesting to read.
I wonder about Sen's use of the phrase 'whiteness' and 'Whiteface', as well as a few others. How often do we refer 'whiteness' as 'whiteness' nowadays? Within just a few years since the publication of this book, I feel the world has made small but drastic steps in the right direction to how e.g. immigrants, languages, and skin colour is perceived. How much has changed, and yet at the same time, how little. We've still got a long way to go.
Very often, spread out in random bursts throughout the book, Sen does repeat herself; her feelings and message. This is obviously important, but also a little bit of a drag at times which disrupts the flow of the book.
When I read this book it's always both a fascination, and also a returning sad realisation of what ethnic minorities, immigrants and diaspora alike, are going through in Western countries, what they've always had to painfully go through. The whole book reads almost like a soft rant, but an honest and very important one at that. In fact, it could well be called "Confessions of an Asian immigrant in America', but at the same time, it's much more than that. She continues, back and forth, repeating lines through different contexts, confessing her feelings as mere statements with no conclusion or solution to the inevitable and forcefully adaptive nature of an immigrant, but by the last chapter she finally comes to a conclusion of acceptance, speaking of her children and her children’s children.
Many quotes from this book have stayed with me, some I hope to further ponder on and share with others. Some are listed below:
. "Privilege is a peculiar possession... When I first came to the United States I felt a peculiar kind of visibility."
. "Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named."
. "In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category. No one can call themselves a person of color without implicitly seeing their color against a backdrop of whiteness."
. "Whiteness meant distancing myself from my Indianness whilst never being fully tethered from it. Whiteface meant being Not Quite White, Not Quite Indian, Not Quite Black, Not Quite Asian. It pleased the Indian immigrants with aspirations of making it and leaving behind a world that stank of curry. It pleased middle class whites who glimpsed at my newfound tastes and habits buttressing of their many convictions."
. "The American-born child gives birth to the foreign-born parent."
July 19, 2020
This book really hit home. Sen's descriptions of the particularities and angst of being Not Quite Not White are sharp and astute, and compelled me to reconsider and reframe some of the experiences I've had growing up Indo-Canadian. Her argument resonates, and her theory about middle class attitudes in Indian society as predicated not on superiority but a deep-seated fear of sliding downwards, into the slums, is interesting. However, as someone who identifies more closely with being a second-generation immigrant than first, her claim on the label "Not White" instead of "person of colour" is uncomfortable. Growing up, embracing diversity and difference has been at the core of the Canadian cultural narrative, and defining onself in relation to whiteness, albeit the unspoken dominant culture, feels antithetical.
Then again, that discomfort and the belligerence in refusing to conform to the model minority ethos, is exactly Sen's point.
Then again, that discomfort and the belligerence in refusing to conform to the model minority ethos, is exactly Sen's point.
August 3, 2024
Clever, insightful, beautifully written–a crucial & wonderfully hybrid text
August 8, 2021
More memoir than manifesto. Could have been a lot shorter. One star for mentioning Frantz Fanon, one more for spelling it right. That’s how far my standards have fallen.
March 31, 2019
From the evocative memories of her genteel, bhadralok childhood in Calcutta, to each stage of navigating the model immigrant experience in the USA of the ‘80s, this is an insightful and moving memoir of a journey of discovery of self as much as culture and race.
April 11, 2021
"Why do we only celebrate immigration as an arrival? Emigration is never really contemplated or made a subject in school. I suppose that is the privilege of rich nations-their children are never taught that one day they too might have to go learn a new language, eat new food, become a foreigner somewhere. Should we only teach our children to welcome strangers among us? Or should we also teach them that one day they too might be strangers in a strange land-pushed around the globe by forces of economics, politics, or nature?"
"The immigrant's story is often written by the second or third generation in America. The American-born child gives birth to the foreign-born parent. Elesewhere is assimilated into the here. The foreign plot is domesticated into the national mythology. Those of the first generation are often too tired, too afraid, too new to English to write their own story. They are busy being good immigrants. When I stopped smiling like a good immigrant, I risked becoming a bad American, an ungrateful immigrant-an angry brown woman. The smile was my road to becoming American. I did not know I would find anger at the end of the journey."
"We were making a historic leap from one continent to another, yet we were an extremely risk-averse family. Many immigrants carry these twin traits within themselves and some even pass them on to the next generation. As risk takers we leap far from the safety of home. Having left the comforts of home we know all too well that there is no safety net of kinship or citizenship to catch us should we topple. This makes us cautious. We check the lock on the door three times before going out. We save more than we spend. We collect sugar and ketchuo packets from McDonald's and cannot throw anything away. At work, we beat every deadline in the office and never pass up a second gig to make extra money. We tell our children to keep their heads down, study hard, and always look for a bargain. As risk-averse immigrants, we do not rock the boat."
"Anger is the useless emotion of people with grievances. Civilized people, superior people, capable people manage anger through reason, televised town hall meetings, logic gates, strategic planning, branding exercises, op-eds, and fireside chats with tea and sherry."
"I envy Colonel Redfern and Jimmy Porter-white men can openly rage against everything changing and against nothing changing. I envy them, for their rage is not arrested."
"I am angry at myself for feigning ignorance, hiding my accomplishments, softening the sharp edges of my arguments, pretending to lack conviction, throwing the game so I can remain the token minority who brings pleasant diversity to a white workplace."
"The uniquely American concept of race that I inherited upon arrival was shaped by two symmetrical genres of early American writing-the captivity narrative and the slave narrative. Both genres racialize religion and religionize race. In the past couple of decades another type of race narrative has appeared on the horizon-the clash of civilizations theory. This theory has made explicit the implicit intertwining of race and religion in the West since the Protestant Reformation. If you listen closely to American race talk today, you will hear the echoes of the old slave narratives and captivity narratives; and you will also discern shades of the idea that Islan and Christianity, much like the Rebel Alliance and the Galactic Empire, are locked in perpetual enmity."
"What happens when race is not inherited at birth, but acquired, even chosen, later in life? What happens when you get race after you arrive as an immigrant to the United States? Throughout this book I will use the odd formulation of getting race because I want to show you how I once perceived race as an alien object, a thing outside myself, a disease. I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something."
"Every society invents ways of partitioning themselves and methods of reading the hidden signs displayed by those who wish to cheat the rules."
"Small differences will always prove to be more divisive than the big ones, just as little traditions have more adhesive power than the great ones."
"A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag."
"It is a wonderful thing that living languages can continually absorb new entrants and not impose visa restrictions on them."
"The greatest division in a society is one that makes an entire group of humans simply invisible to us."
"One would be forgiven for thinking that human beings change abruptly when we cross an imaginary line on the ground, the line we call national borders. Languages, religions, tastes, beliefs, hair color, skin color, and even the shapes of bodies change when we cross borders. Except they do not."
"Immigrants are supposed to be delighted when they arrive in America-huddled masses who have reached their final destination."
"Immigration routes are patterned on kinship networks. Brothers follow brothers. Children follow parents. Grandparents follow grandchildren. Through marriage these networks become ever more expansive and intricate. A new bride follows a husband. A few years later her mother might follow. Then her brother and his wife. Entire districts from certain parts of the world might find themselves in a small American town as families follow one another across well-established migratory paths."
"Even though I had no say at all in my family's decision to emigrate, I felt my shoulders weighed down with the plenitude of the host country. This plenitude of which I was to be the grateful recipient was evidence that white people were superior to people like me. How else could one nation be so wealthy and another be so poor; one country have so much to give and another stand in a queue to receive? The inequality of nations was surely a sign that some races were morally, physically, and intellectually superior to others. The inequality of nations surely had nothing to do with man, but was shaped by Providence."
"Americanization to me is a New World phenomenon-a [henomenon of the Americas. Americanization is something far more profound than simple assimilation into the dominant culture of the United States. It is a process of creolization. The English creole, the Spanish criollo, the French creole, the Portuguese -all these words have a common root in the Latin creare, to produce or create. The creole is born in the New World. Even more expansively, we can say that the creole is created in the New World. In this sense, all immigrants are creole. Indeed, all of the Americas is creole. The creole is the most valuable thing made in America."
"For one the sense of belonging in the New World is rooted in the triumph of arrival. For another the sense of belonging in the New World is rooted in the tragedy of enslavement. These are two threads of world history, two threads of racial memory, two ways of looking at how we came to be here."
"When people move they inevitably bring certain things with them, leave a few things behind, and acquire new possessions."
"While being wholly ignorant of the religious history of America, I was beginning to sense that there were hierarchies among white Christians. It felt like sitting down at someone else's family dinner table midway through a meal. Old quarrels echoed in the polite tinkling of silverware as everyone ate in silence."
"My palate was unaccustomed to something as exotic as a bowl of raw lettuce drizzled with a pungent, unctuous liquid."
"White men who went native were almost always able to the return to their white identity. Going Native is a type of drag. The pleasure of seeing a white man dressed as an Arab or an Indian springs from our awareness of his whiteness underneath the brownface, just as we can imagine male genitalia beneath female dress when we relish the performance of a drag queen. White Europeans who went native did not try to hide their whiteness completely. They flaunted their camouflage. They stood out precisely because they took such great pride in blending in."
"If I were to go native in America, I had to figure out two things first: Which native was to be emulated? And who was my audience? No performance is complete without an audience. In order to research my role, I had to identify my audience. I had to understand which plotlines were legible to those who would read my body and my actions."
"India was part of the continent of Asia. I was born in India. Therefore, I must be Asian. Not Quite. In the United States, "Asian" was a code word for Chinese during the early 1980s. There was barely enough room for Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese, or Filipinos to be included within this label. The Sinosphere loomed large in the mainstream imagination as the only way of understanding who was Asian. My Asianness was measured by my proximity to Chinese culture by the dominant white culture of the United States. It was a test of Asianness unlike any I had anticipated when I lived in an Asian city facing the Bay of Bengal."
"As aspirational immigrants we aimed for a higher rung, desperate to impress the dominant culture with our work ethic, family values, and the antiquity of our culture. Emigration itself is risky enough. Having embraced one kind of risk, the immigrant needs to assess all other risks judiciously. The black figure, etched against the backdrop of white respectability and normalcy, stands for preposterous risks-economic, political, moral-from which the new immigrant, regardless of the exact shade of her skin, tries to inch away."
"Once you see the American racial hierarchy through the newly arrived migrant's eyes, you will understand why Toni Morrison once wrote that the road to becoming American is built on the backs of blacks."
"As immigrants we were in a rush to fit in with the new country to the best of our ability. We did not wish to stand out, call attention to ourselves. The natives of the new country, especially the white ones, were rushing all over the world meanwhile, searching for the most authentic sashimi, for the truest sole meuniere, for the most virginal of olive oils. Which natives were we supposed to emulate? Anti-black bias compelled us to differentiate ourselves from Americans for darker hues. Anti-chinese bias made us hesitate to enter the big tent of Asian America. And in our attempt to go native, we turned a blind eye to other natives-the other Indians-who had been brutally pushed aside as part of the conquest of the wilderness."
"Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color."
"Immigrants are supposed to abandon themselves to the energetic whirl of American culture. Those who do not embrace their host country, who do not learn the language, adopt the values, or fly the flag, were considered as problemtic thirty years ago as they are today. Failure to assimilate can lead to accusations of ingratitude, incompetence, or, worse, infidelity to the host nation."
"The newly arrived immigrant, meanwhile, could only move between two places-sending country and receiving country, my alpha and my omega. In graduate school, none of what I knew during the first twelve years of my life in Calcutta counted as knowledge. Trying to get ahead by increasing my knowledge of the West was like trying to earn a living by gambling in a casino. The house always won."
"Language is no empty vessel. It carries stories, events, emotions from times past. Language always overdelivers. It outstripes its promise."
"Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. In the United States, there is no need to name the male, the white, the Protestant because these are attributes of the normative. And when we who are not male, white, or Protestant choose to name these things, we risk sounding like people with grievances-angry, shrill, dangerous."
"When a person whi is Not White names whiteness, ordinary talk turns into race talk. Black, brown, yellow-when we use these colors are descriptors of people, of ideas, of culture we are shining our light on something that is kept hidden in plain sight. These colors-the people associated with these colors and their actions-are always under scrutiny, in a perpetual state of being vetted."
"The immigrant's story is often written by the second or third generation in America. The American-born child gives birth to the foreign-born parent. Elesewhere is assimilated into the here. The foreign plot is domesticated into the national mythology. Those of the first generation are often too tired, too afraid, too new to English to write their own story. They are busy being good immigrants. When I stopped smiling like a good immigrant, I risked becoming a bad American, an ungrateful immigrant-an angry brown woman. The smile was my road to becoming American. I did not know I would find anger at the end of the journey."
"We were making a historic leap from one continent to another, yet we were an extremely risk-averse family. Many immigrants carry these twin traits within themselves and some even pass them on to the next generation. As risk takers we leap far from the safety of home. Having left the comforts of home we know all too well that there is no safety net of kinship or citizenship to catch us should we topple. This makes us cautious. We check the lock on the door three times before going out. We save more than we spend. We collect sugar and ketchuo packets from McDonald's and cannot throw anything away. At work, we beat every deadline in the office and never pass up a second gig to make extra money. We tell our children to keep their heads down, study hard, and always look for a bargain. As risk-averse immigrants, we do not rock the boat."
"Anger is the useless emotion of people with grievances. Civilized people, superior people, capable people manage anger through reason, televised town hall meetings, logic gates, strategic planning, branding exercises, op-eds, and fireside chats with tea and sherry."
"I envy Colonel Redfern and Jimmy Porter-white men can openly rage against everything changing and against nothing changing. I envy them, for their rage is not arrested."
"I am angry at myself for feigning ignorance, hiding my accomplishments, softening the sharp edges of my arguments, pretending to lack conviction, throwing the game so I can remain the token minority who brings pleasant diversity to a white workplace."
"The uniquely American concept of race that I inherited upon arrival was shaped by two symmetrical genres of early American writing-the captivity narrative and the slave narrative. Both genres racialize religion and religionize race. In the past couple of decades another type of race narrative has appeared on the horizon-the clash of civilizations theory. This theory has made explicit the implicit intertwining of race and religion in the West since the Protestant Reformation. If you listen closely to American race talk today, you will hear the echoes of the old slave narratives and captivity narratives; and you will also discern shades of the idea that Islan and Christianity, much like the Rebel Alliance and the Galactic Empire, are locked in perpetual enmity."
"What happens when race is not inherited at birth, but acquired, even chosen, later in life? What happens when you get race after you arrive as an immigrant to the United States? Throughout this book I will use the odd formulation of getting race because I want to show you how I once perceived race as an alien object, a thing outside myself, a disease. I got race the way people get chicken pox. I also got race as one gets a pair of shoes or a cell phone. It was something to be used to communicate with others. In another register, I finally got race, in the idiomatic American sense of fully comprehending something."
"Every society invents ways of partitioning themselves and methods of reading the hidden signs displayed by those who wish to cheat the rules."
"Small differences will always prove to be more divisive than the big ones, just as little traditions have more adhesive power than the great ones."
"A truly dominant group is unthreatened by minority cultures as long as they can be domesticated, consumed, transformed into an accessory, a condiment, a bit of swag."
"It is a wonderful thing that living languages can continually absorb new entrants and not impose visa restrictions on them."
"The greatest division in a society is one that makes an entire group of humans simply invisible to us."
"One would be forgiven for thinking that human beings change abruptly when we cross an imaginary line on the ground, the line we call national borders. Languages, religions, tastes, beliefs, hair color, skin color, and even the shapes of bodies change when we cross borders. Except they do not."
"Immigrants are supposed to be delighted when they arrive in America-huddled masses who have reached their final destination."
"Immigration routes are patterned on kinship networks. Brothers follow brothers. Children follow parents. Grandparents follow grandchildren. Through marriage these networks become ever more expansive and intricate. A new bride follows a husband. A few years later her mother might follow. Then her brother and his wife. Entire districts from certain parts of the world might find themselves in a small American town as families follow one another across well-established migratory paths."
"Even though I had no say at all in my family's decision to emigrate, I felt my shoulders weighed down with the plenitude of the host country. This plenitude of which I was to be the grateful recipient was evidence that white people were superior to people like me. How else could one nation be so wealthy and another be so poor; one country have so much to give and another stand in a queue to receive? The inequality of nations was surely a sign that some races were morally, physically, and intellectually superior to others. The inequality of nations surely had nothing to do with man, but was shaped by Providence."
"Americanization to me is a New World phenomenon-a [henomenon of the Americas. Americanization is something far more profound than simple assimilation into the dominant culture of the United States. It is a process of creolization. The English creole, the Spanish criollo, the French creole, the Portuguese -all these words have a common root in the Latin creare, to produce or create. The creole is born in the New World. Even more expansively, we can say that the creole is created in the New World. In this sense, all immigrants are creole. Indeed, all of the Americas is creole. The creole is the most valuable thing made in America."
"For one the sense of belonging in the New World is rooted in the triumph of arrival. For another the sense of belonging in the New World is rooted in the tragedy of enslavement. These are two threads of world history, two threads of racial memory, two ways of looking at how we came to be here."
"When people move they inevitably bring certain things with them, leave a few things behind, and acquire new possessions."
"While being wholly ignorant of the religious history of America, I was beginning to sense that there were hierarchies among white Christians. It felt like sitting down at someone else's family dinner table midway through a meal. Old quarrels echoed in the polite tinkling of silverware as everyone ate in silence."
"My palate was unaccustomed to something as exotic as a bowl of raw lettuce drizzled with a pungent, unctuous liquid."
"White men who went native were almost always able to the return to their white identity. Going Native is a type of drag. The pleasure of seeing a white man dressed as an Arab or an Indian springs from our awareness of his whiteness underneath the brownface, just as we can imagine male genitalia beneath female dress when we relish the performance of a drag queen. White Europeans who went native did not try to hide their whiteness completely. They flaunted their camouflage. They stood out precisely because they took such great pride in blending in."
"If I were to go native in America, I had to figure out two things first: Which native was to be emulated? And who was my audience? No performance is complete without an audience. In order to research my role, I had to identify my audience. I had to understand which plotlines were legible to those who would read my body and my actions."
"India was part of the continent of Asia. I was born in India. Therefore, I must be Asian. Not Quite. In the United States, "Asian" was a code word for Chinese during the early 1980s. There was barely enough room for Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese, or Filipinos to be included within this label. The Sinosphere loomed large in the mainstream imagination as the only way of understanding who was Asian. My Asianness was measured by my proximity to Chinese culture by the dominant white culture of the United States. It was a test of Asianness unlike any I had anticipated when I lived in an Asian city facing the Bay of Bengal."
"As aspirational immigrants we aimed for a higher rung, desperate to impress the dominant culture with our work ethic, family values, and the antiquity of our culture. Emigration itself is risky enough. Having embraced one kind of risk, the immigrant needs to assess all other risks judiciously. The black figure, etched against the backdrop of white respectability and normalcy, stands for preposterous risks-economic, political, moral-from which the new immigrant, regardless of the exact shade of her skin, tries to inch away."
"Once you see the American racial hierarchy through the newly arrived migrant's eyes, you will understand why Toni Morrison once wrote that the road to becoming American is built on the backs of blacks."
"As immigrants we were in a rush to fit in with the new country to the best of our ability. We did not wish to stand out, call attention to ourselves. The natives of the new country, especially the white ones, were rushing all over the world meanwhile, searching for the most authentic sashimi, for the truest sole meuniere, for the most virginal of olive oils. Which natives were we supposed to emulate? Anti-black bias compelled us to differentiate ourselves from Americans for darker hues. Anti-chinese bias made us hesitate to enter the big tent of Asian America. And in our attempt to go native, we turned a blind eye to other natives-the other Indians-who had been brutally pushed aside as part of the conquest of the wilderness."
"Privilege is a peculiar possession. To those who possess it, privilege is weightless, tasteless, odorless, soundless, and colorless. Those who have the least access to it are painfully aware of its mass, density, taste, odor, texture, sound, and color."
"Immigrants are supposed to abandon themselves to the energetic whirl of American culture. Those who do not embrace their host country, who do not learn the language, adopt the values, or fly the flag, were considered as problemtic thirty years ago as they are today. Failure to assimilate can lead to accusations of ingratitude, incompetence, or, worse, infidelity to the host nation."
"The newly arrived immigrant, meanwhile, could only move between two places-sending country and receiving country, my alpha and my omega. In graduate school, none of what I knew during the first twelve years of my life in Calcutta counted as knowledge. Trying to get ahead by increasing my knowledge of the West was like trying to earn a living by gambling in a casino. The house always won."
"Language is no empty vessel. It carries stories, events, emotions from times past. Language always overdelivers. It outstripes its promise."
"Having been a young immigrant, I already knew that real power lies in being so dominant that you need not be named. The normal needs no name, no special qualifier. In the United States, there is no need to name the male, the white, the Protestant because these are attributes of the normative. And when we who are not male, white, or Protestant choose to name these things, we risk sounding like people with grievances-angry, shrill, dangerous."
"When a person whi is Not White names whiteness, ordinary talk turns into race talk. Black, brown, yellow-when we use these colors are descriptors of people, of ideas, of culture we are shining our light on something that is kept hidden in plain sight. These colors-the people associated with these colors and their actions-are always under scrutiny, in a perpetual state of being vetted."
May 3, 2018
Sen narrates her journey from a very privileged life in India to that of a minority immigrant in Massachusetts. From the age of 12, race becomes a part of her life as she struggles to navigate the confusing journey to “becoming an American” with her foreign accent betraying her light skin. Not Quite, Not White is part personal history and part academic treatise, and while I wish it were a bit less academic, that doesn't diminish the importance of what Sen has to say.
A highlight is the section in which Sen talks about how male British travelers and explorers have historically “gone native” by appropriating the dress / culture of places like India, the Middle East, etc., and how these men derived power from the fact that they weren't actually “not white.” Sen casts “going native” as something that only white men can do, as they can slip back into their original privilege whenever convenient.
Overall, I really appreciated how thought-provoking this book was.
A highlight is the section in which Sen talks about how male British travelers and explorers have historically “gone native” by appropriating the dress / culture of places like India, the Middle East, etc., and how these men derived power from the fact that they weren't actually “not white.” Sen casts “going native” as something that only white men can do, as they can slip back into their original privilege whenever convenient.
Overall, I really appreciated how thought-provoking this book was.
January 21, 2019
This was an enjoyable, interesting, and quick read. I loved the parts of her story based in Calcutta. I felt transported by her multi sensory descriptions of this part of her experience. Her assimilation references were a trip down memory lane for me, and it’s interesting to consider those pop culture experiences from a child’s anthropological point of view. I loved that she used Good Times, The Waltons, Three’s Company and Dynasty to make sense of her new country. The author is very honest about the racism she came to this country with and the racism she learned here, which deepened the reader’s understanding of how she came to understand her own experience both as Bengali and as an American.
September 29, 2018
This was a fascinating book to me. I cannot pretend that I know what being an immigrant is like or someone who isn’t white. This book opens a window into that world.
There are a lot of parallels between Indian caste and American race, but it was interesting to learn that race isn’t something that really exists in India. Having grown up in the U.S., I had never thought of India being in Asia, but of course it is.
A thought provoking book.
There are a lot of parallels between Indian caste and American race, but it was interesting to learn that race isn’t something that really exists in India. Having grown up in the U.S., I had never thought of India being in Asia, but of course it is.
A thought provoking book.
August 27, 2019
Sharmila Sen's personal account of her discovery of race (and commitment to recognizing herself not as a POC, but as Not White) as a first-gen immigrant to the US. She takes us from her Bengali childhood through her American studenthood to her Not White parenthood, sharply observing the role of racial assignment. It's a little unfocused here and there, but overall a bright South Asian addition to a mostly binary racial dialogue.
June 28, 2023
This book should be widely read and discussed in conversations about race. Sharmila Sen emigrated from Kolkata, India in 1982 to Boston leaving behind her friends, extended family and her middle class way of life. Her parents came to this country for better opportunities, homo economicus. As a 12 year old child, newly arrived in America, Sen tried her best to change her accent, eat American food, adopt American ways to assimilate to the dominant culture - the white culture. Her jaw ached from the smile that she kept plastered on her face. She acted in ways that did not call attention to her behavior and stayed silent so her words would not cause a stir. For the first time in her young life, she was a minority.
She writes about the many inequities that she observed in India but one thing that she acquired in this country 'like chicken pox' was race. Race was not something that she was aware of in India and here every form that she filled out required her to indicate which race she belonged to. Part memoir, part historical account about immigration from Asian countries after 1965 and part exploration of what it means to be Americanized, this brilliant book is a must read to understand race relations.
There are so many quotable lines in this book that I wanted to write down and it also evoked such memories of my own growing up in Kolkata at the same time as the author. Her experiences mirrored mine deeply. I also grew up looking but not seeing the domestic help who swept my house, staying away from the children who lived in slums so as not to be influenced by them, being afraid of kidnappers and holding my mother's hand tightly when we went out in crowd...
Sen talks about whiteness being the norm, nobody talks about the dominant race or religion. Only people of color are called by the color of their skin, only the minority religion is named. For example, the 44th president was the first Black president. Nobody called the presidents before him white presidents because that was the norm. This is what Sen says about calling herself Non White instead of person of color. "Within the heart of Not Whiteness lies the power to name whiteness. By naming whiteness, I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all other colors. I contain it and domesticate it before it can contain and domesticate me and my children. I refuse to grant it the magic power of invisibility. I make it less free to move about without being stopped and frisked, without passports and visas. By naming whiteness, I do not allow it to lay sole claim to all that we choose to call American." (P.190, 191)
She writes about the many inequities that she observed in India but one thing that she acquired in this country 'like chicken pox' was race. Race was not something that she was aware of in India and here every form that she filled out required her to indicate which race she belonged to. Part memoir, part historical account about immigration from Asian countries after 1965 and part exploration of what it means to be Americanized, this brilliant book is a must read to understand race relations.
There are so many quotable lines in this book that I wanted to write down and it also evoked such memories of my own growing up in Kolkata at the same time as the author. Her experiences mirrored mine deeply. I also grew up looking but not seeing the domestic help who swept my house, staying away from the children who lived in slums so as not to be influenced by them, being afraid of kidnappers and holding my mother's hand tightly when we went out in crowd...
Sen talks about whiteness being the norm, nobody talks about the dominant race or religion. Only people of color are called by the color of their skin, only the minority religion is named. For example, the 44th president was the first Black president. Nobody called the presidents before him white presidents because that was the norm. This is what Sen says about calling herself Non White instead of person of color. "Within the heart of Not Whiteness lies the power to name whiteness. By naming whiteness, I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all other colors. I contain it and domesticate it before it can contain and domesticate me and my children. I refuse to grant it the magic power of invisibility. I make it less free to move about without being stopped and frisked, without passports and visas. By naming whiteness, I do not allow it to lay sole claim to all that we choose to call American." (P.190, 191)
July 25, 2023
In "Not Quite, Not White," author Sharmila Sen takes readers on a deeply personal and insightful journey into the complexities of her identity and the broader landscape of race and ethnicity in America. Born in India and raised in the United States, Sen grapples with the notion of belonging in a world that often categorizes people into neat racial boxes.
The book is a thought-provoking blend of memoir, cultural analysis, and social commentary. Sen fearlessly delves into her experiences as a person of color, highlighting the struggles she faced growing up in predominantly white communities while also being seen as an outsider within her Indian heritage. She opens up about the sense of alienation she felt, trying to find her place in a society that demanded clear-cut racial identities.
Through her poignant and candid storytelling, Sen expertly navigates through complex subjects like colorism, cultural appropriation, and how society imposes narrow definitions of race and assimilation. She challenges the concept of "whiteness" and explores how being "not quite, not white" shaped her understanding of identity, heritage, and the pursuit of acceptance.
What makes "Not Quite, Not White" exceptional is Sen's ability to interweave her narrative with broader historical and sociopolitical contexts. The book delves into America's racial landscape, examining the intricate interactions between different ethnic groups and their struggles for acceptance. Sen's analysis is both enlightening and accessible, offering readers a fresh perspective on race relations and identity in the United States.
While tackling severe issues, the book is infused with humor and warmth, making it a compelling and enjoyable read. Sen's prose is engaging and heartfelt, pulling readers into her world and inviting them to reflect on their own experiences with identity and belonging.
Overall, "Not Quite, Not White" is a compelling and emotionally resonant exploration of one woman's journey to find her place in a society defined by race. Sharmila Sen's masterful blend of memoir and social commentary opens up essential conversations about identity and race, making this book a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the complexities of multiculturalism in modern-day America.
The book is a thought-provoking blend of memoir, cultural analysis, and social commentary. Sen fearlessly delves into her experiences as a person of color, highlighting the struggles she faced growing up in predominantly white communities while also being seen as an outsider within her Indian heritage. She opens up about the sense of alienation she felt, trying to find her place in a society that demanded clear-cut racial identities.
Through her poignant and candid storytelling, Sen expertly navigates through complex subjects like colorism, cultural appropriation, and how society imposes narrow definitions of race and assimilation. She challenges the concept of "whiteness" and explores how being "not quite, not white" shaped her understanding of identity, heritage, and the pursuit of acceptance.
What makes "Not Quite, Not White" exceptional is Sen's ability to interweave her narrative with broader historical and sociopolitical contexts. The book delves into America's racial landscape, examining the intricate interactions between different ethnic groups and their struggles for acceptance. Sen's analysis is both enlightening and accessible, offering readers a fresh perspective on race relations and identity in the United States.
While tackling severe issues, the book is infused with humor and warmth, making it a compelling and enjoyable read. Sen's prose is engaging and heartfelt, pulling readers into her world and inviting them to reflect on their own experiences with identity and belonging.
Overall, "Not Quite, Not White" is a compelling and emotionally resonant exploration of one woman's journey to find her place in a society defined by race. Sharmila Sen's masterful blend of memoir and social commentary opens up essential conversations about identity and race, making this book a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the complexities of multiculturalism in modern-day America.
April 6, 2022
I was fairly interested in this book after the introduction, almost decided to quit on it multiple times in the first two chapters, and then was very glad I persevered as I got a lot out of the final two chapters (there are only four chapters). In my opinion—admittedly a potentially biased one—Sen is at her best when she is talking about identity, when she is interrogating American (and Indian) ideas about social structure, and when she is unpacking the choices she has had to make in college and as an adult in order to navigate being “Not White” in America. Her references and connections to whiteface, to Dunbar’s mask and JWJ’s “Ex-Colored Man” all resonated powerfully for me. I was significantly less interested in the first two chapters, which mostly explored her childhood in India and then early in the US. I think my main frustration was that Sen felt compelled to give a seemingly exhaustive list of cultural details in both countries—food, social groups, tv shows, elementary school politics, and so on, without digging into or connecting with many of them. It’s not that I couldn’t have been interested in many of the topics and details, but it was too often just a list, a nod, a hint, and I wish she had picked a few more details and stories to go more deeply into. Perhaps it is because she is trying to tell stories about a time she doesn’t remember with as much specificity? (Certainly she already provides way more detail about her preteen memories than I could ever try to of mine) Some of the material was new to me—aspects of Indian geography, social structure, food, etc, but it just felt distant and disjointed (maybe a little more important and relevant to the story for the author than it feels for this reader?), and for example the exhaustive lists of American TV shows and cuisine just didn’t add enough for me to make it worth digging through. When she gets back to navigating and philosophizing about race and identity in America, it is definitely worth the journey. 3.75.
January 26, 2021
I really wanted to love this book but unfortunately, this book didn’t meet my high expectations. The title and the preface really resonated with me considering I am a Middle Eastern Canadian and a child of immigrants. However, the rest of the book was a little too broad for me.
The author tackles really important issues such as racism, westernization, colonialism, and social status. But this book was lacking engagement. There were issues that I feel the author could have really went into detail and made a stronger argument for.
In the first half of the book, Sen shares her childhood years in detail. This was interesting but it got a little dull for me. I felt that the author excelled most in Chapter 3. In this chapter she shares a few important points:
-that most Indians believe that the “real Americans” are white Americans. Unfortunately, this is believed by many immigrants and non-Americans.
-Growing up, Sen always viewed herself as Asian. In recent years, Asian only included Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese or Filipino. This has confused every other country in Asia.
-Racism is present in Indian communities. Indian parents fear that their children will marry a Black person because of the way they’re portrayed on TV or the way they’re treated by politicians/police.
This book was well written however, some of the important points were lacking strong arguments. I do believe that there are better books out there that tackle race and immigration in the US more effectively.
The author tackles really important issues such as racism, westernization, colonialism, and social status. But this book was lacking engagement. There were issues that I feel the author could have really went into detail and made a stronger argument for.
In the first half of the book, Sen shares her childhood years in detail. This was interesting but it got a little dull for me. I felt that the author excelled most in Chapter 3. In this chapter she shares a few important points:
-that most Indians believe that the “real Americans” are white Americans. Unfortunately, this is believed by many immigrants and non-Americans.
-Growing up, Sen always viewed herself as Asian. In recent years, Asian only included Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese or Filipino. This has confused every other country in Asia.
-Racism is present in Indian communities. Indian parents fear that their children will marry a Black person because of the way they’re portrayed on TV or the way they’re treated by politicians/police.
This book was well written however, some of the important points were lacking strong arguments. I do believe that there are better books out there that tackle race and immigration in the US more effectively.
November 8, 2022
This book chronicles Sen's life starting in India and ending in the United States, and what labels she accumulates and sheds along the way. It's a journey from her being "not quite white" to fully embracing herself as "Not White."
The "Not Quite Not White" part is actually a much smaller part of the story - Sen frames some of her points using English explorers who take on the culture and costume of "native", Not White people, donning and discarding it at will, gaining the respect and exoticism of a world traveler while their Whiteness and privilege is never questioned.
"Not White" people play this game too - in the US, they are forced to adopt the trappings and culture of Whiteness, but in order to survive. In the quest for assimilation, they even end up donning their own culture as a costume for the amusement of White people. This assimilation is encouraged as long as their success is "[kept] within limits ... remain[ing] the salutatorian, the runner-up, the solid A minus, the magna cum laude, the Not Quite", and the immigrant is able to provide colorful fun facts about their culture or confirm the stereotypes portrayed in the media.
I have simplified her argument here, but Sen had a lot of interesting things to say and I appreciated her analysis. However, some of the execution was repetitive and she often provided long lists of examples of books, people, movies, etc. that didn't add much to the text. I think the book could have been more effective with another edit and a bit of trimming.
The "Not Quite Not White" part is actually a much smaller part of the story - Sen frames some of her points using English explorers who take on the culture and costume of "native", Not White people, donning and discarding it at will, gaining the respect and exoticism of a world traveler while their Whiteness and privilege is never questioned.
"Not White" people play this game too - in the US, they are forced to adopt the trappings and culture of Whiteness, but in order to survive. In the quest for assimilation, they even end up donning their own culture as a costume for the amusement of White people. This assimilation is encouraged as long as their success is "[kept] within limits ... remain[ing] the salutatorian, the runner-up, the solid A minus, the magna cum laude, the Not Quite", and the immigrant is able to provide colorful fun facts about their culture or confirm the stereotypes portrayed in the media.
I have simplified her argument here, but Sen had a lot of interesting things to say and I appreciated her analysis. However, some of the execution was repetitive and she often provided long lists of examples of books, people, movies, etc. that didn't add much to the text. I think the book could have been more effective with another edit and a bit of trimming.
December 24, 2023
I have not finished reading this book, but it reminds me of another book that I read last year: Beautiful Country by Wang Qian. Sharmila Sen tells about her immigration to Boston from India at the age of 12 in 1982. Qian tells about her immigration to New York from Beijing at the age of 7. Sharmila has more deep reflections on race assimilation. Qian has more fun and vivid stories to tell.
I finished reading the book today. I'm also a first generation immigrant, so I could relate to Sharmila, when she says that she felt the urge to blend into the American society when she arrived at Boston as a teenager. To be more precise, the urge to pass as White. But my ethnicity is Chinese, so I don't really relate to her experience with people with diverse background in her home country, India. My home country China is less diverse in terms of religion and language.
Quote from the book that I really like: Within the heart of Not Whiteness lies the power to name whiteness. By naming whiteness, I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all the other colors. ... I refuse to grant it the magic power of invisibility. I make it less free to move about without being stopped and frisked, without passports and visas. By naming whiteness, I do not allow it lay sole claim to all that we choose to call America.
My rating of this book, 3 out of 5, is not that high, because the author is not a story-teller. She does not tell a riveting story of spending the first 12 years of her life in Bengali, moving to Boston at the age of 12, trying hard to assimilating, achieving success etc. This book is more about her opinion and sarcasm about race and racial inequality in America. But she does not make the effort to make her point clear and concise. The reader must be patient with her claims and thoughts, because she just wouldn't lay out the claim and her evidence supporting the claim. That being said, I might read this book again in a few years, to see if I resonate more with this book.
I finished reading the book today. I'm also a first generation immigrant, so I could relate to Sharmila, when she says that she felt the urge to blend into the American society when she arrived at Boston as a teenager. To be more precise, the urge to pass as White. But my ethnicity is Chinese, so I don't really relate to her experience with people with diverse background in her home country, India. My home country China is less diverse in terms of religion and language.
Quote from the book that I really like: Within the heart of Not Whiteness lies the power to name whiteness. By naming whiteness, I do not grant it more centrality or power. I give it shape and local habitation. I make it come down from its high perch of normativity and assume its rightful place among all the other colors. ... I refuse to grant it the magic power of invisibility. I make it less free to move about without being stopped and frisked, without passports and visas. By naming whiteness, I do not allow it lay sole claim to all that we choose to call America.
My rating of this book, 3 out of 5, is not that high, because the author is not a story-teller. She does not tell a riveting story of spending the first 12 years of her life in Bengali, moving to Boston at the age of 12, trying hard to assimilating, achieving success etc. This book is more about her opinion and sarcasm about race and racial inequality in America. But she does not make the effort to make her point clear and concise. The reader must be patient with her claims and thoughts, because she just wouldn't lay out the claim and her evidence supporting the claim. That being said, I might read this book again in a few years, to see if I resonate more with this book.
January 23, 2019
This was a really well-written memoir. I think the author did a great job explaining her discovery of the concept of "race" as a new immigrant to the US in the 1980s. As a somewhat privileged woman in India, the author was used to the divisions of her world. Most of the time, she came out on top. She was able to look past the "untouchables" and slum-dwellers in her community. She never thought of racial divisions, but then she couldn't avoid them once coming to the USA. Suddenly she is aware that the divisions she was used to hold no sway in her new world. Her privilege is related now to her impression of an "american" (i.e. a white american), so she adapts to the role of the "good immigrant."
I didn't agree with every characterization of white people in this book (can't speak to anyone else). I completely disagree with white people who try to make immigrants afraid of their native cultures and languages or those who interact with them as if they are "the other" (as the author often felt). On the other hand, I refuse to give up my interest in cultures and languages from places where people that look like me are the minority. I guess sometimes interest and appreciation of a culture can be shown in a less-than-dignified way (or some people can just be asses).
Now that my little rant is over, just read this book. It's guaranteed to get you thinking.
I didn't agree with every characterization of white people in this book (can't speak to anyone else). I completely disagree with white people who try to make immigrants afraid of their native cultures and languages or those who interact with them as if they are "the other" (as the author often felt). On the other hand, I refuse to give up my interest in cultures and languages from places where people that look like me are the minority. I guess sometimes interest and appreciation of a culture can be shown in a less-than-dignified way (or some people can just be asses).
Now that my little rant is over, just read this book. It's guaranteed to get you thinking.
July 21, 2019
I won this book in a giveaway. It was interesting to read of Sharmila Sen's experience as a new immigrant to America, and how the concept of Race as a way to classify and divide people was different than had been her experience in India. Of course, India has its own way of classifying and dividing, because wherever you go, people are people. Her story of trying to figure out where she belonged, and to what group, were interesting. I taught middle school in an inner city (in Massachusetts, where the Sen family settled) for years, and we had student body that was primarily students classified as black and hispanic, with white students being the next largest segment. We also had a cluster of immigrants, muslims from Africa, mostly Somali. These students were in class together (because of the language barrier, and the lack of translators who could help them, it was hard to integrate them), they sat together at lunch, and, despite well-meaning educators, it was obvious that they were considered "the other," kids who were not the same. Kids who fasted for Ramadan. Who wore scarves on their heads. Kids who had little to no formal educational experience. These students could never "pass". Not even for regular African-American kids. This is what Sharmila's story made me think of-- the struggle and reality of the real immigrant experience.
October 31, 2019
Giving this book four stars instead of the three I had planned on because of the last two chapters. Totally redeemed by the end.
I had high hopes for this book when I borrowed it from the library. The title, concepts, and description on the back cover are all right up my alley. And the last two chapters totally delivered on this. Sen does a notable job parsing the nuances of race in America and why she considers herself “Not White”, rather than a person of color.
The first half of the book though was a little tough to get through. What she really needed was a better editor. Eventhough the dimensions of the book are small, With only 4 chapters in 200 pages, there’s just too much to Cover in each section. The book would have greatly benefitted from more smaller chapters that covered a specific slice of her life and her thoughts about her experiences. I tended to get a bit lost in the childhood memories that are threaded through with reflections form the present moment. Some paragraphs cover three or four ideas and it just all felt a bit too stream-of-consciousness for me.
Until the end. The last two chapters, and specifically the last 50 pages are brilliant and absolutely worth reading.
I had high hopes for this book when I borrowed it from the library. The title, concepts, and description on the back cover are all right up my alley. And the last two chapters totally delivered on this. Sen does a notable job parsing the nuances of race in America and why she considers herself “Not White”, rather than a person of color.
The first half of the book though was a little tough to get through. What she really needed was a better editor. Eventhough the dimensions of the book are small, With only 4 chapters in 200 pages, there’s just too much to Cover in each section. The book would have greatly benefitted from more smaller chapters that covered a specific slice of her life and her thoughts about her experiences. I tended to get a bit lost in the childhood memories that are threaded through with reflections form the present moment. Some paragraphs cover three or four ideas and it just all felt a bit too stream-of-consciousness for me.
Until the end. The last two chapters, and specifically the last 50 pages are brilliant and absolutely worth reading.
March 30, 2021
Sen describes her upbringing in India, before she immigrates to the USA with her parents when she was 12 years old. In my opinion she was able to deliver a very strong depiction of the different segregation forms that India has: caste, income, education, job, skin tone, origin. She powerfully puts that into contrast to the USA, where she eventually comes into contact with race.
The book takes a strong turn in the last chapter, when she breaks with her model-immigrant perception, her being able to count as white, and the American intolerance towards everything that doesn't fit into the western image of a good American (e.g. smell of turmeric).
For me, the Pointe of this book was a little weaker than expected. I understand it as a mainly internal process that she must have gone through over years, but the book ends quite quickly. The finale chapter in which she rejects the American model-immigrant image ends quite quickly and is very forceful. It doesn't hold for me the transformation process that I would have expected to understand how she was fully able to redefine her "race". Her upbringing in India is described in way more detail than the actual change of race definition.
The book takes a strong turn in the last chapter, when she breaks with her model-immigrant perception, her being able to count as white, and the American intolerance towards everything that doesn't fit into the western image of a good American (e.g. smell of turmeric).
For me, the Pointe of this book was a little weaker than expected. I understand it as a mainly internal process that she must have gone through over years, but the book ends quite quickly. The finale chapter in which she rejects the American model-immigrant image ends quite quickly and is very forceful. It doesn't hold for me the transformation process that I would have expected to understand how she was fully able to redefine her "race". Her upbringing in India is described in way more detail than the actual change of race definition.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 19, 2022
Sen paints an engaging enough portrait of her experiences as a racialized American. At first, her story presented as the usual immigrant experience, and I kept waiting for the bigger hardships and heartfelt arcs that would endear me to her. They did not come. What came instead were tangents of her well-researched and carefully considered opinions on race. At first, I will admit, I thought it hypocritical that she took issue with race in America, when India is no less innocent in its rendering of discrimination by way of the caste system (I am aware that one is not the other). She did bring this point to the forefront, but at the very end, and this could have been more thoroughly explored much earlier. I did take issue with Sen constantly reiterating that she was fair-skinned enough to be mistaken for white, while insisting that being “not white” was her rebel anthem. This felt a bit disingenuous to me, like she knew she could straddle the boundaries, but wished instead to be perceived as righteous in her defence of people of colour who cannot pass off as “white”. All in all, this book held my interest until the end and educated me some along the way, even if it was a tad preachy.
December 5, 2018
The title of the book intrigued me and it was interesting to see what the author was going to say about race relations, racism, immigration, etc. Author Sen talks bout her life and times discussing what it was like to move to the United States and suddenly be forced to see what it's like to be different in the US, what is to try to become "white," navigating white-majority spaces, etc.
Initially I thought it was great. Reading about her experiences, talking about what it's like to navigate and adapt, how to deal with this in her own community, etc. But then I felt overall the book was quite messy. I'll certainly grant that part of it is that I don't share many of her experiences but the book felt quite jumbled and confusing. It felt like a ramble-y mess of thoughts.
It's a shame because there's a lot here to unpack and I think what she had to say was definitely something many immigrants or children of immigrants can understand and relate to and feel. More editing might have been what's missing for me.
Bought this but wish I had waited until my library had it.
Initially I thought it was great. Reading about her experiences, talking about what it's like to navigate and adapt, how to deal with this in her own community, etc. But then I felt overall the book was quite messy. I'll certainly grant that part of it is that I don't share many of her experiences but the book felt quite jumbled and confusing. It felt like a ramble-y mess of thoughts.
It's a shame because there's a lot here to unpack and I think what she had to say was definitely something many immigrants or children of immigrants can understand and relate to and feel. More editing might have been what's missing for me.
Bought this but wish I had waited until my library had it.
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