Telling the Right Story

Narrative as a Mechanism for Japanese American Ethnic Boundary Maintenance

Bibliographic Data

ID2291817
AuthorsDana Y Nakano (California State University, Stanislaus, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume88
Issue2
Pages216-244
Publication date2018-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociological Inquiry (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0245 • E-ISSN: 1475-682X
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/soin.12188
OpenAlexW2625619117
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited40

This study conceptualizes ethnic grand narrative, a comprehensive story of a people, as a mechanism for maintaining and policing ethnic community boundaries. Such symbolic boundaries are shaped through relational processes of negotiation and contestation: boundary work. Taking the case of Japanese Americans, I demonstrate that legitimate claim on community membership relies on more than common ancestry, as ethnicity usually implies. Through an examination of the newspaper discourse surrounding two Japanese American men, Scott Fujita and Lt. Ehren Watada, I find that the collective ethnic narrative serves to define ethnic community boundaries and is used as a reference point for individual narratives. Depending on the alignment between personal narratives and collective ethnic narratives, in terms of content and structure, determines an individual's legitimate claim on ethnic membership. Notwithstanding the continued value placed on perceived shared biological heritage, ethnic membership is better conceived of as a combination of both common ancestry and strong fit between personal and community narratives

Ethnic group · Linguistics · Media studies · Narrative · Negotiation · Newspaper · Social science · Sociology · Value (mathematics) · Anthropology · Asian American and Pacific Histories · Computer Science · Gender Studies · Media Studies and Communication · Philosophy · Rhetoric and Communication Studies

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