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Reticence as participation: Discourses of resistance from Asians in America

Upon arrival in the United States, international students not only encounter culture shock and complex linguistic barriers but also immediate transmutation into minorities. In a classroom setting, foreigners must confront continually evolving negotiations of competence, membership, and identity to validate their place in academic discourse. Pervading their efforts for validation, of course, are racialized issues of generalization, stereotype, power, and access. For many, academic socialization goes beyond the formation of scholarly discipline and positive peer relationships to include denial of cultural norms and adoption of alien practices. This study examines how some international students may resist cultural and linguistic marginalization and stereotyping through purposeful management of personal agency in discursive practice. Specifically, I investigate how two Korean graduate students represented themselves as dynamic classroom participants and academic scholars in a U.S. context. While characterizing themselves as reticent, they rejected the notion that silence equates passivity or a noncontributory disposition. Rather, these learners demonstrate active negotiation of identity and positionality within their academic community and throughout their participation in academic domains. In the process, their academic experiences as Asians in America provide support for expanding notions of a dynamic Asian American identity to account for growing transnational and global perspectives.