Page 158 - On Not Speaking Chinese Living Between Asia and the West

THE CURSE OF THE SMILE

that of reminding ‘I am different’ while unsettling every definition of
otherness arrived at.
(ibid.: 74)

This insightful description of the positioning of the minority subject as more or less
undecidable, as eluding the fixed identity conferred on her, relies on a recognition
of ambivalence as a source of strength for those at the margins of the dominant
symbolic order. In Bauman’s (1991: 179) provocative words: ‘Ambivalence is the
limit to the power of the powerful. For the same reason, it is the freedom of
the powerless.’ But a romanticizing tendency in this valorization of the ambivalent
hybrid is imminent, based not only on the assumption that the deconstruction of
binary oppositions as such is politically subversive and desirable, but also, in my
view, on an overstating of the unsettling power of the hybridized minority subject;
that is, the power of ambivalence.
As my analysis shows, the discourse of multiculturalism itself is based on a
structural ambivalence which, however, does not overturn the binary opposition
between the (white) self and the (non-white) other, but reinscribes it in a different
fashion, in which the very status of the other is now invested with ambivalence. To
put it concretely, being ‘Asian’ in ‘multicultural Australia’ means being positioned
in the grey area of inclusion and exclusion, in the ambivalent space of ‘almost the
same [as us], but not quite’, to use Homi Bhabha’s (1994: 86) phrase. In other
words, the ambivalent position of inside/outside is not just of the minority subject’s
own making, as at least Trinh seems to suggest, but it is imposed on her by the
multicultural ethos itself. In short, if the ambivalence of multicultural discourse
creates a space, itself replete with ambivalence, in-between sameness and otherness,
then it is a space in which minority subjects are both discursively confined and
symbolically embraced. Ambivalence is not only a source of power but also a trap,
a predicament.
From this perspective we should not just seize on the ‘not quite’ in terms of
its indeterminacy (and therefore its opportunity for hybridity, for ‘freedom’), but
must also look at its functionality for the dominant discourse. That is, precisely the
‘not quite’ status of the ‘Asian’ in ‘multicultural Australia’ enables this sign to be
filled with meanings of ‘Asianness’ which can operate as a function of Australia’s
nationalist desire. That is to say, ‘we let you in despite/because of your difference’
because, ultimately, ‘we want your difference’. But, we must now add, not just any
difference. To see this, let us return to the image of the ‘Asian’ woman on the
government poster. While the state’s preferred meaning of the poster is clearly that
of benevolent inclusiveness – it effectively says, ‘you can be part of our Australian
family too’ – a creeping ambivalence becomes apparent when we make explicit the
tension unwittingly created by that last word ‘too’ and continue the sentence: not
just ‘you can be part of our Australian family even though you are/look Asian’, but
also ‘please become a member of our Australian family because you are Asian’.
Crucially, however, what the image represents is not just any ‘Asian’. Most
conspicuously, she is a (young) woman. Why? Why is the Australian image of the

147