When the Prison Doors Are Opened, the Real Dragon Will Fly Out: Seeking Alternative Asian / American Futurities

Abstract

Glitch as error; the erroneous element, the perversity to the desirable. The current hegemonic structure disseminates varying images of the Asian as the “other” and imposes expectations of labor and assimilation onto Asians in the United States. Drawing on Vivian Huang’s conception of the Asian/American as “inscrutable” and Rosa Menkman’s framework regarding the glitch, I aim to link the idea of glitch as another means of potential for Asian American futurity to reject assimilationist tactics and Orientalist perceptions of Asian individuals as a whole. How can we refuse the American Dream and reclaim images of the Asian individual? Similarly, what rituals have Vietnamese diasporic communities maintained from the homeland to cultivate havens separate from the powers of America? The existence of Asian Americans and the continuance of their cultural spaces and practices present themselves as ‘errors’ within the white supremacist state. Both the glitch and the Asian American contradict hegemonic political and aesthetic conventions. How can glitches and Asian Americans reject homogeneity and racialization, and move toward a future of agency and autonomy for the Asian American individual?