Abstract
This study problematizes racial identity, both in psychoanalytic and political terms. Though the psychological value of racial identity has empirical support, the presenter will argue for the continued interrogation of our unconscious participation in the perpetuation of colonial and imperial mechanisms. Focusing on Asian-American identities, the author uses psychoanalytic scholarship to complicate the academic research on racial identity.To elaborate links between traumatic loss and racial identity, the author considers the psychic appeal of the Filipino boxer-politician Manny Pacquiao for the Philippines and more broadly as a Pan-Asian signifier. Using, but going beyond, his celebrity object relationship to Pacquiao, the presenter (through an interactive video exercise) asks us to consider the fantasies and feelings the athlete activated. This program argues for rethinking our identification with figures like Pacquiao and emboldened forms of racial (and other) identities. This is thought of in terms of the limitations of projects (political and otherwise) that take recognition as a goal. The paper looks to writings from various fields that address the tensions and contradictions within and between Asian identities. The author argues for the political potential of conceiving movements to and from mania, melancholy and mourning as affective positions to mine in response to what is impossibly lost. We discuss the possibilities of transcending our investment in identity, taking up Viet Thanh Nguyen’s dare “to be both Asian American and to imagine a world beyond it, one in which being Asian American isn’t necessary.”
Presenters
Joseph ReynosoClinical Psychologist for Children and Adults, Private Practice/Provider for NBPA Mental health and wellness initiative, New York, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
ASIAN AMERICAN, IDENTITY, POLITICS, FANDOM, RACISM, PSYCHOANALYSIS BOXING, MASCULINITY
