Very American

“That’s very American,” the student says. He’s part of a group of university students attending a printmaking workshop I am leading. For the month of July 2014, I am a resident-artist at the Philippine Association of Printmakers. The student is commenting on how I am “inking a slab,” transferring a line of ink onto a glass table for printmaking. I look up in surprise, and notice that he’s young, not more than eighteen. I tell myself that I have ten years on this kid, and that for eight of those years, I’ve worked in education. I tell myself that I am eminently prepared for this interaction. Nonetheless I find the student’s observation terrifying and astute.

To printmakers, inking is practically a reflexive process. I am ready to assert that my technique isn’t American. I’m ready to protest that “no, this is how you roll ink.” But his words give me pause. I’m struck that the phrase has implications beyond printmaking, that this student may find me, Jade, “very American.” To someone who has spent her life identifying not as American per se, but as Filipina-American, the experience is nothing short of disconcerting.

“I’m Filipina, too!” I want to tell the student. I want to share how I embrace my biracial and bicultural identity in my professional, artistic, and personal actions. I want this student to know about my service in Americorps helping low-income students of color gain university admission. I want to tell him how my artwork is about cultural identity, to enumerate my every artistic accomplishment voicing the Asian-American experience. I want to thrust a picture of my family before him, saying,“Look! I have my mom’s nose!”

Though my features do resemble my mom’s, the student is right. My printmaking technique, which I studied in American universities and in an American artistic context, is undoubtedly American. And the rest of me, I admit, is American, too. At home in the United States, for better or for worse, I am a cultural shape-shifter, born in the liminal space between cultures. Here in Manila, I am irrefutably and awkwardly American. I am in Manila for a month with the Philippine Association of Printmakers in order to gain insight into Filipino printmaking and art. This month will be far too short, I realize. I have too much to learn about Filipino artistic culture and too much to learn about myself.

That’s very American. Today, a year later, I still think about that phrase. In my professional life working for higher education institutions and non-profit organizations, I hear the phrase “build bridges” frequently to describe these cultural efforts to bring people together. The phrase is so common, and often so glibly delivered, that I easily underestimate how hard building bridges can be. I forget that these bridges are not made incarnate by good intention or native ability, but are constructed thanks to hard-earned experience and the patience of those willing to educate one another. Standing jet-lagged before twenty Filipino teenagers in a Manila printshop, I am keenly aware that these bridges are built interaction by interaction.

“What’s your name?” I ask the student.

“Joey,” he responds.

“That’s so interesting to hear about the ink, Joey.” I say, holding out a palette knife to him. “Will you show me how you do it here?”

Jade Hoyer is an Academic Advisor for the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tennesee, Knoxville, where she is also pursuing her Master of Fine Arts, with an empahsis in printmaking.