Wong, Jade Snow

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WONG, Jade Snow

Born 21 January 1922, San Francisco, California

Daughter of Hong and Hing Kwai Tong Wong; married WoodrowOng, 1950; children: Ming Tao (Mark Stuart), Lai Yee (Tyi Elizabeth), Lai Wai (Ellora Louise), Ming Choy (Lance Orion)

Jade Snow Wong's best-known work is Fifth Chinese Daughter. First published in 1950 and still in print in the 1990s, this third-person autobiography was one of the first books published by a Chinese American woman in the United States.

Fifth Chinese Daughter traces Wong's life in San Francisco through the mid-1940s. Like later works by Chinese American women as Maxine Hong Kingston's The Woman Warrior and Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club, Wong's book documents a young woman's search "for balance between the pull from two cultures." The book poignantly recounts Wong's search for a "middle way" between the conflicting demands of the traditional Chinese culture of her immigrant parents, with its values of obedience, respect, and order and its assumption of women's inferiority, and the more individualistic American culture. It at once poses and tries to answer the question, "Am I of my father's race or am I an American?"

Wong's search for a "middle way" is crystallized in her book's form. She writes an autobiography, consistent with the American valuation of the individual and the individual's right to speak her mind. But in keeping with Chinese custom, which deems extensive use of the first person immodest (and perhaps, for women, unthinkable), she writes in the third person.

Women of today—those of Asian American descent and those who are not—continue to identify with Wong's autobiographical work. They can relate to her straightforward and honest storytelling of growing up in one world and growing into another world upon reaching maturity. Many can even identify with having to prove themselves in the eyes of a male-oriented culture. Though Wong grows up in a very sheltered Chinese family, she must face many of the same challenges women face every day, even in today's culture. Fifth Chinese Daughter also explores the intricacies of the Chinese culture Wong grows up in, including the emphasis on males in the family, Chinese cooking and traditions, and Chinese festivals. The story also paints a vivid picture of Chinatown in San Francisco during the World War II. Her experiences and choices move her further from the confines of Chinatown and expands her horizons into the rest of American society. Wong herself said Fifth Chinese Daughter is still in print and used by schools to create an understanding between the worlds of the Chinese and Americans.

Wong continues to use third-person narration through much of No Chinese Stranger (1975), her less well-received sequel to Fifth Chinese Daughter. She uses the first person only after having narrated the death of her father. In addition to these autobiographical writings, Wong has written a column in the San Francisco Examiner and contributed to periodicals including Holiday and Horn Book. Educated at San Francisco Junior College (A.A., 1940) and Mills College (B.A., 1942), Wong is also an accomplished potter.

Wong has received recognition for both her work as a writer and for her accomplishments as a potter. In 1947 she received an award for pottery from the California State Fair, and again in 1949 she received an award for enamel. She also received a Silver Medal for craftsmanship from Mademoiselle magazine. For her treasured work in Fifth Chinese Daughter she was honored with a Silver Medal for nonfiction from the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco in 1976. She also holds an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Mills College. In addition, she has continued to honor her Chinese background as a member of the advisory councils for the China Institute of New York and as a director of the Chinese Culture Center from 1978 to 1981.

Bibliography:

Demirturk, E. L., The Female Identity in Cross-Cultural Perspective: Immigrant Women's Autobiographies (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Iowa, 1986). Kim, E. H., Asian American Literature: An Introduction to the Writings and Their Social Context (1982). Ling, A., Between Worlds: Women Writers of Chinese Ancestry (1990). Meissenburg, K., The Writing on the Wall: Socio-Historical Aspects of Chinese American Literature, 1900-1980 (1986).