A couple of weeks ago, Time’s Joel Stein wrote a racist column lampooning the growing Asian Indian population in his hometown of Edison, New Jersey — and earning himself the ire of the entire Asian American blogosphere. Although Stein’s column was both offensive and ill-advised, his column can certainly be called timely: Census data from the last several years reveal that the national Asian American population is the second fastest-growing minority population in the United States. In fact, the Census projects that the size of the Asian American population will nearly double (Table 1) in the next forty years.
If these projections prove true, the next few decades will be fascinating: how will America adapt to the changing face of its demographics?
In Lexington, Massachusettes (a city just north-west of Boston), we are seeing just such changes take place. This morning, the Boston Globe ran an article about Lexington’s growing East Asian population.
In 1990, the Asian population in Lexington was a mere 6%; fifteen years later, Lexington’s Asian population is (tentatively) estimated to represent approximately 20% of total residents. While some of these residents are foreign-born and/or temporary residents, others are permanent citizens starting families in the United States. This reflects the national break-down of Asian Americans: while 60% of Asian Americans are foreign-born, the median age of our community is 5 years younger than non-Hispanic Whites. In addition, we are more likely to live in English-speaking households and have given birth recently, indicating that our community is rapidly shifting towards being more of a native-born, English-proficient Asian American population.
In direct contrast to Joel Stein’s confession that he feels “uncomfortable” with Edison’s growing Desi population, Lexington shows no qualms about welcoming its new East Asian neighbours. According to the Boston Globe, the Lexington public library now houses a well-stocked collection of Chinese language books for all ages, and city officials are working to close the language barrier by providing Mandarin translations of legal documents and ordinance information.
Earlier this year, the town created a task force to pull together statistics on the town’s changing demographics and recommend ways to adapt. The group’s final report concluded that Lexington’s Asian population is significantly higher than in neighboring communities, and will continue to expand. Town officials plan to talk to communities on the West Coast with high Asian populations for suggestions on ways to better incorporate Asians into town government and boards.
“I don’t believe that we realized, in terms of the Asian community, how quickly it was growing,’’ said Carl Valente, Lexington town manager and a member of the task force.
The Lexington Police Department has hired a Mandarin speaker. The Lexington Chinese School, which started in 1972, has grown to one of the largest such schools in New England, with about 400 students.
The task force created to look at the town’s changing demographics recommended that the town further investigate the growth and makeup of the Asian community, and track emergency situations involving residents who don’t speak English well. That information would help town officials know which languages most Asian residents speak. Although the largest percentage of Asians in Lexington are Chinese, according to statistics, there are also residents from India, Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Bangladesh, and other Asian countries.
Promisingly, Lexington’s public officials aren’t just paying lip service to Lexington’s Asian population; they are working towards actively integrating the population into the Lexington community. A separate task force is currently being formed that would improve participation of Lexington’s Asian population into the political process, and would specifically try to increase representation of Asians in Lexington’s elected offices.
The Lexington task force has recommended creating a separate task force to increase the participation of Asian American residents in local government. Asian Americans have served as Town Meeting members and on the School Committee, and one ran unsuccessfully for selectman this year. Still, the number of Asians involved in local government doesn’t reflect the percentage of Asians in town.
Peter Lee, spokesman for the Chinese American Association of Lexington and a member of the task force, would like to see more Asians become involved in local government or volunteer work. The town should encourage broader participation, but Lee also believes that as Asians become more socially integrated in town, they may become more inclined to get involved.
Joel Stein claimed that, as “someone who believes that immigration has enriched American life”, he wrote his column to interrogate a common reaction to Edison’s changing demographics. Yet, it’s clear that in Lexington, there is no such squeamishness over non-White faces running a Chinese supermarket in the same building that housed a traditional teen hang-out. Lexington residents have welcomed multilingual city services, rather than to start groups aimed at stamping out the “Press 1 for English” phenomenon. Lexington seems to view its East Asian population as an exciting increase in the city’s cultural and political diversity, not as a plague that must be eradicated.
With all of the xenophobic national hullabaloo over immigration lately, perhaps we all stand to learn a little something from Lexington, Massachusettes.
