Amy Chua Quotes

So-called racial characteristics are not really racial at all but are due to the historical experiences of the communities in question.

I'd like it if people thought I was Jewish looking.

Race has become an increasingly obsolete way of constructing community because it is based on unchangeable, immutable biological facts in a pseudo-scientific way.

Does a black person make them an African American? No. There are Hispanics that are very, very dark skinned so the word has lost its meaning, it's not a very concise or proper word to use even today and it wasn't then.

The fact that people didn't know I was British did work for quite a while.

Other people have a nationality. The Irish and the Jews have a psychosis.

I feel Anglo-American.

I always identified myself as non-Swedish. I was never discriminated against, because I looked Swedish and speak without an accent. But I had an outsider's perspective.

The Africans know I'm not an African. I'm an American.

I had one incident where my daughter said that a girl asked if she was a brown person. I said, 'We're black. You have black people, white people, Chinese people, Hispanic people; we're all brought up differently.'

I have to expend an awful lot of energy actively undoing the impact of my name. Understandably, people assume that I have at least some connection to Iran. The truth is that I don't. I have very little knowledge about the culture, the language, the history. I've never been to Iran. I've never even been inside a mosque.

A racial or religious or tribal identity is a kind of fact.

I'm an honest man. I am living my life. I'm not stealing. And I've never been ashamed of who I am - I am a Roma.

I'm not a massive reader of online comments but I come across the odd comment where people still question if I'm English. I find that so silly.

I come from a community that has a lot of white kids, and I notice how, a lot of times, they don't understand our differences and how I come from a different culture and my ancestors are different and my history is different.

I've lived 16, 17 years of my life in Asia, and that's most of my life. I was born in Asia - I've lived cultures that are synonymous with Asian culture - but it's still not Asian enough for some people.

A lot of stuff has been said about me. People said I was a Malayali because I have Shivan in my name just like Santhosh Sivan does. But I'm a Tamilian.

Race is the least reliable information you can have about someone. It's real information, but it tells you next to nothing.

I think it's the way I talk. I think they thought I was too country. And I'm not ashamed of that by any means.

I'm very happy to have the heritage that I do, but I'm not wanting to be 'the Latino actor.' I just want to be 'an actor.'

I'm certainly proud to be Cuban American, and it's a fantastic opportunity for anybody - regardless of their ethnicity or nationality. It does carry a measure or pride to know where you're from and to know what your roots are.

There are a lot of people in Beverly Hills who come from the Middle East, who are very much a part of the Beverly Hills fabric, and their kids grew up with the privileges of Beverly Hills. And yet they still have to deal with a lot of the prejudice against them for being foreign-born.

Most of my life I was occupied with American television and American food. My ethnicity was my choice. It still is.

I'm about as Chinese as Herbert Hoover.

My children don't look Hispanic.