While most liberals have an entirely understandable discomfort about colonialism, Wang has a more pragmatic approach. Malaysia – a nation that wouldn’t exist without the British Empire - came out of it better than most. And, unfashionably, Wang admits to pride about his British side of his heritage.‘Why wouldn’t you be proud of all that influence and power’ the UK once wielded, he asks. Any amount of time spent with Phil Wang is never enough. I've been watching his comedy ever since he slid into guest spots on 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown and British panel show podcasts. His style of humour is understated but insightful, and it was wonderful to see him develop a more complex narrative in Sidesplitter. It's not a memoir, he makes that clear from the beginning, then eases up. Okay, it's kind of a memoir. Phil uses his British-Malaysian lived experience to discuss contemporary relationships to identity, family, history, race, and cultural belonging. His comedy helps to avoid sentimentality, but it's also grounded in enough perception that there's levity even in the heaviest moments. rounded up to 5. Far denser than I expected, while still feeling like a broad intro survey to Asian American pop history. I recommend the syllabus sections for further exploration because each topic is deserving of their own deep dives. Despite the title, the Before section does a decent job at describing from the earliest waves of immigration through the 1980s, historically and in pop culture. The authors' reasoning for nineties onward is because that's when the children of post-1965 Hart-Cellar Act immigration waves started making art (which isn't to say previous waves existed! In sheer terms of numbers there's more post-65 Asian Americans than prior waves like my own family).

Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now

We all need to catch up on the history of Asian-Americans and Rise is an easy and fun way to do so. Recommended for just about anyone. Phil’s dry sense of humour comes over really well in this audiobook. It feels like he’s dealing with some quite serious and potentially contentious issues in a way which makes it safe to have the conversation. I especially like the fact that while he says he is comfortable with the ‘where are you really from’ question when it comes from a place of genuine curiosity, but he recognises that his experience and perspective is personal and that for other people there are good reasons why that question can be offensive. All this is given extra credence coming from an open-minded internationalist than an archetypal Little Englander, and typical of the fascinating, honest and sometimes unconventional personal take that defines the book. He wants an open conversation about race and says it always makes him feel more human when he engages in that. He points out the daftness of the more extreme reactions to perceived “cultural appropriation” while asking people to simply not be rude in the way that they might “use” elements from a different culture. I thought, ‘This will get a few hundred retweets,’” he says. “But the mad thing is it’s probably the most anyone has seen of any of my work. That one Sunday I spent writing, filming and editing that little clip was more exposure than all these TV shows. It’s just such a strange world now. There are times when I think, ‘What am I doing, doing standup? I should just be making videos every Sunday.’”

In his 20s, Wang began to make modest changes to his look. He had always worn thin, frameless spectacles hoping, he thinks, that people wouldn’t realise he was wearing glasses at all. Then, one day in Specsavers, he popped on a pair of oversized frames as a joke and saw they suited him. He had never thought much about his hair, but decided to finally spend money on a cut. “It’s arrogant to call it a transformation,” says Wang. “I mean, who knows if it’s even better, but it feels better. It’s certainly more expensive.” Sixteen years in Malaysia, 16 in the UK. Thirty-two-year-old Phil Wang’s geographical equilibrium is nicely reflected in his new show The Real Hero in All This. If you want intelligent standup (a bit observational, a bit autobiographical) with no particular cultural flavour, Wang won’t disappoint, with strong routines on social media, the fridge versus the oven, and “photos of people who live in the house, in the house”. If you want a little cross-cultural flavouring on your standup dish – well, there’s his usual garnish here of now-thoughtful, now-flighty jokes on life as a biracial British-Asian with an amusingly beady prospect on western life. This, for Wang, is what he loves about standup. One time, after a gig in London, a white middle-class couple from Essex came up to him – and the comedians Pierre Novellie and Nish Kumar – and said they had enjoyed the show in the main, “but enough of the race stuff, eh?” Wang found the comment, and the ensuing discussion, enlightening. In Malaysia, everyone had talked about race all the time: that’s what happens in a country that is highly racially diverse, where the largest ethnic group – the Malays – make up only half the population. In the UK, where 80% of the population is white British, the subject can remain more of a taboo.

Sidesplitter: How To Be From Two Worlds At Once - Kindle

I really don't know how to describe this book, it is a memoir but it is so much more than that, it's an insight and analysis of what it is like to grow up between two cultures. Phil writes about some quite serious topics but it never feels preachy or judgemental and I think the expert use of his comedic experience keeps what could have been a heavy read, light and interesting. That’s not to say he shy’s away from difficult topics because he doesn’t, he talks openly and with sometimes potentially contentious opinions such as when defends the sitcom ‘Mind your language’ or when he talks about his opinion on cultural appropriation. This article was amended on 16 August 2021 to make it clear in the body of the text that Philly Philly Wang Wang is now on Netflix. Wang won the 2010 Chortle Student Comedian of the Year Award [14] and, in 2011, Comedy Central's Funniest Student Award. In 2012, he was president of Footlights at Cambridge University, where he did a four-year engineering degree. [15] Wang has since performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe [16] and at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. [17] This was a shame as it wasn't lazy - he'd called comedians, even if the call with Sindhu Vee didn't result in much material for the book - and I thought he had nuanced views about cultural appropriation and stereotypes in comedy. He told anecdotes without each chapter just being an excuse for telling stories, as he actually explored the topics.The authors are all notables in Asian American pop culture: Philip Wang is part of the trio who founded Wong Fu Productions, an early mainstay on Youtube; Jeff Yang is a journalist with decades of experience and father of Hudson Yang, star of Fresh Off the Boat; and Phil Yu runs Angry Asian Man, a longrunning blog connecting Asian America (and for me growing up from enclaves, a life line into the diaspora). Highly recommend all their work, especially Jeff & Phil's podcast They Call Us Bruce. I recently read the book "Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now" by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu and Philip Wang and was absolutely delighted by the clever and entertaining way the authors gather many short prose pieces and graphical content from contributors from many corners to present many different perspectives into the experiences of Asian Pacific Americans through the lens of popular culture and our localized sub-culture. The book ranges from the sobering timeline and, honestly, baseline of racist propaganda in America to the hilarious and heartwarming anecdotes more recent triumphs. Though the book touches from when the first Filipino slaves jumped ship from the Spanish Galleons in 1762, the book focuses on the last three decades of Asian American history, from the 1990s through the 2010s. But whenever I felt the show wanting for an injection of oomph, it got one, via a well-hewn joke or unlikely formulation, if not from any variation in Wang’s delivery. There’s a choice routine about what makes white people panic – not what you’d expect, but not something you can deny. There’s a section on the editing process of his recent book – which might sound highbrow but ends up, via “a wank that was primarily admin”, as anything but. I found his chapter on race the most thought provoking, especially when defending an old racist British sitcom from the 1970s. Again, he talks about a perspective I hadn't considered as a well meaning white lefty. I'm so glad this book exists, I've rarely gotten to read books by other people who have British and Malaysian roots. I've been trying to describe my emotions about feeling not fully English and not Chinese or Malaysian enough my whole life, so I'm glad this book exists and explores all of that so well.

Sidesplitter, by Phil Wang : Book reviews 2021 : Chortle Sidesplitter, by Phil Wang : Book reviews 2021 : Chortle

What do people say about the importance of winning The War? 'If it wasn't for my grandfather, we'd all be speaking German!' Oh no! Not a second language!" Phil explores the contrasts between Eastern and Western cultures and delves into Britain and Malaysia’s shared histories, bringing his trademark cynicism and wit to topics ranging from family, food, and comedy to race, empire, and colonialism. Each and every chapter is beautiful as a stand-alone insight but together, they beautifully interweave to a colourful tapestry of "how to be from two worlds at once".I will say that while Pacific Islanders (a nebulous term anyway, in the same way that all grouping terms are, as Indonesians and Filipinos are by technicality of island countries within the Pacific Ocean "Pacific Islanders" but are very strictly included as "Asian" because of physiognomy) are coupled with the umbrella term "Asian American" – see Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month – but are very rarely featured in this work. They are included as Hawaii is a US state, but there's very minor inclusion of any outside of Hawaiians. But then again, as stated in the essay by four Pacific Islanders (Samoan, Tongan, Hawaiian, Chamorro), they don't feel they should be included in this umbrella combo of "AAPI" because zero of them feel that our ethnic/racial groups overlap and we have certainly had separate histories related to our places within the USA and Canada. I am very glad that they included this essay, but I feel like it's one of the most important essays and that its length and size within the whole will take focus away from it. I don't say this in a "there should be more Pacific Islander" content in this book on Asians in America, but I mean it more that anyone who reads this book might still carry on with the AAPI/API acronym (I have to cut it out of use myself, now) and we should be helping raise up our Pacific Islander brethren, along with all other racialized peoples, in the West. Comedian Phil Wang, 32, was born in Stoke-on-Trent and raised in Malaysia. He studied engineering at Cambridge University, where he became president of the Footlights. Last year, he released a Netflix comedy special, Philly Philly Wang Wang, and published a book, Sidesplitter: How to Be from Two Worlds at Once. The UK and Ireland leg of his world tour, Wang in There, Baby! begins in spring 2023. He is single and lives in London. A really fascinating, funny look at how growing up with a white British mother and a Malasian father has helped shape Phil Wang's views on family, food and race among other things. I’m not usually a non-fiction reader! I struggle with taking it in and staying focused when it’s on paper but I thoroughly enjoyed this! I think I’ll choose to listen to memoirs/non-fiction books from now on! I loved the way that Phil was able to use his comedy expertise to inject some fun into his narration of the book. I’m not sure some of the jokes would have come across as well on paper. As someone mixed race, I found myself frequently agreeing with him - especially on the racial and sex chapters - as mixed race of certain ethnicities we are so often stereotyped by the traditional idea of our ethnicity, and often not given the space to express our own feelings. Similarly, races can't own things - I agree with this massively. There is a huge difference between appreciation and appropriation and Phil Wang perfectly explains them in a way that makes it very clear that the term 'cultural appropriation' is often applied too readily. And for the record - I love the cheongsam they are truly beautiful and having worked with many wonderful Chinese women who wear them daily, I can say quite confidently they are even prettier and beautiful than the picture would have you believe. This book was both hugely informative, a love letter to being from two worlds and realising you may never truly fit in anywhere but accepting that for all the luxuries it gives you - especially how home can mean so many different things while still being special.