Abstract
All-American Girl (AAG) premiered on ABC in 1994. The show fictionalized Margaret Cho’s popular stand-up routines that mocked intergenerational cultural conflicts and was the first sitcom to feature an all-Asian cast. The show was pulled after 19 episodes, and many scholars have critiqued the show’s representation of Korean-Americans and Asian-Americans in the years since, but few have investigated the show as a first-generation American narrative. Using this lens, this autocritography demonstrates (1) how AAG normalized the intergenerational relationships between women at different stages of acculturation, (2) the insights AAG—and by extension, Cho—offered regarding the American family on television compared to contemporary programing, and (3) how my experiences as a first-generation American woman led me to a nuanced reading of the program.
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Notes
- 1.
I learned of the term “tiger mom” with Amy Chua’s Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother (2011), but it was perfect term for her parenting style.
- 2.
By way of my biological father who was largely absent from my life.
- 3.
One notable exception was Who’s the Boss (1984–1992), which featured a surrogate father in Tony Danza who delivered a surrogate daughter to complete three generations of women living together.
- 4.
At 16, Margaret Cho was partied with friends and was expelled from the gifted high school in which she was enrolled.
- 5.
She did allow me to go to my own prom a year later, and even sewed the dress because I couldn’t find one that matched my frame. Although now I wonder if it was to ensure that the dress itself was appropriately modest.
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Corsbie-Massay, C.L. (2021). Am I an All-American Girl? An Autocritography of Ethnicity, Gender, and Acculturation via Margaret Cho’s All-American Girl (1994–1995). In: Banjo, O.O. (eds) Immigrant Generations, Media Representations, and Audiences. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75311-5_10
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