What Asian Americans Really Care about When They Care about Education

Scholars assume that Asian Americans’ emphasis on education is due to immigrant parents’ own experiences with intense education when young and concerns about their children’s social mobility in the United States. This article reopens the question by considering Indian immigrants who prioritize academics for their children, including extracurricular academics. Contrary to common assumption, education is not these immigrants’ top priority. Instead, they are responding to and motivated by a sense of intense competition, in which their children must stand out among peers. Asian immigrant parents choose education as the best venue in which to make their children competitive. They demonstrate a minority culture of mobility, performed as a distinct style of concerted cultivation.