Mini Translation Project

(Assessment Weighting: 30%Deadline: March 21)

Please translate the following critique and its title from English into Chinese, and write a

translator's afterword (译后记 in Chinese, about 600- 800 words)

Why Eileen Gu Matters

The rise of 18-year old San Francisco-born freestyle skier Eileen Gu ( 谷 爱 凌 Gǔ

Àilíng) has caused considerable debate and hand wringing in the media, most of which

surrounds her 2019 choice to represent the People’s Republic of China at the 2022 Beijing

Winter Olympics. But my younger sister and I have known a different Eileen, beginning

earlier, when she was an up-and-coming athlete with only 30,000 followers on Instagram (she

now has 1.1 million).

Back then, Gu posted daily stories of her life; she was an avid journaler and her cursive

print would fill the pages of her notebook. If you zoomed in and squinted, you could make out

the aspirations and vulnerabilities of this teenage athlete. My sister and I meticulously sent

each other the latest news about her: from the “Everyday Eileen” Red Bull mini-

documentaries to articles about her X Games victories. When Gu got into Stanford and cried,

we all celebrated, even though we had never met her.

Part of our fascination was that we had never seen a girl like her so visible in the media.

Gu was fluent in both Mandarin Chinese and English and was actively immersed in both

cultures (and Gen-Z senses of humor). She spoke of self-care, positive body image, and

passion. We knew she was going to become a big star someday, yet it also gave us both

anxiety to watch it unfold.

You can understand why. Accompanying the recent influx of media coverage — from

Time Magazine, ESPN, the New York Times, Bloomberg, etc. — came accusations and

criticism. Headline-writers capitalized off her controversy to build engagement: Gu

apparently “ditched” the U.S., while mainstream papers openly questioned why she still “lives

there” (um, because she has a home there?). Other publications got weird. As the commentary

piled up, I couldn’t help but notice a conspicuous lack of Asian-American and American-

born-Chinese perspectives.
 While many of the challenges that Gu faces as an Olympian and preternaturally gifted

competitor are unique, American-born Chinese (ABCs) like myself have dealt with questions

about our identity and loyalty for years. Will she be embraced or will she be shunned?

Curiosity and hope about the “Eileen experiment” (as I call it) are deeply rooted in these

frustrated feelings and other childhood experiences. Eileen Gu maybe doesn’t want to

comment about it, with all of her words being dissected by societies on opposite sides of the

world, but ABCs like my sister and I can.

Identity defined as a binary

“When I’m in the U.S., I’m American, but when I’m in China, I’m Chinese,” Gu often

says. “当我在美国，我是美国人，但当我在中国，我就是中国人。”

It’s 2022. We know gender is not a binary and that many identities in our lives exist on a

spectrum. Yet I’m still being asked, “Are you more Chinese or more American?” as if there

were a universal definition of what it means to be “Chinese” or “American.”

Watching the social media debates about Gu’s citizenship status has been painful. Her

capacities as a human with emotions and agency are secondary to everyone else’s opinions

about geopolitics. The perception of loyalty, of patriotism, of identity in itself is based upon

an idea of nation-state. Why? Because that is how, regardless of whether we grew up in the

U.S. or China, we have been indoctrinated to organize our world. The Olympics, for all its

idealism and love of John Lennon’s “Imagine,” reinforce the idea of national identity. That is

the way in which our competitions are funded and structured.

People cannot fathom that I can appreciate Chinese culture while also being critical of

the CCP. The number of times that I have been asked by someone, from relatives to random

strangers, “If America and China went to war, what side would you choose?” is astounding.

I think back to my first lessons about Asian American history in school, focusing on

Japanese internment during World War II. We see people with complicated identities as an

“other,” a potential national security compromise, a traitor. We see these humans as a threat

defined only through the small minds of powers that be. Othering people during times of
geopolitical tension is part of civilization, but people caught up in the act are always

blindsided by the way they repeat history.

Being an individual
People debate whether Eileen Gu is a pawn. The truth is, we are all pawns and have

always been in the eyes of governments and corporations. People love to frame Gu’s choice

as financially motivated, yet never question the earnings of other Olympians. American

snowboarder Shaun White’s net worth is $60 million. Just one year ago, the Tokyo Summer

Olympics hosted Kevin Durant, who makes $75 million per year, and Naomi Osaka, who

made $55 million in endorsements in the previous 12 months. If Gu chooses to advance her

career and wealth, that is her choice.

To inspire millions, Gu works within a system that forces a choice. People are borderline

obsessive at how the Chinese government may potentially be granting people like Gu the

privilege of two passports (there is no confirmation that she has renounced her American

citizenship) because these benefits do not extend to everyone. Sure, we can express contempt

for her elite privilege, as other women are seemingly swept under the rug within larger

existing structural inequalities. But why are we hating the players rather than the game itself?

When asked about her decision to represent the P.R.C., Gu told the Associated Press:

“I’ve gotten a lot of hate, a lot of people saying ‘It’s a question of loyalty and which country

she likes more.’ It’s really not. It was really a big thing between the impact I would be able to

have and what I’d be able to do with skiing.”

I’m sure that Gu is very well aware of what her choice can mean. She is aware of the

platform she has. That is why she speaks out about racial injustice in the United States. She is

aware that if she speaks about Chinese politics, her platform will vanish. We can speculate all

we want about her motivations. But what we know for certain is that she’s a girl with big

dreams and the belief that she can inspire millions. No other American-born Chinese has the

world’s attention as she does

When I watch Eileen express herself in Mandarin, I see so many similarities between my
code switching and hers. She makes people laugh. She makes people feel inspired. Multiple

things can be true. She can be thinking strategically while also loving the people and cultures

that she grew up with.

In the Youku documentary about her, My Legacy and I, Gu says, “The most important

thing for me in life is to find something you love, and enjoy it.” As she has expressed in other

interviews, she is proud to represent her sport and herself.

For many ABCs caught up within the hellstorm of geopolitics, our joy is policed. For Gu

to find a way to negotiate a new norm feels like a form of resistance.

Why do my sister and I care about Eileen? We care because she could be that exception

that we hope will become the norm. And because within her, we see bits and pieces of

ourselves. We wonder if she will speak out about human rights abuses amidst censorship,

because we ourselves have tried to bring up these topics to our elders, unsuccessfully. We

wonder if journalists will stop asking her to talk about “balance,” with the hope that people

will also stop asking us. The nation-state in sports gives an athlete both freedom and

restrictions. We sit and wonder if she will be able to achieve what we ourselves feel is often

unattainable because of geopolitics: just being seen as an individual.