Not My Cup of Jo, But I Can't be Mad

John Chinaman , My Jo

This is obviously not a love song or a loving song for that matter. John Chinaman according to Moon is a character created by Americans to make fun of Asian immigrants exaggeration accents, the inability to pronounce English words properly, and he’s also feminized.
John Chinaman is the thorn in the railroad workers sides. Arriving in large numbers, the Asian immigrants impose on the railroad works by not only bringing much man power, but by having a better work ethic and sense of responsibility to the quality of their work –outshining white railroad workers who as the speaker said at the beginning were more likely to get drunk and strike than the Asian workers.
This difference seems to be recognized especially in the line that says

“Here's blessings on your head, John
And more power to your tail.”

But at the same time, the song is tainted with jealousy. This song reflects the feelings of the time.

To apply this to today’s culture, with Asian students capturing the majority minority in top schools, there may exist tension between other minority groups such as there is here in this Scots-Irish song and the Asians.

This song was published 12 years before the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, so during this time, Chinese immigrants were flooding into the United States. The song makes it seem as if America was the best thing that happened to these Chinese saying that

“You used to live on rice,
But now you purchase flour, plums
And other things that's nice.”

“The Geisha, Chin Chin Chinaman”

I am not impressed. But I probably would be if it were 1892. Powers’ imitation of Chinese language was probably quite funny because it’s half true. European immigrants have probably not encountered such a different intonation and pronunciation of words. Asian dialects sound very distinct from Western dialects. Moon would probably say that this was an expression the inferiority some Americans felt towards Chinese. While I can easily condemn this for being wrong, unsympathetic, and down-right racist-which it is in a sense, I can also say that this is just an avenue of expression. If an Asian American were the one singing it, would it be wrong, then? As I see it, this is an interpretation. Both songs are expressions of feelings and interpretations. It's the ideas of a few individuals. This becomes problematic if this is the only expression of Asians seen though, which is was at the time. There definitely needs to be a balance between the positive and the negative.