Quotes About Identity

I want to be tagged as an actor and not as a star.

I'm one of not even a handful of British Asian popstars who are maninstream. Of course I was always tagged as British Asian singer Jay Sean as opposed to pop R'n'B singer Jay Sean.

There's an expression in Persian, 'to play with the lion's tail.' I wasn't what Iranian society wanted me to be - a good girl. I played with the lion's tail.

I've had every haircut you could possibly imagine: mullet, tail, dreadlocks, afro, crew cut. It's always been an expression of who I am.

I like having a tailor everywhere because I am everywhere.

It seems like if you are not painted up special way or have some tailor made outfit to put on to go out on stage... I don't know... there's too much of it out there.

A song has to become as much a part of you as a tailored suit.

We don't realize how much racism has tainted our self-image as human beings.

But now all of a sudden some idiots in Taiwan start to say that they are not Chinese. Their grand parents were Chinese. But for some reason, they feel they are not Chinese.

Taiwan is an independent sovereign country.

I am an Asian designer. I was born in Taiwan. That is who I am. But I am a designer, like any designer of any race. Growing up in the '80s in Taiwan, the arts were not considered a career.

For the world's four Chinese-speaking regions - Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong and mainland China - the longer the colonization, the more advanced a place is.

I grew up in Taiwan, which was a military dictatorship.

The majority of Taiwan people cannot accept Taiwan becoming a second Hong Kong, nor can we accept Taiwan becoming a local government of the People's Republic of China or a Special Administrative Region of China.

Taiwan has been so well developed economically. But we are underdeveloped culturally.

I remember going to Taiwan for the first time and... I didn't realize that everyone looked like me here and what that'd feel like.

Singapore is better than Hong Kong; Hong Kong is better than Taiwan; Taiwan is better than the mainland. I'm speaking in terms of culture.

Even though I grew up in America, at home we spoke mostly Chinese, because my mom is from Taiwan.

For many Taiwanese, almost all Taiwanese, we'd like to we say we are a country, and we have a sovereignty of our own.

You can take the guy out of the neighorhood but you can't take the neighborhood out of the guy.

You can take a man out of Ireland, but you can't take the Irishness out of the man.

You can take the boy out of Bombay; you can't take Bombay out of the boy, you know.

In order for people to take what you say seriously, they have to know who you are as a person.

There are people who take fashion at different levels, but personally, I'm just a kid with it.