Nanigashi

(Sorry; my fingers are too fat and that return key is too big)... that I don't think having an interest in others' ancestry is always or inherently problematic; I just wanted to alert the OP that many Asian Americans are asked this kind of thing so often that the question can be very unwelcome, especially from a new acquaintance.

This probably should have been moved to chat a long time ago, and I'd love to continue the discussion, but I really have to be going now – I should have been in bed hours ago. I do want to stress that I don't think having an interest I.

@dwilli, I've honestly never heard of a single instance in which someone asked a European American where s/he was from, got an answer like "Cincinnati," and then followed up with "No, where are you really from?" or "No, I meant where did your family come from?" And this happens to Asian Americans quite frequently, as attested by the satirical YouTube video to which I added a link in my answer. Also, I've never asked a European American (or anyone) "Where are you from?" and had the person respond by spontaneously volunteering information about where his/her ancestors immigrated from.

@dwilli, I just want to add that I absolutely accept that every word of what you have written is offered in good faith, and that I hope it doesn't seem otherwise.

Asian Americans often get that kind of "You know what I mean – where are you really from?" follow-up question, too, and are likely to draw exactly the same conclusion from it.

@dwilli, I didn't mean to suggest that Europeans are never asked about their ancestry, or that having an interest in an acquaintance's ethnic heritage is always inappropriate. My point was that Asian Americans are much likelier to be asked this kind of thing, especially by people they have only just met, and that this focus on ancestry can come off as awfully reductive and diminishing. And when it takes the form "Where are you from?", it is in fact patently offensive, because the underlying assumption is that in some essential way a person with Asian features can't "really" be American.

@Lambie, yes, that's why I wrote "often" instead of "always."