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What’s in a name Well, for Ji-Young, the newest Muppet resident on Sesame Street, her name is a sign that she should live there.
“So in Korean, the two syllables traditionally mean something different and Ji means something like clever or wise. And Young means brave or brave and strong, ”Ji-Young said in a recent interview. “But we looked it up and guess what? Ji also means sesame. “
At the age of only 7, Ji-Young was the first Asian-American muppet to write in the canon of “Sesame Street”. She is Korean and has two passions: rocking her electric guitar and skateboarding. The children’s television show, which first aired 52 years ago this month, gave The Associated Press a first look at its adorable new resident.
Ji-Young is officially featured in See Us Coming Together: A Sesame Street Special. Simu Liu, Padma Lakshmi and Naomi Osaka are among the celebrities appearing in the special that will post Thanksgiving Day on HBO Max, Sesame Street social media platforms and local PBS networks.
Part of Ji-Young’s personality comes from her puppeteer. Kathleen Kim, 41 and Korean, got into puppet shows in her 30s. In 2014 she was accepted into a “Sesame Street” workshop. A mentorship developed from this and became part of the team the following year. As a puppeteer on a show Kim grew up a dream had come true. But sculpting an original muppet is an entirely different achievement.
“I feel like I have a lot of weight that I might take on to teach these lessons and be that representative that I didn’t have as a kid,” Kim said. But puppeteer Leslie Carrara-Rudolph – who plays Abby Cadabby – reminded her, “It’s not about us … It’s about this message.”
Ji-Young’s existence is the culmination of much discussion after the events of 2020 – the death of George Floyd and anti-Asian hate incidents. Like many companies, Sesame Street thought about how it could “hit the moment,” said Kay Wilson Stallings, executive vice president of creative and production at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit behind Sesame Street.
Sesame Workshop has set up two working groups – one to deal with the content and another to deal with its own diversity. The result is Coming Together, a multi-year initiative that aims to talk to children about race, ethnicity and culture.
One result was 8-year-old Tamir. While he wasn’t the first black muppet on the show, he was one of the first to speak out on topics like racism.
“When we knew we were going to do this work that would focus on the experience of the Asian and Pacific islanders, of course we knew we had to develop an Asian muppet as well,” Stallings said.
These newer muppets – their personalities and their looks – were remarkably constructed in just a few months. The process usually takes at least a couple of years. There are outside experts and a cross section of staff known as “Culture Trusts” who weigh every aspect of a new Muppet, Stallings said.
For Kim, it was crucial that Ji-Young is not “generally Pan-Asian”.
“Because that’s something that all Asian Americans have experienced. They kind of want to put us in these monolithic ‘Asians’, ”Kim said. “So it was very important that she was specifically Korean-American, not just generally Korean, but that she was born here.”
One thing that Ji-Young will teach children is to be a good “facilitator”. “Sesame Street” first used the term last year in its TV special “The Power of We”, in which Tamir was seen.
“To be an upstander is to point out things that are wrong or what someone does or says that is based on their negative attitudes towards the person based on the color of their skin or the language they speak or where they come from,” said Stallings called . “We want our audience to understand that they can be upstander.”
In “See Us Coming Together”, Sesame Street prepares for the neighbor’s day, when everyone shares food, music or dance from their culture. Ji-Young gets angry after an off-screen child tells her to “go home,” an insult often inflicted on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. But she feels empowered after the other Asian-American residents of Sesame Street, guest stars and friends like Elmo assured her that she is as much a part of it as everyone else.
The fact that Ji-Young was created to counter the anti-Asian sentiment makes it, in a way, special to Kim.
“I remember the Atlanta shootings and how terrible it was for me,” said Kim. “My only hope, of course, is to actually teach what racism is, to teach children to recognize it, and then to speak out against it. But my other hope for Ji-Young is that she will just normalize seeing different-looking children on TV. “
Vanessa Leung, Co-Executive Director of the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families, is excited about Ji-Young. The organization was not involved in founding Ji-Young, but had previously consulted for the Sesam workshop on anti-racism content. It is important if Asian-American families, especially if many of them are immigrant families, can be reflected in an institution like “Sesame Street,” Leung said.
“It arouses curiosity and an early understanding of the diversity of our community, the beauty in the diversity of our community,” said Leung.
Ji-Young will have a strong presence during the new season, Stallings assured. Nor is it just used for content related to racial justice. She will appear in various digital programs, live action and animated.
As a new kid on the street, Ji-Young looks forward to showing her friends and neighbors aspects of Korean culture such as food. She loves to cook dishes like tteokbokki (chewy rice cakes) with her halmoni (grandmother). And she already has a friend from “Sesame Street” who would like to have a sample.
“I would love to try it out,” said Ernie, who attended Ji-Young’s interview. “You know, I tried bulgogi. I like Bulgogi very much. I suspect that old buddy Bert may never have tried Korean food. “
After Ji-Young has already made some famous friends on Sesame Street, does he want to meet someone else?
“The Linda Lindas, because they’re so cool,” Ji-Young said, referring to the teenage punk rock band. “And they rock and they are cool girls and most of them are Asians. You are my heroes. When we get the Linda Lindas on Sesame Street, I would show her around. “
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Terry Tang is a member of The Associated Press’ Race and Ethnicity Team. Follow her on Twitter at https://twitter.com/ttangAP
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