I had a very difficult time with the Friday reading. To me it seemed a bit too everywhere, and didn’t come to a solid point or conclusion. I thought it was cool to have a chapter with a major Seattle connection. Linking Chief Seattle’s speech and the WTO protests weren’t ever something I’ve heard of before. I thought that was interesting. Reading about the impact of various Seattle-ites on pop culture had been fun.
Tag Archives: kato
POPositions!
Hollywood has a desire for the kine-aesthetic and performative narrative in the forms of Samurai and Kung Fu films, which is the art born of reclamation of culture from post-colonialism.- POPosition, Kato, Group 5.
I think that Hollywood’s crave for these arts is comparable to wanting another child’s toy. There are these epic fight films that Japan and China had that showed battle and extreme physicality and the early Hollywood didn’t have that. These films could be foreign enough to entice viewers, but not enough to turn them away.
Yet, when viewed with the Western lens, there is a slight discrepancy between the stories being seen. With the Western gaze, you see something like the equivalent of a cowboy movie. However, in the originality, the story may play out much deeper with such deep rooted cultural meanings and history that may otherwise go over the knowledge of someone outside.
As an art of politics and liberation, the kinetic arts like kung fu are often disregarded. People often just take it at face value instead, enjoying it for the kicking and action. Therefore the political messages through kung fu are often lost.
Week 6, Friday. Kato, chpt 3: Mutiny in the Global Village
“As if it were attempting to sea the leakage of ‘reality’ from the factory of fantasy, Hollywood resorted to every possible means to eradicate the voices of labor. It ranged from an outright violent repression- deploying thugs, private police, and the (social) department (in case of Warner Brothers)- to the use of collaborative unions, and, most significantly, the rhetoric of ‘anti-communism’” (page 75).
While it is important to look at the lack of representation in films when it comes to oppressed people it is also important to look at the representations that do exist, especially when there is an overlapping theme among those who portray characters. On page 74 there is a quote on motion pictures being silent propaganda; a visual stimulant that one subconsciously takes with them past the time the screen is turned off. I once heard that Leave it to Beaver‘s June Cleaver was meant to show women who had “forgotten their place” outside of the home post-WWII how incredible the pumps-and-pearls lifestyle was. It was meant to remind them how glorious it was to be a stay-at-home mother and wife. Of course, the “them” that was being reminded of this American dream were not those who had already found the dream one they weren’t allowed to experience in waking life. Looking back, we can clearly see how the absence of opportunity and representation for women of color was exhibited through a women meant to represent only the white, middle-class family. And, in this representation the propaganda for who was middle-class, who was pumps-and-pearls, an who was the all American wife was obvious.
It is through this form of representation that stereotypes and type-casting becomes problematic. On page 104, Kato describes how the extras for what seems to be the “bad guy’s posse” were contrived of Chinese addicts without housing in Hong Kong. Not only does this give us a view on how people treat those with addictions (immediate villains)and in poverty but it creates this face-to-the-lifestyle sort of propaganda. Our subconscious remembers the bad guy from on screen and moves that image out of Hollywood. And as discussed through pages 100-104, there is a large amount of concealing the reality of those images that goes into the production of the film. No one wants to see the green screen, and that is understandable, but it’s the “Disneyland myth” in terms of labor that proves to have the negative impacts; “[...]where the trace of labor, not to mention of resistance, is completely erased in the final product” (page 104). The viewer begins to become disassociated with the labor that is necessary for the product and this issue expands into clothing and food production (among others).
However, there remains to be activism through alternative methods . I looked into this when researching the art that came from the American Japanese Internment Camps during World War II and found that by discrediting resistance that does not fit the common definition, we are erasing both the voice and the courage that came through the art. On pages 89 and 108, we are given examples of how Hendrix and Lee (respectively) used their power as pop culture icon and their art to fight back as activists.
Containment
con·tain·ment
noun \kən-ˈtān-mənt\
: the policy, process, or result of preventing the expansion of a hostile power or ideology
Jimi Hendrix and Bruce Lee experienced the corporate mediation of their image. Kung Fu films and Hendrix’s music have revolutionary potential that was “contained” by Hollywood’s repackaging and production. The rebelliousness inherent to youth culture was endorsed only on a symbolic level within a contained framework. Similarly, the idealogical threat of Third World resistance present in Kung Fu films was contained by processing the films with Hollywood Orientalism, essentially producing a simulacrum of actual liberatory media.
The “containment” model that Kato references is not limited to the sphere of Hollywood. ”Containment” is also the term used to describe the strategic foreign policy the United States adopted during the 1950s-60s to stop the perceived spread of communism. The communist threat of USSR was to be contained and isolated, lest it spread to neighboring nations. The containment policy eventually lead to the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. The foreign policy version of containment sounds eerily similar to Kato’s model presented in From Kung Fu To Hip Hop.
Connecting Kato
Who: David Carradine
What: Kungfu
When: 1972- 1975
Where: Hollywood
With the success of Kungfu in American pop culture, it seems like the next step for America to take after kungfu movies is to make a T.V. show about it and showcase it the people of the United States. When I was first reading about it, I really liked the idea of where the show, Kungfu was going to take. Then I get to the part where they go into details about the cast of the show and that’s where I felt very disappointed. As per usual though, I don’t really like to focus too much on the negative side of things so I’ll give it this much, I am glad that they utilized Bruce Lee as a plot consultation, at least they were trying to keep things in the background as close to authentic as they could get it. What I don’t understand the decisions in choosing someone whose white, with no interest in kungfu or martial arts in general to be the face of this show. It reminds me in of the section in Dave with the discussion of shows based in Hawai’i, why does Hollywood always want to put a white face on a completely different culture from their protagonist? And if it’s not a white face they want to portray, then instead they try to caricaturize a person’s culture or just having no mention of someones background at all.
“Nonetheless, such investment was not to introduce “realism” but rather to refine the “prop” with sophistication so that the paradigm of the kung fu genre can be processed” (95)
I understand that television is a way to escape from reality but there have been plenty of television shows in the past that try and talk about real historical events that have happened in the past and even in this day and age we have a whole genre called “reality T.V.” but even then, that genre is so misleading because it’s not reality in a lot of cases. Why does Hollywood claim that they want to show the realistic aspects of life but constantly show lies?
POP-ositions
One of the ways in which I can relate the globalization that happens in Kato’s book and modern times is when Kato is talking about when the writing for karate changed.
“…the schools in Tokyo saw that name as inappropriate and altered it’s spelling to “karate” by applying the Japanese phonetic system (hiragana) instead of the Chinese ideogram.” (21 Kato)
The way I see the connection is for instance, in one of Sachi’s blog posts she compares and contrasts the American definition of ‘kawaii’ and the Japanese definition of ‘kawaii’. When you read the blog you notice immediately by looking at the photos of her google image search that there is clearly a different definition for each culture.
Or another example is whenever I meet exchange students from Japan, I like to bring them to places like Happy Teriyaki or Koibito and suggest to them they try the teriyaki. I ask because I know that the type of teriyaki that they are used to in Japan, is not the same flavor of teriyaki that we have in the states. So, while I think that globalization in some ways can be a great thing, by fusing two or more different cultures together, it’s something that one has to be careful of doing. To fuse something together, for me, means to understand both cultures and what they mean and the history behind it, otherwise, rather than globalization, I think it turns into something like stealing from another culture or appropriating another culture and that’s never a good thing.
From Kung Fu to Hip Hop, pg. 71-112 – examining the connections
Bruce Lee and Jimi Hendrix.
Two titans. Two legends. And never the two shall meet. Or so I thought.
The legacies of these two ground-breaking artists live within American culture like plump fruit born from a withering tree. Their names are immortal, their faces undeniable – these are people who “changed the game” so to speak. They challenged conventions of Hollywood and the music industry, and created defining works that people still look back to analyze, study and respect. Both Enter the Dragon and Electric Ladyland are considered staples or watershed moments, and those who understand still feel the weight of those respected works today. Throughout my life I never really thought to connect the two men, but after the reading I felt a very strong bond between the two. It’s an overstatement to say that these two artists were “gifted”, but I think what they represented meant so much more. Bruce and Jimi were both born on November 27th (two years apart) in America, and grew up through the 40s and 50s. As such, they lived through the defining moments of the 20th century, and being “non-white” meant dealing with the strong racist sentiment of the time. Both Bruce and Jimi are “mixed plates” in terms of heritage, as Bruce’s mother is half-Caucasian and Jimi is mixed Cherokee and African American.
What I find interesting about the journeys of these men is the fact that they had to go “outside the system” in order to achieve success. Bruce tried to make it Hollywood, but like George Takei, found himself confined to roles that weren’t fulfilling and were stereotypical. Instead, Bruce had to go to Asia in order to find that success and through the Hong Kong system helped cement the legacy he has today. Jimi also had to step outside America in order to find his success, as his early triumphs came from playing shows in the UK before releasing his first LP Are You Experienced?. I enjoyed reading about Bruce Lee’s attitude on set and how he always tried to be on the level with the “average people”. He ate with the crew, argued on their behalf and constantly butted heads with the director – Bruce Lee was truly a unique being. You could tell that this is a man who lives by his art and understood the world in a way most didn’t. Because of this and his films, I find that he has been elevated to an almost “folk hero”-like interpretation. The fact that these men died so young only helps to strengthen that legacy or myth, and the idea of what they could have accomplished had they lived on makes it all the more tragic but also further enhances the legend. Because of these similarities, Jimi Hendrix and Bruce Lee are tied together much more than I thought – hell, they’re both buried in Washington. Maybe I shouldn’t mistake fate for coincidence…
Kato
Bruce Lee’s low-key political statements throughout his career were genius. You would not know that his anti-imperialistic, anti-globalization politics were present in kung-fu films unless …
Week 6, Tuesday. Pop-ositions and Kato readings, Chpts 1&2.
Poposition: The use of vernacular in pop culture by means globalization by turning certain words into buzz words,. Examples; merci, voila, skosh/sukoshi, sayonara, and various tattoos (such as kanji on those who do not know kanji).
I’m choosing this one of our our four pop-ositions because it was influenced by a chapter I wrote a previous blog entry on, so instead of focusing on that again I chose to focus on the vernacular of this book and how the book takes the subject of pop culture (which some might argue as lacking substance) and place it into the academic realm (which has a high level of importance placed onto it).
First, the language of this book, as discussed in class, is heavy with culture theory words. Occasionally, some of these words are turned around be seen as negative or condescending. For instance, how “privilege” has become a word around Evergreen that some use to make fun of how “PC” people are. On the other side of this, however, is that the book’s “vernacular” in other realms, such as blogs, creates a barrier between those who are only venturing into the blog to “troll” (internet language) and who will be deterred by the language. Of course, this backfires, as it also lowers its accessibility to those could highly benefit from the material. This somewhat mirrors the way that vernacular among people of color also keeps them safe because it allows them a voice that is their own an which creates barriers that keep others out. However, as mentioned in the proposition, those words can be caught ono as a catch phrases or buzz words and then appropriated or misused.
A common theme throughout the first 2 chapters of Kato’s From Kung Fu to Hip Hop was the wide-spread student riots that were taking place, something that combined both youth culture vernacular and academic speak. This sort of cross between cultures allowed students to speak for the families and cultures they were from (such as the Chican@ movement or the Black Power movement) while creating a new vernacular that was deemed “safe” because it was within the “intelligent” community. It also created a bridge; if you’re coming from one side, the bridge becomes accessibility by using vernacular into political academia while the other side leads into representation of themselves. To have a pop culture representative was another way in which youth and entertainment culture merged with activism in a way that was accessible (and subconscious through representation) an another instance as to why Lee was so beneficial to the social revolution of the 1960s and 1970s.