“Beginning in the first years of the century, short film strips and one-reelers shown in nickelodeons catered to working-class and immigrant audiences.  By the second decade of the century, as movies shifted towards the more complex and novelistic feature-length narrative and as movie theaters were designed to imitate legitimate theaters, the movies began to take a more reputable image and attract a middle class audience.” (Lee 119)

This section was interesting to me for a few reasons. The first was that in the beginning, they were catered toward the working class and immigrant audience. I think this is interesting because it seems like almost nothing was for these two groups during the early part of the decade. It seemed like most things in the world were directed to the more wealthy population.
It is also interesting that during the next decade, the movies were directed toward middle-class people, and the theaters were even designed differently. Were these people to good to go to the theaters before hand? I also want to know what exactly changed to cause the shift in audience? Why all of a sudden did they decide that movies were now for middle class citizens versus working class and immigrants. Maybe they made more money off of them? I don’t know, but it is  something to think about.

Chapter 9 : Filipinos

-They were “American Nationals” not foreigners, because the Philippines were acquired from Spain during the war.

-Filipinos on the mainland faced violence from white men, but Filipinos in Hawaii did not.

- Manongs = 1st generation Filipinos

-They went to Stockton California for work as either domestic servicemen, in fisheries, or doing agriculture jobs. (It seems like at least a few times in this quarter, Stockton California was brought up. There is a lot of history here, which is interesting because this is where my mom was born.)

-Exclusion of Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, and Asian Indians caused the need of so many filipinos in agriculture.

-Agricultural camps

-Independent people and fought for rights and wages in the field.

-FLU: Filipino Labor Union

-They were often mistaken as Chinese or Japanese. Sometimes black. There were “No Filipinos Allowed” signs.

-They Couldn’t buy a home and it was hard to find someone who would rent to them.

-They were treated as if they were violent people.

-White farmers were threatened if they had Filipino workers. The threats were to ruin their crops, and them.

-Caused many problems if they were with white girls.

-Apparently this caused problems because they could attract girls more because they were good dancers, they wore more stylish clothes, and they spent their money more lavishly then white men did.

-Filipino men would seek out white women more often then Japanese, Korean, or Chinese Americans would.

-Apparently they are also good in bed! The white men were threatened because the Filipinos were taking ‘their’ ladies.

-The California government was worried another type of mallato was going to be created. It was against the law for Filipinos and Whites to be together.

-The government decided to grant the Philippines independence so that they would no longer be ‘American Nationals’. This means that they could now be excluded from citizenship along with other Asians. Tydings-McDuffee Act

-Filipinos in the United States were now known as Aliens because of the Tydings-McDuffee Act and were cut from many benefits.

-In LA, thousands of filipinos were deported back to the Philippines because it was cheaper than keeping them on welfare.

-In 1935, the Repatriation Act was passed. The government would send Filipinos who had assistance from Public or Private Orginizations back to the Philippines…but they had to give up their right to re-enter the United States. They worded this in a good way, so many went for it.

-Filipinos were initially wanted for cheap labor, but they now had Mexicans, so now they didn’t need the Filipinos and wanted them deported.

-They would be humiliated if they were deported back at the governments expense.

-They didn’t have ethnic communities like the Chinese and Japanese did.

-White prostitutes were brought to the Filipino camps.

-At dance halls, they paid a dime to the women to dance with them for one song.

-They married other races because there were very few FIlipinos in the United States.

-Filipino men knew how to get girls better than other Asians because they were more familiar with western culture. They were more romantic, they didn’t believe in arranged marriages and they dressed sharp.

Chinese Americans:

-Impossible to become a citizen unless you were white.

-worked in gold mines and on railroads mainly.

-They had strikes because they were paid less.

-Very similar to Japanese American Stories

- Chinese were forced out of their homes because of the unemployed white worker riots.

-1870: movement where whites would pin minorities against each other.

-1854: A court case where a white man was guilty and there were three  Chinese witness’s, but they let the white man go because the witness’s were Chinese.

-Anti-Chinese poetry became popular.

-1400:1 ratio of males to females

-Most female Chinese that came were forced into prostitution.

-Chinatowns: Community Building

-Chinese Exclusion Act: They were forced out of their homes in 1882 and sent on a train. This ruined their China town.

Japanese Americans:

-Children of plantation workers were in schools in Hawaii learning about equal rights and stuff as their parents weren’t being treated equally.

-Pidgin English helped all different cultures communicate and create this new identity for them in Hawaii.

(I didn’t write too much about Japanese Americans since we learned so much about them last quarter.)

The Watershed of World War II:

-Since the bombing of Pearl Harbor, it would change how all Asians were treated…not just the Japanese. Also, it would cause the divide between Asians and Americans.

-In the Philippines, Americans and Filipinos fought together against the Japanese. Even though they were from 2 different backgrounds. they helped each other.

-Filipinos in the U.S. automatically had more respect. They wanted to fight in the war and help out but since they were ‘nationals’ they couldn’t.  That law was changed in 1942 and a new Filipino infantry was created.

-Filipinos were finally allowed to become citizens.

-1941: Excecutive Order 8802″ Prohibiting Racial discrimination in employment.

I thought this movie was so cute ! I don’t often see movies with Indian-Americans, so between this and My Name is Khan, I definitely would love to watch more! I really like seeing the Indian Culture!

So I payed attention to the music as the movie went along, which I don’t normally do. I just remember that Chico mentioned it before we started the movie. What I noticed is that there were 2 different types of music played. The first was down south music, and the second was traditional African music. At first the southern music was played only when the scenes were in Mississippi, and the African music was only played when the scenes were in Uganda. This changed when Jay visited Uganda after all those years and he visited his old home. The whole time he was in the United States he kept dreaming about his home Uganda. When he went back, he realized that it changed. Okelo had died. He didn’t know anyone there anymore, and his wife and daughter were in the United States. As he looked at the landscape from his old house, the music suddenly wasn’t African, but southern music. This is when he realized that this was no longer his home. His Home was where his family was.

“Home is where the heart is, and my heart is with you.”

Identity was an interesting theme in this book. We mainly saw examples of Nao having to question herself and if she was worth it. There were so many things that happened in her life that made her think her life wasn’t even worth living.

-Her classmates hated her so much, they bullied her everyday

-They tried to rape her in the bathroom

-The whole class, including the teacher had a funeral for her

-Her dad kept trying to kill himself. (Is she wanted as a daughter?!)

-Her mother didn’t seem to even have any time for her at all.

-Her “Best Friend ” Kayla didn’t seem to have much interest in her anymore.

It seemed like the only person who could help Nao feel like she was worth something was Old Jiko. She helped her form her identity, with her supapawa. She taught her how to ignore what everyone else was doing her, and move on.

Communication was really an interesting thing that was played with in the book.

1.There was Nao communicating with the future. At least she hopes she was…as long as somebody would find her diary. And she did.

2. There was Nao and Ruth communicating..sort of. Nao got to communicate with Ruth, without Nao ever realizing it. And there was Ruth who really really wanted to be able to communicate back to Nao, but didn’t have a way to.

3. There was the author Ruth Ozeki…communicating with whoever was reading the book. I thought some of the footnotes were interesting. It seemed like every once in a while a little bit of personality would pop out of the footnotes, versus just being totally informational. It was like Ruth the author was communicating with me, completely outside of the story.

4. There was Nao communicating with not only the future, but also the reader of her diary. She would ask things like “What do you look like?” “Are you male or female?” Etc.

5. Jiko and Nao mostly communicated through text, which I think is funny because Jiko is supposedly 104 years old and most people decades younger than her don’t even want to have anything to do with cell phones.

6. Haruki #1 communicated to Nao as a ghost, and was able to tell her a few things.

There were so many examples of loss in this book.

1: Self-Confidence. It seems like Nao lost all of her self confidence and also sense of self when she had to move back to Japan. She was so happy with her life in California, and completely changed when they moved back. It must have been especially hard for her since she was 15. That’s such  an important time for young girls when they are learning all about their self identity.

2: Nao’s Father: Ever since he started becoming depressed, it was like he was no longer there for Nao. There were so many times in the book where she had to worry about him killing himself. Or where she would try to communicate with him and she just couldn’t get through to him. It seemed like he always looked right through her. I started having hope for their relationship when they went to visit Old Jiko and he stayed for a little while. I was hoping like she was that he would stay with her for the summer and they could bond. Instead, he just left without saying goodbye.

3. Loss of purpose: Nao feels like she no longer has any purpose to her life. Everyone hates her. She has no friends. She can’t go to school without being bullied extremely bad. It’s so sad that a girl who is only 15 years old and has her whole entire life ahead of her, can’t even think of a reason to live. I am hoping that Old Jiko will give Nao enough hope to live. I still have about 50 pages left in my reading so I don’t know what happens to her yet!  It seemed like at least through the parts I read though that Old Jiko changed Nao’s view of the world, and definitely gave her tricks to get through the rough times, so hopefully she doesn’t end up committing suicide.