Author Archives: kmlynn

Music Videos

BEP: Go against the grain- make their songs half Tagalog/English or just in Tagalog. Music videos portrayed the early Takaki chapters of “Dollar a Day Dime a Dance.” and Filipino pride with BEBOT. APL song is mostly about how Apl’s homeland was. music video has things with Filipino grandpa in a nursing home- ASIAN CULTURES DO NO DO THAT- western cultures do.

BLUE SCHOLARS= Blue Collar? SCHOLAR- educated “profound knowledge of a certain subject”

BEP- Where is the Love (2003) ELEPHUNK

Click here to view the embedded video.

 

BEP- One Tribe (2009) THE E N D

Click here to view the embedded video.

Power of deceit

“Apu is a naturalised US citizen. He holds a Ph.D. in computer science. He graduated first in his class of seven million at ‘Caltech’ — Calcutta Technical Institute — going on to earn his doctorate at the Springfield Heights Institute of Technology (S.H.I.T.).

Apu began working at the Kwik-E-Mart during graduate school to pay off his student loan, but he stayed afterward as he had come to enjoy his job and the friends he had made. He remained an illegal immigrant until Mayor Quimby proposed a municipal law to expel all undocumented aliens. Apu responded by purchasing a forged birth certificate from the Springfield Mafia that listed his parents as US citizens Herb and Judy Nahasapeemapetilon, but when he realized he was forsaking his origins, he abandoned this plan and instead successfully managed to pass his citizenship test with help from Lisa and Homer Simpson.” (Wikipedia)

Apu is an Indian character in the hit tv series The Simpsons. He’s funny and portrays a “vehicle to introduce current views and debates about minorities in the United States” (323). Though he is one of the few Indian representations on television in today’s society, who Apu is is not who he seems to be. The person who voices Apu is not Indian, nor is he Asian. Hank Azaria actually voices Apu. There had been dilemmas in the past where white actors would portray Asian ones even though there were Asian actors in the field. Why have someone who is not a certain race be a certain race? I understand that he is just acting, yet that gives privilege to other white actors to mimic and and give that one accent to that certain race. “The satire of ethnic assimilation illustrates how racial and ethnic identities operate beyond the visual and are influenced by the reception of accented speech” (315). What is happening is an accent is giving the audience an image (more than likely a racial image) of someone and then an assumption of some racial culture and binding it. For instance, if on the radio, there was a woman talking with an Asian accent, most people would picture an Asian, most likely Chinese, woman talking with having this certain Asian culture that she lives by.

We also watched a film, The Wedding Banquet, and the movie was about a gay Chinese man who marries a woman just to please his parents. When his parents decide to visit to help with the banquet, both Wei Wei and Wei Tung practically renovate the apartment. Instead of having all the modern art pieces around the apartment, they took all of it down and replaced it with traditional Chinese items. In the movie, Wei Tung has a typical Chinese accent, but he does not live the traditional Chinese culture. This movie sort of breaks that bond between sound and appearance.

Overall, I think both the book and movie show the power of deceit. The way someone talks with an accent can lead to an assumption on how that person looks and the way they live. The movie challenges it by Wei Tung covering his real living environment with “fake” Chinese living styles and Apu, in real life, not being Asian or any form of Asian at all.

 

Class Notes 1/31

bound·a·ry

[boun-duh-ree, -dree] noun, plural bound·a·ries. 1. something that indicates boundaries or limits; a limiting or bounding line.

In class today we related Slanted Screen, Orientals, and Saving Face together by relating them to the term “boundary.” Above I gave Dictionary.com‘s definition of boundary  and in class, we defined boundaries as a division, borders, or lines. All three relate to boundaries of sexuality, opportunity, traditions, interracial boundaries and more.

We eventually moved onto East Main Street and the different chapters. Each chapter has a different topic, but they all have the same theme of having these boundaries given to them.

The first chapter we covered was chapter 6, “Within Each Crack/A Story.” This chapter covers the “political economy of queering Filipino American pasts” (117). The title can mean various things, like the cracks in our hans, or cracks in a story, or even a butt crack.

queer

[kweer] 

adjective, queer·er, queer·est.

1. strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint; unusually different; singular: a queer notion of justice.

2.of a questionable nature or character; suspicious; shady: Something queer about the language  of theprospectus kept investors away.
3.not feeling physically right or well; giddy, faint, or qualmish: to feel queer.
4.mentally unbalanced or deranged.
5. Slang: Disparaging and Offensive.

a. homosexual
 b. effeminate; unmanly.

Queer has many different meanins; however, in today’s society, most people only understand “queer” as the derogatory term. In this chapter, though, queer is actually used in both the strange or odd conventional viewpoint and the homosexual meaning. On page 125 it states, “‘They like you because you eat dog,’” obviously this is a queer view of it being something that would seem mentally unbalanced in the American culture;  furthermore, this essay tries to use “‘queer domesticity’ to characterize pre- 1965 communitities of Filipino laborers”(119). In a sense, some habits of Filipino culture can be seen queer to the American eyes, yet what Filipino had to go through is quite queer itself insofaras to America sees the Philippines as “little brown children” (124). As the Filipino community tries to assimilate to America, America has set this boundary in which they cannot cross.

The second chapter we covered was chapter 10 “Miss Cherry Blossom Meets Mainstream America.” This chapter covered Japanes American second generation (Nisei) beauty pageants and how they tried to assimilate to American cultures. There was a boundary already set up against the Japanese-Amreican culture to prevent them from being part of the American culture so creating pageants that “mimiced” mainstream America (208). Their way of mimicing the American culture was their way to prove to the whites that they were trying to assimilate, “by dressing the queen in western garb and promoting her keen and usually native-born ability to speak English, the community highlighted the “Americanness” of Japanese Americans…They too could claim to be ‘All American Girls’ by mimicking and adopting hegemonic American cultural values such as innocence, sexual purtity, honesty, and caring” (207). Instead of being able to cross this boundary of beauty pageants, Nisei pageants ended up making a new boundary to acceptance of a new kind of beauty pageant of Japanese American culture.

The last chapter we covered for the day was chapter 14, “How to Rehabilitate a Mulatto.”

mu·lat·to

[muh-lat-oh, -lah-toh, myoo-] 

noun, plural mu·lat·toes, mu·lat·tos.

1. Anthropology . (not in technical use) the offspring of one white parent and one black parent.
2. Older Use: Often Offensive. a person who has both black and white ancestors.
adjective
3. of a light-brown color.
As most people know, Tiger Woods is a “mulatto” and a famous golfer. Golfing is seen as a rich, “white” sport, Woods has already crossed that boundary by just being part Black. He does not call himself that; instead, he calls himself  a “‘Cablinasian,’ Black, Indian, and Asian” (222). He does not refer to himself as just one race, though most people see him just as a Black golfer. He crosses the boundary of identifying himself as an “African American” or “Asian American” he instead, refers to a combination of his ethnicities. There was also an exerpt in the book about Nike and the commericals they aired. Tiger had an ad where a group of children of all different races stated, “I am Tiger Woods.” Instead of having one person wishing to be that idol of a certain race or ethnicity, Wood’s commercial has portrayed a variety of cultures. This erases the lines created by racism and instead of categorizing the races, the races are all together as one.

Saving Face

Click here to view the embedded video.

Today we talked about CRISIS and what role it plays in Asian American culture. Overall, I feel like there is a crisis within the Asian realm of media. For instance, in today’s movie earlier, we watched The Slanted Screen: Asian Men in Film and Television. In the documentary, there was a typical stereo-type of Asian men being either being a bad guy or some sort of “kung-fu” master. There was a famous actor, Sessue Hayakawa, who was the first Asian-American actor to incorporate himself in interracial relationships. Though it was a ground-breaking move for Asians in media, it still has not helped too much in today’s society. Keep in mind that these films were made many decades ago; however, movies today in 2014, are still very similar. Yes, there are Asian protagonists, yet there are still typical Asian stereo-types portrayed. In Romeo Must Die, Jet Li is Asian and he is very good at martial arts and the main female role, Aaliyah (African-American) does not end up with Romeo who essentially saves her. The title says ROMEO, so it implies a Romeo and Juliet sort of a tone, but they do not fall in love. Though that it just an implication, there are still stereo-types of Asian American men with knowing karate and being the bad guy in today’s society, creating a crisis of Asian American identity within media.

In addition to the stereo-types, there are also different standards that Asian-American men are held up to in America. There was a snippet of one of the Actors from The Slanted Screen about Bruce Lee and how in America, he had to keep his mask and clothes on to do his physical scenes; however, in China, he can reveal himself and take his shirt off to do his fighting scenes. I thought that this was a crisis in a way that, Lee’s films ended up being famous here in America anyways. Also, it sets up this standard that Asian’s cannot reveal their true-selves in a way. So again, a crisis with who Asian American’s are.

We also watched a movie, Saving Face, which is about a lesbian Asian woman who takes in her mother who is pregnant and will not tell who the father is. Their two roles already are seen as “disgraced” in a typical Asian culture. In this movie, this also creates a crisis again with identity. The characters do not stand as stereo-typed Asian women in a crisis with playing cheesy stereo-types, but a crisis in which they do not fit within typical Asian cultures.

Thinking about the title of the movie I see it relating to keeping the “face” or reputation of both Ma’s and Wil’s family. First off, Ma marries someone who she does not truly love and ends up having Wil. She marries this man to make her father happy and to keep the family’s successful reputation up. So he ends up dying and she somehow gets pregnant! Who is the daddy? Throughout the movie she does not say a thing. Ma ends up getting herself in this arranged marriage to, again, make her father proud of her and to keep his reputation up. However, Wil finds out that her mothers first marriage was not out of love, but business. At the end, we find out it was Little Yu that she had an affair with. And the mother accepts that she must follow her heart instead of instructions and orders.

Wil is a lesbian. Her mother, in the past, found her with a girl but did not say anything about it. Her mother ended up pushing Wil to find a man and get married. Her mother tried to cover up the possibility that Wil could be gay. This causes Wil to be very timid around her  mother about her social life. For instance, when her neighbor, Jay (who is black), comes over her mother makes really racist remarks against him in Chinese, very subtly though. This causes Wil to be aggravated. Then when Vivian pushes Wil to let her meet Ma, Ma accuses Vivian of not liking black people because she did not want to date Jay. When Ma acts up about Vivian dating Jay, it was as if Ma knew they were dating, but did not want to admit it to herself. Wil eventually comes out to her mother and tells her that that was who she was.

In this film, there was also some graphic nudity and identity crisis. I feel like this movie breaks a lot of ground as to having both leading roles to be disgraces to typical Asian cultures. This again, is like an identity crisis within their own culture. Both Ma and Wil cannot truly be themselves because it is not what their family wants to see. As for the graphic nudity, I find it amusing how before, Bruce Lee could not show himself without his shirt on here in the U.S., but now there are movies with lesbian sex scenes. Thus, there is media progress, but still identity crisis.

Overall, the films we had talked about today related to this crisis of stereo-typing and breaking ground in media.  In Slanted Screen there was discussion on both stereo-typing and making media history for Asian-American’s with interracial relationships and breaking the “bad guy” view of Asians. In Saving Face there is lesbian acceptance from her family and Ma’s father accepting her decision to be with who she truly loves. There is a lot of different scopes to see crisis; for instance, identity crisis within the media sphere and the identity crisis within one’s own culture. In the end I feel they all relate to identity and being able to make it within each individual environment.

Relating this all to Lee’s Orientals I would have to bring it back to stereo-types. So in Slanted Screen the Asian actors could not be “sexual” they can be romantic, but that’s it. So in Slanted Screen we saw Asian men as romantics, flirts, or sexual-less. Opposed to Saving Face Ma is a woman who has sex with someone, ends up getting pregnant, and does not share who the father is; thus, giving the stereo-type of Asian women has sly, secretive, and hyper-sexual. Wil, too, gets intimate with Vivian a few times, but acts very timid in public; therefore, leaving the audience to see both Vivian and Wil as these secret sexual beings.Then none of the men in the movie are scene as coming off as promiscuous in any way. This relates to the crisis of Lee introducing the sexual views that American’s have put on Asians. It still lives on in today’s media. So, how do we, as a society fix the media? I suppose that question is a crisis within itself.

The Perfect Woman

 

 

She would be exotic, mysteriously sensual, obedient, and pamper her man like a real woman should. In Slaying the Dragon: Asian Women In U.S. most of the Asian women were seen in that tone. Whether the character they played was evil, good, or a stand-by character, they definitely got the attention of the white man. One of the few things that was introduced at the beginning of the movie was how many men commented on how Asian women were “exotic” and in movie clips the women were wearing fitted dresses with slits half way up each side. Then, there was this clip about Suzy Wong and how she was seen as this very sensual being that created this trend of the long haired, party Asian girl. I feel like she portrayed the mysterious sensual role that most Asian women have in most movies. Lastly, Sayonara portrayed the image of Asian women having this role of pampering their husbands and being obedient to them. Overall, all these qualities create this image of the stereo-typed Asian woman.

In 47 Ronin there were 2 main women who played the different sides of the Asian woman stereotype. The woman that Kai fell in love with, Mika, portrayed the obedient, quiet, and polite role; on the other hand, the Witch was sensual-like with her graceful movements, she was very exotic, and pampered her master. In Joy Luck Club the June’s aunties, Ying Ying, An Mei, and Lindo, were young Asian girls who broke the stereotypes that were presented in Slaying the Dragon. For instance, Ying Ying married a man who was a cheater and could careless about him, yet she stayed in the relationship and did what he asked. An Mei and Lindo were like the outspoken ones. An Mei spoke out against her Father and “Big Mother” at her mother’s funeral and Lindo lied to her mother-in-law and everyone else present to get out of a marriage. They were all obedient; however, none of them grew up to still be obedient (in a way to roll over and do what they were told), they all became independent women.

Lastly, in Orientals I feel like the stereotypes of Asians in general, were created by the media. For instance, the “Third Sex” was a suppressing label for Asians. How this relates to the stereotypes of women, is how media affects the views of people. Everyone now has an expectation for Asian women to be sexual deviants, for pampering slaves, or Asian men to be this weird in-between sexual being. Overall, stereotypes have shaped peoples view of Asians in today’s society.

 

Orientals ix-105

The first few chapters of Robert Lee’s book Orientals was very informative as to define the names that Asians were labeled. It reminded me of Walt in Gran Torino and how he would call his neighbors “gooks” all the time. It was, of course, meant to be very derogatory towards the Asians; however, later in the movie Thao ends up doing these chores for Walt. As Walt gets comfortable having Thao doing a few things for him I think Walt begins to see Thao as the “model minority” type, the perfect worker. The further I read, the more I understood that having Asians in that time was like a double-edged sword for the U.S.

I understood that having Asian was useful to the economy by labor getting done, but also threatening to the superior white race of the country. Asians were needed to work the fields, railroads, mines, and other various work places to build the U.S. However, the immigration of Asians gave the whites nostalgia. They felt intruded and that the Chinese ruined the nice “tone” of California (28). Thus, having the Asian immigrants come to the U.S. was bittersweet.

Asians eventually began to gain their rights to citizenship; however, this was like an invitation to the whites to study the Chinese culture. This lead to U.S. white citizens to make assumptions about the Chinese and their appearances. “Oriental sexuality was constructed as ambiguous, inscrutable, and hermaphroditic; the Oriental (male or female) was constructed as a ‘third sex’” (85). The term “third sex” was constructed specifically for the Chinese. “Sexuality does the political work of defining and regulating desire as well as the body, determining whose bodies and what body parts are eroticized…what privilege, rewards, and punishments accompany sexual behavior”(86).  Defining one’s sexuality was just another political vehicle to categorize racial identities. This tactic, I have never thought of, or read of before.

Unfortunately, some of these terms like “gook” and “model minority” are still used in today’s society. However, the new way to refer to someone as a model minority is to simply ask, “You’re Asian, right?” Implying that when asking an Asian that that they are good at math, know “kung-fu,” for eat with chopsticks. After reading this first part of the section, I realized how some things might have changed, but how some things are simply altered to modern day communication.

January 23 Class Notes

Anime Wong (play on//week 9 animes?): First Chinese American actress
Racialicious: “Racialicious is a blog about the intersection of race and pop culture.” & East Main Street
Parrying Katy: Geisha’s just love with all their heart. I think Katy Perry wasn’t being racist, I think she’s just ignorant about the culture and the lifestyle of Japan. I mean yea she could have just not said anything, but I mean, I don’t think she meant to be racist/offensive
Covering Richard Sherman: Monkey & a Thug. A corner back who was part of the team who gets to proceed to SUPERBOWL XXXXVIII. Super exciting right? But, he had made a very aggressive commentary against Crabtree of the 49ers saying that [sherman] is the best corner back in the league and that Crabtree shouldn’t be talking about him. & people reacted to this by calling him a “monkey & thug.” A thug: young black person who is outspoken. This bugs me. It’s a sport, it’s competitive, and it’s the nature of the game. People get heated and into the moment, of course there’s competition and people will talk, but what do people expect? It’s not like nobody else has ever lost their cool in a heated moment like that.

CULTURE: Integrated pattern of human behavior that includes thoughts, speech, action, and artifacts that depends on mans capacity, customary beliefs, social forms, material trait of a racial religion or social groups.

Popular Culture starts with studying someone’s culture
Define:

1. Culture that is widely favored or well liked by many people
2. Culture which is left over after we have decided what is high culture
3. Mass Culture
4. Culture which originates from “the people”
5.Culture rooted in exchange and negotiation between dominant and subordinate groups
6. Culture which no longer recognizes distinction.

———————————————————-
Stereotype: greek/ stereo:hard, fixed – typos: blow, impression
Oriental: geocentric, why isn’t the U.S. the “East?”
Yellowface: derogatory of blackface. blackface 1830-40 cultural form to characterizing black people

Battle Games

An alternative future of a society brings a reaping of under-aged children together to fight to the death! All these kids put together in an arena, supplied with weapons, and must abide by the rules in order to survive.

Can you guess what novel I’m talking about? A little confused? A little torn

2012Starting5

Well, in class we talked about a topic, “Parrying Katy.” She talks about how Geisha’s just love with all their heart and how she loves the culture. Then I started to think that she may not be racist, maybe she’s just ignorant and doesn’t really know much about the history of Japan and how they’ve come to be in America. I then began to ponder on how she even got the idea to dress like a Geisha and how common it is that celebrities often “copy” or have similar outfits and costumes that relate back to Asia. All of a sudden, I remember being told about Battle Royale and how The Hunger Games is very similar to it and how it seemed to be the “copied” American version (what a friend had told me).

2012Starting5

Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games

Both novels have a futuristic time frame with both states are led by authoritarianism. In Hunger Games 1 boy and 1 girl is reaped from each of the 12 districts, they are called “tributes.” All tributes get training, get put into an arena and are expected to fight each other until there is only one victor. In Battle Royale these students are gassed on a bus and taken to “The Program” which is a military experiment and is an island where they all must fight to the death and again, until only victor remains. In both novels the reason for doing this is to terrorize the people of the states and to prevent an uprising against the government. Also, before entering the area all 24 tributes get a tracket inserted into their forearms, where as the students in Battle Royale have trackers in their collars. In both novels the main characters have witnessed death and lost friends over the course of the battle. Lastly, instead of there only being victor, both novels end up having 2 survivors that are close to each other. For instance, Katiss and Peeta end up winning the games and Noriko and Shuya end up escaping the program. If not identical, very similar right?

a-leather-louis-vuittons-handbag-bag-speedy-30-a213

Chiaki Kuriyama plays Takako Chigusa in Battle Royale

Though there are a few things that separate these two. Though the storyline may be different, the way the movies were produced at least, separate the two as far as popularity goes. I know that books and movies are different, but both of these novels have been turned into movies. So, in Battle Royale it is way more gruesome than the Hunger Games. In Battle Royale the grouping of the students is a public secret, everybody knows it’s happening, but nobody wants to admit that it really is. In Collins novels, the Hunger Games is advertised and televised throughout Panem. Many also argue that Battle Royale is more about violence, gore, and chaos whereas the Hunger Games is about survival and movement towards a rebellion.

I did further research to see when both authors Susan Collins (Hunger Games) and Koushun Takami (Battle Royale) had published their books. Battle Royale was first published in 1999 and was later on translated into English in 2003. There was then an expanded version with a word from Takami as well that was published in 2009. The Hunger Games was first published as a hardcover in 2008. It has since then been a hit and has been sold in 38 territories world wide.

So I guess what I am wondering is if the Hunger Games really is a “knock-off” or at least inspired by Battle Royale? Or is it just a very bizarre coincidence? I have yet to find anything that has proof that Collins had completely ripped of Takami or that there was any political conflict over it. I could agree that both movies/novels are very similar, but I also think that they are both very different in certain ways. Nonetheless, both movies/novels are very interesting and entertaining to watch.

I did my research from here and here (I just searched for each book there and compared.)

Orientals

The Coolie and the Making of the White Working Class

COOLIE: cheap Chinese labor. In 1970 and 1850 has been called the “period of proletarianization” Prices were set by craftsmen which gave way to wages set by employers.  Artisans and independent small producers still represented a large portion of the economy.pg. 55  women, children, and immigrant labor. immigrant labor was being introduced into factories as well as new machinery. This new machinery obviously reduced the need for skilled work, but opened up sho doors to immigrant workers with minimum training and apprenticeship.

Though immigration employment in factorys was big, the spread was uneven among jobs. native born anglo-saxon men maintained their privilegded position in such industries as iron molding, furniture making, and ropemaking. Immigrant women &children worked in textiles and clothing factories and replaced native born women. Irish and French canadian catholics entered the shoe making factories. HOWEVER, machinery threatened the need for these skilled workers. (55) Different kinds of work for different wages & payments. Chinese  v. Irish. anti-chinese groups prominent in those groups, chinese saw irish and short-tempered and undisciplined. The 200 whites that worked with the 600 chinese attacked their neighborhood killing 15 and wounding more. This act barred many Chinese from entering the country. Chinese later tried to mend things with white workers, but whites resisted.

White men worried that chinese will be married to white women. (72 &74) Many women who did marry Chinese men were Irish. These interracial marriages disrupted the Irish men community…(76) Half-breeds (82).

The Third Sex

(85)third sex is  oriental sexuality constructed as ambiguous, inscrutable, and hermaphroditic. male or female Oriental (the third sex). pg 86 [family is more depicted]. Sexual/questionable ones are where? Different ways they see thier sexuality presented. Chinese prostitutes are bound to corrupt the minds of young white men. 94- women & families=racial questions if interracial.

 

Orientals

The “Heathen Chinee” on God’s Free Soil

California as it was and is: False claims in the song. Chinee miners in the mining districts of Cali had NTHING to do with the decline in gold prices. The song created a nostalgiz pastoral vision of CA for nineteenth-century American audiences.Popular musc offered a powerful medium for an ideology of nostalgia. Many of the songs were not ethnological and pirated.(17) Goes over mining, steamer days and how great it was (18-19). Between 1848 and 1851 some 22000 chinese had arrived and doubled within the next two years. The arrival of the Chinese ruined the nostalgic tone for California. TRADES: fur trade, hide trade, CA merchants developed a near-monopoly on the HI and Philippine trade, built a respectable trade with Japan and shared the China trade with NY. Chinese immigration was part of the global working class migration that fuled SF’s explosive population growth in 1850s and 1860s. CA also attracted immigrants from the hinterlands of Europe, Latin America, and Asia. (ENTIRE WORLD-WIDE WORKING CLASS MIGRATING TO ECON CORE)(22-23). in 1850′s erratic economy (24) Many Chinese settlers in CA undermined the definition of Oriental difference which relied on distance…construction of racial different as present at threatenin. FEW V THE MANY(28) PAGE 31 [p 2 china not jus for trade, but for workers...museum in china vs. ordinary chinese stuff in US]. Chinese is to blame for the past and having it go away. (32) MINSTREL show became an entertainment for the new urban working class. minstrel was seen as the construc to Chinese polluting the racial other in the popular imagination. (siamese twins) (32). the show contained and displayed a line up of raceial and ethnic characters. Minstresley can be understood as the ritual response to boundary crisis. Zipcoon represented freedom w/o self control needed for republican virtue. the ideological representation of chinese immigrant as racial other relied on trope insurmountable cultural difference.  CULTURAL DEGREGATION. made fun of pidgen, hair, food, syntax, vocabulary, symbols. pg 43- yellowskins get out! free persons of color v 5 broad positions. (47) LASTLY, there is like a revenge from the whites by cutting pay, labor, and resources