“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.

The wonderful thing about this movie is that although it focuses on 2 people who come from different races, neither of them are Caucasian which allows for many interesting relationships and conflicts to be brought up. Meena’s father and Demetrius showcase one of these conflicts when they have a conversation about whether Demetrius can see Meena anymore. Jay does not want Demetrius around, making assumptions about him and his family even though in reality, his family had treated her extremely well. Demetrius retorts back saying that Jay does not see the connection between himself and Demetrius, but he has no clue that Jay was kicked out of Uganda for his race and he was well aware. Two very different circumstances brought those two families together in America, yet America seemed to pit them against each other.

The fact that this movie was directed by Mira Nair, an Indian film maker, makes it that much more powerful and relevant. She is obviously aware of these complex relationships and this awareness adds more depth to the movie. While so many movies are directed by White men, the perspective of Mira becomes a fresh breath to an already unique movie and plot. If you mix all that together with a wonderful soundtrack that shows the contrasts between the different worlds and cultures, you get a Rom-Com with lots of room for reading and understanding.

Mira Nair layin’ down the law on set :]

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.

Communication

noun

1. the act or process of communicating; fact of being communicated.

2. the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs.

3. something imparted, interchanged, or transmitted.

4. a document or message imparting news, views, information, etc.

5. passage, or an opportunity or means of passage, between places.

Each time you communicate with someone (or something), you’re learning from them. Even if you’re learning something small. Communication is an opportunity to gain and impart knowledge onto someone. You can communicate in various ways, talking, yelling, social networking. Sometimes you’re communicating without even thinking about it. Through facial expression, body language, your tone, the way you write, the music you listen to, the clothes you wear, all of these are different forms of communication! Your behavior, emotions, how you look at people!

These forms are overlooked when the topic of communication is brought up. Most people are limited to talking, or signing, or writing. Even if you don’t do anything you are communicating something! Silence speaks on so many levels. No words. Even music communicates with us, on various levels as well. Even if I ended this with an image instead words, it would speak to you in one way or another. Don’t believe me?

(Also, this GIF is my reaction to the novel. Too many feels!!! Feels = emotions)

Each of the characters communicate in their own way as well, though their methods vary based on their personality and experiences.

Ruth:

She communicates when it’s necessary to her, when she either wants to know or understand something. She communicates from more of an emotional place usually and filters what he say very often.

Nao:

She only really communicates the thoughts in the journal. She really doesn’t talk to others that much, not even her own parents. She though when she does decide to communicate, it can be very brash and not always well thought out. She says what she thinks.

Reader:

Communitcates by comparing Nao and Ruth’s experiences to our own. Questioning the author’s purpose for writing this text, wondering why they wrote this and why in this method. Why center the book around time? Why did she end the book where she did? Is the character Ruth actually the author or is the name similarity jut mere coincidence? (I doubt that)

Family Relationships/Superpowahs

I’ve always found the bond between family interesting. I had never really thought about the impact our immediate family has on us. My senior year of high school I lived with my friend Catherine. We always joked that we’re basically the same person but opposite races (she’s white and I’m black). Catherine and I grew up on completely different ends of the spectrum. My family has always been lower class, my parents were divorced, I’d lost a sibling, the only time I’ve traveled out of the country was to Vancouver, Canada and I’d only moved towns once in my life. Catherine was born in London, she’d moved around Europe until she was twelve, her parents are still together, her family was constantly taking family trips around the country during the summer and she lived in a huge three story house. Despite these differences our personalities are very similar. Home and family life clearly has a large impact on our life outside of the house.

Nao is having trouble at home with her dad’s repeated suicide attempts. Her mom is so concerned with keeping a roof over their heads and keeping an eye on her husband that she doesn’t have time for Nao. Having all of this on her mind, Nao’s last concern is herself. I think that people feel that sense of vulnerability. Despite everything that happened in my life, none of them had long term affects on me. I had my mom and she has basically been the only stable thing in my life. Maybe that’s my superpowah? Having one person in my life that I can trust. Maybe that’s everyone’s superpowah.

Nao didn’t really start coming into herself until she spent the summer holiday with her grandmother. You could argue that her sense of self was from getting away from her home and just being away from the negativity. I think it was more than that though. She felt safe.

Its that simple, to me at least. It comes down to feeling safe. And not the kind of safe that involves you staying inside your comfort zone. The kind of safe you feel when you have someone in your life that you can rely on. That kind of safety makes it feel like one wrong move won’t cause your whole life to fall apart.

One of the key points in the film is the fact that Binh is the child of of Vietnamese mother and an American serviceman father during the time of the Vietnam War who is thus a child of both worlds. However, fitting in none which was true of many of the children that were left behind either during or post war. More often than not, these children were left behind never speaking to the American parent again thus becoming outcasts in Vietnam. While the term of  ”bui doi” is a derogatory term it is by defination of the word correct as to what Binh is as part of his heritage. A similar term is applied to these same children in the United States which is “Ameri-asian” and that term is no less derogatory then being called a bui doi in the country of his birth. Therein lies the problem. We,as humans, have a need to label everyone and everything no matter if the term causes pain or not. Often, we do not realise the consequences of the action of that label. Words hurt. They carry power. They can condemn a child to a life of pain and servitude because of it as well. Instead of embracing the uniqueness of Binh the world chooses to judge him by ancestry. This is the most important point that I felt in the movie that needed to be conveyed to the public. Words hurt as does the actions that they cause so therefore we must be mindful of the pain those words can cause.

This movie was definitely interesting for me.  I can definitely relate to Meena and her family in the sense that they were Indians born in Uganda, which made them Ugandan/Indians!?  And my family is, well a mix of things, but we are White on my grandpa’s side, Indian on my grandma’s side, but all of my family on my dad’s side was born in Trinidad.  I was born here so I guess I’m just all of the above.  Culturally however, my family is Trinidadian first and foremost, and then Indian.  We have a mixture of the two cultures in our family traditions and ways of thinking.

As for the other aspects of this film, I wasn’t surprised at all about the two families not being pleased with Meena and Demetrius’ relationship.  They came from two different cultures that don’t understand each other.  I do think it’s strange that Meena’s parents weren’t more understanding because they came from Uganda.  But I guess they still wanted her to marry someone who was also Indian regardless of where they lived.

This film touched on issues of race, and worked against stereotypical outcomes of what could be ‘racial’ encounters.  For example, when Demetrius accidentally hit the white guys car.  I was fully expecting a white police officer to show up and pull the ‘white power’ card on Demetrius and blame him for everything.  However, what happened instead was a black police officer showing up and dealing with the situation without looking at the two men’s race, but the situation at hand.  Another way that the director forced the audience to rethink they’re initial biases or thoughts was when Meena’s mom was forced at gun-point to get off the bus while trying to leave Uganda.  I actually didn’t fully understand what was going on in that scene.  I did think that something really bad was going to happen.  I thought she was going to be shot or degraded in some way.  However, in our class discussion Chico brought up the point that not everything is as clear cut as it seems.  The Ugandans seemed like they were being unfair, but when the Ugandan officer forced Kinnu to open her suitcase, we saw that she had many nice things.  She also had a Westernized picture of an Indian man which signified their views and wealth in Uganda.  This forced us as the audience to keep our assumptions in check.

“I was never a citizen of any particular place… My parents left China to go to Taiwan. We were outsiders there. We moved to the States. Outsiders. Back to China. Now we were outsiders there, too – outsiders from America.”–Ang Lee, interview with Roger Ebert, December 11, 2005

This film explored the differences between traditional views and modern views.  The traditional views that Wai’s parents wanted for him conflicted with what he wanted.  This film seemed pretty progressed in the sense that it portrayed a gay relationship, in a Chinese family, in 1995.

I wanted to research the director of the film a little because I wanted to understand what kind of movies he usually made.  It seems that he likes to deal with difficult topics, and handle them in the best way possible.  One of the best parts of this film was the emotional content.  It was funny, tense, and real.  It wasn’t just about a gay couple, it was about all of the complications that were inevitable in a Chinese family.  Not that in America parents are always accepting of their children’s choices in this sense, but I think that in other cultures it is a lot harder for a family to accept that their child is gay.

I really enjoyed this film, and I like the happy ending even if that is not always realistic.  At least it’s hopeful.

I really enjoyed this film.  It wasn’t my first time seeing it, but it was the first time seeing it through the lense of Asian/American studies.  I think that in spite of the blatantly racist comments made by Walt, this movie wasn’t meant to be racist in the typical sense.  I think that even though on the outside Walt was blatantly and shamelessly racist, on the inside there was much more to him.  I also really appreciate the fact that in the beginning of the film there was a scene in which Walt and the Hmong old lady were both outside, and were both saying racist things about each other in their own languages.  I think it was meant to show that racism is built from ignorance of different cultures and beliefs.

One of the things that I really liked about this film is that it showed Walt, an ignorant, old, and grumpy man who was able to put aside his racist and biased feelings and open himself up to a culture that he had previously not cared to know anything about.  I also think that his decision at the end of the film wasn’t necessarily meant to be portraying the ‘white savior.’  I think that he had grown to really care about Thao and his family, and he blamed himself for what happened to Sue.  He also knew that he was going to die anyway, so he wanted to make things right.