Jimi Hendrix In Kato

Jimi Hendrix

I have lived next to Jimi Hendrix’s grave for majority of my life. Going to the gas station I would pass his house, you couldn’t miss it, it was the one with the blue tarp draping over it. Never have I realized that he had a big impact on the country with his playing of the National Anthem. He understood that music can have just as much power was words do. He knew by playing the National Anthem in a way no one else could would say more words then one could express.

I knew that Hendrix was famous for his guitar-playing skills, but I never knew that he was able to compare his music playing to some of the great activist during the black power movement. Hendrix was able to take his music to the next level and be remembered by greatness and not trash-talk that we encounter in our generation today. Its admirable that Jimi Hendrix was able to see that he could do so much more with music then JUST play the guitar. I never realized how much of an honor it is to be able to go to his grave or live in the same area as he once did. I never was able to see the importance he made by playing the National Anthem in a way nobody could.

Zombie Obsession Post 8: Revelations

“For my obsession project I have decided to compare and contrast a Japanese zombie T.V. show/movie with an American zombie T.V. show/movie once a week. The goal of this project will be to answer the overarching question, “What do these shows say about their native societies?” by the end of week 9 (its week 3 right now). To do this, I will answer in my weekly blogging’s a set of my own questions over the course of the next seven weeks. These questions may include the following:” (from my week 3 blog)

Well it’s week 9 now and I don’t know if I have an exact answer to my overarching question. 9 weeks just wasn’t long enough to study both Japanese and American culture…. but on the positive side I did make many revelations and  learned new things along the way. Here they are:

1.  There are very, very, very, few Asian American actors/actresses cast in zombie themed T.V. shows or films. I mean, I always knew there weren’t that many…but after doing this project I can’t deny that I’m shocked at the reality of the situation. It’s scary to know the only Asian American character I could find in a zombie themed show/movie was Glenn. That’s just sad….Fortunately, the show did a pretty good job at not stereotyping him.

2. Both American and Japanese shows/films usually have romance as part of the plot; however I noticed the relationships portrayed in the Japanese films are much less important to the plotline and are also much less sexual when compared to American films.

3. Like many American films, (from what I’ve seen) Japanese shows/films are typically sexist too, but sometimes in a different way. I also think that Japanese culture is way more open to the idea of a “strong and sexy” woman than American culture is. I feel like in American culture a woman cannot be both, it’s like she has to choose between the two. In addition, I think that maybe Japanese culture has more “fun” when it comes to portraying different types of relationships in films; this can especially be seen in the film Wild Zero where the main character Ace is convinced by Guitar Wolf that it doesn’t matter if his love interest was in actuality born as a boy.

4.  Japanese and American “cult” zombie films gain a cult following in very similar fashion… which includes; the main “heroes” having a “mock-heroic” type attitude and being connected to a different time period other than the one they belong in; having an “evil” force/villain present in the film, and the zombies knowing how to fight and make decisions for themselves.

Because I was left with just as many questions as answers, I have decided to continue my project well into the future.

 

 

Best Dressed

I really wish that I had managed to bring the cultural costumes of other Asian countries into my blog, but I ended up only focusing on the Korean wear. I had originally planned to upload some of my designs and maybe construct one, but time managed to slip away from me and I didn’t finish any of them.

Here’s a great pic of South Asian dresses and I would have really loved to maybe get into some of them. Also, this Tumblr, Asian National Costumes is great to look at various dress types.

traditional_dresses_of_south_asia_by_azad126-d4ibd6t

Group 5

interracial-group-people-5042628Chapter5 : Due to colonization, Languages have affected one anthers meaning and created new words and meanings for exsiting words. It has lead to a sense of privledge in some cases due to education and has influenced popular music by being able to have double meanings and be interchangeable in language.

In the book Davé, he talks about how language and music have been cross currents into different languages. He has examples of words like Pappy, Padré, Papa,  and daddy. We in all languages can understand these words even though we might not speak that language.

It was also explained how English is being taught all over the world. I think that it is very accurate that we can all understand people even if we speak different languages. Working in retail I have had times were customers won’t speak one or two words of English but we are still able to communiate with the few words that are given and understood between the two of us.

Joy Luck & Lee

We viewed Slaying the Dragon, a documentary about Asian American women in film. It explored prominent roles played by actresses like Nancy Kwan, Nobu McCarthy, Kim Miyori, and Anna May Wong. We also viewed The Joy Luck Club. It followed four women, and their daughters’ lives through the experiences and hardships that shaped them.

Each of the Tuesday films covered the portrayal of women in media, the Lee reading also tied into this. I thought that The Joy Luck Club was amazing. I really felt connected to some of the daughters’ due to shared experiences, and they showed such depth that made them feel so much realer. The mothers’ stories were absolutely heartbreaking as well. The cast was amazing, nearly all of my favorite Asian American actresses were in it.

In Lee’s Orientals, the chapter deals with Orientalizing women in media and the stereotypes in film. I thought that this really gave insight into why The Joy Luck Club is so great. Thought it’s about Chinese and Chinese American women, they portray such a wide array of character types that it is so far from where the industry started.

Crisis

Crisis, singular. Crises, plural.

  • 危机
  • wēijī
  • dangerous/critical point

I chose to present the Chinese for “crisis” since one of the films dealt with a Chinese family, and the documentary dealt with a “Chinaman” image.

Saving Face involved many sort of crises. Honor, romantic, personal, occupational. Ma’s crises begin with her pregnancy, being kicked out of her home, dating, and fear of motherhood. Since she was unwed and pregnant, Ma’s father kicked her out of his home. For him, having an unwed pregnant daughter caused him to lose face (a sort of social honor). Wil tries to get her on dates so that she will get married and move out, but she feels insecure about her age. She also kept repeating her fears about not being able to take care of the child well. She’s afraid she can’t manage it.

Wil faces crises over her relationship with Vivian. She is afraid to tell others about their relationship, mainly her mother and the Chinese community because she would seem like a disrespectful daughter. She also struggles to balance her job, her mother, and Vivian. When she lets Vivian go, whether because of her fear or for Vivian’s future, she fully admits she loved Vivian.

The Slanted Screen highlighted the roles that Asian American men have had in film and television. The real crisis about this is the lack of proper roles being presented.

Mississippi Masala

Multiracial and cultural relationships are definitely embedded in the themes of this movie. The duality between being African-American and never having been to Africa and then being Indian descent but identify with being African was interesting to see the duality between them. The racist aspect was also something that I wasn’t expecting. There was a strange tension between the female character’s father and Denzel Washington’s character as well, though I don’t think it was from racism, but the feeling of betrayal from his best friend from Africa.

This was also the first time that I had heard about Indians being in Africa, and what they went through. Though it doesn’t really specify much about the history. Though it gave enough details to know what had happened in Uganda. While there was some general information, it would have been nice to know more about what happened in detail, but I guess that’s up to me to research.

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The End.

What I wanted to do while looking at video games, particularly Bioshock Infinite, was to show the connection to our own world and reality. While most games represent the extreme, I think it can be important to read into some of these games as a commentary on our society. While some may see them as useless, I do think that the lessons presented in these games can be taken and used if the player – or reader of the text – is willing to look past just the entertainment and look into the details.

If we let them I think that there are some games that really do have something to say. They both have the power to entertain and teach, as long as the player can read between the lines.

 

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a3/Official_cover_art_for_Bioshock_Infinite.jpg

Connection

“By changing our history and our memory, they try to erase all our shame.”

-The email from the professor to Ruth about Haruki. Before this class I was in a human rights class, and one of the things that we talked about was the Japanese invasion in China, but particularly the denial of these massacres. There was even a government official who attempted to claim that the Chinese death count was too high by multiple thousands, that it hadn’t been ‘that bad.’

There was also mention of a group of Japanese men who had been taken prisoner in China who then attempted to remind the country of what had happened using the philosophy that if they continued to deny what they had done then it was only a matter of time that it would be repeated. They wanted to bring attention to these matters in order to keep the truth from dying.

I think that Ruth has an amazing way of bringing in issues that had happened in the past to color her characters of the past, present and future.

Mississippi Masala

If you’ve ever seen a movie with a mostly black cast then you know that usually, someone dies. And it isn’t because of natural cause like cancer or something. Can you take a guess as to what it might be?

Gang Violence!

During all of Mississippi I was waiting for something bad to happen. I was waiting for the younger brother to get shot in a drive by. I was waiting for someone to get called the N word. I was waiting for something really racially wrong to happen. And even though there was a clear diversity happening, not once did something ever go really wrong. Yeah, the parents forbid her from seeing him but that didn’t stop her! (She was in love which is on a whole different level of being ridiculous.) No, her parents said no and she ran off with him anyways! That’s how the story ended! They ran away together!

I did enjoy the movie overall. It was interesting seeing how race doesn’t necessarily determine  culture. Mina was racially Indian but she was born and raised in Africa. Demetrius was racially  African but was born and raised in America. There was definite similarities, like who important family was to both of them, but at the end of the day they chose love. That could be an American thing though, culturally, we don’t look up to our elders and keep up with traditions like we used to. Honestly though I felt like this movie portrayed my black culture pretty well. Like I was saying earlier, it was nice to see a black family and not see gang violence with it.