AsAm English 150 UW Madison Final Review

Orientalism

Ideas and beliefs held by "the West" about "the East"

Identifies Asia as "the Other" against which Europe/America defines itself

Edward Said, Orientalism

"The Orient was almost a European invention"

"A Western style for for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient"

Typical Orientalist themes

Orient as "heathen," "feminine," "backward," "sensual," "stagnant"

American Orientalism

US presence in the Middle East is described as distinctive from European/post colonial presence

Thoreau, Emerson fascinated by "infinite" and "immovable" East (esp. India)

Walt Whitman, "A Broadway Pageant"

Literary techniques

Personification: speaking of an object as if it were human

Apostrophe: direct address to an absent person/object

Anaphora: repetition of word/phrase in successive lines

Themes

Orient as opposite ("Antipodes"), ancient ("Originatress"), female ("all-mother)

Unity of Asia: Japanese and Indians as part of "race of Brahma"

Vs. America as "young Libertad"

"Greater supremacy" of America, renewing Asia through commerce

"Well-pois'd" between Asia and Europe

London, "The Yellow Peril" (1904)

Aftermath of Russo-Japanese War in which Japan defeats Russia

The real "peril" is a possible union of the Chinese and Japanese

London, "The Unparalleled Invasion" (1910)

Orientalist view of China and West as opposites, "mental aliens"

Chinese immigration as invasion: "The real threat lay in the fecundity of her loins"

"Solution": biological warfare, genocide of Chinese

Sui Sin Far

Sui Sin Far (1865-1914) : mixed-race Asian North American (Chinese mother, white father)

Often seen as first expression of "Chinese American" or "Asian American perspective"; sympathetic portrayal of Chinese immigrants

"Leaves from the Mental Portfolio of an Eurasian"

Series of autobiographical episodes; themes of racialization, identification

"Mrs. Spring Fragrance"

Short story with theme of "Chinese" vs. "American" values, often treated ironically

Critique of American hypocrisy: "protector of China" vs. detention of immigrants and discrimination

Maxine Hong Kingston, China Men

Blurring of genres: history, memoir, fiction

Use and rewriting of Chinese literature/mythology/folklore

Title: reclaiming of term "Chinaman"

Narrator's attempt to interpret her father's silences

"I'll tell you what I suppose from your silences and few words"

Structure: episodes about different "fathers" in different eras

Both individual and collective figures; incorporating history

Different stories create different fathers

Claiming America: "Grandfather of the Sierra Nevada Mountains"

"He had built a railroad out of sweat, why not have an American child out of longing?"

Carlos Bulosan, America Is in the Heart

Context: US colonization of the Philippines (1902-1946)

"Ethnobiography": combination of biography and ethnography

Opening sections in Philippines: tradition vs. modernity

Brother Leon's marriage

Mary Strandon: idealized white American woman

Arrival in America

Entry into Filipino American communities

Unity as response to racism

Idealization of white women as symbol of America

Khaty Xiong

Poet, born to Hmong refugees from Laos

Hmong fighters recruited by CIA in "secret war" in Laos; many later become refugees and come to US

"Pork Rinds, Watered Rice"

Speaker's mother as hard-working chili picker

Khaty Xiong

"On Visiting the Franklin Park Conservatory & Botanic Gardens"

"Pork Rinds, Watered Rice"

Lawson Fusao Inada, "Concentration Constellation"

"Constellation" of sites of internment camps that "scar" the American landscape

WWII Japanese American internment

1942-1945: Japanese Americans forcibly removed from West Coast and interned in camps across the West, South

Fred Korematsu: challenges internment in court

Korematsu v. US (1944) upholds legality of internment

Asian American activism

Asian American movement of 1960s/70s: interracial, international, pan-ethnic political activism

San Francisco State College strike (1968-69)

Leads to creation of ethnic studies

Aion:

first Asian American literary magazine

"Looking for America"

Janice Mirikitani's

critique of stereotypes of Asians in popular culture

We, the Dangerous"

Janice Mirikitani's

response to Japanese American internment; links Japanese American experiences to experiences of the victims of Hiroshima and the people of Vietnam

"Confessions of a Chinatown Cowboy"

Frank Chin

Masculinity: Ben Fee and "Chinatown cowboy"

Problem of language: "college white" vs. "practical" language of Chinatown

Chinese Americans as chameleons, imitators

Rise of model minority myth

Idea of "Chinese culture" as way of keeping Chinese alien

"Movies in Chinatown": martial arts films vs. emasculating stereotypes of Hollywood

Chinatown as home; Mr. Mah's language: "Chinatown buck-buck bagaw"

The Woman Warrior

Maxine Hong Kingston

Genre: blurring of fact, fiction, myth

Organized by stories told by narrator and/or her mother

"No-Name Woman": story of aunt told by mother, retold by daughter

Necessity vs. extravagance

"White Tigers": retelling of Fa Mu Lan story

Narrator places herself into Fa Mu Lan story

Combined with other stories (words carved into back)

"Shaman": mother's ghost stories

Ghosts as threats to women's independence

"Ghosts" are also white Americans; memories of past

"A Song for a Barbarian Reed Pipe"

Episode of "silent girl" as "racial double" of narrator

"Bad English"

"Bad English": "The English heard in church, among friends and family in K-Town, was short, barbed, and broken"

"Engrish": "mistranslated English from East Asian countries"

Reclaiming "bad English"

"bad English is my heritage"

"Literary lineage" of "writers who make the unmastering of English their rallying cry"

"Persimmons"

Li-Young Lee

Speaker of Chinese descent punished by his teacher for not distinguishing words "persimmon" and "precision"

Speaker displays his own cultural knowledge by showing that choosing persimmons is a form of precision; takes on role of teacher

Sound and meaning: links similar-sounding words through his experiences

Chiasmus: order of the terms in first clause is reversed in the second

Father's painting of persimmons

Agha Shahid Ali

George Uba: "Activist" vs. "post-activist" poetry

Ali: raised in Kashmir, spends career in US

Ghazal: Arabic verse form with themes of loss, romantic love

Each couplet ends on the same word or phrase (radif) and includes rhyming word (qafia); poet's name often included at end

"Tonight"

Agha Shahid Ali

"Tonight"

Allusions to Dickinson, Melville, Bible

Shifting of the "you" throughout poem

The Best We Could Do

Thi Bui

Background of US war in Vietnam

Structured around family's oral histories

Visual style: panels, color, shading, etc.

Responding to dominant images of Vietnam War

Chan Is Missing

Wayne Wang

Often described as first Asian American feature film

"Revisionist Charlie Chan" film

Self-consciousness about stereotypes

Destabilization of "Chinese" identity opens space for Asian American identity

Manilatown scene: from Chinese to Asian American

"Look in the puddle"

Crazy Rich Asians and media representation

Production, text, audience

History of yellowface (Breakfast at Tiffany's)

Asian Americans in film

Flower Drum Song

Asian American films: Chan Is Missing, Joy Luck Club

Crazy Rich Asians

Based on novel by Kevin Kwan

International cast of Asian, Asian American actors

Self-consciously Asian American elements

Severance and COVID-19

Ling Ma

Multiple genres: workplace story, zombie/post-apocalyptic story, immigrant story

Shen Fever: carried by goods from China

The "fevered" as "creatures of habit" who repeat routine actions

Relationship to nostalgia

Immigrant narrative: Candace's Fujianese family

Multiple locations: New York, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Fujian, Chicago

Relevance to current COVID-19 pandemic and rise of anti-Asian violence

Labeling of virus as "Chinese virus" or "kung flu"

Increase in anti-Asian hate incidents

"United"

Cathy Park Hong

"Purgatorial" status of Asian Americans between black and white

Popular perception of Asian Americans as "carpenter ants"

"Impassive" appearance vs. internal "inadequacy"

Dragging of David Dao off United flight: as image of Asians being "ejected, evicted, exiled"

Asian Americans as "tenuous alliance of many nationalities"

Techniques of close reading: diction, tone, imagery

Even the Rain

Agha Shahid Ali-rain represents grief of a lost love-had brain tumor and was expecting death-rain is life giving force-his mother died from brain tumor-rain links beginning of life in india with his resting place in america

Land

Adha Shadid Ali- stanzas end in "land"-no sugar in promised land (us is not his sweet home anymore)-relies on alcohol to assimilate-misses home