Amy Lamparelli

Well i’ve found to enjoy reading the little side stories, erm tidbits in the begining of the story.

“…In China he was an accountant. To finance his visit, he began looking for owrk in New York. The only job he could find was washing dishes and unloading boxes in a Chinese restuarant.” Zia pg. 196

Okay what is wrong with this quote, this if a 50 year old man, who used to be an accountant in his country, now comes to the United States for a better life? and he is now is a dishwasher and moves boxes? Hello! Whatever happend to the Land of the Free? I feel that in other countries like forChina,  everyone feels that the United States is the remedie to all situations. If you have a shitty life in China, well then the idea of coming to America, where technically we are the land of the free, yet when immigrants show up they typically can’t speak English, they live misrible apartments, and have under the table jobs, where they get paid $1 or $2 for manual labor. Doesn’t really sound like the land of the free to me. The one thing that boggles me is that for example, someone who is an Accountant in China, shouldn’t he be an Accountant in America too?

” Auntie Betty, Though, was disturbed by the stubborn chinese habits…they washed their laundry in the sink each day, and hung their clothes to dry throughout the small apartment…she couldn’t understand why they wouldn’t spend fifty cents to use the dryer. This is America, not China…” pg 197

This is America, yet you take Auntie Betty, who has grown a custom to the American traditions because she has been in America, and is “Americanized” For immigrants coming over, it is a struggle, and someone living with new immigrants has to accept it, and wait for them to grow acustom to American customs. But if you take Ziyoung, after a few months, he gave up and went back to China, because he will have a better life in China then he will in America.

“…the United States, dispite  its gilded image and high standard of living, was harsh palce for those with little money and limited English–so harsh that life in China looked a lot better…”pg. 197

In class on Wednesday we spoke about situations how Asian American groups combatted situtations to find just situtations. Within Chapter five there was a large protest against the Broadway show,  Miss Saigon.  The reason for the protest was about how Asian American actors weren’t getting roles for actual Asian roles.

“B.D. Wong was at a dinner party in 1989 with friends who had just seen the show in London. “They said how embarassing it was to see this tall white man perform in “yellow face,” Wong recalled “we were a certian that the role would be recast when it came to New York.”…”We just assumed that Asian American actors would have a chance to be auditioned.”pg. 119 Yellowface became a term that was widely known and used in the acting district. Even though there was a huge list as of Asian American actors who werre qualifed to play roles, yet no one would even let Asian Americans Audition.  Yellowface, is a make up technique by caking on make up to make the white actors look Asian, even though Asians do not have yellow faces…(strange huh?)  along with caking on make up many actors would tape their eyes to have an apperance of a slant eye. This technique was also used in Breakfest at Tiffineys’.

There became an up roar in with the fact that there wasn’t equality in the acting world. B.D. Wong ended up contacting the Actors Equality, and set up a sub group called Racial Equality. The Racial Equality soon became; Asian Pacific Alliance for Creative Equality (APACE).

So the one thing that just really tweeks me is that, why would you go through the hassel to make a non Asian actor yellowface, wouldn’t it be easier to just find an amazing Asian Actor to play the role?

Okay so my sister did the whole theater thing, and many times people would flip out that someone  was type casted, and many times it turned out good, and sometimes it turns out horrible. So taking the type casting idea, I’m pretty sure that type casting in this situtation would be perfectly fine. Wouldn’t you want someone who is good enough to fit the role, be the role?

Or is it all about politics? Well in the situtation in Zia, it was politics and the miss treament of Asian Americans.

One thing that I found somewhat ironic is that B.D. Wong is all about nontraditional casting and was apart of APACE. Yet in Law and Order SVU, Wong plays an Asian Psychologist, and don’t we have a sterotype about Asians being smart and them all becoming doctors? think about that!

Chapter Three finaly, cleared up what grassroots really ment. In my last post I aptempted to pull apart what grassroots was, but after reading chapter three, it completelly cleared it up. Few!

In the beinging of Chapter three Zia touches on the traditional and whats expected of Asian Americans. “…I did what any good Asian American child would do: I applied to medical school. Though I majored in public and international affairs, and miniored in East Asian studies and student activism, I also took a few pre-med courses…after struggling for years I finally mustered the courage to ruin forever my parents dream…”pg.56

this quote shows the how the culture of Asian American community and what is expected of their children.

The actions that sparked grassroots, was on page, 59 the killing of Vincient Chin. The first time that The Chinese Welfare Coucil came into action was when Chin’s killers came off with a 2yr probation. The Chinese community was outraged, beating in an Asian mans head four days before his wedding for a scuffle.  The Chinese community needed a place for an out cry, they wanted to make a change and overturn it.  That is where the Chinese Welfare Council came in, the start of the grassroots.

“After the community  meeting at the Golden Star, I issued our first press release. We were flooded with numerous request for information and offers to help. Without advocacy group to manage the community respone, we decied some kind of organization would have to formed…”pg. 65-66

Zia shows that after one meeting,  the community becomes engaged and wants to promote change.  They choose to make the group bigger in order to get anywhere to make change. The Chinese Welfare Council chose to create “American Citizens for Justice.” The travel from a small community group to a large activist group  gives a strong definiation of grassroots.

well after looking at a bunch of blogs, I think that there is a lot of terms that have just been “skimming the surface.” After last class when we talked about Grassroots I thought that it would be a word of interest give more thought too.

Grassroots:

of or involving the common people as constituting a fundamental political and economic group; “a grassroots movement for nuclear disarmament”

Grassroots can contrubite to our discusion of Asian Americans. Otamtsu showed the importance of how grassroots can make a difference. Wu showed that the community of common people, just normal Asian Americans, (Asian Americans who aren’t activists)

“The survival of grassroots organizations is significant because it helped to cushion the impact of the war against the poor in Asian American communities. More important, the grassroots formations provided the foundation for many of the sucessful empowerment campaigns occuring in the 1980s. for example, Japanese Americans builit their national effort to win reparations for their internment during WWII on the experiences of grassroots neighborhood organizations housing and anti-evection struggles of the early 1970s. ” Omatsu pg. 93

The quote represents the importance of why their is grassroots. For Asian Americans it helped start base of change.  By having grassroots it brought about change.
Grassroots is one of the bases for change with in the Asian American community.

In The “Four Prisons” and the Movements of Liberaton by Glenn Omatsu wrote about the cultural uprising and what Asian Americans went through to get there.  “1969 represented a turning point for Asian Americans and toehr sectors of American society. But while white male leaders saw the year as marking a decline of the movement 1968 for Asian Americans was a year of birth. It marked the beginning of the San Francisco State Strike and al that followed.”  The strike was the first time that there was an upraising of young Asian Americans. Students protested for ethinic studies and redifinition of the education system. The students won the first school of Ethnic studies. Many “vocab” words came up through out the reading. Words that were related more too Asian Americans and there progress in the 1970′s are, consciousness, theory, ideology, participatory democracy, community and liberation. Theses words are what shapped the community in the 1970′s just sugguestive words to reform, and really what Asians Americans should do.  By 1980, the words were revamped and ideas had changed. They were: advocacy, access, legitimacy, empowerment and assertiveness. These words are a strong example of how the ideas changed of the course of ten years. Asian American activist really impowered these words, they felt as if they will be able  to promote polical change through educating the masses. Futhermore, they felt as if they would have strength in numbers and target the  unorganized, low income workers, tenants, small-business people, and highschool youth.  “…thus activiest saw poloical consciousness as rising not form study groups but from involving people in the process of social change, through their confronting the institutions of power around them and creating new visions of community life based on these struggles.” This quote repsents the notion that mass in numbers work.  any large group of poeple who speak up are going to make a difference.  Overall, the general change in Asian American ideas have been progessing since 1969. They’ve gone from ideas and thoughts, to actions.

Things that I have noticed through the semester so far:

• The over all theme I have come up with is the “just want to fit in” idea
• Zia, and Liu similarities as to how they grew up, a strict Asian family
• Both figured out who they were later in life.  Zia in college at Princeton, Liu on TV becoming passionate about his race when he really was just there to “entertain people” pg. 62. “…it seemed I’d become a righteous, vocal Asian American.”
• All three authors, Zia, Liu, Young, had many childhood memories as to how they felt racism toward being Asian American. Young had his experance in New Orleans, Liu and Zia both had the traditional asian family.
• Bloggers along with authors felt the need to advocate for their race, to help break down the sterotypes
• Terms such as Minor, in which the authors and bloggers at times would right it off as they were something small trying to fit in and be accepted by the dominate culture.
• theres a large discusion about what is Asian American culture. Throughout the readings I haven’t come across a general consensus about what is Asian American culture. some feel that there isn’t a standard culture. Eric Liu refereanced that Asian American Culture is what Asian americans are doing at the that time. In the blogs and the authors tried to get away from the traditional Asian american culture, because they felt that it labled them with the sterotype.

Overall I’ve found that theres the over lying theme of:

• What is Asian American Culture? Who is going to decied as to what it really is?
• What defines the author as an Asian American, what time in their life
• All authors/bloggers felt that they are and their culture is minor.

This was a very different piece of reading, I felt that it was a bit harder to grasp the concepts that Young was trying to express, compared to the earlier readings. pg. 39 “…”hey boy don’t you know english?”… in fact Hawaii it was “normal”… those haole (white kids) were the ones who were probably going to stand out in my neighborhood…Confusion became this was perhaps the first time I expereienced blatant racism. Race became a reality for me.” This expericance first introduced Young to racism, for the longest time Young felt that even if you were Japanese or Filipino you were still American and that nothing was wrong with that. But since he was not exizled on Hawaii, but they didn’t have as much diversity which caused assumpsion as to what was accepted.  pg. 44-45 “…”Your not a citizen?” “Do you have a green card?” I was puzzled (both then and now as I try to sort through this new awareness of something different between us”…In Hawawii you were Japanese or chinese or Filipino or Samoan and the American was assumed… he seemed as “local” as any of the other kids I knew. But now he was different.” This shows how Young was sheltered and how when growning up he had difficuluties understanding what was race. Additionally now that Young saw that his friend was different and of a different race as him, the reject that he had felt when leaving the states, was now the same rejection that he was giving his friend. Always viewing him as  different. Overall I feel that Young was quite ignorant growing up. Lastly, I fee that in the being of the peice when Young was talking about speach, I feel that ties into the fact how he thought that was a perfectly normal American idea and not somthing that is targeting him as a Asian American. pg. 18 “February 1, 1973: Speech evaluated Missing central incisors. No apparent speech defect; however omits initial /s/ in blends (st, sw). Difficulty could be due to missing teeth. Good stimualbility Recheck…” this was the first evaluation he had. It didn’t state anything to the fact about his race or ethinicity.

Okay, so after talking in class about what is culture for Asian Americans, I thought of one of my favorite TV shows. Jon and Kate plus 8. Basically is about a family who had twins and then sextuplets. Jon the father is a Asian American, his mother I believe is from Korea, and lived in Hawaii growing up. All of Jon and Kate’s eight children have, Asian characteristics. I included a video to show what the children look like. In the episode named, “Korean Dinner.” Jon cooked the family a traditional Korean meal. Jon stressed that it was important that his children understand where part of their heritage comes from. By Jon cooking this meal it showed how he still wanted his family to be involved with his culture and show his kids that he is still in touch with it. Additionally during the dinner, the kids had a debate over who was the most Asian, and who was closer to being a real Asian American.  Further more, earlier in the episode Kate made a comment from when she was pregnant with the sextuplets, and her mother-in law said to her that the children aren’t going to look anything like her because she was Caucasian, and the Korean gene is dominate. Kate later said that she was happy that her children looked of Asian decent because she wanted them to be able to have that connection with their father.

Overall, I think that Jon and Kate plus 8 episode on the “Korean Dinner” showed that the family, especially Jon is still trying to keep the Asian tr addition in his family.

I attachted a video to show what the family is like. I was unable to find the Korean Dinner online.  Jon and Kate plus 8 is on TLC. Its an interesting show, check it out!

While reading “The Accidental Asian” by Eric Liu, I found it to be very interesting. Eric Liu was someone who was born in America. Yet Liu could still connect with the Asian American Idenity. A good example would be when Liu was on a tv program. Orginally he was just there to give is mello opion, but he went onto really become very passionate about his race. “…I realize somehting unusual has happened. When the debate began I was playing a part, because I felt I should. Eight minutes later I had merged completely with my role. Almost by chance, it seemed I’d become a righteous, vocal Asian American. All it had taken was a stage and a villian.” This shows how Liu really went from not caring, becoming someone who is now very vocal.  Even though Liu made aparent that he was not an activist, he just played one on TV.  Additionally,  Liu’s view on race is also very interesting. The idea that he would rather have to view ethnicity and race as an option. You choose whether or not you really want to view different races. Fututher more,  Liu’s idea that Asian Americans were missing culture from there culture was very interesting. “I think Asian American culture is anything that Asian Americans are doing. Just That” Which in some way that is true, since Asian Americans are so many different cultures than it is hard to have their own culture.  On page, 82 Liu speaks about how the Asian Americans are coming as a different breed persay. Asian Americans used to be just that, immigrants from Asia coming to the united states. Now were up to third and fourth generation of Asian Americans, and the culture and what a Asian American has drastically changed.

Okay second try, first time, I deleted it! CRAP!!!

So hello, my name is Amy, I am a sophomore and a childhood/Special education major. I enjoy long walks on the beach and watching romantic comedies….oh oops! thats my personal ad, hahahahaa jk.

Ok well I do love walks on the beach, and I am a stickler for romantic comedies umm hello, Good Luck Chuck? AMAZING. But besides my cheezey romantic side. I love playing sports. I am highly competitive, and I always play to win. No matter what.

I have been a competitive swimmer for 11 years now. I started swimming in a summer leauge when I was nine, and fell in love with the sport. My first swim coach I planned on marring, but he is already married now by the time that I was of legal age, but hey now a days marriages don’t last right? (JUST KIDDING) When I was ten I started swimming all year round for my club team which I have been a member of on and off for about ten years, right now i’m off the team, but who knows! I am a member of the swim team here at school. I am a butterflier, and usually an IMER but i can dabble in the distance and 200breast, it just depends on the day.

In the summer I work as a lifeguard. I guard little childerns lives, and annoyning parents who think they know everything. I also am a swim coach, I’ve been a coach for four summers and I love every second of it. Reasons why i love it, little kids do say the funniest things, and I love teaching a passion that i love too.

I am in love with Ryan Lochte and Michael Phelps, I think that they are both amazing swimmers and have pretty level heads for being as fast and as good as they are.  And yes, I have photoshopped my desktop to my computer to have a amazing photos of them!

I also love food! Chances are you’ll see me eating in class, A LOT! i do swim which means that I really need to keep the healthy and the good caloire intake up there! so if you ever want some veggies come too me! Candy, ::sigh:: not me….:-(

I love stupid movies, and action movies, 300 AMAZING movie.  I also enjoy family guy and Scrubs.

Lastly, if I’m not doing hw, eating, swimming, or sleeping, I’m prolly either snowboarding or at the lake.  I grew up boating and I love it. I can wakeboard, waterski, tube and, kneeboard. I snowboard in the boating off season, just to keep my self balanced.

and I think thats all about me! hope you enjoyed it!