 | Auditions for a production titled "The Song" - a short narrative film about a Manazanar Interment story based on the published works by Yoshimi B. Golden are being held MONDAY, JUNE 10th and TUESDAY, June 11th at RALEIGH STUDIOS. Reservations are required to enter the studio. JAPANESE SPEAKING Actors & Actresses preferred. See character breakdown and casting requirements below. Casting for children and infants, too! <<<Please help us by posting on your bulletins, sharing with talent, and sharing on FACEBOOK>>> Questions may be addressed to Kazuko Golden (510)459-2317. Headshots and request for audition slots are accepted at thesongfilm@gmail.com Able to donate to this production? More info about the film and donations to our Kickstarter campaign are greatly appreciated at: http://bit.ly/ FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - Casting Geographic Regions: Los Angeles & Manzanar, CA Project Title: THE SONG Project Type: Student Film Union Status: SAG-AFTRA & NON-SAG Additional Personnel & Production Info: Produced by : Kazuko Golden Directed by: Zach Mehrbach Cinematographer - Cody Jacobs Casting Director: Zachary Mehrbach Interview Dates: 6/10/13 - 6/11/13 - 5PM - 10PM Raleigh Studios Callback Dates: None Shoot/Start Date: July 8th - July 15th Location: Los Angeles and Manzanar, CA Submission Instructions: PLEASE USE EMAIL TO REQUEST A SPECIFIC TIME FOR YOUR AUDITION. OPEN AUDITIONS ARE NOT ALLOWED. CONTACT Address: Zach Mehrbach, Director - thesongfilm@gmail.com Phone: 603-667-1672 Nudity: No nudity. Roles-Descriptions: The story intertwines the “duality of the World War II Japanese-American internment” by telling the story of two sisters, one in Manzanar and the other in Hiroshima. The film shows how family survives through great distance and emotional struggle. LOGLINE: After leaving her sister and moving to the US, ajapanese mother finds herself desperate to communicate with her sister while incarcerated in the Manzanar Internment camp after she learns of rising tensions in Hiroshima. This is a film about a woman who's willing to do anything to hold onto the dreams of family and future that she came to the USA to fulfill but had denied by the incarceration of the Japanese during world war II. CHARACTERS: [SACHIE] 18-25 YEARS OLD, Female, 1st generation Japanese-American, woman of extreme beauty,a caring woman who's eyes portray a pure window into her emotional soul, she's powerful in her conviction and presence, but soft in her attack, vibrant eyes, stern demeanor, Japanese speaker. [HIROKO] 18-28 YEARS OLD, female, kind, Japanese speaker a plus, thin, a woman who sees her sister in her surroundings, is haunted by her joyful presence and can call upon her with a look, a whisper, or through her baby. She second guesses her actions, worries too much about the future, and loses herself in her thoughts. [YOSHIZO] 19-28, Male, 1st generation Japanese-American, slender, shows his conviction to his family through his work ethic, hides his emotion but is committed to the idea of family and devotion to it being passed on through all his actions, muscular, Japanese speaker [YOUNG SACHIE] 7-12 YEARS OLD, Female, Japanese-American. [YOUNG HIROKO] 7-12, Female, [JOHNNY] 5-12 YEARS OLD, Asian, smart, attentive, Japanese speaker preferred [YOCHYAN] BABY <2, Asian, healthy, girl, parents must be present during acting times [AIKA] 28-35, Female, a mother of two young daughters, watches them with joy, Japanese speaker preferred [FRANK/ US SOLDIER] 30-60, male, smokes, a US World War II Soldier in the Japanese Internment Camps, keeps to himself but his actions are strong, thoughtful and poignant, Lean, Caucasian, stern and serious [JAPANESE POSTMAN] 40-65 YEARS OLD, Japanese speaker preferred [ISAMU] 18-28 YEARS OLD, Male, Japanese speaker a plus, STERN, mean, demanding, slender [MINNE] Baby <2, ASIAN [MAILMAN] 40-65 YEARS OLD, ASIAN, stern, slender |
Saturday, June 8, 2013
Casting Asian/Asian American actors on 10-11 June
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Why we should love Osaka mayor Toru Hashimoto
There are plenty of reasons to love the Osaka mayor Toru Hashimoto. Two weeks ago, he made remarks about comfort women has caused a ripple in the international waters of women issues.
I'm not really clear on what Hashimoto actually said, because when I worked from the Rafu Shimpo I noticed that sometimes statements made by politicians were taken out of context. And sometimes, the media gets caught up in whatever sounds good and sells papers and gets good ratings.
When I first wrote about the issue of comfort women, it was in an essay published in the Rafu Shimpo called "The Rape of Conquered Women." At that time--just before the Los Angeles Riots, there were two claims that are no longer touted today: The comfort women was something unique to the Japanese and that even the Nazis hadn't used sex slaves. One of the favorite witnesses for English language articles was Seiji Yoshida. His accounts and his book were widely criticized by Japanese historians (who were then in turned bitterly criticized for being Japan apologists).
As it turned out, neither claim was true. The Nazis did have sex slaves--taken from the Jewish, gypsies and other political prisoners. The exploitation and sexual enslavement of women from conquered populations has a history that goes back further than 415 BC, which was when "Troades" or "The Trojan Women" was first produced. Greek playwright Euripides wrote the tragedy during the Peloponnesian War. In 1971, Katharine Hepburn was Hecuba, Vanessa Redgrave was Andromache and Genevieve Bujold was Cassandra. Irene Papas was the infamous Helen.
After the publication of my essay, men, mostly I suppose Korean, threatened my colleagues and myself. Ironically, a man threatening me with violence or rape because I held an opinion he didn't like puts such a person on the same level of men who rape during war. Fear is a way of silencing dissenting voices. Rape is a way of silencing women and disgracing "their" men.
The rape and enslavement of conquered women during 415 BC was one of the perks of war. What about in 1930-1940s when the Japanese committed the war crimes supposedly associated with the comfort women. I propose there are several problems in revisiting these acts and interpreting them.
While the article goes on to assert "There is no mainstream evidence that modern militaries other than Japan employed a formal sex slavery system." it also continues that "Pulitzer Prize-winning historian John Dower is among credible sources who say American troops committed multiple rapes of Japanese women during the occupation and that press censorship muted reporting of these crimes."
What the article means by formal is hard to define. If by modern, Dower could refer to the early modern period of the 18th Century. There is ample evidence that the Nazis had sex slaves and they kept good records. There is also evidence that the British military in India kept and promoted military brothels. Brothels were lawful in British India until the 1930s and created racial and class conundrums, particularly when European prostitutes came. To put this in the context of the history of Japanese aggression, first Sino-Japanese war was in the 1894-1895 and the second was in 1937-1945 with minor incidents beginning in 1931. And what about the American military in Vietnam or in Korea? A 2009 UCLA thesis by Elya Filler looks at the role of Japan's comfort women system in the contemporary sex industry, but doesn't indicate where the Japanese got this idea.
When Commodore Perry opened Japan in the 1850s, Japan had been in seclusion for 200 years. It had no modern army, navy or airforce. Where did it learn modern warfare? Military brothels were already being used in Europe and Asia by the British and French.
I do not believe that we as Americans or former Comfort women from Korea have the right to pressure the people of Osaka to find a new mayor, particularly since he has raised the issue of comfort women and attempted to expand the conundrum of the comfort women from an Asian point of view. We've had mayors accused of sexism such as New York's Michael Bloomberg and Warren, Michigan's James Fouts. Fouts added that public employees should buy American autos. Bloomberg and Hashimoto are men of the 2010s. Men and women in the 1930s and 1940s in America were conditioned to accept:
I'm not really clear on what Hashimoto actually said, because when I worked from the Rafu Shimpo I noticed that sometimes statements made by politicians were taken out of context. And sometimes, the media gets caught up in whatever sounds good and sells papers and gets good ratings.
When I first wrote about the issue of comfort women, it was in an essay published in the Rafu Shimpo called "The Rape of Conquered Women." At that time--just before the Los Angeles Riots, there were two claims that are no longer touted today: The comfort women was something unique to the Japanese and that even the Nazis hadn't used sex slaves. One of the favorite witnesses for English language articles was Seiji Yoshida. His accounts and his book were widely criticized by Japanese historians (who were then in turned bitterly criticized for being Japan apologists).
As it turned out, neither claim was true. The Nazis did have sex slaves--taken from the Jewish, gypsies and other political prisoners. The exploitation and sexual enslavement of women from conquered populations has a history that goes back further than 415 BC, which was when "Troades" or "The Trojan Women" was first produced. Greek playwright Euripides wrote the tragedy during the Peloponnesian War. In 1971, Katharine Hepburn was Hecuba, Vanessa Redgrave was Andromache and Genevieve Bujold was Cassandra. Irene Papas was the infamous Helen.
After the publication of my essay, men, mostly I suppose Korean, threatened my colleagues and myself. Ironically, a man threatening me with violence or rape because I held an opinion he didn't like puts such a person on the same level of men who rape during war. Fear is a way of silencing dissenting voices. Rape is a way of silencing women and disgracing "their" men.
The rape and enslavement of conquered women during 415 BC was one of the perks of war. What about in 1930-1940s when the Japanese committed the war crimes supposedly associated with the comfort women. I propose there are several problems in revisiting these acts and interpreting them.
- Racism in the Allied Countries such as the U.S. allowed for the rape of non-white women by white men without much fear of punishment.
- Institutionalized racism affected national and international policy.
- The attitudes toward rape tended to blame the victims.
- The attitudes toward women protected as property.
- Because women were treated as property within certain cultures and societies, the concern was not about how women were treated by how women were treated by others.
- Similar war crimes committed by the Allied troops against the women, including "rescued" comfort women, complicated the issue and made it more likely to be ignored.
According to Associated Press reporters Mari Yamaguchi and Malcolm Foster, Hashimoto's most recent statement clarifies his position. He "meant to say military authorities at the time, not only in Japan but in many other countries, considered it necessary." From my understanding of Japanese history, this is true. One of the first things they provided for foreigners in Yokohama after the opening of Japan was a whore house. There was a concept that men needed to have a sexual release and this wasn't only present in Japanese culture. The British also held that attitude and brothels were a part of their experience during World War I.
Probably what should outrage women in Japan is that he suggested in a recent visit to Okinawa that the U.S. military make better use of the legal sex industry "to control the sexual energy of those tough guys."
You might have been misled by more recent articles. In Japan Today, Washington's Jen Psaki supposedly denounced the comments Hashimoto made on Friday (17 May 2013), however Psaki's comment were on 16 May 2013.
The full transcript reads:
QUESTION: Hi, my name is Takashi from Japanese newspaper Asahi. Osaka City Mayor Hashimoto recently made a comment on the so-called “comfort women” issue, arguing that even though it is unacceptable from the moral perspective value, but the comfort women were necessary during the war period. And he also argued that it is not fair that only Japan is criticized by the United States and other countries, because there are other country military that were provided sexual service by prostitute. And do U.S. has any position on his comment or criticism against the United States?
MS. PSAKI: We have seen, of course, those comments. Mayor Hashimoto’s comments were outrageous and offensive. As the United States has stated previously, what happened in that era to these women who were trafficked for sexual purposes is deplorable and clearly a grave human rights violation of enormous proportions. We extend, again, our sincere and deep sympathy to the victims, and we hope that Japan will continue to work with its neighbors to address this and other issues arising from the past and cultivate relationships that allow them to move forward.
QUESTION: Do you describe this issue sex slave or comfort women?
MS. PSAKI: Again, I don’t know that I’m going to define it. You kind of laid out the specific details there, and we have described this issue in the past as comfort women[ii].The U.S. State Department didn't reply to Hashimoto's additional comments. According to JapanToday.com, Hashimoto reply to Psaki via Twitter was:
Let me go straight to the point. When America occupied Japan, didn’t they make use of Japanese women?The U.S. State Department (Patrick Ventrell, the acting deputy spokesman) didn't actually reply to these statements in the Monday daily brief:
I can’t help but point out that it is unfair for America to criticize only Japan by putting aside acts by its own country.
The United States should face what the US military did against local women, in particular Okinawan women when they occupied Japan.
QUESTION: Something about Japan’s comfort women? Osaka Mayor Hashimoto continued to argue that the American troops utilized women for sexual purpose during the occupation period in Japan, and even later – especially in Okinawa. And he also argues that the United States is unfairly criticizing Japan by putting aside what they did to local women during and after the war period. And I was wondering if you have any comment on that.
MR. VENTRELL: I didn’t hear who you said at the beginning that said this.
QUESTION: Osaka Mayor Mr. Hashimoto.
MR. VENTRELL: This is something that Jen addressed at the briefing last week and gave a very robust condemnation of those remarks. I really refer you to what Jen said last week. But we already condemned those.
QUESTION: But I thought what she condemned last week was his comments about them being a military necessity.
MR. VENTRELL: Yeah. Is this a new --
QUESTION: This sounds to be – this seems to be something new.
MR. VENTRELL: I hadn’t seen these new remarks. Let me --
QUESTION: The mayor says that the U.S. troops used– whatever term you want to call them – during the occupation.
MR. VENTRELL: Let me look in. I’m not aware of new remarks by the mayor of Osaka, more that we had a strong reaction to what he had said previously. Let me look in and see whether we’re aware of any subsequent remarks.
While the article goes on to assert "There is no mainstream evidence that modern militaries other than Japan employed a formal sex slavery system." it also continues that "Pulitzer Prize-winning historian John Dower is among credible sources who say American troops committed multiple rapes of Japanese women during the occupation and that press censorship muted reporting of these crimes."
What the article means by formal is hard to define. If by modern, Dower could refer to the early modern period of the 18th Century. There is ample evidence that the Nazis had sex slaves and they kept good records. There is also evidence that the British military in India kept and promoted military brothels. Brothels were lawful in British India until the 1930s and created racial and class conundrums, particularly when European prostitutes came. To put this in the context of the history of Japanese aggression, first Sino-Japanese war was in the 1894-1895 and the second was in 1937-1945 with minor incidents beginning in 1931. And what about the American military in Vietnam or in Korea? A 2009 UCLA thesis by Elya Filler looks at the role of Japan's comfort women system in the contemporary sex industry, but doesn't indicate where the Japanese got this idea.
When Commodore Perry opened Japan in the 1850s, Japan had been in seclusion for 200 years. It had no modern army, navy or airforce. Where did it learn modern warfare? Military brothels were already being used in Europe and Asia by the British and French.
I do not believe that we as Americans or former Comfort women from Korea have the right to pressure the people of Osaka to find a new mayor, particularly since he has raised the issue of comfort women and attempted to expand the conundrum of the comfort women from an Asian point of view. We've had mayors accused of sexism such as New York's Michael Bloomberg and Warren, Michigan's James Fouts. Fouts added that public employees should buy American autos. Bloomberg and Hashimoto are men of the 2010s. Men and women in the 1930s and 1940s in America were conditioned to accept:
- All women want to be raped.
- No woman can be raped against her will.
- If a woman was raped, she was asking for it (perhaps by the way she was dressed or by being out late at night or drinking alcohol).
- Rape can be enjoyable as in if you're going to be raped, you might as well relax and enjoy it.
Susan Brownmiller noted in her book "Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape" that gang rape was found in many cultures as a measure of control for women who strayed from their prescribed social roles. The 1975 book has a chapter devoted to war and notes that during the Occupation of Japan there were incidents of rape.
A more recent article by Terese Svoboda, noted that the U.S. government concealed information about rape and that the reasons were not just political but also racial. The punishment of black soldiers for rape was more extreme.
Another article online draws from Svoboda as well as other researchers and newspaper reports of the time. There is also mention of Korean comfort women being raped by U.S. forces. While the article is new, the information is not. I was aware of the rape of Japanese comfort women by the Allied forces a few decades ago from sources written in English.
Although Hashimoto has backpedaled in a long three-hour statement, his original assertions should indicate why the issue of the comfort women is more complicated than has been presented to Americans by the media. Further, South Korea seems more concerned about their women's treatment by Japan as opposed to the concept of comfort women or the current plight of foreign women in Korea who find themselves under similar circumstances. That seems to hark back to the ancient concept of rape as a crime against property and not a person. According to Wikipedia, South Korea supplied comfort women to American forces in Korea and according to the New York Times, some of they want apologies and compensation. In a 2009 New York Times article, the women called the South Korean government hypocritical, something that is perhaps not lost on many Japanese.
Hashimoto bravely continued to assert:
Hashimoto bravely continued to assert:
Based on the premise that Japan must remorsefully face its past offenses and must never justify the offenses, I intended to argue that other nations in the world must not attempt to conclude the matter by blaming only Japan and by associating Japan alone with the simple phrase of "sex slaves" or "sex slavery."As L.A. Asians, shouldn't we be concerned about the rape or sexual slavery of all Asian women during war or colonialism or even times of peace? That is the conundrum of the Korean comfort women. The issue should reach beyond Japan and reparations for crimes committed under imperialism has far-reaching implications. Imagine if Great Britain had to pay reparations to all the countries that had been under the British Imperial empire, including the women who became sex slaves.
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Soba fresh in a Torrance hideway: Bamboo Inn
I love hole-in-the-wall restaurants with good food and one of my favorites is the humble Bamboo Inn. Located in Old Torrance, they make their noodles (udon and soba) once a day and when it's gone, you are out of luck. So get there early if you want to avoid being disappointed.
If you don't speak Japanese you might be put off. The people at this place are generally friendly but most of the staff I've seen (usually only one person up front) do not speak English well. That may be the price for authenticity.
The soba and udon served at the Bamboo Inn (also known as Ichimi An in Japanese) is made from flour shipped directly from Japan in refrigerated containers. Then the buckwheat is milled daily and the chef uses the flour to make the daily batch of noodles. The freshness is what makes these soba noodles so chewy and fragrant.
I love the unagi soba for $8.50. The serving is respectable but don't expect leftovers. In any case, soba like most noodles doesn't do well the day after. The nishin soba ($8) has fish that has a light touch with the sweetener.
There's tororo which refers to yam puree. It's gooey and a bit stringy, but has a light taste. Once mixed with the broth (you can order hot or cold noodles), tororo acts as a thickener. Nishin soba is soba topped with migaki nishin (dried Pacific herring slightly sweetened with sugar and seasoned with soy sauce). There is a whole vocabulary list for Japanese noodle dishes. If you have a question, don't be afraid to ask or better yet...just order it and see if you like it.
If you don't like noodles, you can always have something like mentai rice ($2.75) or maybe two pieces of inari sushi ($1.50). Mentai rice is rice with mentaiko (marinated pollock roe ). Thin slices of nori are sprinkled on top. You mix them all up for a tasty, slighty salty savory treat.
Other rice dishes include donburi. For the less adventurous, there's always oyakodon (chicken and eggs cooked over rice) for $4.60.
Bamboo Inn currently has two locations, but the second newer location in the Rolling Hills Plaza has a different menu and goes under the name: Ichimi An ( An means hermitage). Don't be fooled by the humble Old Torrance storefront because inside are gourmet treasures.
Old Torrance
1618 Cravens Ave.
Torrance, CA 90501
Tel: 310-328-1323
Hours of Business:
Mondays, Wednesday - Fridays: 11:00 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.
Saturdays-Sundays: 11:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Closed on Tuesdays
Ramen lovers love Santouka Ramen
Do you love ramen? That's reason enough to visit the South Bay and one of your ramen tasting stops should be Santouka Ramen. Tucked away in the food court of Mitsuwa marketplace in Torrance, this ramen shop is well known. Check out Yelp. People come back for more and sometimes the lines are long.
You can get a miso ramen done spicy ($6.99) and the toroniku ($9.99) The ramen may look spicy, and you might break a sweat but it won't turn you into a fire-breathing dragon like the kimchee ramen. For the toroniku (miso) there are seven pieces of pork on the plate! More than double what is offered with the regular-sized ramen. These pieces of pork are extra tender because they come from the cheek (jowl).
You can add an egg hard-boiled in soy sauce (Tamago $0.99). Who said fast food couldn't be good and look good?
Photo credit:
Ian Ono/Jana Monji
Santouka Ramen
- 21515 Western Ave.,
- Torrance,CA 90501
- (310) 212-1101
- 11:00 a.m.～8:00 p.m. (Last order 7:30pm)
- cash only
Could Asian pugilists have changed stereotypes?
Since I went to see the play "The Royale" at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, I've been thinking about men, manhood and racism in America.
The world premiere play "The Royale" takes its name from Battles Royale. You might remember a 1999 Japanese novel called "Battle Royale." The story about how the Japanese government forces junior high school students in a battle to the death competition became a movie in 2000. You can stream it on Netflix.
Historically, battle royale or a battle royal, pits more than one competitor against each other and the winner is the last one standing. Apparently, illegal fights had well to do white men betting on black men fighting for spare change. According to MuhammadAliBoxing.org.UK, the battles royals is "The purest form of depersonalization." The play, "The Royale," is a fictionalized account of Jack Johnson's winning the heavyweight championship by beating a white man.
What struck me as odd was that he wasn't the first black man in the ring to beat a white man. That had already been done (Joe Gans in 1902). He was the first black heavyweight to beat a white heavyweight boxer. I then watched "Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson," a PBS documentary on the real Jack Johnson and the riots he caused.
This being Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I began thinking: What would have happened if an Asian had done the deed? Jack Johnson was born in 1878. He died in 1946, after World War II had ended. Johnson knocked out Canadian Tommy Burns in 1908, and then in 1910 beat James J. Jeffries in Reno, Nevada.
Searching on the Internet, I found that the first and only Asian to hold a major heavweight title was Ruslan Chagaev. Born in 1978 in what was at the time the Soviet Union, he won the the WBA title in 2007. The city where he was born, Andijan or Andizhan is the fourth-largest city in what is now Uzbekistan. The Republic of Uzbekistan is a Central Asian country, bordered by Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. Internet chatter muddies up the matter. Some claim that Chagaev is either full or part Tatar. The Tatars were the western part of the Mongol Empire, the Golden Horde.
If a black man becoming a heavyweight champion started riots, what would have happened if some Asian or Pacific Islander guy had done it? Yellow perilism had brought the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act. How about instead of weightlifting and basketball, what if some Chinese sized large men had done boxing? What would have happened if a few Samoan guys had taken to boxing instead?
Boxing as a sport isn't good for your brains or your good looks. It's like asking for a concussion and whiplash daily. It's like wondering if your nose isn't flat enough. I know from watching a recent documentary that some Chinese are turning toward boxing as a means of escaping poverty. I also know from Frederick Wiseman's "Boxing Gym" that white collar workers are taking to boxing as a form of recreation.
My father used to watch boxing and he even got us two pairs of boxing gloves, mostly for my brother. We didn't take to pummeling each other though. We all scrapped our way through college because we were poor and my father had passed away before we even graduated from high school. Our battles were more intellectual.
I guess what shocked me about Jack Johnson's story was that it wasn't a black man beating a white man that started riots or that rioting in the streets after a sports event started so early, but that was only the heavyweight title that carried so much cultural meaning, that was linked to concepts of manhood and race.
Weird what it takes to be considered a man in America.
*Help fund my education.
The world premiere play "The Royale" takes its name from Battles Royale. You might remember a 1999 Japanese novel called "Battle Royale." The story about how the Japanese government forces junior high school students in a battle to the death competition became a movie in 2000. You can stream it on Netflix.
Historically, battle royale or a battle royal, pits more than one competitor against each other and the winner is the last one standing. Apparently, illegal fights had well to do white men betting on black men fighting for spare change. According to MuhammadAliBoxing.org.UK, the battles royals is "The purest form of depersonalization." The play, "The Royale," is a fictionalized account of Jack Johnson's winning the heavyweight championship by beating a white man.
What struck me as odd was that he wasn't the first black man in the ring to beat a white man. That had already been done (Joe Gans in 1902). He was the first black heavyweight to beat a white heavyweight boxer. I then watched "Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson," a PBS documentary on the real Jack Johnson and the riots he caused.
This being Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I began thinking: What would have happened if an Asian had done the deed? Jack Johnson was born in 1878. He died in 1946, after World War II had ended. Johnson knocked out Canadian Tommy Burns in 1908, and then in 1910 beat James J. Jeffries in Reno, Nevada.
Searching on the Internet, I found that the first and only Asian to hold a major heavweight title was Ruslan Chagaev. Born in 1978 in what was at the time the Soviet Union, he won the the WBA title in 2007. The city where he was born, Andijan or Andizhan is the fourth-largest city in what is now Uzbekistan. The Republic of Uzbekistan is a Central Asian country, bordered by Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. Internet chatter muddies up the matter. Some claim that Chagaev is either full or part Tatar. The Tatars were the western part of the Mongol Empire, the Golden Horde.
If a black man becoming a heavyweight champion started riots, what would have happened if some Asian or Pacific Islander guy had done it? Yellow perilism had brought the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act. How about instead of weightlifting and basketball, what if some Chinese sized large men had done boxing? What would have happened if a few Samoan guys had taken to boxing instead?
Boxing as a sport isn't good for your brains or your good looks. It's like asking for a concussion and whiplash daily. It's like wondering if your nose isn't flat enough. I know from watching a recent documentary that some Chinese are turning toward boxing as a means of escaping poverty. I also know from Frederick Wiseman's "Boxing Gym" that white collar workers are taking to boxing as a form of recreation.
My father used to watch boxing and he even got us two pairs of boxing gloves, mostly for my brother. We didn't take to pummeling each other though. We all scrapped our way through college because we were poor and my father had passed away before we even graduated from high school. Our battles were more intellectual.
I guess what shocked me about Jack Johnson's story was that it wasn't a black man beating a white man that started riots or that rioting in the streets after a sports event started so early, but that was only the heavyweight title that carried so much cultural meaning, that was linked to concepts of manhood and race.
Weird what it takes to be considered a man in America.
- Frederick Wiseman's "Boxing Gym" on Wordpress Pasadena Art Beat blog
- "Chinese Heavyweight" review on Wordpress Pasadena Art Beat blog
- Review of "The Royale" on Wordpress Pasadena Art Beat blog
- Review of "Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson" on Wordpress Pasadena Art Beat blog
*Help fund my education.
When Asian modesty goes too far
Sometimes, it's not that we weren't listening, it was that our elders didn't tell us. It's never too late to start talking...we while we are living at least. When you're dead it is much too late.
After my uncle died, his widow found out that he had been in the army. He died from lung cancer after years of smoking. He could have easily died in Europe during World War II.
My uncle was a man of few words. He was extremely modest. During his prime, he got up early every day to work on a his farm. He and my aunt, my mother's older sister, never had children. They were kind people and very patient.
I never remember seeing them argue. The only thing I really remember him saying was that he didn't want to return to Europe. He had seen enough.
It was after he died that his widow discovered he had a Purple Heart. A Purple Heart. That came as a complete surprise to her. My aunt wondered about what he had done to deserve such a high honor. We've actually sent an inquiry about it, but months later, have yet to hear back.
Maybe you and yours haven't done anything as life-and-death critical as he did, but when you've done something, it's really is worth talking about. Talking and not boasting surely won't offend any Asian cultural constraints. Tell your friends. Tell your children. Tell your stories.
My uncle, Hideo "Tom" Maruyama, was a hero at a time when so many exploits by people of color went unrecognized, when so many people died and could not tell their stories. I wish he had told me those stories just as his widow now wishes to know what little information remains in the military archives.
After my uncle died, his widow found out that he had been in the army. He died from lung cancer after years of smoking. He could have easily died in Europe during World War II.
My uncle was a man of few words. He was extremely modest. During his prime, he got up early every day to work on a his farm. He and my aunt, my mother's older sister, never had children. They were kind people and very patient.
I never remember seeing them argue. The only thing I really remember him saying was that he didn't want to return to Europe. He had seen enough.
It was after he died that his widow discovered he had a Purple Heart. A Purple Heart. That came as a complete surprise to her. My aunt wondered about what he had done to deserve such a high honor. We've actually sent an inquiry about it, but months later, have yet to hear back.
Maybe you and yours haven't done anything as life-and-death critical as he did, but when you've done something, it's really is worth talking about. Talking and not boasting surely won't offend any Asian cultural constraints. Tell your friends. Tell your children. Tell your stories.
My uncle, Hideo "Tom" Maruyama, was a hero at a time when so many exploits by people of color went unrecognized, when so many people died and could not tell their stories. I wish he had told me those stories just as his widow now wishes to know what little information remains in the military archives.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Reclaiming and disclaiming Khan
Khan is a title for a ruler in Turkic and Mongolian languages. It was also used by Persians and Afghans for their chiefs and noblemen. Khan is also a surname found in Central and Western Asia. That all makes sense.
In history, the most famous Khan was Genghis Khan (1162-1227), the ruler of the Mongol Empire. His grandson was also famous enough, Kublai Khan. Genghis conquered most of Eurasia--the largest contiguous empire in history. Not just the history of Asia. In history. He united nomadic tribes brought the overland Silk Road under a stable socio-political environment. In Turkey and Mongolia, he's a hero.
In China, he gets mixed reviews. In Iran, Egypt and Europe, he was one of those threatening hordes.
In "Star Trek" TOS, he was the savage in "The Savage Curtain." That's the episode that pitted good (Abraham Lincoln, Captain Kirk, Spock and Vulcan hero Surak) against evil (Genghis Khan, Klingon empire founder Kahless, genocidal human Colonel Green, and having a bad-hair century Zora of Tiburon).
Khan was played by an East Asian American (Nathan Jung). And according to Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki, the Klingons were originally made to look like "futuristic Genghis Khan."
Of course, in Star Trek, there's that other Khan. I'm not talking about the 23rd Century USS Genghis Khan, but the infamous Khan Noonien Singh. He makes his first appearance in TOS episode "Space Seed," portrayed by Ricardo Montalbán. Montalbán reprised the character in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."
Khan was supposed to be a genetically engineered superhuman Sikh from Asia. He took control over a quarter of Earth during a Eugenics Wars in the 1990s. When found by Kirk and Enterprise, he's been in suspended animation. Now in Star Date 2267, he attempts to take control of the Enterprise. Kirk defeats him, but puts him on a planet Ceti Alpha V. Fifteen years later, he escapes and attempts to get revenge upon Kirk.
The casting of Montalbán as a Sikh can be explained away as the convention of those times. Then for the movie, there was a matter of continuity. SPOILER ALERT. Yet for the current reboot of Star Trek, there is almost no credible explanation. Marissa Sammy called it "Star Trek: Into Whiteness."
In 2004, there was an estimated 27 million Sikhs. Most of them are in India. There are quite a few in the U.K. and the United States as well as Canada if accent was a problem for J.J. Abrams. I've not seen the movie yet and am unlikely to do so. I'm not pleased with Abrams casting choices for Kirk, Sulu or Spock and Uhura. I was a theater critic and the captains I admired all had stage presence and theater backgrounds. Like Christian Blauvelt, I appreciated what he calls the "exploratory spirit" of Gene Roddenberry's series. I liked the humor of TOS and also admired Janeway in the Voyager.
I'm not interested in an action movie that keeps our attention instead of attempting character development and writing in emotional or intellectual content. There are still many ethical and social questions that can still be explored in this century that could be transferred to the time of a young Captain Kirk, but not with J.J. Abrams.
And I particularly am not a fan of whitewashing history. Both Blauvelt and Marissa Sammy of Racebending.com noted this whitewashing as well. I enjoy Cumberbatch as an actor. I enjoyed the encore screening of his "Frankenstein" with Jonny Lee Miller. But he doesn't make me think Asian or Sikh and he won't replace the impression that Ricardo Montalbán made as Khan in my mind, even, I'm pretty sure, if I went to see the movie.
Aren't there enough Asians and Asian Americans in Los Angeles for J.J. Abrams and Hollywood to understand this? There's been a lot of whitewashing in movies--think of "21." And then there's yellowface.
Another point would be in this reboot, with an international market that TOS didn't expect to have, why don't the producers even acknowledge and give respect to Asia and ethnic Asians who make up over 60 percent of the world population. I'm not saying that the new Khan has to be Sikh. He should be able to pass as Sikh or Asian Indian. He should not be the same actor who has taken to playing some very distinctly English characters as in Sherlock Holmes (a modern version) or a British officer in "War Horse."
The Star Trek reboot had the opportunity to overcome the ethnocentric evaluation of Genghis Khan which I feel relates to why this villain is given the name of Khan Noonien Singh. We're in a different century, five decades after TOS. While "Iron Man" skillfully handled the issue of bringing The Mandarin forward into this century, "Star Trek into Darkness" went backward.
If the English considered the Asian Indians, including the Sikhs, as black like "Little Black Sambo" then why does our Sikh of the future Khan Noonien Singh appear to be so white? Is this like "Cloud Atlas" where the whole population of the Big Island of Hawaii becomes white as Tom Hanks? These two cases of whitewashing remind me of the 1944 "Dragon Seed" where white people can play any race and Asians and ethnic Asians can be background actors in the movies and life.
I don't know that 60 percent of Earth's population wants to remain background players in movies or in the world. When will the whitewashing end? Some day I hope that a Star Trek movie will reclaim Khan as Asian and that other Khans like Genghis will be re-evaluated as if the Federation actually has become a less Eurocentric organization. That would be a step into a future that Asian and Asian Americans can share and I would endorse. What J.J. Abrams proposes is a future that has gone backwards and his movie should come with a disclaimer: This is Khan and the Federation with an attitude from the 1940s but the CGI and technology of the 2010s.
*Help sponsor me at USC.
In history, the most famous Khan was Genghis Khan (1162-1227), the ruler of the Mongol Empire. His grandson was also famous enough, Kublai Khan. Genghis conquered most of Eurasia--the largest contiguous empire in history. Not just the history of Asia. In history. He united nomadic tribes brought the overland Silk Road under a stable socio-political environment. In Turkey and Mongolia, he's a hero.
In China, he gets mixed reviews. In Iran, Egypt and Europe, he was one of those threatening hordes.
In "Star Trek" TOS, he was the savage in "The Savage Curtain." That's the episode that pitted good (Abraham Lincoln, Captain Kirk, Spock and Vulcan hero Surak) against evil (Genghis Khan, Klingon empire founder Kahless, genocidal human Colonel Green, and having a bad-hair century Zora of Tiburon).
Khan was played by an East Asian American (Nathan Jung). And according to Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki, the Klingons were originally made to look like "futuristic Genghis Khan."
Of course, in Star Trek, there's that other Khan. I'm not talking about the 23rd Century USS Genghis Khan, but the infamous Khan Noonien Singh. He makes his first appearance in TOS episode "Space Seed," portrayed by Ricardo Montalbán. Montalbán reprised the character in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."
Khan was supposed to be a genetically engineered superhuman Sikh from Asia. He took control over a quarter of Earth during a Eugenics Wars in the 1990s. When found by Kirk and Enterprise, he's been in suspended animation. Now in Star Date 2267, he attempts to take control of the Enterprise. Kirk defeats him, but puts him on a planet Ceti Alpha V. Fifteen years later, he escapes and attempts to get revenge upon Kirk.
The casting of Montalbán as a Sikh can be explained away as the convention of those times. Then for the movie, there was a matter of continuity. SPOILER ALERT. Yet for the current reboot of Star Trek, there is almost no credible explanation. Marissa Sammy called it "Star Trek: Into Whiteness."
In 2004, there was an estimated 27 million Sikhs. Most of them are in India. There are quite a few in the U.K. and the United States as well as Canada if accent was a problem for J.J. Abrams. I've not seen the movie yet and am unlikely to do so. I'm not pleased with Abrams casting choices for Kirk, Sulu or Spock and Uhura. I was a theater critic and the captains I admired all had stage presence and theater backgrounds. Like Christian Blauvelt, I appreciated what he calls the "exploratory spirit" of Gene Roddenberry's series. I liked the humor of TOS and also admired Janeway in the Voyager.
I'm not interested in an action movie that keeps our attention instead of attempting character development and writing in emotional or intellectual content. There are still many ethical and social questions that can still be explored in this century that could be transferred to the time of a young Captain Kirk, but not with J.J. Abrams.
And I particularly am not a fan of whitewashing history. Both Blauvelt and Marissa Sammy of Racebending.com noted this whitewashing as well. I enjoy Cumberbatch as an actor. I enjoyed the encore screening of his "Frankenstein" with Jonny Lee Miller. But he doesn't make me think Asian or Sikh and he won't replace the impression that Ricardo Montalbán made as Khan in my mind, even, I'm pretty sure, if I went to see the movie.
Aren't there enough Asians and Asian Americans in Los Angeles for J.J. Abrams and Hollywood to understand this? There's been a lot of whitewashing in movies--think of "21." And then there's yellowface.
Another point would be in this reboot, with an international market that TOS didn't expect to have, why don't the producers even acknowledge and give respect to Asia and ethnic Asians who make up over 60 percent of the world population. I'm not saying that the new Khan has to be Sikh. He should be able to pass as Sikh or Asian Indian. He should not be the same actor who has taken to playing some very distinctly English characters as in Sherlock Holmes (a modern version) or a British officer in "War Horse."
The Star Trek reboot had the opportunity to overcome the ethnocentric evaluation of Genghis Khan which I feel relates to why this villain is given the name of Khan Noonien Singh. We're in a different century, five decades after TOS. While "Iron Man" skillfully handled the issue of bringing The Mandarin forward into this century, "Star Trek into Darkness" went backward.
If the English considered the Asian Indians, including the Sikhs, as black like "Little Black Sambo" then why does our Sikh of the future Khan Noonien Singh appear to be so white? Is this like "Cloud Atlas" where the whole population of the Big Island of Hawaii becomes white as Tom Hanks? These two cases of whitewashing remind me of the 1944 "Dragon Seed" where white people can play any race and Asians and ethnic Asians can be background actors in the movies and life.
I don't know that 60 percent of Earth's population wants to remain background players in movies or in the world. When will the whitewashing end? Some day I hope that a Star Trek movie will reclaim Khan as Asian and that other Khans like Genghis will be re-evaluated as if the Federation actually has become a less Eurocentric organization. That would be a step into a future that Asian and Asian Americans can share and I would endorse. What J.J. Abrams proposes is a future that has gone backwards and his movie should come with a disclaimer: This is Khan and the Federation with an attitude from the 1940s but the CGI and technology of the 2010s.
*Help sponsor me at USC.
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