AMST 103 Intro to American Cultures

Welcome to AMST 103 Spring 2010!!

2010-01-21T13:40:00.000-08:00

Please e-mail me with any questions on how to post to the blog (mdelmont@scrippscollege.edu).

Final Blog Post

2009-05-03T14:59:00.000-07:00

Coming into this class I had a very negative and monolithic perception of Los Angeles. Growing up in San Francisco as a Giants fan I was taught to hate the Dodgers (and also Los Angeles). I considered San Francisco to be more cultured, cosmopolitan, socially conscious, and hip in its aesthetic. As for Los Angeles, I associated the region with extreme excess, image-consciousness, materialism, and consumerism. Shows like Entourage and the OC encouraged this characterization (not that I watched them all too often!). I never really thought about how cultural representations of Los Angeles privileged a very narrow—often a white—subjectivity. Nor did I fully grasp the diversity of experiences contained within LA, especially the experiences of individuals and communities that are either negated or distorted in popular images and media.

Through this class my old issues with Los Angeles have given way to a new set of issues (and also some new appreciations). I am no longer merely repulsed by the superficiality of Los Angeles’ popular culture, so much as I am concerned with the condition of places within Los Angeles that are far less glamorous and superficial. I no longer spend my time thinking about the cars that people buy in Beverly Hills or in Orange County, because I realize that these examples of excess materialism never exist in isolation; they are part and parcel of a deep inequality that has been racialized and spatially entrenched through historical processes. LA’s enclaves of materialism reinforce LA’s enclaves of environmental degradation and immiseration.

Through this course I have come to understand the significance of racial formation; indeed the relationship between race and class is more concrete and graspable now. Los Angeles’ geographic and material inequality cannot be understood without grappling with the centrality of racial formation. Surbanization and decentralized urban expansion during the postwar period altered peoples’ social consciousness and sense of racial identity. The process by which certain people became white, and others racialized, took place alongside the regidification of materially unequal spaces.

Alongside my growing consciousness of Los Angeles’ inequalities, I have also come to appreciate the unique and powerful forms of activism and resistance that this region has harbored. More specifically, the ascendance of multiracial and multiethnic organizations around environmental justice—such as the Bus Riders Union and the South Central Farm—is encouraging because it addresses the reality of unequal geographies (spaces, regions, neighborhoods, that have been discriminated against, neglected, or exploited). Identity politics in Los Angeles has in some ways been reinforced by, and in other ways overcome by, the centrality of space. More so than any other factor, it seems opportunity in Los Angeles is circumscribed by where one lives or grows up (though race, class and gender are spatialized). Given that injustice in LA operates in very spatialized ways, I believe that environmental justice has emerged as the most successful form of resistance; it foregrounds geography and space to unite people in the fight for justice.

Final Reflection Post

2009-05-01T20:15:00.000-07:00

Like Kate, When I decided to come to Claremont, I lamented that I would be living outside of Los Angeles. Other than the nice year-round weather, Los Angeles turned me off completely. It seemed like a sprawling poorly planned metropolis with an aging, inefficient transit system. Since I arrived, I had the opportunity to see a couple jazz shows in Hollywood and went into downtown Los Angeles once or twice. Then, last semester, I took a course called "Building Los Angeles" where we learned about the development of Southern California and its architecture. Every Saturday, we either rode Metrolink or took a bus to see various sites in Los Angeles, including buildings and infrastructure. We visited the LA River to understand how the river had shaped the development of the Los Angeles Basin, and how the residents had tried to control the river by encasing it in concrete. We also saw numerous examples of early modern architecture in the Los Angeles basin.

While I had a newfound respect for the architecture and history of Los Angeles development after last semester, I was left wanting to know more about the people who actually live in Los Angeles and especially the people whose neighborhoods we didn't visit because the architecture wasn't notable. This course was very illuminating in exposing how race has shaped LA and how specific events have had a lasting impact on the culture of Los Angeles, as well as individuals' lives. While I had always been critical of the freeway system for its environmental consequences, I had not realized the way its had torn largely minority communities apart in order to benefit the largely white upper class who dominated the roadways at the time. Although the public is much more aware of community issues than it once was, I think we need to be careful that we don't disrupt the way of life of communities who can't represent themselves in this time of enthusiasm for green infrastructure building.

I was also particularly fascinated by the two major LA riots: the Watts Riots of 1965 and the Rodney King Riots of 1992. Race issues are often studied academically and ignored by the general public as well as pushed aside by those involved. While the widespread violence and hostility of the riots is unforgivable, it is hard not to have sympathy for the rioters' anger. It seems that one of the most important tasks for communities is to provide a constructive avenue for their members to build something new. From what we heard in class and what I saw in The Garden, the South Central Farmers are doing just that. By providing a place for the community to engage in a constructive activity, they are not only directly benefitting the community by providing a place to grow food, they bring the community together, so that when tragedies happen, they can effectively address an issue. I hope that some of the insights I have gained in this course will not only give me a greater appreciate for Los Angeles, but will help me to understand the dynamics of whatever city I end up living in after school.

2009-05-01T00:31:00.000-07:00

When I first heard this semester’s topic for AMST103 I was bit suspicious of how something as broad as an “Introduction to American Cultures,” could take place within the relatively narrow framework of Los Angeles. However, as the semester progressed I realized how the city encompassed, and often epitomized, many important trends and topics in the country’s history. Ultimately, I really enjoyed focusing on Los Angeles because it allowed us to observe broader themes in a smaller, more manageable context.

However, I found that the more we read about problems in Los Angeles the more unsatisfied I became. Like Christian, I also struggled with our distance from the people who’s stories we analyzed and picked apart. I spent a lot of time thinking about how privileged I was to be able to observe the problems in our country from the safety of a private liberal arts college and how this position of privilege played into the very issues we were discussing. I do believe that is incredibly important to critically study the past so we can better understand how to make effective change in the future and in this regard, the course was very helpful. It taught me how to piece together a variety of sources, from academic scholarship to popular music, to create an in depth picture of our culture and society. But I wish that we had more extensively explored the position from which we were surveying Los Angeles and if, or how, this affected our scholarship. The Los Angeles activity was definitely one of my favorite parts of the class because it encouraged involvement in the greater community. In this way I also found the Ruiz article that Kaitlin mentioned to be very interesting. Ruiz’s article offered an answer to my questions as to how a scholars can negotiate the space between themselves and what they “study” by arguing that “civic engagement should be an essential component of any American studies curriculum,”(17) and that the key ingredients for that engagement are “respect and collaboration”(13).

Looking back at the semester, I believe that one of the most valuable things that I will take away from the course are these questions because they are what will inspire me to continue investigating American studies and propel me to become more actively involved in the community. Equally important, this class gave me the tools to understand the importance of social justice work and explained the unique opportunity that American studies offers to combine academic scholarship with activism.

What I Have Gained from this Class

2009-05-01T00:21:00.000-07:00

After taking this class I can definitely say that generally, I have gained a greater understanding of the race relations and development of minority culture within a specific community. Learning about the history of different racial groups within the Los Angeles community significantly expanded my knowledge of the details of defining racial and cultural status, interactions between minority groups over time, and how minority cultures were grew from, or in some cases, struggled with the complex relations they were involved in.

As the class has come towards the end I have considered the array of material we covered over the course of the semester, and remembered back to the first day when we all went around saying our individual perceptions of LA. Similar to what we briefly discussed in class today, I have thought about how I no longer perceive LA to be a beach scene with sprawling population, smog, traffic and celebrities. Although these are definitely characteristics of LA, there is a much broader description of LA encompassing much more of its history and growth that we have studied and discussed during American Studies. Studying the interactions between individuals, movements to improve minority status and rights, jobs and work life of minorities, public transportation, and housing distribution have all helped me gain an expanded understanding of the complexity of race relations and how they define the city outside of just popular culture.

Specifically I really enjoyed studying the South central gardeners and how the community came together to establish the garden, share it with many people, and fight for it as they learned they were losing it. Hearing the teenagers talk about their involvement was very interesting particularly because they were students, our age, who had found their passion in keeping this community together through an activity involving nature in a city I previously did not consider to be very natural and fertile. Overall, their story was fascinating in how they found the positive lights and moved forward with their passion.

I also enjoyed exploring the article about Compton and how it explained the growth of a community beyond its nationally known negative reputation. Previously, I had only known Compton to be the “ghetto” as many people explained it when talking about the neighborhood surrounding USC. However, the article broadened what I know about the neighborhood, from its history, to its reputation and associations, to what the direction it is moving in.

Last summer I worked with a nonprofit organization helping organize community volunteer events. With this internship I became very interested in community development and ways in which to bring a community together. Although these were a theme of our studies, the story of the South central gardeners and the article about Compton particularly interested me because I was able to look at common issues in communities everywhere, and how they were approached within the context of Los Angeles, whose history I now have a thorough understanding of.

People live here?

2009-04-30T23:50:00.000-07:00

Like Amy, I came into this class with an entirely different image of Los Angeles than what I now have. My one-dimensional notions about LA probably came mostly from the influence of the media and popular culture, too. I don’t even remember when that started, but I can remember that as early as 6th grade, I hated this place. Part of my hatred for LA also developed out of a few bad experiences I had when I came here for the first time, when my brother was visiting colleges. Wherever my bad feelings about LA came from, when I chose Pomona, I considered its location to be its biggest and, perhaps, only recognizable weakness (at the time). When people in my community asked where Pomona was, I was genuinely ashamed to say that it was in LA and that I had chosen to go to college in such an ugly, unnatural, polluted city that seemed to lack authenticity and human soul. I believed that I could not and would not be able to identify with LA or the people who live here.

Throughout this class, my feelings about LA have changed from disgust and repulsion to appreciation. Being saturated in the history of LA has given me the opportunity to actually find beauty in this landscape – sometimes when I am driving into LA, I see a hill and think that it is actually pretty, or I imagine the green hilly landscape described by Deverell. But beyond imagining the buried and distorted “natural” landscape, it has been particularly transformative for me to learn that LA is not defined by the social and cultural artificiality that seems to emanate from its name, or rather what I came to associate with it. Furthermore, it isn’t just a buried “natural” landscape, but there are buried human experiences and lives here too, built landscapes that have been buried through the apparatuses of racial injustice. Now, I think about what I’m driving through and over – real people and communities who are/were embedded in a history of injustice. However, this is not the extent of the history we have learned: it’s not that these injustices are the only thing at play – people have revolted against this system of racial exclusion and formed powerful coalitions that have done radical work with tangible results. Not only has it been important for me to learn about the production of race in LA in terms of structural and historical injustices but also about the people here who are active agents in and against these processes.

Final Blog Post

2009-04-30T23:45:00.000-07:00

This class exposed me to new ways of approaching topics. Some of things I found most interesting related back to the idea of racial formation. In the Pulido reading and many others, the idea of racial triangulation is invoked. By moving away from a purely white/Black binary, authors such as Deverell and Avila were able to more fully grasp how race and ethnicity operates, as well as what purpose and who it serves. I liked learning about the degree to which racial categories have been fluid and dynamic rather than purely static groupings.

Before this class, I wasn't able to articulate the way that race and ethnicity have been produced through spaces. It is something that was always on my mind but I wasn't sure how to talk about it. For example, I’ve always loved taking the train around the surrounding area and looking at the difference places. But it wasn’t until taking this class that I was able to string together my own observations in a way that better conceptualizes the historical contexts that have led to development and reshaping of these communities. This class has enabled me to use an analytic framework to understand the way LA and other cities are built and understood.

Because of the variety of readings and other things we did in class, I never felt like I became too boxed in. In the past I've struggled with some of my classes because I wasn't sure how they related to anything in my life. But I felt that this class helped me broaden my own awareness; I have became more aware of the intersectionality of race, sex, and gender as well how issues such as immigration, labor rights, and prison reform for example overlap and invite coalition building. On a more personal level, something I have been grappling with for a long time is the idea of the academy vs. activism. I thought I was supposed to resolve it by ranking one above the other. But even just looking at the American Studies scholarship, it becomes clear that this binary is challenged through their work.

I also thought bringing in Kelsey and Ashley was a good way of wrapping up our course because hearing them talk made me think about how valuable a theoretical basis can be when coupled with action. This is part of the reason I decided to declare American Studies as a result of this class; from day one I liked the emphasis on social justice and community organizing. Taking this course also made me feel less disconnected and more aware of being part of a larger Los Angeles community. This class has enabled me make the connections I wasn't able to or willing to make on my own. This is probably the most important thing I am going to take away from it all.

Last Blog

2009-04-30T23:30:00.000-07:00

Before coming to Claremont and learning more about Los Angeles, I had always gotten the impression that Victor Villaraigosa was a pretty good guy; he had grown up in East Los Angeles, went to UCLA and became a labor organizer. I later chose to do a research paper on how Villaraigosa won the 2005 mayoral election after he was defeated by the same opponent, James K. Hahn, in 2001.

What I found was that James Hahn had won in 2001 by mobilizing the Black vote. He did this by reminding Black voters how his father, Kenneth Hahn (someone who was mention in our readings) had supported many civil rights issues while he was county supervisor. James Hahn even boasted about growing up in Crenshaw, even though the community was primarily white when he lived there. Ultimately, the Black community was credited with giving James Hahn a boost in defeating Villaraigosa. After the election, it was suggested by the Los Angeles Times that Villaraigosa show the black community that the high Latino population would not destroy the political participation of African Americans.

However, during James Hahn’s days in the mayoral office, he chose to fire Bernard Parks, the Los Angeles Police Chief, and also a prominent figure in the Black community. With this decision, many of the people in the African American felt betrayed by Hahn. And so, in 2005, Villaraigosa showed the black population that he could represent them by meeting with popular leaders like Parks and other political members in their community. That is not to neglect the great impact Latino voters had on helping Villaraigosa win. In 2005, the Latino population came out in the highest numbers than ever before, the most being in East Los Angeles where Villaraigosa grew up. Villaraigosa had become the first Latino mayor of Los Angeles in over one hundred years.

The reason I bring up Villaraigosa’s victory is because it always seemed to me that he represented Los Angeles in many ways. He was born and raised there, he was a minority, and even worked to improve the situation of his fellow community members. I believed that he would have a great impact on the city, being that he grew up on those streets and saw the injustices taking place. However, when I went to see The Garden, I realized how much one could change when politics come into play. The Garden exposed Villaraigosa making deals with forever 21 to support his campaign, the same company who was planning to build a factory on the community garden. Sure, Villaraigosa talked a lot about how he supported the farm workers, but he never acted on it. Instead, he watched the trees come crashing down. Throughout many of readings and films, we have seen the huge impact politicians have on various movements, and how they could make or break a certain cause. What we tend to see is that most times (not all the time) the main concern is how the political figure is going to get re-elected. What that boils down to is who is receiving the most money in their campaign, no matter how much one is supposed to be connected or involved in the community.

Final Blog Post

2009-04-30T22:48:00.000-07:00

I definitely have a clearer understanding of American Studies scholarship. If I had to articulate the theme of our class, I would say that in order to imagine a more survivable future, we should look to the past of distinct spaces. The narratives and texts we studied were useful in drawing a vision of Los Angeles in which local spaces are active in the complex systems of identity and community formation that come together within broader networks to define America. This is obviously valuable, but in spite of this, I had always felt that there was a troubling corollary. I had always thought that academia and local spaces really did not communicate and that this problem was irreconcilable. I found that as we moved into the semester my knowledge of Los Angeles (as a native Los Angeleno) was inadequate. I couldn’t shake this unease about thinking that it was only because I was in the privileged sphere of academia that I interacted to these local narratives. I mean, provided I live in the suburbs, most of my childhood was spent in Bellflower and South Gate and later working with my father in San Pedro. However, I did not connect to these spaces in the way we had read about. Fortunately, the LA activity gave me more perspective. I realize now that while it is true that most people probably will never understand the traditions and complexities of these spaces, there are conscious efforts to counteract this trend. I guess I’m leaving this class with a clearer sense of the problem and thinking about possible solutions—what I’ll do with this, I’m not really sure, but there's hope for something.

Local People

2009-04-30T16:55:00.001-07:00

Overall, I am going to try to take away from this course some of the more positive and hopeful topics that we discussed. I appreciated that while we did learn about some very deep and unjust issues, we were presented with examples of ways to take action and to right those wrongs. By finding out about what local people are doing to improve their communities and environments, I developed a new, more fleshed-out understanding of Los Angeles.

Like Aerienne, I found learning the South Central Farms to be a particularly interesting part of the course. I am also very interested in environmental issues and would have liked simply reading about the work of these organic farmers; having some of the farmers come to class, though, made the subject all the more interesting and personal. After seeing both the short documentary the South Central Farms representatives showed to us in class and "The Garden" outside of class, I was struck by the number of people participating in the organization. Both documentaries, I felt, did a really good job of representing many different people working at the farm, from people in leadership positions to general members of the community. Hearing the stories and views of the individuals who came to class, I got a sense of the importance of the South Central Farms for the community on many different levels. This was a very positive part of the class, and inspired me to find an organization that I feel equally passionate about to work for.

I was also really interested by the LA River expedition from 2008 which was briefly mentioned in class. It was really fun to see this alternative approach to protecting the Los Angeles river, and to see the potential ways this river could be used for good by the people of Los Angeles. I have not had a chance to look into this expedition in more depth as I would like to yet, but it made me curious about the hundreds of other small-scale actions individuals are taking to try to improve LA. It makes sense for a city that has made its fame from creating movies and the like to have creative individuals finding inventive ways to protest environmental and social injustices taking place. This class has made me want to look at these smaller movements in LA started by local people.

Experiencing the real Los Angeles

2009-04-30T15:55:00.000-07:00

Similar to Brandon I am also an outsider looking in. This year is my first visit to America, and one of the reasons I chose Claremont was its close proximity to Los Angeles as the city has always fascinated me. I am an American Studies major back in England so therefore I had briefly been exposed to some of the realities of LA. I had learnt about the Watts Riots in a history class and had read an article by Mike Davis in a sociology class. However the chance to look at LA in such depth and whilst in such close proximity has been a chance of a lifetime for myself. We also do not have an official American Studies department so this was a great opportunity to take a class which incorporates all the disciplines.

I have particularly enjoyed learning about the people themselves, especially the visit by the South Central Farmers. Their dedication and determination to the project whilst trying to juggle the commitments of College are admirable. I feel that through the documentaries, talks and texts we have learnt a lot about the communities which are present in LA and how they express themselves. I live very close to London (probably the same distance as Claremont to LA) which in many respects can be compared to LA. This class has made me consider the way in which I perceive culture in London and the communities which are present there. I had always seen London as a place to go for good shopping, clubbing and to see a show at the West End. I never thought about the people who were living in London in poor housing or the high crime rates, I feel this class has taught me that these factors cannot be ignored.

I had visited LA several times before this class had started I didn’t really look with my eyes open, I went to see the LA Dodgers, Disneyland, Walk of Fame and all the other tourist hotspots. However on subsequent visits I feel that the readings and discussions have had a profound impact on my understanding of LA. I have learnt about the people who live there and their experiences and have visited parts of LA that I never would have thought about visiting before this class. For example the very weekend after the Golden Gulag reading by Gilmore I encountered two men who had just been released from prison. I could not help but overhear their conversation, in which they had already resigned themselves to the fact that they would soon return to prison as if it was inevitable. This conversation could have been taken straight out of the Gilmore text. I guess what I am trying to say is that the texts are all very true to life and really do represent what is happening in LA.

I feel that the skills I will take away from this course will help me to look at culture in any town or city in a very different light. I have learnt that Los Angeles is a city full of diverse culture and fascinating people which is sadly overshadowed by the Hollywood film industry, tourist attractions and the media. This course has allowed me a glimpse at the real side of Los Angeles, the good and bad, the beautiful and ugly.

Zandy's post

2009-04-30T14:59:00.001-07:00

After reading all the texts in our American Studies class, I decided that my favorite text was the Straight Into Compton article. This article provided surprising and enlightening details on the transformation of a once middle-class neighborhood to one of the most notorious neighborhoods in the US. After hearing Compton invoked often by the media and in pop culture, it was exciting to learn more specifics about this particular neighborhood in Los Angeles.
While reading the article, I noticed how the educational system played a significant role in the neighborhood’s transformation. Throughout this class I frequently noticed the impact of education on a community. This article proved how proper education is vital if a community wants to progress. It was interesting to see that Compton once had a decent educational system and during this time the neighborhood was considered nice. However, with the development of crack cocaine and gangs in Compton, the school system deteriorated. Many students became embroidered in these activities and thus did not focus on their studies. As a result, the school system declined along with the neighborhood. Since students did not get a good education and possibly go to college, the neighborhood was unable to progress. Thus, Compton provides a great model for why a community needs to invest in education.
Another interesting aspect of the article was the fact that pop culture provided an image of Compton that did not present all the facts. Many rappers in the 1980s and 1990s incited Compton into their lyrics in order to sound “gangsta”. The most prominent example was NWA and their album Straight Outta Compton. Even though many of the NWA rappers were not even from Compton, the rap group wanted to create an image by invoking Compton. Although the group did present some accurate facts surrounding life in Compton, it filtered out many other aspects important to the neighborhood. Also, movies such Boyz in the ‘Hood and Menace II Society did not show Compton’s general historic reality, but instead tried to show it as one the most notorious neighborhoods in the country. Because of these pop cultural references, society solely learns about the chaos of the neighborhood instead of its other aspects.
--Zandy

Suprisingly Interdisciplinary

2009-04-30T12:33:00.000-07:00

When I signed up for this class at the beginning of the semester, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I never realized how interdisciplinary the course could be, and I now have a completely different view of the city of Los Angeles. Looking back, my favorite aspect of the coarse was my ability to connect it to other courses I was taking, despite the fact that they are in completely different subjects. I am taking an Asian Religious Traditions class at CMC, and one of our activities was a trip to a Buddhist temple. I was lucky enough to visit the temple when they were celebrating the Thai New Year, so there was a large festival with tons of authentic Thai food available to the visitors of the temple. I also took this opportunity to use the temple visit as my LA activity. This was a perfect example of how diverse the LA area is. I was very surprised to find that the temple was located in the middle of a neighborhood in Ontario. When I walked past the gates of the temple, I felt as if I was stepping into a completely different world, almost forgetting that I was in a residential LA area. Before coming to the Claremont Colleges, I had only visited LA once before, which limited my view of the area. This class helped me to see all aspects of LA and all it has to offer.
In my Core class, which focuses on traditional and modern fairytales and they psychoanalytic interpretations behind them, we have discussed at length the role of Disney in the fairy tale realm, as well as the racial stereotypes portrayed in them. Our discussion of Disneyland and other films, including Tarzan, reminded me of many points of discussion that were brought up in my Core class. As Maggie mentioned before, the newest Disney film that is soon to be released, The Princess and the Frog, stars the first African American princess. There has been a lot of discussion and debate about multiple aspects of the film that appear racist and insensitive, including whether or not the prince should also be African American. I realize that regardless of what Disney decides, there will always be a group that finds aspects of the film at fault, as seen as the changes made in the Tarzan films, where regardless of the changes made, there were sill parties that were offended.

Misconceptions Cleared

2009-04-30T11:00:00.000-07:00

Whenever people ask me if I have seen LA I often said no. But my understanding of LA used to differ form what I now understand of it. Three years ago, I envisioned LA as the center of Americas film and music industry. A vibrant city with a raging nigh life and five star restaurants, where the high society enjoys the so-called ‘fab-life’(MTV Cribs) A place where famous movie stars loitered on streets, mostly accompanied by a crew of stalking paparazzi.
My imagination of LA fit the accurate description of Sun Set Boulevard. All I knew about LA was form the television shows and movies. I then realized that I was thinking of Downtown LA and as an outsider to the area I was unaware of the existence of other parts of LA. But Intro to American Cultures broadened my prospective on the city and got me thinking of the city form various different angels. For example, studying about LA form a geographical, cultural, racial and economic prospective.
I like the fact that we had to participate in an LA activity. Its only when you interact with the real world and have mindful discussions and then refer to academic texts to back up your arguments that you know you realize how much you have learnt in class. I only realized this when I was speaking to a friend from Pasadena about the FHA housing reading that I realized how much I knew and how much he didn’t know about his home town.
Overall I would say the class was really interesting. From the music at the beginning of the class, to the Youtube clips made the class even more entertaining. Some of the discussions were really interesting, especially the ones about culture and music. What I will take away form this class is a greater understanding of the area around me. As this is my first American Studies class, I think I have learnt a great deal about America and its past. Hopefully many of my naïve misconceptions have been cleared. Now my answer has changed to yes I have been to LA, but I am still looking forward to visit Sun Set Boulevard and drum on the streets sometime this year.

word association

2009-04-30T01:37:00.000-07:00

On the first day of class we were asked for words we associated with LA. If I remember correctly most of the words given had a negative connotation. I don’t remember mine specifically but I think it may have been plastic surgery…a topic we never got around to. You see I came into this class with the preconceived notion that LA was a, superficial, cultureless, and racially divided city. In fact, I did not see LA as a city per se but rather suburbs connected by highway (I must mention that I hate driving). How did I come to these negative feelings towards LA, you may ask. Did I spend any significant time in LA? No. But my view of LA, formulated from popular culture, was valid from my perspective.

What I’ve realized with this course, however, is that labeling anything one-dimensionally (like LA as strictly materialistic) only prevents one from realizing the truth. It is an excuse not to go further, to make fact out of stereotype somewhat like racism.

Perhaps the Sides article “Straight into Compton” best personifies my point. The word association with Compton has become synonymous with crime, poverty, drugs, gang-violence, Black’s, and urban crisis. In looking at Compton’s history we see that it “originated” as a working-class white neighborhood that resisted black integration (as Black’s fled to LA during WWII through post-WWII) exemplified in Compton City Council’s prevention of pubic housing. Despite Compton’s resistance towards Black families seeking the “suburban dream” Compton became an intergraded suburb (although white’s still welded the political power. )

It was not until the decreased industrial jobs and the Watt’s Riots that whites began to flee Compton. With decreased manufacturing jobs, white flight, economic decline and increased gang violence Compton changed. This change was exploited by popular culture/media exposure such as NWA’s song “Straight-out of Compton” which personified Compton as a violent, drug-infested, and bleak social landscape. This one-dimensional concept of Compton was profitable and therefore furthered through films like “Boy’s in the Hood.”

The negative connotation that came along with Compton made many communities dissociate with Compton including East Compton who voted to be called East Rancho Dominguez instead. Ironically, East Compton was the neighborhood that was most notorious for drugs in Compton. So who are the people of Compton then? Are they working-middle class people searching for the “suburban dream”? Are they what we see in the NWA video? Is it either or? I mean, NWA who capitalized on Compton’s “dangerous image” didn’t even fit the stereotype. Ice Cube, for example, was taking advanced architecture courses in Arizona before the group assembled! Also, there is a large Mexican population in Compton that is completely ignored from the image of Compton.

Basically, Sides and this course made me realize how powerful and incorrect word-associations are. Word- associations are one-dimensional and ignore the complex and history of a place or thing. Side’s shows, through Compton’s history, that Compton in not simply a bleak, violent, gang and drug infested suburb it is composed of a diverse group of people, people who are not encompassed under Compton’s definition. Side’s challenge of Compton’s definition parallels my changing definition if LA. Yes, I do believe parts of LA are materialistic but I also believe that LA has so much to offer: culture, diversity, social movements and history that we can all gain/learn from. From now on I will defend LA rather than define it.

A Closer Look

2009-04-29T22:28:00.000-07:00

The city of Los Angeles has always meant one thing for me- home. Its places and people have always influenced me. I’ve known the city my entire life. Or at least I thought I did before I took this class.

Disneyland has always been a big part of life. It has always been, as my friend says, “our motherland, our home.” And all the while I’ve never questioned it- the Disney films, Disneyland, everything Disney. The Disney films and characters that once filled up our childhood days come to life as we pass the gates of Disneyland into the “world of Yesterday, Tomorrow, and Fantasy.” They bring out joy and happy memories from the past. But now I’ve realized I need to take a closer look at Disneyland itself and what it originally stood for and the purpose it was meant to fulfill. In class, it was mentioned that Disneyland portrayed races in stereotypical ways and I had never thought about it that way. It really relies on the stereotypical versions of the many races. It raises the question of what message Disney is trying to send its “guests,” particularly the younger “guests.” In my media studies class, we discussed Disneyland as a kind of simulation of reality and the idea that we lose sense of what’s real and what isn’t and somehow places like Disneyland have become more real than reality itself. However, Disneyland doesn’t portray an accurate image of reality. It only shows stereotypes. Even though I don’t think the love I have for Disneyland will change due to nostalgia, the realization that Disney is different than what it seems definitely changes my perception of how minorities and other races are portrayed by Disney.

The most memorable thing that I will take from the class is the realization that even though I thought I knew Los Angeles, it turned out that there was and still is much I need to learn. Deverell’s Whitewashed Adobe described the Simon Brickyard as being one of the most successful brickyards in Los Angeles. It was surprisingly located where I live now. I hadn’t even thought about the history of the city I lived in, I just always thought it was the same old city I’d always known. Now after taking this class, I realize that there is so much about home and Los Angeles that I have simply looked over. I just accepted that the way things are now had always been that way, which based on from what we read in this class, is not the case at all.

Looking Back

2009-04-29T21:36:00.000-07:00

One very important thing which I will take away from this class is a sense of how insidious and yet unseen a white supremacist power structure can be. Throughout the course, I was constantly left gaping as my naivety regarding race relations was flattened by moment after historical moment where the most seemingly innocuous things were used to reaffirm white dominance in the hierarchy of race. The disappearance of street cars, viewed as dirty because of their potential as a public space, where all races could come together; the construction of freeways being used as an excuse to break up and destroy communities of color; the redlining practices of the FHA, enforcing segregation by denying people of color the ability to flee the emaciated city for the suburbs; more recently, the anti-gang ordinances used against minority youth and the brutality of the LAPD leveled against them; the over-incarceration of these same young men and women, aided by the Three Strikes rule—all of these things would have once seemed so innocent and unintentional to me. This course has taught me to look for intention—not to be overly suspicious, but to learn to connect the dots between a policy and the harm that it can do.

This has also affected my understanding of history as a process. While I certainly understood before taking this class that history builds on itself with each moment continuing into the next, I think before now I always read it through the lens of that fabled American dream, upward mobility. To some extent, I had previously failed to understand how fifty-year-old policies could still hobble a new generation, even after the policies themselves have been stricken. One thing that really drove this point home for me was doing research for a previous blog post, and learning that the majority of foreclosures in my home state’s capital were occurring in neighborhoods that had previously been redlined. This point was, of course, also addressed in the Avila readings and more recently in “Straight in to Compton”, but I think reading about redlining in a city that I closely identify with—instead of L.A., which I certainly know more about now, but is still a mystery to be explored and unraveled—really opened my eyes.

Finally, the single most important thing I have learned in this class came with the very first reading, and has been emphasized ever after. It is, simply, the idea that as scholars of American Studies, we have the power, and perhaps the obligation, to examine our topics from a moral perspective, to ascribe values of good and bad to the past and the present. And, somehow, we also earn the right to discuss the future, even to point in the direction that we would like to see that future go, as Gilmore does with her theses in Golden Gulag, and as Kun does less extensively in “What is an MC?” This idea, that a scholar does not only engage with material to understand it but also to enact positive change in the word, I found incredibly inspiring. More than anything else, the realization that this field gives me the opportunity to academically engage my hopes for America makes me want to continue my education in American studies.

South Central Farm

2009-04-29T21:08:00.000-07:00

As the child of hippies and a possible Environmental Anaylsis major, I'm naturally inclined towards anything relatively environmental in nature (pun intended)-- a large part of my life philosophy is about resourcefulness and reuse: the reuse of clothes, food, energy, trash, space, etc. Being raised a lower-class vegetarian, I know how difficult it can be to afford fresh fruits and vegetables, much less organically grown. Because of this, the segment of the class regarding the South Central Organic Farm was, for me, the most fascinating and enjoyable. It was great to see a group of people coming together for the greater good of the community, especially with something as important as food. In a lot of cases, lower class families can't afford to eat healthy foods, so I found this to be a really positive and uplifting ideal that the community was working towards. At times, especially in this modern era, I tend to lose a lot of faith in the American population--it feels as if apathy has shrouded the United States like a dark cloud. That being said, it is always pleasantly surprising to see Americans coming together and using what few resources they may have to make a positive change; there seems something very typically American about the idea. Though the people of South Central had very little money, space, or time for volunteering, they took the little that they had to create a great, safe space which brought together and united the entire community, despite being in a harsh urban environment; this is something which I have great respect and admiration for. Having done volunteer work on a local organic farm near my own home in Illinois, I felt I could relate to these individuals on a personal level--it's all about an exchange of hard work and dedication for a greater good on a community level.

Upon hearing that Forever 21 and the city of Los Angeles were responsible for the seizure of the property, I was enraged; it immediately struck me as a great injustice. After class, I came back to my room and began researching the situation, and upon finding out more, I decided to join those from the farm and boycott Forever 21, telling all my friends and peers to do the same. It upset me to know that our own government would abuse the power of eminent domain to such a degree that it would compromise the well-being and hard work of so many individuals. Seeing the struggle which these people went through and the compromises they had to make trying to save the farm moved me to tears, especially the scene in the film in which the farm was being bulldozed. This indeed raised many questions for me, one being to what extent can the government breach our property rights? I myself have had personal experiences with the power eminent domain, which I was reminded of during this segment of the class; perhaps my own battles with this problem contribute to my sympathy and interest in the subject. I was raised in a lower-class neighborhood in Indianapolis with proximity to a large river, The White River, an affluent shopping area, and good school districts. The property values in surrounding areas were all very high but because of the ethnic and socioeconomic diversity associated with the neighborhood, no one wanted to live there. Recently, my former home (currently my grandmother's house) has been targeted for eminent domain. My grandmother and her neighbors were told that their properties would be seized and they would receive compensation so that the city could build upscale river condominiums. Currently, they are still going through legal battles over the properties, but it seems that the city will win the case. In my eyes, it doesn't seem fair that the government can violate someone's property rights so casually, not taking into consideration the sentimental values associated with it. Whether it is my grandmother's house or the South Central Farm, it doesn't matter; inevitably, this issue still exists today and should not be something that is swept under the rug, and it's something which this class has further motivated me to investigate.

Multimedia

2009-04-29T17:36:00.001-07:00

I agree with Maria in that I think one of the coolest parts of the class was the multi media aspect. Being as this class is very historically based, often times I find those classes can be somewhat monotonous and hard to grasp everything. I usually find that I have a hard time in historical classes just with constantly reading about what happened and not having much other context. It was cool in this class that not only did we have readings, but we also did a lot with film, music, fiction writing, etc. I find that it is so much easier to get a better understanding of the historical context and what was going on with all of the different multimedia aspects. Even just the short Youtube clips that we watched that were from those different times such as the Disney clips and the Tarzan clip were really interesting to see. My friend had to do a presentation for her Fairy Tales class so we were watching trailers for the new Disney movie coming out with the African American princess. There has been a lot of controversy around this, even with minor things such as what her name should be. She is from New Orleans and meets a prince who is supposedly more “olive” skinned and is voiced by a Brazilian actor. A lot of people are wondering why she doesn’t fall in love with an African American prince while others say why should he have to be African American? I started thinking about this because of the different racisms portrayed in the old Disney and Tarzan clips. It’s interesting that even though we have made so many leaps and bounds today, those same issues are still prevalent, just in a different light and setting. Also, it has been really cool to have the music at the beginning of every class. It almost sets a tone for how the class will go, and I always really enjoy it whenever the music is specifically mentioned in our readings. For example, it was extremely interesting to get all of that historical background about songs such as “Straight Outta Compton” or “No Hay Manera” and then to study the songs and music videos in class as well. While it is possible to just listen to the songs or watch the videos on your own time, it was really interesting to get to analyze them in class together and find some deeper meaning in them. Songs like those don’t really seem like they would be analyzed or used in a collegiate course like this, so it was cool to see that it is possible to use them so in depth and study them. In terms of the readings we looked at, it always amazes me how often readings from this class are referred to in my other classes. For example, our Mike Davis reading was always brought up in our other classes and it was nice to have background on the reading and be able to have knowledge about it and refer to it. Also, our fiction readings added a cool context to the class, putting less of an analytical spin on everything. Overall, having the multi media aspect in this class really made it relatable and thoroughly enjoyable. While other classes sometimes have that same aspect, this one always had something extra going along with just the straight readings and that always kept me intrigued and wanting to do the work.

April blog post

2009-04-28T21:39:00.000-07:00

The two main aspects that I really liked about this class were the use of multi-media sources and the idea that events should be set against a backdrop of community and cross-community culture and relations to really understand how and why they happened. For the latter, a specific example would be the Lopez reading. Lopez places the Chicano movement within the context of the Biltmore Six and East Los Angeles Thirteen trials. Another example would be the Pulido reading in which the creation of the Third World Left movement is explained by discussing the history of and the interactions between the African American, Chicano, Asian American, and Native American movements during that time. The understanding that I received about the historical events that we studied in class was much more thorough than anything I would ever had gotten from my high school history text book. The readings offered a lot of new information with various viewpoints which was refreshing and set the readings apart from one another. This class was like a history class make-over. It was also interesting to see the way in which the films we saw and the fiction we read added to my understanding of the topics we were discussing. There is a different dynamic to learning when we are able to study sources other than analytical, research-based literature. Not knowing anything about Los Angeles before I came here to Claremont, I was able to learn a lot about the city and about the greater Los Angeles area through its centralized role and constant presence in our readings about ethnicity and race relations. I don’t think I ever really had any kind of expectation of what Los Angeles would be like before this class and certainly before college. I knew it was an important city but I had no
tlineidea as to the extent of its importance. To me, Los Angeles wasn’t so much a defined city with concrete buildings and people as more of a nebulous place that had a vague purpose in American society. I liked how this course grounded a topic as general as race relations with something more specific such as the history of Los Angeles. I suppose that is why I felt like I have a much better understanding of the history of race relations in Los Angeles because the readings were very focused and more specific than a regular history course. One idea that constantly caught me off guard was how closely connected the different racial groups in Los Angeles (or in any city, I suppose) are - not just in a physical sense (the ways in which races physically interact) but also in a conceptual and ideological way (race relations does not simply refer to interactions between minority groups and whites but also between different minority groups). In this class, I have been able to see how race is physically presented and formed in Los Angeles and understand more about the extent in which international and national cultures influence each other.

2009-04-28T20:38:00.000-07:00

I had always believed I was well versed in the racial and social discrepancies of Los Angeles. I grew up as the only white kid in my neighborhood (mostly made up of Mexicans and Salvadorians) and I commuted everyday to Studio City where I went a private school (mostly white and Jewish). I experienced high society Los Angeles and working class Los Angeles on a day to day basis. To me, the city a place that did not embrace reality. It presents itself as glamorous and untouchable, but I viewed it as a giant gentrified plot of land. The areas that are not yet gentrified, like East L.A. and South L.A., lack funds and decent quality of life. I saw that as the city's way of making low income citizens and people of color so uncomfortable that they are forced to leave. Then Los Angeles could live up to its glamorous reputation. Needless to say my outlook on Los Angeles was grim.
Things began to change after I read the article "What is an MC?". The writer, Josh Kun, vocalized everything I felt about Los Angeles, but also added a sense of hopefulness for the future. He references "No Hay Manera", a song that takes two different cultures and presents them in away where they are not fighting each other. The cultures are not blended, but are both present in a harmonious way. The class discussion of this article made me think of the time when my brother and I were being yelled at to "Go home! We were here first. This is our land" by a visibly inebriated young Latino on Halloween. Kun's article did, in a way, rectify that memory. The conflict of cultures in Los Angeles seemed blatantly violent and not fixable. Though the disharmony in Los Angeles is present, there can be found a unity of the multiple cultures, not as one, but as layers.
After reading and experiencing so many negative aspects of Los Angeles I will take away from this class an understanding of what needs to happen. How the cultures do not need to clash or assimilate. High society Los Angeles needs to acknowledge the cultural transition, as well as, history and embrace it.

What I'll Take Away

2009-04-27T21:58:00.000-07:00

I have always thought that the way space was arranged was the result of many different visions colliding into one another. I assumed this should be the case with Los Angeles especially because it is known to be so diverse. It is known for its sprawl, and I had thought that all of that space would allow various groups to develop how they wished to. I acknowledge that was a pretty naïve idea. I had thought that of course, one group could, and probably did have more influence than the others. But I just had no idea that a vision of white superiority could be executed so efficiently and in so many ways. Space and race are so tightly braided together in Los Angeles it is impossible to study one without the other. This is most interesting because this is not an issue of the past. Until this class, I never heard about the FHA policies that pretty much blocked people of color from white neighborhoods. I knew nothing of slum clearance or racist covenants. I guess I never realized that the racism of the past that shaped space was so blatant and backed by policy.
Before I came here for school, I had always thought that because Los Angeles was diverse, it meant that everyone was mixed up pretty much randomly within the space. I didn’t realize that the communities are really broken up by race. Yes, Los Angeles is diverse. But it is only diverse because there are various pockets of races/ethnicities.
What really interested me at the beginning of the year was the notion that Los Angeles has romanticized its Mexican roots, culture, and people. the outright police brutality inflicted on many of the African American community, this façade may not turn too many heads. It doesn’t call attention to itself, and is so sly because it tries to pass itself off for celebration of diversity. I feel like I can identify with this because it is very similar to the commoditization of the Hawaiian culture back in Hawaii where I’m from. I really appreciated Amy’s post about her spring break visit there because she seemed so aware. When people visit the islands, they go to staged luaus and buy fake leis from the tourist shops in Waikiki. And yet, I bet most of them do not encounter many, if not any Native Hawaiians.

2009-04-27T21:53:00.001-07:00

Coming into this class, I knew Los Angeles was a divided city on a variety of levels. I, actually, imagined it as two cities. The first, a sprawling series of wealthy suburbs connected loosely by highways packed with luxury cars. In this Los Angeles, celebrities and rich mingled, shopped and made movies. The other is the one of poverty and crime, formed by images from hip-hop, the Rodney King riots and hyperbolic reporting. The second city mainly consisted of people excluded from the luxuries of the first city. While this class did further illustrate the divides of Los Angeles, it gave me a more dynamic perspective on them.

Through this class, I gained an understanding of how intentional structural forces shaped the current cultural divides of the city. The most illustrative institutional force is the housing policies discussed in Avila’s book. Seeing the way in which the FHA explicitly denied loans to people of color, helped me to understand the current dynamic of the city. I also found Deverell’s book enlightening on how intentional ethnic divides from the city’s early history shape today’s society. The work of Mexican immigrant laborers literally built and fueled the city, yet white American excluded them from the story of Los Angeles. The fact that their histories, and the histories of other communities we covered, are not part of the popular narrative of Los Angeles astounds me. This exclusion, I think, helped contribute to my formerly limited perspective of the city.

I also learned that simply because there are many communities and identities, does not mean that there will always be the violent division seen on cable news. The visit from the volunteers from South Central Farms gave Los Angeles genuinely helped change my perspective of this. They illustrated how grassroots movements can help people overcome the structural barriers that can limit intercultural dialog. A reading that reinforced this, for me, is Wild’s Street Meeting. Reading about the multiethnic child’s play of the early 1900s illustrated that the current cultural divisions are not natural and do not have to exist. They are, instead, the product of policies that manufactured them.

What I'll Take Away from AMST103

2009-04-25T15:54:00.000-07:00

Overall, I think the most important part of this class to me has been thinking about both race and Los Angeles and my personal connection to both of them. First off, I learned a lot of the early history of Los Angeles and California. Having just moved to California from Massachusetts for college, this class gave me more of a background of the space where I am living and I like having this connection to the history. Of course I had learned some things before in US History, but I think in elementary school, each state tends to focus on its own history. (Which is apparently why I learned about pilgrims every year instead of missions.) Before I came here for college, my experience with California consisted of three vacations that my family had taken to visit relatives out here and do the typical touristy things- San Diego Zoo, Disneyland, Sea World, etc. I saw CA as a vacation spot, and as a young child I never thought about the state’s past. Also, in this class I learned more about the culture of LA than I might have found out about from just being in Claremont. Los Angeles functions as a space demarcation which we used to focus our studies of race. For me it also is now the place where I am living for at least four years of my life. I think learning about the history of Los Angeles can make me feel more connected to the place where I am.

In addition, this class has brought to my attention issues of race that I had never really considered before. I was aware of race before, but had never really given the idea much consideration. This class has brought up many questions for me which I have been considering and which I think I will need to continue to contemplate. These thoughts include questions like whether race even can or should be defined, to what extent defining race is helpful or not, how I individually identify my race, whether I even need to, and whether it is meaningful to even question my race. My answers to these questions are still not fully formed, and can vary from day to day. I think that finding the answers to these questions will contribute to my personal identity, both literally by defining my racial identity, but also by defining where I stand on important racial and societal issues. In kind of a cliché sequence of events, this class has helped me to explore my individuality and get to know myself better. Although I never would have expected it from an Intro to American Cultures class, I have had a great opportunity to learn things about myself I never would have thought to ask myself.

Golden Gulag class notes

2009-04-14T14:48:00.000-07:00

•The problem
==> Prison system is a burgeoning social space/mechanism which was implicated in issues of income, jobs, gender, urban development, etc. the raise in spending strongly suggests that it was something that changed state structure, local and regional identities, and social identities as it became part of the state economy and infrastructure
•What is prison supposed to do and why?
==> Govern people through retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, incarceration, prisons protect social stability, current ideas of rights/freedoms (especially democracy)
•The dominant and counterexplanations for prison growth
==> Is the crime – “crackdown” true?
− Drug epidemic/threat to public safety
− Structural changes in employment
==> Why prisons now? Why does the state change?
− Racial cleansing – new slavery
− Pursuit of profits (surplus cash/privatization of public)
− Rural urban competition
− Reform school
•Looking backward to look forward
==> More resistance, more criminals
==> 1968 – increase in profit and wealth because of war
==> racial hierarchies
==> shift in the job market/power
==> surplus didn’t create prisons, but it helped
•From reform to punishment
==> Rehabilitation → incapacitation
==> Changed in 1977
==> Before 77, parole boards contained many problems
==> Cheaper to punish than reform
==> CA legislature wanted parole officers to be more liberal when invoking parole violations, thus more convicts returned to prison but crime didn’t increase
•Capital for construction
==> In order to expand prison construction, rapidly turned to borrowing (LRBs) to avoid political backlash (tax).
==> This allowed for prison expansion that included nonviolent criminals and an entirely new social policy
•Siting the prisons
==> Considerations
− Land – rural agricultural l(and?) taking up land surplus
− Communities/NIMBY – which communities can organize
− Politics – LA prison battle legislature
− Economics – powerful landholders selling idle land at inflated prices, promised jobs for labor surplus, fewer employers dependent on traditional economy
•Producing more prisoners
==> Increase in prison legislation
− Drug recriminalization, profiling of criminals
− 3 strikes – new demographics of prison (race, incomes, nature of crime)
•Industrializing punishment
==> Not as much focus on where the crimes came from, but more about how to control those committing the crimes
==> Financing the prisons: how they got the $ and why they got the amounts they did, not really any strict rules about the allocation of $
==> Growing population → increased crime → increased needs for prisons thus need for more $ to improve efficiency
==> Increase in requirements for prison workers who were not taught as much about where the crimes came from but more about the efficiency and control of the system

Definitions of race

2009-04-06T13:52:00.000-07:00

We've been talking a lot about different racial identities in class and I was curious about the currently accepted definitions of race. So I did a little research online and found a couple definitions. As might be expected, the Merriam-Webster's Dictionary's definition is very broad and not terribly enlightening. [1]

race: a family, tribe, people, or nation belonging to the same stock
b: a class or kind of people unified by shared interests, habits, or characteristics
c: a category of humankind that shares certain distinctive physical traits

In 1998, the American Anthropological Association published a statement on race that they believe ``represents generally the contemporary thinking and scholarly positions of a majority of anthropologists.'' They first describe scientific notions of race. The vast majority, about 94% of physical variation lies within commonly accepted racial groups. That is, geographic racial groups only genetically differ from one another by about 6%. This is because human beings have always interbred when they have come into contact with other groups. Because of interbreeding, physical variations occur gradually and are independent of each other. For example, skin color tends to vary according to whether a region is more tropical and sunnier or whether it is a more temperate region, but this is not necessarily tied to eye color or curly or straight hair.

Clearly, race has meanings far beyond physical characteristics. The AAA trace the concept of race to ancient hierarchies used to compare different individuals to God. These hierarchies were given more credibility by Europeans in order to rationalize their colonization of the rest of the world and at its most extreme to justify slavery of non-Europeans. They associated superior traits with Europeans and inferior traits to others. As ideas of evolution and natural selection became more developed, culminating in the publication of On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin in 1859, many Europeans applied pseudo-scientific reasoning to justify their racism. They claimed that whites had evolved further from apes than Africans, and that Africans were therefore more primitive and more suited to manual labor.

Today, anthropologists accept that all humans can learn any cultural behavior, regardless of their genetic background. No one is born with any specific culture or language. Therefore disparities between "racial groups" has nothing to do with biological inheritance but is a product of "historical and contemporary social, economic, educational, and political circumstances." In light of these conclusions, it seems that are notions of race are based almost entirely on visual differences between individuals. As interracial marriages and children become more and more prevalent, will our traditional notions of race fade into obscurity because it will become more difficult for strangers to assign racial identity to others?

[1] http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/race%5B3%5D
[2] http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/racepp.htm

The Watts Towers and the militaristic architecture of LA

2009-04-05T21:32:00.000-07:00

When I read the Schrank article one of the first things that struck me was Watts Towers’ stark contrast with other forms of architecture in Los Angeles. In my art history course last semester we read a chapter from Mike Davis’ City of Quartz entitled “Fortress L.A.” that discussed how the buildings and planning of Los Angeles create a militaristic and exclusionary environment. To illustrate this architectural “style” my professor focused primarily on the new Cathedral of Our Lady in the Bunker Hill neighborhood of LA. I think it’s really interesting how the Watts’ Towers both fits into Davis’ portrait of L.A. and compares to the antagonistic design of the Cathedral because it is within this framework that the Watts’ Towers developed its unique importance to the local and international communities.

In the chapter “Fortress L.A.” Davis explores the “architectural policing of social boundaries”(223) in Los Angeles. He argues that the chained link fences and video cameras that characterize downtown LA function as exclusionary symbols that frame underrepresented groups’ perceptions of the city but are unnoticeable to the upper/middle class. Coupled with an aggressive “containment” of the homeless policy and growing gentrification, the militaristic face of the city has directly influenced the continued fragmentation of LA. The destruction of public space, a familiar point in our class, is explained by Davis as a “universal and ineluctable consequence of this crusade to secure the city”(226). This point relates to Schrank’s article because the city’s attempt to demolish the towers to make space for a commercial housing project is another example of the eradication of public space in exchange for corporate defined redevelopment. The subsequent appropriation of the towers as a symbol of successful urban renewal mirrors LA’s fascination with “urban realist” architecture, as exemplified in the work of Frank Gehry (236-240).

The recently rebuilt Cathedral of Our Lady, designed by Spanish architect Rafael Moneo, similarly integrates security precautions into its post-modern design. Like Gehry’s works, the Cathedral’s tightly controlled exterior gives way to a luxurious interior complete with a 2.5 acre plaza, multiple gardens and a gift shop. Moneo wanted to restrict how people used the building, so the expansive 58,000 square foot cathedral has only one entrance, which is gated. The unwelcoming facade of the building also reflects the tensions of the Bunker Hill neighborhood that had previously been forcefully redeveloped by the city. In addition, the design of the Cathedral comments on the city’s historic past through the adobe color of its concrete exterior and location on the historic El Camino Real.

When I first learned of the Watts’ Towers, I immediately thought back to the new Cathedral of Our Lady because of the evident disparities between two of the most iconic examples of Los Angeles architecture. Although both works dominate the surrounding landscape because of their relative height, the face of the Cathedral is heavily guarded with few windows and high walls whereas the Towers are completely exposed and open. Both reflect the militaristic nature of the city that Davis articulately described in “Fortress LA” but they do it in very different ways- the Cathedral by internalizing drastic security features and displaying an exclusionary exterior; the Towers by embodying the raw and “brutalizing physicality of the modern urban experience” (Schrank 277).

Link to Compton article in Newsweek

2009-04-02T12:56:00.000-07:00

http://www.newsweek.com/id/190655

Radical Thought and Academia--A Bit of a Ramble

2009-04-02T02:16:00.000-07:00

American Studies Blog Post #2:

After class today I began thinking about radical thought within Academia, and the broader historical trends that have taken place within American political discourse. A question popped into my mind: How does the increased formalization and legitimization of critical and radical thought within academia relate to, if at all, the deradicalization of American political discourse and culture and the pacification of students?

On the one hand, since the “Power Movements” many disciplines have been legitimized and secured—after decades of fighting—that welcome critical, oppositional and radical analyses of society. Ethnic studies, American studies, women’s studies, queer studies, cultural studies and probably a host of others build off of canonical texts that articulate endemic, intractable, fundamental problems with society, and often pose revolutionary or liberatory ways of moving forward. Capitalism, patriarchy, racism, white supremacy, heteronormativity, and other dominant ideological and structural forces are interrogated, unpacked, and intellectually dismantled. Perverse contradictions, inequalities and hierarchies are de-naturalized and wrestled with in all of these disciplines.

Yet that being said, I cannot help but notice that the growing legitimization and normalization of radical thought within academia has also taken place alongside two other problematic (according to my own subjective values) trends: the conservatization of American mainstream political culture and discourse, and the rise of a less active and less critical generation of students (of which I am a part). Within our country capitalism and unfettered markets seem less questioned and more immutable than ever (this is changing in slight ways as evidenced by Obama’s election and mild economic interventionism). Racial inequality and discrimination, though less blatant and no longer legal, still characterize American society. And yet, few imaginative alternatives to the current social and economic order have any serious currency within American political discourse. Only mild tinkering with the market economy is considered, and bolstering public goods and services will be a battle for the Obama administration. Inequality and poverty seem to be relatively low-profile political issues in America, and racial inequality (in terms of outcomes and substantive opportunity) is practically taboo to speak about.

As academia has become incredibly diverse ideologically, it seems American political discourse has narrowed and become more conservative. Are these trends related? On the one hand, it seems that academia has become a haven of sorts for radical thought during an era in which conservatism and reformism have reigned. It makes sense that an institution with at least a degree of autonomy (from business and government) has become the repository for radical thinking even when such thinking holds no wider political viability. That being said, I wonder if the legitimization of radical thinking in academia has in any way hindered the Left’s growth since the Reagan Revolution. For one, radical thought in academia often seems to be depoliticized and decontextualized (crazy ideas from the past that are severed from the actual people and struggles that precipitated such thinking). Also, as academia has become the main repository for radical thinking and radical intellectuals, it seems that a geographical gulf has formed between communities that disproportionately bear the brunt of structures of domination (be they social or economic) and ideas from the Leftist tradition. More privileged members of society attending four-year institutions are exposed to revolutionary ways of thinking, yet such thinking may often be merely consumed like candy--taken as ideas that are to be wrestled with for the sake of one’s own intellectual development, not because they are to influence praxis.

In this way, I wonder if those most capable of revolutionizing society (those with the lived experiences that inspire action) are most distanced from the ideas that could be empowering, and those least capable of revolutionizing society (those with the greatest stake, materially speaking, in the status quo) are exposed to radical thought, yet often consume it as part of an intellectual feast en-route to a comfortable, professional existence.

These are very rough ideas, though I am simply entertaining the thought that the legitimization of radical thought within academia, and the fact that academia has become somewhat of a haven for radical thinking during a conservative era, may have had some serious ramifications: namely, the fact that privileged people have complete access to critical theory and the theoretical products of the Leftist tradition, while working class and underprivileged people are completely distanced from these narratives and traditions—both spatially and otherwise. Moreover, I wonder whether the access disparities have hampered the Left’s reemergence.

South Central Farms

2009-04-01T12:37:00.000-07:00

When the South Central Farmers spoke to our class about their struggle I was reminded of a class I took last year where we discussed an unfamiliar form of injustice (as least to me), environmental racism. The act of inflicting toxins on to a voiceless subordinated group of people.

Last year in my International Studies class we discussed the immensely understated occurrences of environmental racism throughout the world. We talked about the discrepancy in water quality in Chicago. The south side of Chicago had a toxic level of lead in its tap water as opposed to the wealthier, whiter north side that had safe drinkable water. We noted that this was no coincidence and perhaps it was a way to slowly get rid of the minorities. Despite the shocking level of lead in the water, the overt environmental racism was never nationally recognized. Most commercial environmental activist groups tend to be run by middle white people who do not experience the environmental injustices caused by racism. Commercial environmental groups were more focused on animals and trees, not on humans. With this fact, grassroots environmentalism has become more and more prevalent.

The South Central Farmers brought to light that there are no health food stores let alone a few grocery stores. South Central residents have very little ways to obtain healthy organic foods because the liquor stores out number the grocery stores. The young female South Central resident said we need healthy options, but we are only given essentially poisonous foods. This is exactly why the South Central Farm was so important, it finally allowed low income people to have healthy options. She also talked about how the South Central Farm taught people to think about what they are eating and stressed the importance of organic produce. Unfortunately, it is no coincidence that healthy options are not available in South Central. This is a prime example of environmental racism. It puts the South Central residents at a disadvantage in life because they are not given the same healthy choices. The South Central Farm was that healthy option for many low income people and it was taken away without much understanding of the importance of organic farming for these families. Thus, the grassroots movement began.

As the farmers voiced their concerns they caught the attention of celebrities and politicians. Although, the politicians proved to be of know help, they did grab the public's attention. The land where the farm once was is still vacant an unused, they were able to find a plot of land in Bakersfield. The grassroots movement is still going strong without the help of the Mayor and exemplifies the injustice inflicted on the subordinated. Their voices individually were silenced, but as a group they are subtly making progress as most grassroots movements do.

Desperate Housewives and the Chicano Identity

2009-04-01T00:54:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I also watched the episode of “Desperate Housewives” that Jane talks about in her blog post with the scene of Lucy assuming that two girls playing in her office were the children of the cleaning lady when they were actually the daughters of her boss. In addition to Jane’s discussion of common sense racism, I related this scene Haney Lopez’s discussion of “Inventing Chicanos” in chapter 9 of Racism on Trial.

I was really interested in Haney Lopez’s descriptions of the reasons why Mexican Americans involved in the Chicano movement sought to change their identity by primarily changing their racial title. Haney Lopez explains that “the Chicano movement worked constantly, creatively, and self-consciously to fashion a new racial identity” (205) that was a “positive identity” with a lot of meaning behind it. He says that “Mexican Americans understood race to have relatively little power to determine identity” (206) while Chicanos felt that the color of their skin went hand in hand with the often negative or degrading societal images associated with the Mexican culture. The Chicano movement fought to change their title to therefore separate themselves from the white identity and create an identity that could differ from the stereotypes around them. This new identity would be positive in the sense that their efforts went towards representing the positive aspects of their culture and who they were collectively, which provided depth and meaning by emphasizing the many dimensions to their racial and ethnic community.

Haney Lopez breaks this racial identity into three “lines:” characteristics as the traits of groups; categories as the racial group itself; and properties as the cultural conceptions of the racial group, or the “supposed attributes of race.” (205) By creating a new category (Chicanos), the Chicano movement distinguished their characteristics from those of the white category that Mexican Americans were associated with, in attempt of developing the properties of their identity into positive conceptions that would positively develop the Chicano’s place in society.

The scene from “Desperate Housewives” symbolizes the reason why Chicanos did not want to be considered part of the white racial category because they were not treated as white and were associated with disrespectful, careless, and generally poor behavior. Lucy exaggerated the situation because of the color of the girls’ skin, and her association of the behavior of the girls with lower class minorities. These assumptions and properties are what the Chicano movement fought to change by creating their new identity.

Additionally, this scene was an example of the “whitened Mexicans” Haney Lopez discusses. “According to Chicanos, ‘whitened’ Mexicans identified with and aspired to the status of whites. They were also those who, because of physical features, wealth, profession, education, or business position, possessed characteristics associated with whites.” (207) Carlos, the father of the two girls, is an example of a whitened Mexican because even though his skin color is the same as the skin of the Chicanos, he has been successful, represented by his high business position and apparent wealth. Although the show does not characterize Carlos with “possessed characteristics associated with whites,” it is clear that Lucy treats him as she would a white man because of his status. Lucy’s behavior represents the behavior of many people in society who today only treat minorities as equals when they have achieved the power and status of what people like Lucy consider to be properties of the white racial group.

Uniting a Community

2009-04-01T00:48:00.000-07:00

Reading about Latino unity in Racism on Trial: The Fight for Chicano Justice made me reflect on a separate event in Los Angeles that I felt strongly showed Latino unity in East Los Angeles. While reading the descriptions of the walkouts and watching the clips of the film Walkout, I couldn’t help but think of the event. It isn’t as revolutionary as high school walkouts or definitely not life altering but I still felt that it somehow showed a strong sense of unity within the Latino community.

Every year during high school football season, two long-time rivals, the Roosevelt High School Rough Riders and the Garfield High School Bulldogs- two schools involved in the 1968 walkouts- play against each other in what is known as the “East L.A. Classic.” Both of the school’s populations, along with the alumni, are predominantly Latino. This particular football game brings in alumni from all over Los Angeles and alumni ranging from various years. Usually, the game gets so much attendance by alumni and fans that the game is usually held at a local college instead of at one of the high school’s football fields and for a few years even had to be held at the Los Angeles Coliseum, a stadium used for the 1984 Summer Olympics and is now used for USC football games. The reason it reminds me of Latino unity is because I’ve witnessed this traditional event for many years and seen how united the Latino community of Los Angeles can become.

When I initially started the reading, my mind went to this game because the two schools, who I thought were rivals, had joined together and took part in the 1968 walkouts. It surprised me to realize that at one point in history these two schools were once allies and helped bring the Chicano community together in the fight for Chicano justice. I’d only ever seen them under the conditions of the game- going head to head. I wondered why it was they went back to being rivals if they had already become allies. However, I realized that despite the fact they were now rivals and weren’t walking out together, they both still brought the Chicano community together except under different circumstances.

As a result of having two parents, one from each rival school, our family has taken part in this tradition for years. Every year, our family alternates which school we’re going to sit and root for and every year, on whatever school I sit and root for, I always notice how despite the tense rivalry between the two schools, their fans, and their alumni, the people are always just happy to take part in the tradition. During the game, insults are thrown, the crowd tries to out-cheer each other and emotions run high but it really doesn’t matter which school you support in the end, because the fact that people are actually there cheering on one of the schools on a Friday night is enough to unite the community. It becomes a celebration of loyalty and pride to be part of this long-time tradition and community for fans ranging from senior citizens (one man I recall wore his class of ’39 letterman jacket) to the newest generation of Bulldogs and Rough Riders.

Even during the year, be it summer, spring, winter, if people come across fellow “Rough Riders” or “Bulldogs,” the game comes to mind and immediately turns strangers into friends. Countless times have I heard my dad come across a fellow Garfield High alumnus and ask, “Hey you went to Garfield? Another Bulldog! What year did you graduate?” or sometimes have a run-in with a rival and tease, “You went to Roosevelt? How embarrassing. We’ll see who wins this year at the Classic!” Just the recognition of attending these schools immediately unites people under this one commonality of taking part in the rivalry. It may not be a fight for justice but the result is still the same- a community, even if only on one cold autumn night under stadium lights, unites to support each other.

Political Determination

2009-03-31T23:23:00.000-07:00

The 1950’s through 1970’s fostered action towards Chicano empowerment in response to over a century of strife. Political and social activism to correct injustices and defeat discrimination were a natural outgrowth of that awareness and a major feature of the movement. While incidents before had already demonstrated the need for social amelioration, the post-war era was important because it was the first time Chicanos really began to be politically self-actualized. Indeed, since the 1960s, when legislation such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 brought more Americans into the political mainstream, the Hispanic vote proved to be influential in local, state, and national elections. In presidential elections, candidates have been paying more attention to Hispanics since they have striking numbers in four key states: California, Florida, Texas, and Illinois—a major chunk of electoral votes. However, at the same time, the movement for political empowerment has still not been completely realized because of a history of component problems facing Chicanos.

It appears as if the specter of racial discrimination has revealed itself in socioeconomic difference—this time to interfere with the Chicano political identity. Internal factors explaining low political participation include socioeconomic status. It is no secret that low levels of age, education, and income negatively affect voter registration and turnout. Unfortunately, Chicanos have historically found themselves in the lowest levels of these categories. In 1980 the median age of Chicanos was 22.1 years; for the whole population it was 31 years. Only about fifty percent of Chicanos complete high school and median family income is only two-thirds of the national average[1]. In 2007, it would appear that conditions have improved, but Latinos and Chicanos still find themselves in the same station. According the Census Bureau, the median income for “Hispanic” households was $38,679 in 2007, which was 70 percent of the median for non-Hispanic White households, the “Hispanic” population in 2007 had a median age of 27.6, and there has been a slight increase in high school graduation rates.[2] Considering its growth in size over the past years, it’s problematic to see this group still low across the board. Education is particularly important in galvanizing political participation, especially because the largest proportion of Chicanos are just entering the voting age. However, socioeconomic demarcations resulting from demographic concentration in the Southwest and in urban barrios have left deep cleavages in educational quality. For many high schools in the Southwest, the facilities are not far improved from what they had been in the 1960s. The low standards of education create lower expectations for Chicano students, resulting in a dangerous cycle. Without any encouragement for Chicano youth to complete high school education, it is very likely the position of Chicano students will stagnate.

The Mexican-American population has grown considerably over the past century from about two million in 1930 to nearly six million in 1970 and 45.5 million in 2007.[3] From this increase of numbers should naturally follow an increase of political representation, especially since the next generation of Chicano immigrants is nearing the age to vote. For this reason, it is especially important to address the problem of political non-representation by remembering historically structured obstacles, including diversity among Latino/Hispanic groups all over the United States and the low levels of education in low income areas. In light of the increase of attention to illegal immigrants (a predominately unrepresented group entering the political fray) and the subsequent legislation, it seems even more important for this group to unify and tap into a political potential that has been steadily recognized.

[1] McWilliams, Carey. North From Mexico. (286).

[2]Statistics provided by the United States Census Bureau current population reports, issued 2008. http://www.census.gov/population/www/index.html

[3] McWilliams 285 and U.S. Census data.

HAWAII

2009-03-31T23:19:00.000-07:00

I had the great fortune to vacation in Hanalei, Kauai this past spring break residing in a beach house where the sound of the waves put me to sleep. To give you some background Kauai is one of the 8 islands that encompass the state of Hawaii. It is the oldest island (closest to Japan) and is called the “Garden Island” due to its rich vegetation that even clings to the volcanic mountains surrounded by the clear turquoise water. (Jurassic Park, King Kong, Lost, and other films/TV shows were filmed here!) Needless to say, it is beautiful.

Kauai, like the other 8 Islands went through years of occupation and struggle for independence during the turn of the century. Hawaii had an emperor until 1891 was claimed a territory of the US in 1900. In 1941, due to Pearl Harbor, the US declared Martial Law in Hawaii increasing US residency. By 1959 Americans who had lived in Hawaii for a year had the right to vote in for Hawaiin Statehood. (This vote excluded those native Hawaiians who protested US law)

Although I know little about the colonization/ statehood of Hawaii during my trip I couldn’t help but feel like an intruder. From the shaved ice with condensed milk, Guava EVERYTHING, roosters that crowded the street, to the relaxed atmosphere… the identity of Kauai is still very un-American despite its large tourist-based economy (around 80 percent American). However, I almost only saw Americans during my vacation. It seemed that everyone I met moved to Kauai when they were young, usually from California, and decided to stay. – This reminds me somewhat of LA and the racial /cultural segregation that takes place. Although some “locals” told me that there is land allocated to those who hold a certain percentage of Hawaiian ancestry they didn’t mention it was only one percent (Race, Class, Gender, 47).

I felt flooded with questions on the relationship between local Hawaiians and the Americans who have moved here since the 1959 declaration Hawaii’s Statehood. What is this doing to Hawaiian culture? Language? I asked some “locals” who told me that it wasn’t the older generation that was hostile towards Americans but the younger generation of Hawaiians. However, they said that if you showed respect to the Hawaiians the tension was usually eased. When it comes to language and culture it seems that, “Hawaiian language was banned in all private and public schools in 1896 and this ban continued until 1986 when it was rescinded through Punana Leo lobbying in1987”(Kauanoe Kamana and William H. Wilson). Currently, there has been an increased push to have Hawaiian taught elementary schools.

In the book Race, Class, and Gender: An Anthology, which I sited above, I stumbled upon a narrative of a Hawaiian woman named Haunani-Kay Trask who described that there was, “the world that we lived in- my ancestors, my family, and my people- and then there was the world historians described.” She describes how historians are like colonizers in that they only put value on Anglo- ideals transforming the belief that no own owned the land to and oppressive capitalist society. She ends her narrative describing that in order to understand Hawaiian culture they must be willing to learn the language and prevent their Western way of thought to influence their analysis of Hawaiians. – this seems to echo some of the Asian American, Chicano and goals of the BPP’s for an accurate history.

After this narrative I couldn’t help but compare the experiences of Hawaiians with that of Mexicans and other ethnic groups. Looking specifically at Whitewashed Adobe I can’t help but see the parallels between Hawaii and California’s history and culture defined by whites. Using Mexican and Hawaiian culture to draw tourists/ residence ( Mr. and Mrs. LA). It also led me to make parallels between the Chicano movement in Lopez and the articles we read for class today. It seems since the 1960’s Hawaiians have had a nationalist movement that can be relatable to that of the Chicano, Black, and Asian American movement in the struggle for a self-created- identity.

Legal rights are also a struggle for Hawaiians. Even recently in 2006 Hawaiians have been fighting to forge an identity and government separate from Americans in the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act of 2005. “A bill to express the policy of the United States regarding the United States relationship with Native Hawaiians and to provide a process for the recognition by the United States of the Native Hawaiian governing entity. “(http://www.govtrack.us/) Hawaiian sovereignty movements and other Native-Hawaiian activist groups seem to mirror the same struggle for legal rights and identity as other minority groups in LA.

Made in L.A.

2009-03-31T22:29:00.000-07:00

I went to the Made in L.A. screening a week ago, and I was incredibly impressed with the whole event. I didn’t know that it was a community event, so I was a little surprised to see so many non-college students there. During the introduction of the event, Timothy Sandoval, who, if I remember correctly, is the director of the Bright Prospect organization, told the audience mostly about the hope that he has in the high school students in the program, many of which were at the showing, his belief in their leadership abilities, and the students’ potential to affect their community. Sometimes I feel like the discussions in this class, as well as in my sociology class, are so abstract and topics of social justice are handled in an almost sterile way. What I mean to say is that in class discussions societal problems are recognized and then analyzed like a math problem; the solution is the result of logic detached from any emotional repercussions. Listening to Mr. Sandoval speak about his pride for the Bright Prospect students brought those class discussions out of Cloud Abstraction down to a more emotional level. I could see the investment that he had in his students. This also kind of ties into the level of activism here among the Claremont Colleges students and the different ethnic communities that we were talking about in class today. Participation in racial, political, or social issues doesn’t have to be contained solely in the classroom, and yet it seems like for the majority of students it is.
Made in L.A. was really well made and definitely a worthwhile documentary. When Ms. Carracedo gave a description of the process of making this film she told the audience that it was supposed to be a five month project, but as she was filming she recognized a change in the three main women and so the documentary lengthened in order to reflect that. It was really apparent to see what Ms. Carracedo meant when she said that, and it was really amazing to see how those women’s lives and their involvement in the lawsuit against Forever 21 just naturally followed an archetypal model of the underdog story. Made in L.A. also added a more experienced and humanistic perspective to the class discussions. It made obvious, again, how books can sometimes render acts of dehumanizing and humiliating discrimination into facts used as background information to support a large-scale idea or pattern. Maybe I’m more of an audio/visual learner than I thought, but for me, the most striking aspect of this documentary was the women’s telling of their experiences as Mexican immigrants and garment workers and being able to see their reactions on their faces. Another part of Made in L.A. that really gave me pause was at the very end when Lupe, one of the three main women, said something along the lines of "The more I learn, the lonelier I feel". To hear about knowledge in that way, as a student, is a little disheartening. There are obviously circumstantial differences, but even connecting it to just Lupe and how her self-perception changed because of what she learned through her experience in the lawsuit against Forever 21, that statement undermines her achievements.

Community Tutoring Program and Bright Prospect

2009-03-31T21:55:00.000-07:00

Like Zandy and Maggie, this class has made me think about education. By way of a disclaimer, I really have a limited exposure to education policy and a limited understanding of how the public school system works in California. But still, I wanted to share some of my own personal experiences here at Scripps.

This will be my second year now with the Community Tutoring Program (CTP), which works in partnership with Bright Prospect (BP), a college access non-profit in Pomona. CTP offers tutoring to Bright Prospect students and organizes programs here at the Claremont Colleges for these students. For example, last semester CTP offered a Preview Day at Scripps and this semester organized a screening of the documentary “Made in L.A.”

Bright Prospect targets high-achieving students from local low-decile high schools, such as Garey (20 minutes away), Pomona (10 minutes away), and Ganesha (15 minutes away). Just to give a quick (and somewhat superficial comparison), Garey is less than 2% white with over 70% of students qualifying for free lunch. An easy contrast is with Claremont High School, where 11% of students qualify for free lunch and 49% are white [1].

Just looking at the facts Zandy included, it is clear that something must be done about underserved schools in our communities. In addition to the solutions he offered, programs such as Bright Prospect have the opportunity to make a clear difference. The Bright Prospect program is unique (and amazing) in several ways.

The Bright Prospect Scholar Support Program takes the very top students from underserved local high schools and aims to have them gain admission to the nation’s most elite institutions. What is different from many other college access programs is that they support students and their families and sticks with them for all four years for their college career. Consider that of every three low-income minority students attending college on traditional scholarships, two will quit before earning their degree. Bright Prospect offers financial and social support to both students and their families during the application process and throughout college. In addition, they offer many programs and opportunities for students and their families during high school. As a result, 85% of the program participants graduate within four years, which is an amazing statistic in itself.

The second program is larger. The Bright Prospect of Academy of Young Scholars targets the top 20% of local high school students. They supply information about college and aid students in their applications in order to increase the number of students who graduate from four-year universities, mostly Cal State’s or UC’s. They have over two hundred students in this program. A crucial part of the program is peer mentoring. Eleventh and Twelfth graders who have already gone through the program serve as peer mentors to ninth and tenth grades, a mutually beneficial relationship. This ensures each student has a strong support network while extending the number of students Bright Prospect is able to help. Students also gain experience in leadership and organizing through this; for example these students were responsible for ensuring such an abnormally large turnout for “Made in L.A.”

Vicki Ruiz in “Citizen Restaurant” used a quote by George Lipsitz that I really loved. He said, “We do not choose our color, but we do choose our commitments. We do not choose our parents, but do choose our politics” (13). Although I have a pretty limited experience in education, what I have learned through this job has changed my understanding of community and my politics. During high school, I often felt frustrated with the lack of resources offered to students. By way of a disclaimer, I attended the wealthiest school in my district. But even still an understaffed counseling center, limited awareness of the college application process, and other issues were all problems we faced. Luckily, I stumbled across visit programs designed for underrepresented students as well as received a scholarship to attend a summer program. It wasn't until I went to my summer program that I realized that I could attend a private school and that I was qualified enough to be recruited be some. Still, most of my school graduates and goes to community college, which while can be the best option for some students shouldn't be the only option for all.

I can't say I've resolved my disappointment with my high school. What I can say is that this disappointment coupled with my own interest in educational reform has motivated me to get involved.I’ve been able to combat some of the frustration I felt in high school and even at college by working with organizations like Bright Prospect and the Scripps College Academy while broadening my awareness of college access programs and feeling more empowered through action.

I think it is time for me to get off my soapbox and reveal my ulterior motive. I wanted to let you know that CTP hiring another co-coordinator year! Email me (lnolan@scrippscollege.edu) or talk to me in class for more information about this or Bright Prospect.

[1] nces.ed.gov

Colorism and Common Sense

2009-03-31T19:27:00.000-07:00

In Racism On Trial, Lopez notes how during the 1940’s, “Light-featured and relatively well-off Mexicans experienced race differently that other community members. For middle-class Mexicans, especially those with more European looks, claiming to be white was social advantageous in the context of the times…In contrast, for darker-skinned Mexicans, those in the laboring class…the full weight of anti-Mexican hostility made any pretense to be white delusional” (80). It was “common sense” that lighter Mexicans of a lighter skin color were more trustworthy or hardworking than those of darker skin.

This section of the book reminded me of a segment on 20/20 on ‘colorism’ I saw back in high school. In the report, the news crew presented employers of various businesses with dozens of pictures, along with resumes, of potential employees. What the employers didn’t know was that many of the pictures and resumes were the exact same person. The twist was that the news crew changed the names of the applicants and had their faces photo-shopped in order to make their skin color darker or lighter. Not knowing they were evaluating the same person only with a darker skin color, the employers were asked whom they believed was smarter on a scale from 1 to 5.

The results came in showing that the applicants with the lighter skin were generally seen as smarter. And it wasn’t only the whites who would give the lighter skin people higher scores, but the blacks also tended to favor the light skin. While in the 1940’s, it may have been much more obvious that there was discrimination going on based on skin color, there are still similar problems going on today, perhaps a bit more subtle. Like the judges, perhaps these employers had certain shortcuts, or a variation of “common sense” that told them that the applicants who were lighter seemed more trustworthy or smarter. However, they would most likely never admit this because like the judges, they don’t consciously realize it either.

I couldn’t find the video report, but here is the article that accompanied it:

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/GiveMeABreak/story?id=548303&page=1

Education

2009-03-31T17:23:00.001-07:00

Reading Zandy’s post really made me think about the situation where I come from and certain things I have seen going on. I work for a summer program called Horizons, where inner city, underprivileged/ at-risk kids are brought in for a summer camp/ school program. Most of the students who attend are Hispanic and those who aren’t are mostly African American. The program is kindergarten through 8th grade and most of the students who begin the program in the kindergarten class do not speak English. I always find it interesting that we are told not to speak Spanish to the children unless absolutely necessary, as it is their job to learn English. While the majority of the students do end up learning at least Basic English, some truly are not able to grasp the language. It might be that the students have some sort of mental block when learning the new language, but the case is often that English is not spoken at the students’ homes and therefore they are not surrounded by the language on a regular basis and are not really able to practice. I do think it is important that the students are surrounded by English and taught the language while at school, but for some students, it seems like we end up compromising other areas of education in order to teach them something they truly are not grasping. I don’t really know how I feel about this issue, whether or not the students should be allowed to be taught in English or in Spanish, but it is something very pertinent. The ESL (English as a Second Language) program is something interesting to look at. I had an extensive debate with a friend about whether or not school should be allowed to be taught in a language besides English. We discussed the fact that while students may be able to learn subjects easier if they are in their natural language, they may never be able to learn English as easily as if they had started young. The school that our students from Horizons mostly come from teaches almost all of its classes in English with a couple ESL classrooms. We have a few students who have gone through many years of Horizons as well as normal elementary school classes but still do not comprehend English. The Hispanic population in Colorado is now by and large the greatest of all other minorities, with 19.9% of the population being Hispanic and the next largest minority population being 4.2% (from the 2007 U.S. Census Bureau). With such a large percent of the population being of Hispanic descent, and many, many households speaking only Spanish, you would think that Spanish language classrooms would be more predominant. A Colorado website called colorincolorado.org gives advice and support in both English and Spanish to families with ELL (English Language Learners) children. The website’s mission statement is as follows: “The National Institutes of Health estimates that one in five children has serious difficulties learning to read. These children are potentially among the most troubled kids in society. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 17 percent (or approximately 9 million children and youth) of the nation's K-12 public school population is Latino. By 2025, the nationwide school-age population will be 25 percent Latino, and states such as California, Texas, Florida, and New York will have public school districts that are more than 50 percent Latino. These children are all not only learning to read, but also they are struggling to do it in their non-native language. With early identification and a lot of help, however, these children can flourish; without it they are at high risk for school failure. Colorín Colorado's mission is to find research-based and best-practice information about teaching reading to English language learners (ELLs) and use the power and reach of the Internet to make it widely available to parents, educators, and policymakers.” The statistics listed within this mission statement show the great rapidity with which the Hispanic population is growing and how children who are not native English speakers often do have a very hard time succeeding. After this long winded post about Hispanic/ Chicano students and what is being done for them, I go back to Zandy’s post about what was happening in the past and how children were treated then. As Zandy said, children were horribly criticized for their ethnicity. In terms of the children that I know today, it is necessary to keep them from those cruel critiques. Is the only way to do this, though, through English? If we are a country based around the melting pot theory, would it make sense for us to deny rights to those who do not speak English?

An Eye Opening Experience of Los Angeles

2009-03-31T16:29:00.000-07:00

After reading Kate’s blog about her first experience in Hollywood it got me thinking about my first visit to Los Angeles, which was a real eye opener. Before coming to America my knowledge of Los Angeles was limited to portrayals of the city in films and television programs, or commercials for Disneyland.

With a few of my fellow international student we embarked on a trip into the city, using the Metro link. As soon as we left the sleepy suburban town of Claremont we looked out at the window of the train in shock as we passed town after town of dilapidated buildings, which seemed a sharp contrast to the immaculate town of Claremont we had just left. As I looked around at the other passengers it seemed to be predominantly ethnic minorities who were aboard. The diversity of the passengers reminded me of the Lipsitz reading from the beginning of the semester, which discussed the buses role of bringing communities together. The train did not seem to be fulfilling the same role, as most people had self-consciously segregated themselves and were speaking predominantly in their native tongues.

Upon arriving at Union Station we decided to start by exploring the city by foot, we soon stumbled upon the Mexican quarter which immediately presented visitors with a sign which stated that Los Angeles and Mexico City were ‘sister cities’. This made me think of the amnesia of the past which Deverell talks about in ‘Whitewashed Adobe’. After looking around at the stalls full of traditional Mexican clothing and restaurants serving authentic Mexican food, I again was reminded of the Deverell text and his discussion of Los Angeles obsession with romanticizing the Mexican past which was clearly evident here.

After a while we decided to jump on the train and visit the Universal City Walk which is located next to Universal Studios. This as we had guessed was a hotspot of tourism, with plenty of souvenir shops and lots of places to eat what I assume would be classed as ‘traditional American’ food (like hamburgers and candy!) a huge contrast from the Mexican quarter. It lacked any real cultural relation or architectural history of the city, but it had I ‘heart’ Los Angeles t-shirts which kept the tourists happy. This is one place in LA which is much ‘whitewashed’.

After a busy and hectic day we hurried back to Union Station to catch our 9pm train back to Claremont, which we missed by two minutes. We then were horrified when we were informed the next one would not be leaving until 11:30pm! The lack of public transportation and our reaction, made me think of Avila’s point that transportation is taken for granted. In our two and a half hours at Union Station I encountered many homeless people, carrying all their possessions with them. We ourselves were at one point asked to produce our tickets in order to stay inside the station. The irony for me was that right next door, a high school prom filled with middle class kids was in full swing, whilst outside people were searching for a warm and dry place to sleep. I think the most surprising thing for me was that the complete blindness of most people to see the poverty around them, they are too busy with upholding the glamorized version of LA and Hollywood.

Common Sense Racism and Desperate Housewives

2009-03-31T16:08:00.000-07:00

After reading Ian F. Haney Lopez’, “Racism on Trial, The Chicano Fight for Justice” and the idea of common sense racism, I couldn’t help thinking back to an episode of Desperate Housewives that I had watched while at home over spring break. In the particular scene I reflected on, which I also posted, Gaby brings her children to Carlos’ office because she needs to talk to him. Carlos has recently brought in Lucy to crack down on his business and help it become the stronger. Lucy has glass figurines that are very important to her, and doesn’t let anyone in the office touch them. While Gaby is talking to Carlos, their children wander into Lucy’s office, unsupervised, where Lucy finds them playing with her figurines. The scene then cuts to Carlos and Gaby walking down the hallway to find out what the yelling they hear is about, to find Lucy yelling at the cleaning lady, who seems to be of Hispanic descent, about letting her children wander around the office. “Office, Si! Daycare, No!” Lucy yells at the woman. Carlos asks what is going on, and Lucy replies, “Apparently, some people don’t understand that this is a place of business and they need to keep their kids at home!” When Carlos tells Lucy that they are his kids, not the cleaning lady’s, Lucy immediately calms down, and in a much calmer tone apologizes, thinking that the kids were the cleaning lady’s, and proceeds to walk away. Carlos stops her, saying, “So what if they weren’t [his kids], is this how you talk to people?” and proceeds to fire Lucy.
In his book, “Racism On Trial,” Lopez writes, “Common sense is so integral to racism in the contemporary United States that I suggest a new definition: racism is action arising our of racial common sense and enforcing racial hierarchy” (127). In the Desperate Housewives episode, Lucy saw the kids in her office and immediately assumed that they were the cleaning lady’s, spoke to her in a way that assumed that she didn’t understand English, and that she would need to put her kids in daycare or bring them to work with her. Upon discovering that they are actually Carlos, her boss’ kids, she lowers her voice and apologizes, dismissing the problem right away. Like the woman cleaning the office, Carlos and his children are Hispanic, however Lucy doesn’t apply the same behavior towards him because he is her boss, and within the social hierarchy of the office, above her. Lopez also states, “In daily life, we continually make decisions, yet these decisions are almost never based on a complete reevaluation of a situation’s every facet. Instead, we use mental shortcuts to choose from preset alternatives. These shortcuts and alternatives often function as common sense” (123). Lucy used mental shortcuts to jump to the conclusion that the Hispanic children she found in her office belonged to the Hispanic cleaning lady, instead of thinking through the possibilities and asking the children who their parent were. Because of her assumption, she demonstrated common sense racism.
Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0P9lnuqM5mU

Response to ‘Racism On Trial: Chicano Fight for Justice’.

2009-03-31T15:52:00.000-07:00

I was uplifted by the words of Sal Casto form the little clip that we watched in class on Thursday. His words were inspirational and touching and connect with the book on many levels. Just like the Watts Riots were an importance uprising for African Americans, the Walk Out’s were equally important for the new generation of Mexicans to identify themselves and leave a noticeable mark in history. I connected with the younger generation or Chicano’s especially as they were a group of young individuals who sensed a loss of their own culture and raged against a system to better define them. It surprises me as to why the events of Rodney King were more popular than the two cases mention in the last book we were reading ‘Racism On Trial: Chicano Fight for Justice’.
I felt like the author portrayed the older generation as being seduced into the American dream and the want to be considered white. But I felt a sense of independence and rebellion and like the ‘teen spirit’ in terms of activism in the younger generation that constructed a new term and sculpted a new identity of the Mexican American heritage.
What also intrigued me was the formation of terms and how that developed over years. For example, there are so many terms to associate a person with his/her background. I find it forceful for a person has to identify oneself with a specific ethnicity or race, and the definition of this can get a little complicated. Various terms like Latinos, Chicanos, Mexican Americans, Hispanic, Spanish often leaves me confused as how to address someone if your not sure what they define themselves as. From previous similar parallels can be drawn in the Asian construction of race. It gets a little confusing as you have Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Pacific Islander…etc. Which gets even more complicated with the terminology of the first generation immigrants and their decedents. In art where the artist has full authority to specify his art, I like to think that it is based on the individual what specifics of his/her racial category they do or do not want to define themselves with.
The book ‘Racism On Trial….’ exposes various ways in which Mexican Americans identified themselves with race. I like the way the author viewed the evolution of Mexican Americans as a race and how he constructs his gender-based argument in their search for masculinity. In his chapter sub-titled Gendering Race, Racing Gender on PG 223 he mentions, “ Brotherhood unites us and love for our brother makes us a people whose time has come”
What I also found interesting form the discussions in the class is how minorities united against forces that tried to separate them and this is also mentioned in Lopez’s book. All colored people had to submit to Power, that can be viewed form different angels in terms of authority, the government, race, gender norms...etc “Our oppressions are one. Our dreams are one. Our demands are one. We suffer as one, we react as one, and we struggle as one”. These lines on page 213 brings up a concept of racial Triangulation where it wasn’t about the war against black and white but the grey area that consists of liberation and unity amongst all races.
The battle of Mexican’s to find identity in a racially diverse community is not new. In my previous Blog I mentioned about Ritchie Valnes and his struggles to define himself and find identity during the post war period with the ambiguity of his race. Lopez does an astounding job of writing as an observer as he gathers and places these issues from various prospective. But his book got me questioning as to weather it was triggered towards uplifting the Chicano struggle and fight for justice? Or did it just place issues that as individuals we face in terms of identifying with race, color, heritage? Or was he just questioning race in general?

Zandy’s March Blog Entry

2009-03-31T11:48:00.001-07:00

Zandy’s March Blog Entry

While reading the book “Racism on Trial- The Chicano Fight for Freedom”, I became interested in the aspects of the book that detailed education for Chicano children. One particular passage from the book in which a teacher stated “We will keep trying… but there is nothing you can do with those kids, they can’t discuss, they can’t talk, all you can do is give them seat work to keep them busy and keep them under control” (p.17) caught my eye. Although this quote is referring to the educational system in the 1950s and 1960s, the public school system for minorities, and particularly Hispanics, has not improved as much as it should have today. If one wants to create more parity among the different ethnic groups of the United States, one must enhance the public educational system in minority communities.
Today, Latinos are quickly becoming a significant proportion of the US student population according to the US Department on Education. While reading the report from the department, many striking facts hit me, such as almost 2 in 5 students were below the modal grade and do not graduate from high school. The main conclusion of the report showed that Hispanics were lagging behind Blacks and then Whites in test scores and college degrees, however their enrollment in primarily minority schools has increased dramatically. This is likely due to the fact that Hispanics on average have lower average incomes. The study indicates the obvious that primarily minority schools must improve for Hispanics.
Improving the public school system for minority students, especially Hispanics is not an easy challenge. The issue is complex with many conflicting ideologies on how to deal with the problem. However, personally I believe there are a number of strategies that we must implement in order to improve the schools for Hispanic children. First, a dramatic increase in funding is needed for these schools. With more funding, the schools can afford and retain better teachers, which is vital in enhancing the school system. Also, more after-school programs should be created to help tutor and supervise students so that they do not engage in outside activities that could hinder their education. These after-school programs could also include college preparation courses, which could help increase the number of students ready to attend college. Finally, colleges need to offer more student loans and scholarships to Latino students. Latino students are grossly underrepresented in colleges compared to other ethnicities. By increasing the number of Latino college students, the long-term situation will improve. With more Latino college students, the likelihood is greater that more Latino students will become teachers with college degrees that would help in the educational system. Also, if a rise in Latino college attendance occurs, one would most definitely see an increase in average income for Latinos. This would benefit the educational system for Hispanics because their communities could provide more funding for students due to the higher incomes. Something must be done as soon as possible, otherwise the Latino educational system will continue to decline, which thus hinders the Latino effort for greater economic equality.

a pop culture education

2009-03-31T00:14:00.001-07:00

Over Spring Break, my brother’s girlfriend, Cindy, took us on a “pop culture tour” in LA, since my brother and I know virtually nothing about it. Our main destination was Hollywood Boulevard, to see the Kodak Theatre, Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, and the Walk of Fame. We also ventured into the shopping extravaganza of Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, picking up some cupcakes at Sprinkles, “The Original Cupcake Bakery,” (according to their website). We ended the day with a three and a half our drive back to Claremont – how perfect! As it turned out, Sprinkles cupcakes are magical – after an hour and a half of traffic, we decided that we should eat one of the cupcakes, the “Black and White.” To our surprise, the traffic started moving after we ate it. It slowed down a few minutes later, so we decided that we had better eat another. Who knew that a Lemon Coconut cupcake would speed up traffic like that?! Unfortunately, our last two, the Red Velvet and the Double Chocolate, didn’t do the trick.

Anyways, this was my first time in Hollywood, and I was surprised at what I saw. I expected to see a red carpet, maybe some movie stars, at least some upscale restaurants and stores. What I saw instead were average-looking people on an average-looking, dirty street, a kitschy souvenir store, and a McDonald’s. While I might have been standing on a piece of cement where Clint Eastwood left his hand and footprints, the only people I saw looked basically like us. Maybe my surprise is part of my ignorance about pop culture, similar to how I wrote a three-page letter to Jim Carrey when I was eight, fully expecting a written reply with answers to all of my questions. What is it that made me expect these cultural icons to be more accessible? The closest I came to seeing a member of the rich and famous was on Rodeo Drive, where we saw a yellow Rolls Royce. Most people stopped to take pictures with it, almost as if the car itself were a celebrity, when really it was just evidence that there was someone rich nearby, perhaps watching us, vicariously enjoying the attention through his car.

Reflecting on the roots of my expectation that “the life” or at least those who are living “the life” would be somewhat accessible, I am reminded of booster promotions of Los Angeles, discussed by Deverell throughout Whitewashed Adobe. The Hollywood that I imagined sprang from popular media representations that have been carefully constructed to include only certain elements of society, similar to the exclusively expensive Rodeo Drive shopping extravaganza. In reality, both Hollywood and Beverly Hills foster populations that are largely absent in conceptions of Los Angeles as the “white spot,” the place where anyone can pursue the good life.

Ethnic Categories

2009-03-30T22:37:00.000-07:00

I just came across an article on the LA times website (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-arab31-2009mar31,0,1054147.story) that immediately caused me to think of discussions we've had in class. The article is about students who are trying to get the UC system to include a Middle Eastern category on its application, with the possibility of subgroups within this category. Currently, Middle Easterners are considered white, according to college applications such as this one and the US census.

While reading the article, I was immediately reminded of the Chicano movement, where individuals fought to be recognized as a distinct group, not lumped in with whites where their issues could be unseen. As with Mexican-Americans, Arab-Americans once worked hard to be considered white. Now, students are leading the movement to be recognized as a distinct group.

One statement that stood out to me from the article is:
"Back then, to get rights you needed to be white," said Yasi Chehroudi, president of the Iranian Student Group, which is helping spearhead the University of California campaign. "Now it helps to be yourself."

This reminds me of the Chicano movement, as well, and the push for assimilation that activists turned against in order to reclaim themselves and their heritage. I find it interesting how Chehroudi seems to be saying that Middle Easterners were not being themselves before, because they were accepting a false label. Is it possible to be yourself if society calls you something different? Is one's sense of self so tied up in racial categories that without an accurate label one can't be oneself?

The article also said, "The report questioned whether they should be placed in a minority category, which could increase their chances for benefits aimed at the socially and economically disadvantaged. Some in the Middle Eastern community agree. But UCLA junior Shawn Gabrill said he has more in common with other children of immigrants than with those whose parents were born in this country."

This passage shows to me the way that race seems to be another way of talking about class. The label 'white' can imply many things-- educated, well-off etc.-- but it does not guarantee these things. Neither do these adjectives guarantee being white. Still, these labels seem to be used as some kind of code. 'White' doesn't simply mean that you are of European descent, but that you fit into a certain standard of living. Is the purpose of the ethnic identification boxes to guess someone's socio-economic background, or is it to gather information on distinct groups of individuals? Not including a box for Middle Easterners because they fit more closely economically to the white image affirms that the boxes have a different purpose than that of straight-forward data collection. To be a minority, do you need to be disadvantaged in some way? Or do you automatically become white after a certain point?

I don't understand why there are not adequate ethnic category boxes on these forms, nor why it is so difficult to add new ones, particularly when they are as clear as this case. At the same time I wonder, how did these boxes come to be so important in how we see ourselves?

Forever 21: Not Just Annoyingly Loud Music Any More

2009-03-30T21:44:00.001-07:00

I was, unfortunately, unable to make the screening of Made in L.A. this past week (that’s what I get for coming back from break a day late and doing absolutely no work while I was home). Since finding the documentary online was a no-go, I decided to look into the history of Forever 21 boycotts and protests online. I assumed that if the farmers and the garment workers were already angry with Forever 21, someone else must be, too.

Those familiar with stores like Forever 21 and their ilk (Charlotte Russe and Wet Seal come to mind for me, and my West Coast friends tell me Papaya is similar) will not be surprised that many of Forever 21’s products are designer knock-offs (or “recreations”, if you regard them more positively.) What I did find surprising, however, is that several designers have actually recently taken action to protect their intellectual property—a Village Voice article dated September 2007 listed Anthropologie, Diane Von Furstenberg and Anna Sui as being among “more than 20 other designers” suing Forever 21 for infringement of intellectual property rights [1]. An article from E! earlier that year adds Gwen Stefani to the list [2]. I’d like to think that lawsuits like this would be enough to cramp Forever 21’s sweatshop-contracting, warehouse-building style, but unfortunately, I don’t think that will be coming any time soon.

Even though I’m happy that Forever 21 might face consequences for a few of their bad deeds, any money they lose will be going straight into the coffers of the high-end design firms, rather than the more low-profile artists whose work is also being stolen, such as Julia Schonlau, whose t-shirt design, originally made available on Threadless, was practically traced onto a Forever 21 t-shirt [3]. I’m not sure Schonlau is even aware that her work has been stolen—I could find no other mention of this online—but either way, I doubt she has the financial resources to take on a multinational chain like Forever 21. Women who are looking for designer quality aren’t going to shop at Forever 21 anyway, and women who do shop there probably don’t have the extra cash to splurge on designer goods, so the big designers aren’t really losing their market. But Schonlau’s shirt sells for a comparable price to Forever 21’s—in fact, FXXI’s is actually $0.90 more. Schonlau is the one losing business here, but she’s never going to be able to recoup the money.

But obviously, the most unfortunate people involved in all of this are the garment workers who make all of the knock-offs in question, often for less than minimum wage, working long shifts in abhorrent conditions [4]. I agree with Jen’s comment in her post, that the recent victory of in the garment workers’ suit seemed more like an isolated case than a step forward. I know I, for one, am done shopping at Forever 21, but that’s hardly going to do anything. Even the boycotts by the South Central Farmers seem, ultimately, like they’re better for making the farmers feel empowered than actually affecting the store’s sales in a significant way. What will it take, do you think, for the public as a whole to start caring about issues like where our clothes come from, and what exactly we’re supporting when we buy our clothes? Or have we already become used to the idea that our clothes come from sweatshops, that no matter where we turn we’re paying for the continuation of an exploitative system?

[1] http://www.villagevoice.com/2007-09-18/nyc-life/sui-generis/
[2] http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b55656_Gwen_Hates_on_Harajukus_Lovers.html
[3] http://fashionista.com/2008/12/adventures_in_copyright_sad_fa.php
[4] http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=792

Domestic Workers in LA Today

2009-03-29T21:27:00.000-07:00

Over break, I saw this news story online: http://cbs3.com/sports/Kobe.Bryant.Housekeeper.2.968378.html

In short, Kobe Bryant and his wife are being sued by their former housekeeper for unsuitable working conditions and insufficient pay. Other charges also include not being covered by medical insurance when she was told she would be, being wrongly discharged, and being humiliated treated unfairly by the Bryants.

This immediately reminded me of the book that I read for my book review, Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo’s Doméstica: Immigrant Workers Cleaning and Caring in the Shadow of Affluence. In this book, Hondagneu-Sotelo describes the experiences of domestic workers, like the Bryant’s housekeeper, in Los Angeles. She is a big proponent of educating domestic workers about fair working conditions and being paid properly. Hondagneu-Sotelo has distributed information to domestic workers about when they would be eligible to be paid back wages if they were not paid enough by their employers during their time of employment.

I find it sad that this is only a news-worthy case because it involves a sports star, but I think it could be an important step in terms of making the public more aware of the problems that still exist in our society concerning fair labor practices. Hondagneu-Sotelo said that it is difficult to regulate domestic work because of the large number of employers and employees involved plus the fact that many of the employers do not think of themselves as employers with the responsibilities that go along with that role, for example, taking care of their employees.

I hope that this case and others like it will get more media attention, because that would be a great way for domestic workers to get their story known, and gain more rights as workers here in the United States. (Not only rights for domestic workers, but for all workers, for example the garments workers in Jen’s post about Made in LA.)

Opportunities in LA

2009-03-28T21:32:00.000-07:00

I went to watch “Made in LA” last week, and I was a really…new experience for me. As most already know, the film is about the exploitation of immigrant workers in the garment industry here in Los Angeles. It follows the story of three women (Lupe, Maura, and Maria) who fight for their rights against Forever 21. After three years of protesting and trying to push through a legal case, the three women along with sixteen other workers reach a private settlement with Forever 21. This was framed as the “happy ending” for the documentary, but I found it unsettling. The nineteen workers were awarded with a monetary settlement, agreeable work hour limits, and minimum wage. However, I didn’t feel as though their victory was much more than an isolated incident. They didn’t set a new precedent in the law for workers. The documentary also mentioned that many clothing companies are choosing to move their production overseas because of the demands for fair labor here in the US. The workers said that garment work is one of the few opportunities immigrant workers have. If these factories are forced out by worker demands, I wonder how it affects the job market for those who are unable to find other work especially in this economically hard time.

After the screening, there was a question-and-answer session. I found it very interesting that most of the questions weren’t really questions. The viewers passionately shared how they identified with the hardships in the documentary on such a personal level. Everyone spoke of persistence, determination, promise, and above all—dreams. I couldn’t understand the Spanish responses that weren’t translated, but I knew that everyone suffered the same struggles as a community. It became a cemented fact that race played such a determining factor in the lives they lived, and it saddened me.

2009-03-27T09:20:00.000-07:00

For my urban politics class, we went into Los Angeles to do a workshop at City Hall. The workshop was for students to learn how to work the structure of the local government to be better community activists. Much of the day reminded me of things we have covered in class.

First, we had the opportunity to sit in on a city council meeting (which are open to the public). Like the city, the council is very ethnically diverse. The staffers even made a point of telling us that first immigrant ever to be elected to a council position, who is a Mexican American, currently serves. For the few minutes we were there, they debated whether to fund trailers for immigrant day laborers in Watts. This reminded me of Whitewashed Adobe because, although the city benefits from Mexican labor, workers face poor working conditions, a second-class position and almost no protection from the government. Also, Jen Perry, who was instrumental in the dealings that destroyed the South Central Farms, still serves on the council.

After the meeting, we took the elevator to the top floor’s outdoor sightseeing balcony. This only reinforced how many influences are represented in LA. From one corner, you can see Union Station which features the idealized Euro-Mexican architecture discussed in Whitewashed Adobe. Take a few steps to the left and you can see both Dodger Stadium and the iconic Hollywood sign. Both White Flight and Racism on Trial address how the building of Dodger stadium resulted in the leveling of one of LA’s largest and most vibrant Hispanic communities. Lastly, from every angle of the balcony, I saw miles of imposing highways that stretch as far as the eye can see in every direction. As we’ve seen in many of the readings, these highways serve to connect the city and to divide it. From the top of city hall, it is easy to see how these overwhelming structures have such power in shaping the city physically and socially.

Finally, to top off the day, we walked three blocks to little Tokyo and got sushi for lunch. This made me think of consuming culture through food discussed in Ruiz’s Citizen Restaurant and the difficulties many Japanese Americans faced during and after internment discussed in Kurashige’s Shifting Grounds.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

2009-03-05T10:09:00.000-08:00

I grew up in what my car insurance company would call, "a high risk neighborhood," but I never saw Angeleno Heights quite like that. Its a small area right outside of Downtown Los Angeles, conveniently located next to the epicenter of my life, Dodger Stadium. The houses range from gorgeous, perfectly intact Victorians to dingy stucco multi-unit buildings owned by slum landlords. That in itself is the beauty of my neighborhood. About 100 years ago the most wealthy people of Los Angeles lived in Angeleno Heights, now it is considered "high risk". The neighborhood was so "high risk", that many of my friends parents would not allow them to drive to it at night. My friends were all fairly wealthy and disturbingly jaded by their Valley lifestyle. To them, my neighborhood was a living breathing example of the truth in urban media. Gangs, drive by shootings, and graffiti does occur in my neighborhood, but does not define nor contextualize this urban neighborhood. I felt obliged to say, "I've lived here my whole life and have not once felt uncomfortable" simply to enforce the idea that urban media is essentially racist. In reality, my friends and their parents were worried about the amount of Latinos in the neighborhood. They exemplify, aversive racism at its best; avoid people of color entirely, but don't cause trouble. This realization came full circle last week when I told my friends that my house was being forclosed on and I was moving to a townhouse in West L.A.. Their general reaction was, "well, at least you are moving to a better neighborhood". A better neighborhood? Or a whiter neigborhood? My new neighborhood is across the street from the Grove, a disneylandesque shopping mall, down the street from the Beverly Center, a giant mall, and right next door to a Ross. Do shopping malls really make great neighborhoods? Or do they just attract wealthy white people? Because that is exactly the neighborhood I am now living in; a large townhouse community filled with young white families. It is where Los Angeles gets the reputation for being culturally flat. In my eyes, for the first time I am living in a bad neighborhood. I love Angeleno Heights for everything that it had to offer: unique architecture, diversity, and of course, a close proximity to Dodger Stadium.

Freeways: LA vs. Vail

2009-03-01T13:39:00.001-08:00

After reading through the blog entries that had already been posted, Maia and Melissa’s entries on freeways made me think about my own experiences with freeways and how they have or have not benefited where I have grown up. I live in Vail, Colorado, a small ski town about two hours from Denver. Despite having a lot of outdoor activities to participate in, the only way to access a larger city is through one highway, I-70. I-70 connects all the mountain towns and is the sole way for anything to be transported to and from Denver. Whenever there is a snow storm, accident, or falling rocks off of the mountains there can be delays that last up to hours, and more often than not multiple sections of I-70 are closed, prohibiting anyone traveling by car. This can cause a lot of problems for people living in towns like mine; grocery stores run out of food, flights are missed, etc. When the highway is closed, those already traveling have to find somewhere to stay until the freeway is re-opened.
Even though I-70 connects towns and neighborhoods instead of dividing or breaking them up, it can be a major inconvenience when it is closed and there is no other way to access other places such as the airport, large shopping centers, and other businesses that are not available in the small mountain towns such as mine. Unlike Vail, freeways in LA are numerous and were used to break up neighborhoods and areas that were deemed a lesser priority than others. Like I-70, LA’a freeways connect people to other areas of the city, like Disneyland, however because of the multiple highways in place there is more than one way to access where you want to go. When there is traffic or a road closed in Vail, you either sit on the road for hours and wait it out or never reach your destination until the problem passes. In LA, you either sit in traffic, or find a new route.

The Danger of Identity Politics

2009-02-28T22:03:00.000-08:00

In our readings we uncovered a long history of racial interactions within the space of Los Angeles. The post-war period and the Civil Rights movement introduced a new climate of racial violence as well as a new age of multiculturalism. However, as we allowed multiculturalism to pass through our discursive forms, the specter of racial discrimination has worked to create class differences within communities of color. Kurashige notices that while Latino, Asian and African-American communities have emerged as the inner-city majority, their progress has been undercut by the deep structural bases of racial inequality, which has been realized in our socio-economic structure (289) This new discrimination results in the disproportionate allocation of resources to benefit certain communities at the expense of others—specifically, racialized inner-city communities. Some organizations have mobilized previously marginalized groups against these forces by uncovering a wealth of common grievances that cut across race, nationality, and gender. However, the momentum created by this distinction has been weakened by the prevailing multiculturalist understanding.

Pursuant to dominant discourse, the 1992 LA riots were construed as an inter-ethnic conflict. The problem was, while there had been tensions created by the racial interactions between an inter-city majority and the growing migrant minority, the ethos of multiculturalism facilitated narrow ethnic attachments that concretized over previous years. This form of identity politics has been prominent since the 70s. Fear and frustration in response to rising global forces drives the individual to seek political efficacy in numbers. Consequently, in this discourse of multiculturalism, groups dynamics are perceived racially. From there, the racial conflagration makes more sense in terms of tensions within a shared racial space. During the riots, Korean shops were looted and razed because of a class-based resentment, not in terms of the casual consideration of racial tensions within minority neighborhoods. Beyond that, identity fractures the American polity. As we observed in the LA riots, affirmations of difference work against wide acceptance into the dominant discourse. Instead of being understood as a class riot, it has been portrayed as another race riot. This dilemma imparts greater significance on creating inter-ethnic narratives of unity, like Kurashige attempts to do in creating a historical narrative and how George Lipsitz does over his musings on bus rider culture.

The future of Watts and Compton

2009-02-28T16:45:00.000-08:00

I was browsing the LA Times and I came across two articles about two of the most infamous neighborhoods in Los Angles, Watts and Compton. The first article, by the Associate Press, published last week discusses the dramatic decline of crime in Compton. The article notes that "The notoriously high murder rate once propelled Compton to No. 1 on a list of the nation's 20 most dangerous cities. But that rate has now been slashed by more than half -- from 65 killings in 2005 to 28 in 2008, the lowest since 1985."

The article presents transforming the neighborhood as a struggle against gangs, explaining that "residents are reclaiming neighborhoods from gangs." They partially attribute the rise of gang violence to the glorification of Compton by "gangsta rap". By writing raps such as "Straight Outta Compton" and "It's a Compton Thang." In the late 1990s and 2000s, Compton received the aid from the city that it finally needed. Millions of dollars have been spent on improvements including townhouses and a weapon-exchange program. Big box retailers have also been recruited to a new shopping center in the area. Gangs have been largely driven out by neighborhood watches and more extensive police patrols. Despite strong evidence of dramatic improvements, I was surprised that the Times article doesn't quote anybody resentful of the changed racial makeup or the intrusion of multi-million dollar shopping center. Have the efforts really been a complete success or did the Times not to choose to interview critics for fear of undermining redevelopment efforts?

The second article describes a 1 billion dollar housing redevelopment project in Watts that will replace the notorious Jordan Downs housing project which was original developed for war workers during World War II. The project will replace 700 rundown dilapidated units with mixed-use buildings to house both low-income residents and others. The plan also includes space for a significant retail presence that they hope will be drawn to the area. Unsurprisingly, the plan is controversial. While most agree with the premise of the project, they question whether the Los Angeles housing authority can properly manage and construct the project. Furthermore, some community activists feel that residents are being left out of the discussions.

Like so many of the communities we have read about in class, the residents of Watts despreately want change. Since the 1992 riots, the neighborhood has had a national reputation as one of the worst neighborhoods in the country. I found the last interview in the article the most enlightening:

Among them is Keyon Johnson, 22, who grew up in the project and still lives there with his mother and younger brother. Johnson said he is worried officials will not keep their promise that all residents will be able to move into the new urban village.

"Right now they're selling the dream," he said. "Everything under the sun has been promised to Jordan Downs, but nobody ever delivered."

Still, he's excited about the upgrade. The current feel of his community, he said, "looks like bunkers. It has the feel that there's war going on." His mother, he said, deserves better.

It seems to me that one of the hardest struggles in any sort of public works project is gaining the support of the affected residents. Raising the necessary millions of dollars is no small task, but without the support and enthusiasm of locals, the project will be sentenced to the same dilapidated fate as its predecessor.

[1] Compton eyes comeback as murders fall to new low. Los Angeles Times, February 27, 2009
[2] L.A. Officials envision revitalization for Jordan Downs housing project in Watts. Los Angeles Times, February 28, 2009

Space and Transportation

2009-02-28T09:36:00.000-08:00

We’ve been reading a lot about how space functions in Los Angeles, and I can’t help to notice that everywhere I go. Space is manipulated by the designers, giving them a power that many who function in that space rarely notice. There are numerous department stores that shoot you up multiple floors on escalators, but make you walk to the farthest corner of the store to go back down. Back at the University of Michigan, one of my professors took the class out to the main quad where most of our political rallies took place. She explained to us how the university had power over student organization because they constructed the space so that it would concentrate all involved, and made it possible to surround them on all sides by police.
Back at home in Hawaii, several low-income areas circumscribe the downtown business district. Because most of the middle to upper class areas are occupied, a new middle class town has been created on the West side of the island about thirty minutes away. It is interesting to see that even in the Aloha State, classes still choose to remain segregated. However, because of overcrowding on the roads, many who can afford to drive to work are forced to ride the bus with others who can only afford the bus. This common means of transportation partially negates the class divide that many attempt to attain via space.
A new rail mass transit system is also in the works, and although less than 35 homes and businesses will be displaced, I wonder what the effect will be on segregating certain communities. I may be naïve, but the project has the potential to really connect communities. Unlike the trains in LA, they will cost the same as busses. They have multiple stops in lower income areas as well as popular destinations such as Chinatown, and various colleges. Nonetheless, I am a bit skeptical because Hawaii’s economy is based on tourism. Because the rail will be raised, it is possible that like the freeways, it may overlook certain areas, and decrease spatial awareness.

"Urban Renewal" in San Francisco Japantown

2009-02-27T20:51:00.000-08:00

The summer going into my junior year of high school I helped to create a youth-led historical walking tour of San Francisco Japantown as part of an internship with the National Japanese American Historical Society (NJAHS). Designing the tour exposed me to many issues that I had previously been unaware of. Most people consider Japantown to be a cultural landmark that gives tourists and locals alike a veritable peek into Japanese- not necessarily Japanese American- culture. But the story of how Japantown transitioned from an ethnic enclave to a commercial district remains relatively unknown. My own interaction with Japantown had mostly been limited to attending the popular Cherry Blossom Festival and despite my family’s active role in the local Japanese American community I had never thought to look beyond the mall façade of Japantown. As I soon learned “Japantown” did not change naturally into the way it currently functions today, nor did its citizens have a voice in deciding that transformative course.

The same urban renewal programs that took place in Los Angeles also devastated San Francisco Japantown. Prior to World War II Japantown was a vibrant community of roughly 30 blocks with more than 200 Japanese and Japanese-American owned businesses in an neighborhood known as the Western Addition. The area was primarily comprised of Victorian houses built in the late 1800’s that served as stores, meeting places and hospitals. These multi-functional houses helped to create a tight-knit ethnic enclave because many families built storefronts out of the street level garages and lived in the residential portions above. As we read in the Kurashige text, all Japanese and Japanese Americans living on the west coast were expelled from their homes and put in internment camps throughout WWII. During this time many African-Americans settled in the Western Addition, sometimes in houses that were formally occupied by Japanese and Japanese Americans. Internment of course drastically affected Japantown but ultimately did not change the cityscape as much as the upcoming “redevelopment” of the Western Addition.

Only three years after Japanese and Japanese Americans returned to their homes, the city of San Francisco decided to launch one of the nation’s first large scale urban renewal projects in the Western Addition. Exactly parallel to the stories of redevelopment that Avila chronicled in the “Sutured City” chapter, the Western Addition was chosen because of federal money received for city highways and the “blighted” state of the area. The city chose to flatten dynamic ethnic enclaves in favor building the Geary Expressway to connect a predominantly white, middle class residential neighborhood (the Richmond) to downtown San Francisco. The area chosen for redevelopment was roughly 27 square blocks that included the bulk of Japantown and part of the predominantly African American community surrounding it. The city proceeded to displace 8,000 residents, including 1,500 Nikkei, through eminent domain and after provided little or no compensation or assistance. Most of what they demolished were low-income housing, however, what they chose to build on the reclaimed land were commercial establishments, such as the current landmarks of “Japantown”: the Japan Center Mall, the Kabuki Theater and the Miyako Hotel. The city only built 800 units of low-income housing to compensate for the roughly 6,000 units that they razed. The construction of the Geary Expressway also literally divided the African American and Japanese American communities with six lanes of traffic. Redevelopment hit the Western Addition again in 1962 when the city launched another campaign, this time destroying 5,000 units of affordable housing and only building 181. Japanese Americans and African Americans throughout the Western Addition formed coalitions to attempt to stop the repeated destruction of their neighborhoods but ultimately were unable to make a significant difference.

During our walking tour we would tell this complex story of “urban planning,” discrimination and unfair treatment in front of an old Victorian house on Sutter St in Japantown. I would give all the numbers and facts that I listed above in an attempt to describe how Japantown had been fundamentally transformed and how different it would be had the city not categorically destroyed a thriving community. I would ask the audience how much they thought the house that we stood in front of costs today, keeping in mind that they used to offer both affordable housing and business space to Japanese Americans. The answer, $3-4 million, explains why the damage that the city caused is completely irreversible.

Film noir and LA

2009-02-26T16:10:00.000-08:00

In my Core class, "Detective in the City," we are discussing the sort of crime and detective aspect about LA and surrounding areas. A lot of what we talk about relates to the sort of shady, film noir portrayals of the city and how the city itself makes those images possible. Much of the old 1950’s or so glamour of Los Angeles really lends itself towards being depicted in a film noir type vision, which is why many of the classics are. In our class, we discussed the architecture of LA and the sort of fantastical visage it often takes on, such as restaurants, hotels and Disneyland. These different facades of buildings lead to the fantasy as reality idea, which then supports the noir idea with the sort of fantastical ideas as real, hard crime. Also, just the setting of LA and the close proximity of “bad” neighborhoods to “good” neighborhoods, as we discussed with the FHA. The busy streets of Los Angeles allow for crime to easily take place and the fast paced setting of it all allows for the criminals to sneak away.
We have talked about how often times in noir, it will be the ritzy, glamorous folk who have their lives turned upside down by those of a lesser status from somewhere dark in the city. The issue of transportation is also a big one, which includes the ideas of the freeways. Almost all noir includes the stereotypical scene of one car being followed by another and how important it is to easily be able to move from one place to another, such as on the freeways.
Another very important aspect of the film noir subject and Los Angeles is those people who make the films. One very important director in the film noir category was Jules Dassin. Dassin was the director of many famous noir films, such as “Brute Force, “Rififi,” and “The Naked City.” Dassin did much of his later work in Hollywood, where he was a part of the Hollywood Communist Party. During the time period, many people affiliated with Communism worked in Hollywood. With that idea in mind, much of film noir may have been influenced by communistic type ideals. It is interesting that the ideology of communism would be one present within film noir when oppression is so present within all the movies. This leads to the idea that oppression and such is inherent within life and is something criminal, as suggested by the criminal outlook stemming from film noir.

Little Tokyo all Over Again

2009-02-26T15:57:00.000-08:00

Looking through the LA Times, I came across this article which tied in nicely to the Kurashige readings on Little Tokyo.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-korjapan23-2009feb23,0,2634061.story

In the article, it discusses the influx of Korean-Americans in the Little Tokyo neighborhood in the past decade and the relationship that they have with the Japanese-Americans who currently reside there. In the past few years, the number of Koreans living in Little Tokyo has been multiplying, and with this growth, tensions in the Japanese community have been mounting. Because of historically bad relations and tensions between these two ethnic groups, the Japanese residents weren't happy about this change. Each group continued to believe in the racial stereotypes of the other group. The Koreans believed that "'the Japanese are snooty.' 'They don't greet you in the elevator.' 'They disdain Korean culture.' 'They're trying to push us out.'" whereas the Japanese believed that the Koreans "'smell of garlic.' 'They don't follow the rules.' 'They're going to take over.'"

Examining these stereotypes, we can see from an outsider’s perspective that they are simply that-- stereotypes; However, they are still detrimental to the community and perpetuate hatred and disdain among the residents. Though they are all Americans, there is still too much historical hatred and tension for the two ethnic groups to live in harmony, or so it seems. This parallels nicely with the entirety of Chapter 9 in Kurashige's book. Just like with the influx of African-Americans in Little Tokyo in the 1940's, cultural ignorance, limited housing options, and cultural histories have led to racial divides. In the book, Kurashige talks about the mistrust that Japanese-Americans had of African-Americans. The example he provides us is that of a robbery of an elderly Japanese couple by an African-American figure. This singular incident fostered hatred within the Japanese community of African-Americans without considering other evidence. By taking a select few events such as this, it is easy to make assumptions about another race, and that is what has been going on in the Japanese community. In the article, it provides a similar example of one man’s experiences being both Japanese and Korean, and the distrust that he developed for the Japanese. However, instead of dwelling on this incident and becoming spiteful, he used the energy to create solidarity within the community.

Beyond the apparent racial tensions that now exist in Little Tokyo, the article goes on to discuss how in the Little Tokyo Towers, a retirement community, the residents have taken it upon themselves to create a peaceful and harmonious community despite their cultural differences. Though the towers have always been somewhat culturally diverse, they have always been primarily Japanese. But now, with a shortage of housing options for retiring Koreans, about 1/3 of the units are occupied by Korean residents. Just like when African-Americans began occupying Little Tokyo, at first, the Japanese residents were angered that their tower was being filled by Koreans and they put up a fight. Legally, however, the landlords cannot give out the units based on race. The members of the community soon came to realize that fighting, stereotyping, and shutting each other out was not the solution. Just like the Japanese and Black communities realized in the 1940s, both groups should work with one another towards a common goal instead of working against one another. They realized that “if unity… was to be built, the community …would be the principle arena for struggle” (169). In other words, it takes a community effort to band together and work cordially. Even though the stereotypes between the two groups still exist, they have overcome these and learned to cooperate. “Despite the fact that many harbored racial stereotypes… [they still] got along” (170).

In the article, it discusses various ways in which the Koreans and Japanese have come together in order to understand the culture of one another. Members of the Little Toyko Towers have volunteered their time to teach Korean and Japanese language classes; they have all pitched in to purchase a karaoke machine with songs in both Japanese and Korean; they print a newsletter in both languages and have put on concerts from both cultures.

Immediately upon reading this article, the parallels between this current situation and the reading jumped out at me. Of course, this concept of racial tensions leading to solidarity is not unique to Little Tokyo. I myself made connections between this and my own life. Living in a suburban community outside of Chicago, the area has been primarily white for the last several decades; however, in recent years, there has been a large rise in the Mexican population. Because of the racial and cultural barrier, my community has been polarized. Though there has yet to be any real kind of solidarity, I can hope that just like these two situations seen in Little Tokyo, the residents of the community will come together for the sake of harmony in order to reach some kind of mutual cultural understanding.

Ritchie Valnes

2009-02-26T15:11:00.000-08:00

Ritchie Valnes the pioneer of Latin rock has inspired many, including my parents. While reading chapter two The Nations White Spot from Eric Avila’s book I came across familiar names of songs like ‘La Bamba’ and ‘Oh Donna’. Influenced by the vibrant Hispanic culture, his songs were played at every family gathering. I remember my father always asking my mother to dance with him whenever that song started playing. The type of dance he did I think is called ‘jive’. I thought of looking deeper into the life of this rock star and tried to find a connection between his music and its influence on the multi ethnic culture of the post war period.
Valnes began learning the guitar at the age of five. At the age of sixteen, he started playing and singing for the local band ‘The Silhouettes’. After seeing Ritchie play at a Saturday morning matinee movie theater in San Fernando, Bob Keane the owner of a small record label Del-Fi Records invited Ritchie to audition at his place in Silver Lake. Impressed with his first audition, he signed Ritchie to Del Fi on May 27, 1958. Taking advantage of the ambiguity in defining the Mexican American identity during the postwar period, Keane decide to change his name form Ricardo Steven Valenzuela to Ritchie Valnes in order to gain better commercial success amongst the white community. Progressing form the basement of Keans studio Valnes now recorded at Gold Star, where he recorded "Come On, Let's Go" and "Framed," in a single studio session one afternoon. After his success with his first record, he played my favorite “La Bamba” and “Donna” on his following record.
His success as a rock star required him to travel and perform across the country, but Valnes had a fear of flying on account of an accident that took place at his junior high. Ironically, overcoming his fear of flying only brought him closer to his death. After falling ill at the “The Winter Dance Party” accompanied by Buddy Holly, Tommy Allsup, Waylon Jennings and several others, the crew decided to charter a small plane to get to the next show on time. After the performance at Surf Ballroom in Salt Lake Iowa, Holly Richardson, Valnes who had won his seat with the results of a coin toss, and Buddy Holly were taken to the Mason City Airport. On account of bad weather conditions, the plane crashed into a cornfield instantly taking the lives of all three musicians and the pilot.
This event inspired Don McLean’s to produce the popular song American Pie by which he paid tribute to that day by calling it “The Day the Music Died”.
His music seemed to appeal to the audiences, as Valnes used his Mexican heritage to his advantage. As he was raised speaking English at first he was hesitant to sing the song. But after phonetically sounding out the words and altering the song to his style “La Bamba” hit billboards charts. In the mists of the racial animosity of the postwar period Riche Valnes left his mark on the musical scene and will be remembered as a great musician of his time.

Redlining in Minnesota

2009-02-26T13:15:00.000-08:00

There’s little information available online about redlining in Minnesota, and certainly none about my own community, a suburban town called Mahtomedi too small to have its own post office. But race and redlining have certainly played a large, if rarely addressed, role in the formation of my town’s community.
Mahtomedi began as a small collection of lake homes in the early 1900s. It’s claim to fame was an amusement park on the edge of White Bear Lake, accessible by a streetcar line running from the Twin Cities. Driving up and down streets by the lake, you can still tell which houses started their lives as cabins, and only later became continuously occupied.
My town is proud of its history—but only the parts that are sensational. We teach our third graders about the gangsters that used to hide out here, we speculate about the prostitutes that used to work the Elsie Inn, and we’re proud that F. Scott Fitzgerald got thrown out of the local Yacht Club (need I mention that this is a predominantly upper-class and upper middle-class community?) What we don’t talk about is the incredible homogeneity of our town. We don’t talk about the fact that we live in neighborhoods that are still essentially segregated against African Americans. We don’t talk about why our high school has few students of color, or why we have no teachers of color at all—in fact, I didn’t realize that was the case until I started writing this post. I would like to say that I wonder why we don’t talk about these things, but the truth is, I know very well why we don’t. These issues aren’t discussed, because most of my community is content with this homogeneity, if not outright pleased by it.
The only instance I could find of someone discussing redlining in Minnesota was a report of a lecture given by Professor Jeff Crump of the University of Minnesota in November of last year. Crump cited redlining as a cause of the racialized natured of the current housing foreclosure crisis in Minnesota, where the majority of vacant and foreclosed houses are located on the north side, in “racially segregation neighborhoods that were redlined a generation ago.” A little more research led me to reports of development on the north side, where private developers claim to be turning neighborhoods around. But considering what we’ve discussed so far about development in LA, I’m skeptical. The article I read made no reference to race—and that worries me even more. It seems easy for developers to use the foreclosures as an excuse to push people of color out of areas of Northside, which they can then turn into a new white space, further limiting options for already destitute Minnesotans of color.

http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/article/2008/11/09/mortgage-crisis-tainted-racism.html
http://www.minnpost.com/stories/2009/02/03/6336/are_foreclosures_helping_to_improve_minneapolis_north_side

School District Discrimination?- (in light of the Mark Wild article)

2009-02-26T12:17:00.000-08:00

The other day I was reading an article in the LA Times entitled, Funding could oust outside students from Beverly Hills schools, describes how the Beverly Hills School District will be eliminating out-of-district students within the next two years, as wished by Beverly residents, so that the 57 million per-year can go to “actual” residents. “ Within the article one mother and resident of Beverly states:

Out-of-district "parents should realize their free pass is up," said Denise Geller, who said she and her husband made sacrifices six years ago so they could buy a $1-million home in Beverly Hills and enroll their daughters in city schools. "If they really feel it is a great education, they should consider . . . moving to Beverly Hills."

According to the article more than, “16% of the district's 5,100 students are non-Beverly Hills residents attending city schools under special permits. About one-seventh of these permits were issued to increase racial and ethnic diversity at Beverly Hills High.”(The racial demographic stats are from a study done in 2008 on Wikipedia where about 17% of the 2,412 students at the school are of Asian descent, about 5% are Latino and about 7% are African American. 68% of the students are white.)

Although those permits will not be disposed upon students used for racial diversity, “nearly 500 students who bring in extra state dollars while rounding out class sizes and allowing the district to offer additional courses or activities -- middle-school French, higher-level math, a rich arts program -- are on the chopping block.”

This entire article reminded be of an experience I had the summer going into senior year of high school I attended an acting program at Northwestern. There were 162 of us in the program from all across the US and on my first day I overheard two girls saying they were from Beverly Hills. I was completely shocked since I knew no one from Beverly Hills, let alone LA. (It may be cliché, but growing-up I had always fantasized about Beverly Hills as where all the movie stars lived, where Cher from Clueless drove her jeep, the area code was: 90210, and more importantly a place where they served you chai tea and lattes in the hallways between classes in high school (as depicted in the movie The Beverly Hillbillies.) Needless to say, I had my preconceived notions about what living and being a student at Beverly Hills High School entailed.

When I got to know both of these girls from the program I asked them about their school. They said they attended the public Beverly Hills High School. Seeing my enthusiasm they quickly told me that Beverly School District was not a “good” school and that a lot of people were bused in, had fake addresses, or lived in very small apartments in Beverly Hills (Which, to them, may have meant less worthy citizens of Beverly Hills?) They emphasized that the “good” schools in LA were private.

The negativity they attributed to their school was the fault of the non-residents of Beverly Hills . This seemed a prevalent idea according to the article. The Mark Wild article about High School Districts in LA from the 30’s echoed this article for me. – do you agree? Is this a quieter form of district and racial segregation? Career planning? Do they consider out-of-district children a threat to the education of other student? How?- these are questions that the article stirs-up for me.

http://www.latimes.com/news/education/la-me-beverlyhills10-2009feb10,0,6484727.story?page=1

Kurashige: The Fight for Housing Integration

2009-02-26T11:55:00.000-08:00

In Kurashige's chapter entitled, "The Fight for Housing Integration," many startling points were raised that introduced themes in US history I would like to further research. The first is the use of government subsidies to create bastions of white privilege after world war II. Kurashige frequently mentions that tax dollars were being spent to facilitate white flight to the suburbs, most commonly taking the form of housing subsidies and freeway construction. This trend strikes me as significant because it dismantles that myth that government has a tendency to act impartially with its resources; in fact, this example proves just the opposite--government has, historically, utilized its public resources to the benefit of certain communities, and the detriment of others. Such behavior calls into question the progressivist notion of government acting on behalf of the "common good"; in the case of the freeway construction, one notices people are being displaced by freeways in the name of "progress" or "development", as wealth and resources are being transplanted to racialized suburbs (enclaves of protected privilege).

Another fascinating point on housing discrimination in the postwar era is the contradiction that this phenomenon poses when viewed alongside popular perceptions during the war. I am trying to grapple with how Americans overwhelmingly conceived of their country to by antithetical to Nazi Germany--America was unquestionably good and moral--yet so many individuals were fine perpetuating racial inequality and policing racial fault lines after the war. To what degree was racial progress connected with patriotism during WWII? Did this connection dissolve after WWII? How is it that the metanarrative of America's racial inclusion and goodness could be so far from reality? What allowed for such disparity between rhetoric and reality?

Also striking in Kurashige's chapter is the reference to Whites moving several times within a few years in order to avoid the "invasion" of Blacks. Such behavior, which seems to have been fairly prevalent, is truly shocking, and reminds be of the potency of racial discourses during this period. Often racism is described in economic or materialist terms--as a system that facilitates the maldistribution of resources within society, or a system that is materially rational for people atop the racial hierarchy. In the case of people fleeing their homes, while material calculations may have been part of their calculus (the fear that home values would plummet after Blacks entered), it seems that people were also behaving in ways that can only be described as crazy. People were literally moving over and over again to avoid living next to people of color. Such irrational or non-rational behavior speaks to the power and potency of racism and racial perceptions.

Responsible Work?

2009-02-26T11:26:00.000-08:00

At the beginning of this semester, I had to find a job for the second time in the two years that I have been going to school here. The first time I got a job, it was at the beginning of the first semester last year (my freshman year). I worked at the Coop, and ended up not liking working there but more importantly, I couldn’t keep working there because I could not handle it in addition to my workload and adjusting to my new life here. I made sure that this time around, I got a job that paid better and had fewer and more flexible hours. I was also hoping for something that would look good on my resume. That I could afford to consider all of these issues in searching for a job is interesting to me, when I consider my classmates and friends who have to work 20-30 hours per week to put themselves through school.

Anyways, I was interested in tutoring elementary to high school age people because I thought that it might be a good way to work with kids, and that tutoring would be a valuable skill to cultivate. I heard from my brother (a Pomona alum) about a tutoring service that two Pomona graduates started three or four years ago in Claremont. I also knew about Harvey Mudd’s Upward Bound program, which (according to their website) helps “low income, potential first-generation college students in the East San Gabriel Valley community ‘generate the skill and motivation necessary for success in college.’” Upward Bound pays a slightly lower per hour rate than the other tutoring program and has less flexibility for tutors in terms of hours. I pursued and now work for the first agency because they pay better, I get job offers that are based on my schedule and my tutoring abilities, and I’m more likely to get good references out of it, even though the mission of Upward Bound is more along the lines of my social justice interests.

Curious about the per hour rate charged by my tutoring agency, I looked it up on their website. Their “cheapest” service, “phone/video tutoring,” costs about $20/hour. It is easy to imagine that this impersonal kind of service would be far less effective for a student struggling to find motivation to do schoolwork. The cheapest in-person tutoring costs about $25/hour. Upward Bound, on the other hand, is free. Because I believe that I have a responsibility to be aware of the effects of the type of work I do, I have been thinking about the choice I made to not pursue working for Upward Bound.

Looking at the rates they charge, the agency I work for now does not serve low-income families or probably many families that consider themselves middle class. Obviously, it’s a business, not a program with a social justice purpose like Upward Bound, so in some ways it’s irrelevant to wonder why they can’t lower their rates and change other policies so that they serve a less socioeconomically privileged population. On the other hand, I care about this kind of responsibility and I am working for them, so I am thinking about it and my role in greater processes of education and mobility. Only serving middle and upper class students may reinforce the advantage in mobility that these students already have because of their socioeconomic status and the increased privileges they have. They probably live in neighborhoods with people of similar socioeconomic standing, so the schools they go to are already better than the schools serving low-income neighborhoods and would probably benefit more in the long-run from having a tutor. What is my role in reinforcing these typical patterns or finding ways to challenge them, while at the same time considering my own financial needs?

Growing Up in Los Angeles

2009-02-26T00:08:00.000-08:00

Using my childhood and upbringing in Los Angeles, I’ve been able to connect to and reflect on the readings personally by using examples, thoughts, and stories from my life. However, living in Los Angeles and trying to connect to the readings has also helped me realize just how much I do and don't know about where I live and where I grew up.

Avila wrote that as a result of the segregation in Los Angeles, minorities fled to the outskirts of the Los Angeles to find homes- Boyle Heights being one of the more popular areas minorities went to. It was surprising at first to read about how the people of Boyle Heights tried to stop various freeway constructions due to an attempt to drown out minority neighborhoods throughout the area. It was surprising because I’d never thought of the freeways that way before, as a way to keep different races apart and away from each other. My hometown is not very far from Boyle Heights so I consider myself to be fairly familiar with it. After reading Avila, I began to visualize a map of the Boyle Heights including as much of its geography and street layout that I could remember and I realized that it really was a bunch of different freeways and interchanges to even more freeways that “just happened” to all meet in this one specific, low income, minority populated area. I’d never noticed it before.

As a child, I hated going on the freeways because I thought being on them would result in long car rides. They had not been symbolic, known, or even suspected of, as a source for racial tension or other issues (besides traffic) for me. However as I grew up, I marveled at the freeways for their means of making traveling by car faster. I just always thought the freeways helped make the trip from point A to point B faster and easier. Little did I know the freeways had a much bigger impact and meaning for others than just providing faster means of transportation. I realize that freeways matter more, not because of the benefits you get from using them, but because they symbolize freedom and independence for many people. If you want to explore the city, pay a visit, or even go to Disneyland, there’s always the freeway to get you to wherever you want to go.

My hometown was also mentioned as another city that, as a result of segregation and white flight, became much more populated with minorities. It dawned on me that I had been completely oblivious to the history of my hometown and the people who used to live in it. I remembered that during my junior year in high school, I was looking at the yearbooks from when the school first opened in the late 1940’s/ early 1950’s. The student body of the first graduating class was one hundred percent white. As the years passed more and more Latinos started appearing in the yearbooks photos up to the point where the school was (and still is) populated with a majority of Latino students. And as a result of the Latinos moving in, the white student population quickly made its way out into suburbia, leaving a very low percentage of white students at the school. The story of segregation and white flight had been right in front of me and I’d unknowingly known it the whole time.

So far, it has been interesting to learn more about Los Angeles. I’ve learned more about things that I usually just took for granted like the freeways or the Los Angeles River. It shows that there is more to the city and it's history that I initially thought.

LA Riots Aftermath

2009-02-25T16:44:00.000-08:00

I came across an article entitle “South Central-LA, 10 Years after the Riots.” The author, Steve Sailor, describes how ground zero of the LA riots has changed since the riots. He talks about how the neighborhoods have become more respectable and that the area does not look like a traditional ghetto that one sees in popular culture. However, he does point that in 1992, this same description would also fit. Sailor also talks about how Koreans have been replaced by Latinos in many neighborhoods. He cites the main reason for this is that after the riots community activists tried to prevent the rebuilding of Korean liquor stores because they felt alcohol contributed greatly to the riots.
After reading Steve Sailor’s article, I felt as if the author did not fully analyze post-riot LA. Sailor only describes how the layout of South Central LA has changed since the riots. However, if one wants to accurately describe how South Central LA has changed since the riots, one must talk about how the attitudes and demeanor of the people have changed. The few quotes he provides just support his claim that the design of the area has changed since the riots. He doesn’t mention the more important question of whether or not the collective neighborhood has changed its attitude since the riots.
In the article, the author makes some interesting observations, however his analysis differs from Min Hyoung Song in “Strange Future”. The two authors have different views of South Central LA after the riots. One could argue that due to these contradictory descriptions, Song would put Sailor in his section on naïveté. Sailor talks about how the epicenter of the riots has developed greatly while Song describes how in many places such as Vermont Street, the wreckage from the riots is still visible and many stores have yet to be rebuilt. The ruined buildings and the failure to fully redevelop the area would also indicate to Song that the impact of the riots is still resonating while Sailor most likely sees the riots as a short period of tumult that is no longer relevant.
Sailor also fails to fully understand what caused the riots in his article. He states numerous times that alcohol was the main reason for the riots. This explanation oversimplifies the causes of the riots and illustrates his naïveté as stated before. Although alcohol may have played a role in the riots, it certainly was not the main contributor. By stating alcohol as the principal reason, Sailor diminishes the racial tensions that were the foundation of the riots.
Sailor’s article provides insightful information about South Central LA after the riots; however his article fails to realize and address key issues of the riots.

LA riots aftermath

2009-02-25T16:12:00.000-08:00

Influx of the Spanish Language

2009-02-25T12:37:00.000-08:00

So far, a lot of my reflection on the readings and our class discussions has involved my personal experiences and firsthand exposure to the race, class and culture social themes we have studied. It occurred to me that the characteristic of ethnic issues within the US that has impacted me the most is the issue of different languages all being spoken and relied upon within one country.

Specifically, from growing up in Northern California, I have experienced the language barrier with Mexican immigrants and the Spanish language. Because I live in Wine Country, there is a large population of Spanish speaking immigrants who have come for the opportunity to work in agricultural jobs. In many cases, the families of these immigrants have followed, which has significantly increased the Hispanic representation in our community.

When I first really recognized the impact of the Spanish speaking immigrant population on our community was just before sixth grade when I had to choose to take either French or Spanish for my foreign language requirement. Although I was set on the decision to study French, my mom challenged me and made sure I considered the important advantages to learning Spanish. Her primary reason for this consideration was because of the growing Spanish population around us, and the fact that many of them did not know very much English.

Although many of the Mexican immigrants work on learning English once they move to the US, it seems from my personal interactions and relationships, that learning the primary US language is a fairly slow process. My best reasoning for this is the fact that even in a country so new to them, most of their time is spent with other Mexican immigrants within the community they have established, or even by social pressures, have been compelled to establish. Although the men work in agriculture under primarily white employers, majority of their time is spent in the fields/vineyards with fellow immigrants from Mexico where they can speak in their native language. Similarly, many women work in services with fellow immigrants, limiting their need to use English. In addition, specific schools have very high proportions of students who speak English as their second language or grew up bilingual, speaking mostly Spanish in their home. This, as well as the adapted educational culture with Spanish speaking teachers and staff, allows for students to converse in Spanish throughout most of the school day. Additionally, similar to the theme we have studied in class, the immigrants often live in certain neighborhoods with other Mexican immigrants, which represents their isolation within the Mexican culture and Spanish language. Their necessary communication in English is limited, therefore meaning that they have little need to learn the primary language of their new home.

Furthermore, the local community has adapted to the needs of the Mexican immigrants by offering a multitude of resources in Spanish. This includes the requirement for many employees of local businesses to be able to speak basic, if not even fluent Spanish, the array of written materials offered in Spanish, and youth camps and community events hosted in Spanish.

With the influx of the Spanish language, community members have had great exposure to the Mexican culture, and the enriching opportunity to learn a new language. However, the controversy continues to be very apparent with the debate about how willing US communities have to be to adapt to foreign languages. With the cultural benefits come frustration and community divides when Spanish adapted aspects of the community interrupt the usual routines and needs of English speaking community members. An example being the time when my dad had to drive nearly an hour away to find a DMV office that offered a pamphlet he needed in English, not Spanish. In addition to inconvenience, the adaptation of the Spanish language redistributes valuable community resources such as funding and allocation of efforts, which questions the fairness of veering away from traditional focuses to accommodate such adaption.

Tying this back to my language decision in 6th grade, my mom’s perspective was for me to consider the evolving necessity to know the new language of our community, which, as we all know is also the rapidly growing language of California and other states with many Mexican immigrants. This decision left a lingering and unresolved question in my head: how fair is it for me, and many other English-speaking US citizens, to learn a specific foreign language just to get by in our own traditionally English-speaking community?

Women's right to vote

2009-02-24T23:55:00.000-08:00

I've noticed a major hole in all of our readings--something that seems to have been passed over by all of the authors so far despite the fact that it had huge significance for at least half of the Los Angeles population. Why is it that not one of the books we have read even mentions the women's suffrage movement and the 1911 state referendum which granted women in the state of California the right to vote? I was looking through the indexes of the books we have read so far and found nothing. I find this particularly interesting since Kurashige refers quite frequently to Charlotta Bass, the editor of the California Eagle and an active member of the suffrage movement. She wrote many columns for the Eagle supporting women's right to vote, but as far as I can tell he does not mention any of them. Much of the fight for women's suffrage in California took place over a time period covered by Avila, Kurashige and Deverell. While the goal was widespread change on a national level, action on a local level was crucial for the movement's success. Women in California, particularly in urban areas like Los Angeles, played a large role in the suffrage movement.

Here is a very brief history of the suffrage movement in California (I got the dates from the Women of the West Museum website). In 1893, the California state legislature approved a bill granting women the right to vote. Henry Markham, the then governor of California, vetoed the bill, however, deeming it unconstitutional. In 1896, suffragists added a referendum providing for women's suffrage to the ballot, but it was defeated by the male voters. Nearly 15 years later, with the help of suffragists and women leaders across the state, another suffrage issue was submitted to be voted upon by referendum. This time, male voters of California passed the referendum, allowing California to be the sixth state to give women the right to vote. It was not until 1920 that the 19th amendment was passed and women all across America could participate in the political system.

The omission of women gaining the right to vote seems to be a huge oversight on the part of the authors I listed above, but they are not alone. I am taking an American History survey course this semester as well that covers the time period from 1865 to the 1980s and as far as I can tell, none of the texts we are reading that discuss the 1910s and 1920s mention the suffrage movement either. In a course that is meant to cover all of American history, such a crucial moment for female American citizens needs to be included. I also took a survey course about American Politics last semester in which African Americans gaining the right to vote was brought up, but not women. Clearly, since women could not vote in almost every state for several more decades, it was just African American men gaining the right to vote that was mentioned. When half of African Americans were denied this right, how can we say that African Americans in general were able to vote after emancipation? When half of the American population could not participate in the most basic way in politics, how can women's suffrage be overlooked?

I am curious as to why these various authors decided to omit this monumental change in American politics and society. Since voting affects Americans of all races and classes, the subjects of any one of these books were directly influenced by women's suffrage. During the fight for suffrage, many social groups, church groups, ethnic groups, political parties, and unions all incorporated issues of suffrage onto their agendas. Suffragists handed out pamphlets (in many different languages), gave street speeches, canvassed door to door and founded their own newspaper in California, using several of the same media avenues we have talked about in different contexts. Such a fundamental event in the United States' recent history should be addressed when discussing this time period, since it had widespread effects and reached all levels of society. The racial conflicts during and within the movement could add interesting subjects in ethnic and comparative ethnic studies. The aftermath of the 19th amendment and the influence women voters had on the course of American politics is also significant in studying American history, politics, society or culture. In studying the United States and American culture, we cannot neglect to notice the long-awaited and hard-fought enfranchisement for half of the population.

Rodney King and Stephen Lawrence

2009-02-24T20:52:00.000-08:00

When we studied the Rodney King incident, it reminded me of a similar case in England which occurred in 1993. An 18 year old boy from London was stabbed to death by five while males. Just as the King case had a year earlier in LA the murder instantly caused civil disturbance in England. Although Stephen Lawrence was not murdered by policemen they were blamed for racism and incompetence which is believed to have blighted the investigation which has been given as the reason for no one ever being convicted for the crime.

Both the King and Lawrence cases are examples of institutional racism. The attacks were believed by many to be unprovoked and racially motivated. In both cases the victims were single black males and the attackers were a substantial number of white men. The problem with cases like these is how to determine which one’s are racially motivated and which are not. When I first saw the video footage of the King attack I immediately decided it had to be a racist attack. But it is much more complex as many people interpreted the video differently. In the King case the policemen involved justified their actions and even the Jury felt that they had used reasonable force. In the Lawrence case his friend who was present at the attack heard one of the attackers call Lawrence a ‘Nigger’, this was enough for most of the public to determine the attack as racist. This is similar to the reaction that the short silent video of the King attack had on the American public when it was first released. The question is if these small bits of evidence are enough? And if not, what is needed to classify an attack as racially motivated?

The biggest similarity with these two cases is the profound effect they had on society. The King case led to rioting and a retrial which led to the conviction of one of the officers involved. The Lawrence case led to changes in English Law, the Criminal Justice Act 2003 abolishing the strict prohibition against double jeopardy. It seems that more is being done to stop these sorts of attacks from occurring, in these two cases however I still feel left with a feeling of a lack of justice. I feel as if more should have been done to catch Lawrence’s killers and more of the officers involved in the King case should have received harsher punishment for their actions. I think the two examples raise the same questions about injustice, cultural identity and continuing racism which still need answering.

2009-02-24T12:14:00.001-08:00

The thing that I enjoy most about this class and American Studies in general, is the use of non-traditional sources. Being able to draw from the pop culture of whatever period we are studying, challenges us to look at history more fully. Doing this allows us (or maybe I can only speak for myself) to construct a very real bridge between a history of “fact” and a history of “feeling” (extrapolating from Rotella’s idea of cities of feeling and fact). I think a lot of people view history through the big wars, high profile names and public policy, but using nontraditional sources adds an important human lens to those bigger events.

For me this bridge is especially strong in our study of the Rodney King riots. Yes, there are the big facts. There were around 2,000 injuries, 52 deaths and over a billion dollars in property damage. However, Anna Deavere Smith’s expansive interviews in Twilight almost push those numbers to the background. Those personal narratives expand the understanding of what the King riots meant culturally and the greater divides and attitudes from which they emerged. Interviews from people that span LA’s social hierarchy openly present the conflicts, misunderstandings and tensions that led to different interpretations of the events. These interpretations are shaped by the individual actor’s role in a society that is rigidly divided by race and class. Deavere Smith’s interviews help to challenge the ideas that we get from the facts and see something much more complex. They work against the idea that all rioters are “bad guys” that disrupt social order and those in positions of power are always “good” because they did not directly contributed to the unrest. The riots were a symptom of an inequitable society and cannot be understood only through numbers. Sources like these evoke emotions that challenge us to go beyond facts and to (hopefully) analyze our own place in society.

It can also go the other way. Sometimes larger facts are obscured by our personal feelings. I think the idea of a felt history that overshadows fact can tie into Maia’s post on Disneyland. I am willing to bet that the Disney brand in all of its many forms has been a piece of most of our childhoods. It represents a certain set of American “values” and for many is a symbol of a middle class ideal. While Disney does bring about these distinct feelings, it has also had a very real, factual influence in shaping the lives (and the physical spacing) of Southern Californians. Avila’s non-traditional approach of linking highway development and land policy with Disney helps us to challenge what we have been thought to think about the brand and its representation as a middle class ideal.

Freeways

2009-02-24T11:45:00.000-08:00

Avila’s chapter about freeways sheds light on the negative impact the construction of freeways had on the way people lived in Los Angeles. What I found interesting is that freeways had a similar impact on cities and the people who lived in them throughout the United States. Up until recently, I had never really taken into account the downside of freeways. Like Maia mentioned in an earlier post, when I went to Disneyland, tomorrow land was my least favorite part, but it still shaped the way I viewed automobiles, in the sense that I couldn’t wait until I turned sixteen and would be able to drive on a real freeway. I learned in high school about the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, and how great it was that people living in suburbs now had easy access to the cities.

What Avila points out is that demise of the streetcar and public transportations, “had dire consequences for communities such as Watts and Boyle Heights, which became isolated centers of racialized poverty in the subsequent age of the freeway” (189). The freeways were great for business men who lived the “suburban good life,” but they were awful for the people who lived in the existing neighborhoods that the freeways crossed over, like Boyle heights, a community that today is viewed as one of the worst parts of Los Angeles. This is due in part because, as Avila points out, it is surrounded by three freeways – golden state, Pomona, and Santa Monica.

A few months ago, I read an article on Robert A. Caro’s Pulitzer Prize winning book The Power Broker, a book about Robert Moses, the master planner of New York City. Up until that book was written, Moses had been seen in a positive light, as someone who did well for New York by planning out the freeways and bridges. What Caro points out is that Moses had racist tendencies when building the freeways. One example is that he would build freeways low enough so that busses wouldn’t be able to go under them, which meant that communities, like the Bronx, were sometimes trapped and not able to take public transportation into other parts of the city. I found it interesting how Caro took a man that was idolized for many years as building such a great city, and shattered that image by exposing the underlying racism there was in his construction of New York. I’ve never taken into account where freeways are built, or how they are built, and what affect that may have on the way people live their lives.

In San Francisco, I saw how the tearing down of freeways had a positive impact on the community in which it went through. My dad was telling me about how on the embarcadero, a street alongside the waterfront, used to be aesthetically unpleasing, with a huge double deck freeway that led to the bay bridge. This was hard for me to believe, because today I think of the embarcadero being a beautiful street with amazing views of the bay. But it wasn’t until an earthquake struck in 1989 did the city decided to tear it down. The neighborhood went from being somewhat of a slum, to becoming a tourist attraction with great restaurants and shops. Once the freeway was torn down and the city began to rebuild the community, property values of the homes around the embarcadero shot up.

On a more personal level, my own city began talks of building a freeway over a primarily Latino neighborhood about ten years back. This happened when I was a child; I remember thinking that it would be kind of cool to have a freeway close by. Luckily, I wasn’t the one making the decision. The community came out very strongly in protest against the construction, and as a result, the idea never got past the planning stages. I am happy that I can now look back and see how that would have negatively impacted the neigborhood, and how my views of transportation and freeways have become more critical.

Lakewood's Spur Posse

2009-02-23T20:15:00.000-08:00

I got deja vu when I was reading Avila. Last year for my CORE II class we read Joan Didion’s “Trouble in Lakewood,” which focuses on the Spur Posse. In the 90s, the Spur Posse was a gang of “All American” teenage boys from Lakewood who were accused, among other things, of raping underage girls. Didion uses the Spur Posse to get a better handle on identities in flux. What happens when the accessible American dream falls apart? As we read, Lakewood was supposed to be the perfect town. It is defined by its Americanism, Douglas plant, and gigantic shopping center. Everything feeds into each other. Like Avila, Didion is interested in the suburban character of postwar popular culture.

In his introduction, Avila declares that “space, like time, is an arbiter of social relations, and the identities that we inhabit—race, class, gender, sexuality—are codified within a set of spaces”(Avila xiv). The structure of the city embodies the “good life” and “progress.” Lakewood functions as an orderly, insulated, self-sustaining community. Didion’s question is this: “what does it cost to create and maintain an artificial ownership class? What happens when the class stops being useful?" (Didion 1029)As the Douglas Plant becomes less productive, the foundation of the community, identity, and self-worth is shaken. Masculinity too is under siege. Although Didion is not the most sympathetic of narrators, this essay did resonante with me because after all we aren't living with a booming economy right now.

Didion is fascinated by the response to the scandal. Parents blame the school, the media, “them.” The Spur Posse challenges a collective identity, one where everything is fine and dandy in true American form. What I loved about her essay is how she is able to capture the contradictions of Lakewood. It is an ordinary town thrust into the national spotlight. The hierarchy of Lakewood, with it's high school athletes embodying the future, has collapsed. The scandal splits the town down the middle and polarizes the people of Lakewood.

Although Didion does not deal exclusively with race, she does try to sketch at least the outlines of a very complex and contradictory Californian identity. To her, everything is intricately linked: from the postwar boom years and the good times to a faltering identity and a tarnished community. Avila defines cultural history as “the history of stories that people tell about themselves and their world" (Avila xii). Didion’s “Trouble in Lakewood” can be read as a cultural history. To me, Avila and Didion raise interesting questions about the narrative structure of the "accessible" American dream, as embodied in Lakewood, that are timely and relevant.

Didion, Joan. We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live: Collected Nonfiction (Everyman's Library). (New York: Everyman's Library, 2006) 1029.

Public Space and Play Habits

2009-02-23T16:48:00.000-08:00

Jake’s comment a couple weeks ago about the awareness of public space and the following show-and-tell if you will about our childhood play habits really struck a chord with me. I grew up near a small Midwestern town where the population consisted of roughly 1500 people and whose main claim to fame was that the city bank was robbed by Jesse James in 1871. There was no public space - I mean, technically there was but it wasn’t the same public space that you would find in a big city. There were a couple town parks and playgrounds, but it was pretty unusual to have hoards of families and kids using the same play areas at the same time. So even though those areas were open to everybody, you usually ended up with the playground all to yourself. You never really had to worry about the other kids - all of the swings and monkey bars were fair game, and you could take as much time as you wanted on the balance beam without some obnoxious boy trying to get you to fall off. Sharing the playground was inevitable, even in a town that small, but I would just go to the opposite side of the playground and then it was almost like I had the playground to myself again. When my family moved out to Oregon, I became a lot more aware of what it was like to share a playground in the way that it was meant to be shared - with lots of kids. This isn’t to say that I had never been on the playground with more than five kids. After all, what is recess? But there is something different about being on the playground with the kids from school and playing with complete strangers. With the playground in Corydon, it was a really fluid space (there were more resources/play apparatuses than kids) so movement wasn’t hindered. With the playground in Medford, parts of it contained fluid spaces (for a di
fferent reason) while other areas were very controlled. Sometimes you had to just go with the flow of traffic so as not to get in the way because there were so many kids, or sometimes kids would be very aggressive about what they viewed as their area of the playground. This would affect the rest of the kids using the playground because the ratio of play apparatuses to kids has diminished and it hampers the use of the space. All of this is to say that my idea of public space when I was lived in Corydon was that other people may or may not show up, but until they did it was my private area. Public space only became ‘public space all of the time’ when I moved to Medford. Also when my family moved, there was a decrease in my unsupervised play time. My sisters and I were always watched or had some kind of supervision whenever we were in public areas in Corydon and in Medford, but we lived on a farm in Iowa and I had unlimited amounts of unsupervised play. I don’t even think I told my parents I was going outside most of the time. Our swing set and Playskool house were within eyesight of the house, but a lot of times my sisters and I would go out on ‘adventures’ in the nearby woods which weren’t so visible. It’s a little funny how my home was where I had the most opportunities to get into trouble or get lost, but it was also the place where I had the least amount of supervision. Maybe my parents had more control over the situation than I knew of, but to my eight-year old self my parents could have gone into town to run errands without me knowing (in fact, I think that might have happened once or twice).

How the Crash will Reshape America

2009-02-22T19:32:00.000-08:00

Here are a few interesting links on the relationship between the economic crash and urban/suburban development:

--Article by urban theorist Richard Florida

--Interview with Richard Florida

--Interactive map of creative activity, income, and population in different cities.

recent steelworker news!

2009-02-19T17:04:00.000-08:00

NEW: Jobs march draws thousands in Granite City

JOHN SWISTAK JR. PHOTO Union members and other workers marched Tuesday in Granite City to support the federal stimulus plan.
By Scott Cousins
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 3:51 PM CST

A line of more than 5,500 laid-off steelworkers from Granite City, auto workers from Decatur and Fenton, Mo., and their supporters stretched out for more than eight blocks along a mile-long route as part of a “Put America Back To Work” march Tuesday morning in Granite City.

article:
http://suburbanjournals.stltoday.com/articles/2009/02/10/madison/special_feature/doc4991c6986962c267997966.txt

Baca's "Great Wall"

2009-02-19T14:46:00.000-08:00

Here's a link to images of Judy Baca's "Great Wall" (mentioned on page 185 of Avila)...also another possible blog topic.

Blog suggestions

2009-02-19T10:49:00.001-08:00

Thanks to Maia for being the brave first blogger.

I'm writing to offer a few suggestions if you are having trouble getting started.

1) We did a blog in my Race in Popular Culture course last semester which worked well. The students did short posts every other week, so we'd like your posts to be slightly longer (~250-500 words) and more analytical. However, this site will give you a sense of the tone...on the blog we're more interested in your ideas than in polished academic prose.

2) Zandy e-mailed about a documentary about Mario Rocha, a falsely convicted latino from Los Angeles gained his freedom after 10 years in prison. The film, Mario's story, will be on Showtime March 5th. I'm not sure how many of you have access to Showtime on campus, but if you have a chance to see it this would be a good topic for your March post.

3) On the subject of film, there is a documentary film called The Garden showing Friday, March 6th at 7:30 p.m. in the Broad Performance Space (Pitzer). Here's a brief description: "The Garden follows the plight of the farmers, from the tilled soil of this urban farm to the polished marble of City Hall. Mostly immigrants from Latin America , from countries where they feared for their lives if they were to speak out, we watch them organize, fight back, and demand answers: Why was the land sold to a wealthy developer for millions less than fair-market value? Why was the transaction done in a closed-door session of the LA City Council? Why has it never been made public? And the powers-that-be have the same response: “The garden is wonderful, but there is nothing more we can do.” If everyone told you nothing more could be done, would you give up?" We'll mention the film again in class, but this would also be a great subject for your March post.

4) If you are still struggling to think of something to write about, you might consider:
a) The impact of the housing crash/recession on communities of color, especially those in LA/SoCal. Here is an article on Colorlines on this topic.
b) If you are from LA, San Diego, or Sacramento, spend some time on the T-Races site we discussed in class on Tuesday. If your not, you could do a quick search on the history of the FHA/redlining in your hometown.
c) Check out YouTube! Do you have more to say about Trader Horn or Tarzan? Have you seen other films on LA that relate to what we've been reading about? There are several clips from the "Disneyland" TV show that aired in the 1950s while the park was being contructed (Avila talks about them in his chapter on Disneyland). You could watch one of these clips and build on Maia's post.

Your post doesn't need to make reference to our readings, so be creative. We are really most interested in hearing what people want to write/talk about.

Disneyland and Freeways

2009-02-18T22:29:00.000-08:00

I was surprised by how often Disneyland was mentioned in a chapter focusing on the development of the freeways in Los Angeles. (Avila Chapter 6) He ends the chapter talking about how Disneyland can be seen as an escape from the rush of the city, but earlier comparisons make me realize just how representative Disneyland can be of this time period. Perhaps because Disneyland is something very real that I can connect to, it helps to being Los Angeles in this time more to life for me. In my opinion, when one goes to Disneyland, Tomorrowland is perhaps the least thrilling area in the park. If I’m not mistaken it is ironically one of the oldest areas of the park, that has not been renovated much since its construction. As a result, when you enter you are greeted with the “innovations of the future”… of the sixties: cars and rockets. As a child, I was not too thrilled with Autopia: I was driven around a mini road in a mini car. Hadn’t this been how I’d arrived at the park in the first place? Now I can see how exciting this ride might have been to the tourist of the fifties or sixties, especially if they came from outside the city and didn’t have much experience with the freeways, which were new and exciting! Walt Disney was very smart to play off of peoples’ fascination in his park. He was also insightful in his choice of location: right off the highway (p203). How convenient to just drive off the freeway and be in the “Happiest Place on Earth.” I was surprised also by how connected Disneyland and especially Autopia was to automobile consumerism. It seems that the idea was to get children used to and liking cars even before they were old enough to actually drive, but planting seeds for future consumers. I wonder whether Walt Disney thought of these implications of his Tomorrowland and what he might have gained from it. Further connecting these two ideas is the concept of the freeway originally being an escape from society. (Also tying back to Disneyland ironically being an escape from the freeways. ) Originally, the freeways were seen as liberating, giving many people a sense of freedom. They could now leave their homes and neighborhoods for any reason they wanted whether it be work or pleasure. This translated into driving on the freeways as an escape from everyday life, a vacation one might say. Disney incorporated this idea into the Autopia attraction, letting passengers go for a leisurely tour of the track. Additionally, the highway builders took a tip from Disneyland and tried to remove all of the “unwanted” sights (p 213). There were walls along the freeways to hide parts of town that would be considered unsightly.
This insight into Disneyland makes me wonder about what other social comments out forms of entertainment and vacation might reveal. I’m sure Disneyland has even more to offer, in terms of idea about the time that it was created, which of course were totally lost on my eleven-year-old self.

Welcome!

2009-01-15T11:16:00.001-08:00

This is the course blog for AMST 103 Intro to American Cultures at Scripps College Spring 2009.