Ethnic Categories

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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.