Author Archives: Mimi Eang

1. In the article, “Cyberspace, Y2K: Giant Robots, Asian Punks”, written by Rachel Rubin, it discussed about the usage of zine which a great tool for Asian Americans to express talents, cultural needs, and political realities. Rubin explained how zines are the results of consequential international, national and local processes that have altered the entertainment industry. This not only affects the entertainment, but also the Asian American culture within the United States and beyond. Also, she discussed about the important of zines through its technological innovations as it originated in military power all the way to sexuality of individuals.
2. Some of the examples provided in the article were:

• Ijima’s words emphasized that Asian American identity is a deliberate and motivated thing: experiential rather than biological, grounded in the present as much as or more than in the past … for Asian American cyberzine writers, whose numbers include immigrants, the children of immigrants … the contractedness of “Asian American,” coupled with the definitively decentered nature of virtual reality, creates a wide-open, compelling cultural opportunity (5). In this example, the influence of zine can impact Asian American to work together for better opportunities to tell their own stories through zine.
• Because of her needs as a reader, Sabrina Margarita started handing out copies of her zine … to her friends, making up about a hundred photocopies of each issue. Sabrina Margarita’s experience with Bamboo Girl show, in Internet publishing, the lines become thoroughly blurred between consumption, and production to the Net acting as conduit from one to the other (7). This demonstrates that Sabrina was able to launch her own zine because she felt that feminism or queer identity were not geared toward women of color in which zine was the perfect opportunity to showcase her needs through zine.

3. Zine – Which is paper, with an informational website that serves to publicize it; non-commercial “amateur” publication.
4. Rubin explanation about “zine” connects the idea that Asian American cannot only be portrayed through main media such as newspapers, magazines, and television, but through zine as well. Zines gives the perfect opportunities for Asian Americans to make a political and cultural statement.

1. In the article, “If we are Asian, then are we funny?”: Margaret Cho’s All-American Girl” as the First (and Last?) Asian American Sitcom”, written by Sarah Moon Cassinelli, it discussed about Margaret Cho’s entertainment career in the short-lived television show, All-American Girl (1994), or AAG. Cassinellia used Margaret Cho’s memoir, I’m the One that I Want (2001) to emphasized how Margaret felt about her role in AAG. Cassinelli’s main argument is that Margaret’s presences in an all- Asian sitcom demonstrated how important it was in a cultural and critical sense in the Asian American community. She criticized about how AAG had the potential to be a great show for Asian American viewers to watch, but the show focused too much on the “ethnic authenticity”, rather than a specific comedic form.
2. Some of the examples provided in the article were:

   In the show, AAG, Margaret’s character tells her mother that she looked like Yoko Ono when she puts on a big pair of sunglasses on her face. It quoted, “While a certain level of obviousness may produce a stale effect, the reference that any Asian woman who wears large glasses resembles Yoko Ono is also stereotypical. The joke is “obvious” in the way it utilizes Yoko Ono as the “go to” public figure for the comparison of Mrs. Kim in large sunglasses. The joke is characteristically “stale” in the lack of social commentary or satire on the fact that Yoko Ono is one of the few widely-known, female Asian within the entertainment industry, as the woman once accused of causing the breakup of The Beatles, or some other trait that does not necessarily zero in on her ethnicity (133). This showed that the show was mainly focused on making it “Asianness” by making the dialogue towards an Asian reference.

   b. Cho’s character is complex as she plays on the levels of both Americanness and Asianness. In the show, Cho’s boyfriend is a traditional Korean whom he is tricked by Cho into believing she too is a traditional Korean girl. The action is stereotypical because there is no geniuses behind them, otherwise known as yellowface. Her actions create a real/fake Asian binary because the viewer is aware of the trick and witnesses as the character go back and forth between personas throughout the episode (136).

3. (a) Yellowface: The performance “marks the Asian body as unmistakably Oriental; the actions sharply define the Oriental in a racial opposition to whiteness”.
   (b) Model Minority: Highly associated with high academic achievements and upward socioeconomic mobility.
4. Cassinelli’s work highly covers the concept of how there is a lack of Asian Americans on screen by using Margaret Cho’s case. Cassinelli argued that the show AGG did not have any references to go by as they were producing this show, since this was considered the first Asian American television show. They had no bases to go by to make a successful Asian American family sitcom.
5. Questions: Are there any current Asian sitcoms in the U.S. and Canada that is considered successful in today’s time? Has it influence a great number of Asians to watch it? Do you believe there will be future shows with an all Asian cast? Or does it need supporting white-caste to maintain it?

In the article, “Of Myths and Men: “Better Luck Tomorrow” and the Mainstreaming of Asian American Cinema” written by Margaret Hillenbrand, it explores the problems of cinematic representation faced by Asian American men. Hillenbrand discussed about how Asian Americans are cast in less than 3% of film, television, and commercial parts … in only 1.7% of lead roles across the entertainment mainstream (50). Also, she argued that Asian American males are given supportive roles or “non-leading” romantic roles such as cinematic space outside the laundry, the triad, the kung-fu club, or the academic decathlon (50) which they are denied to “get the girl” and masculinity. Since the 1940’s, Asian American males have been portrayed in a feminized position in relation to white male citizens as it is still stands today. Asian American males have faced multiple accounts of being demasculinized through political cartoons, Broadway, television, entertainment, etc. This resulted in Asian American males to be the stereotypical character of playing the villain or the geek. Either roles played by Asian Americans, they are still considered the lowest representation Hillenbrand used the film Better Luck Tomorrow to argue that Asian American masculinity is locked, and it is a film that aspires to oppose the central ideology of Asian American films. While reading this article, I wanted to know what is the first step for Asian American males to play the main lead in a Hollywood film? Does this come from the decisions of the casting directors or does it have to change from the perspective from the public to change their perspective of Asian American males? Another question, how can we push more Asian Americans to go into the entertainment business to be more and accurately represented on screen? This of course comes from a cultural aspect where the entertainment business is not a traditional route for many young Asian Americans to become a professional in.

In the article, “The Cold War Origins of the Model Minority Myth”, written by Robert G. Lee, argued about how the Oriental had properly assimilated as the model minority in the United States because of variety of factors of the Cold War. Lee stated the narrative of Asian ethnic assimilation fit the requirement of the Cold War containment perfectly. For instance, in the 1950’s, three specters haunted Cold War America: the red menace of communism, the black menace of race mixing, and the white menace of homosexuality (146). This indicated that these factors of fear and hysteria within the US was giving an opportunity for a group to be the opposition of these ideals. This role was given to future Asian Americans where the concept of the model minority was given to them. The model minority is a demographic group which is highly associated with Asian Americans in the United States, in which an ethnic, race, or religion group members are perceived to achieve more socioeconomic success than the population average. This success is typically measured relatively by income, education, low criminality and high family/marital stability. Although the Cold War America were experiencing these ideas, on the home front and international scale, it gave an ethnic assimilation sent to The Third World, especially to Asia, that the US was a liberal democratic state where people of color could enjoy equal rights and upward mobility (146). This did not only give the role of the model minority to the Asian Americans, but it was also a tool in politics to argue against other minorities groups such as the African and Latino Americans that Asian Americans had successfully assimilated into American society. This created a problem as the model minority is also viewed as silent and successful that it overshadowed other Asian Americans when it comes to income. For example, 15 percent of Chinese families in New York city had incomes below the federal poverty level, only 3.4 percent had enrolled to receive public assistance (151).  Lee argued that the Oriental were able to successfully transform from the exotic to the acceptable narrative of Americanization or assimilation to American society due to the factors of the Cold War.