- In ‘Cyberspace, Y2K: Giant Robots, Asian Punks’, Rubin chronicles and analyzes young Asian Americans’ utilization of zines (as both creators and consumers) and their aesthetic/characteristics to fight against racism/stereotypes while reclaiming the term ‘Asian American’. She frames her argument in the historical context of early anti-immigration laws passed against Asians, political activism in the mid-late 1900s, development of the Internet, and the infiltration of Asian culture into American mainstream at the turn of the 21st century.
- Rubin references the Chinese Exclusion Act and the 1924 Quota Act to show how “Asian immigration was linked to restriction and racial anxiety” since long ago (pg 3). The War Brides Act, while seemingly a step in the right direction, is (according to Rubin) actually just a different way for the majority to establish a “domestic imperialism” over Asians (pg 3). Rubin says the fact that (cyber)zines are “de-centered, anarchic, independent, outsider and democratic” allowed self-expression to go “against the ‘polite Asian’ stereotype” (among others, such as specific stereotypes about Asian women) (pg 21, pg 16). With the seemingly limitless audience the Internet provided and the popularization of Asian culture in America, zine publishing became an important tool for young Asian Americans to navigate their “Asian ancestry/American struggle” (pg 2).
- (1) zine: short for fanzine, which originated in the 1930’s as self-published cheap periodicals (mostly of the sci-fi genre); common characteristics include being self-produced, grassroots distribution, passion>profit, ‘down with big business’ attitude, openness, contrasting/unpolished aesthetic (2) pastiche: artistic style of taking pieces of existing works from various sources and incorporating them into a new piece (like a collage) (3) postmodernism: art concept that stressed “lack of certainty about meaning, elevation of the popular, and continuous recontextualization of pre-existing material” (pg 9)
- The history of Asian American zines seems to directly contradict the history of Asian Americans in the film industry in a two major ways. The fact that the Internet is a democratic, free space is opposite that of the hierarchical and racially exclusive nature of the major motion film industry (this also explains why Asian Americans are disproportionally so popular on online platforms like Youtube while still struggling for representation in films and TV). Also, while the unpolished, amateurish style of early Asian American films didn’t do many favors for its creators, Rubin attests that a similar aesthetic is one reason why zines served as an ideal platform for Asian Americans.
- In her book “I’m the One That I Want”, Margaret Cho chronicles the process of getting, starring, and ending her show ‘All-American Girl’ and how these events tie into her personal journey of finding herself, coming to grips with race’s role in media, and maturing into a woman who won’t be as easily influenced as in the past. She admits that she was trying to find her identity from opinions of those around her. Cho also mentions the combo of media expectations and her own Korean culture that drove her to nearly starve herself to death in order to live a life in which she wouldn’t be forced to go back to auditioning and touring.
- Cho specifically tells readers that before the pilot of her show, she “lost thirty pounds in two weeks” (pg 111). She felt deeply hurt by her parents’ constant phone greeting of “‘How is your weight?'” and her producer/friend Gail’s demanding of her to lose weight as well as her public denial of that fact in a later press conference (pg 117, pg 125). Cho tried everything (laxatives, unhealthy diets, excessive exercise, illegal diet pills), driven by her desire to hold onto this life of having ‘made it’ which she believed she could only do by being thin (pg 114-115). Cho also provides examples of her immaturity in the past – one being that her firing her agent Karen (who was very vocal about dropping All-American Girl after the weight loss request) because it was “the only thing I knew to do” (pg 109).
- While describing a conflict she once had with a Korean female journalist who had been spreading rumors about her, Cho mentions the term “internalized racism” (pg 127). This is racism in which the culprit and the victim are of the same ethnic group (it could also mean racism towards oneself). Cho introduces this term in her observation that “people of color making strides in a field run by the dominant culture tend to persecute others of their own background, because anyone else’s success makes their own achievement seem unspectacular” (pg 127).
- Sarah Moon Cassinelli’s article ‘”If we are Asian, then are we funny?”‘ describes the factors that contributed to the show’s lack of success and received criticism. She calls the show “a site of conflation between the troubling issues of ethnic marking and the ownership over the female body” (pg 133). Cassinelli acknowledges that Hollywood has a long habit of putting unrealistically thin leading ladies on screen, but she argues that the detail of the network having a problem with Cho’s face makes this issue about more than just weight. She also says “the show focused on the ideas they had regarding ethnic authenticity” and “seemed to overemphasize the characters’ Asianness”, resulting in criticism from both those who couldn’t connect with these flat characters making stale jokes and those who were outraged by the misinterpretation of their own kind (pg 131). Evidently, from “I’m the One That I Want”, this was criticism that Cho was not ready for at the time – however in hindsight she can understand where it came from.
- Hillenbrand first analyzes and explains the barriers specific to Asian American men breaking out of a emasculated stereotypical mold as well as historical events that have contributed to them. She then categorizes the bulk of Asian American films into three categories (close-focus empiricism, political grandstanding, art house avant-gardism) and discusses why these films haven’t been effective in breaking into the mainstream cinema market and dispelling stereotypes. Finally, she uses the films Better Luck Tomorrow and Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle to describe how, as an amalgamation of parodies of common American film tropes, roles for Asian American men might most effectively be transformed to include complexity, diversity, and (of course) masculinity.
- “The problem with ethnic “explaining,” and the failure to be a “filmmaker”…is that it keeps the Asian American battle for representational space and accuracy squarely in the trenches” (pg 54). While well-intentioned, many Asian American filmmakers’ works come off as preachy and usually preach to consumers who are the least in need of hearing their messages. Better Luck Tomorrow and Harold and Kumar take a different route by utilizing common mainstream cinematic genres but using Asian American male protagonists who don’t fit the “model minority” character. The stark difference between the two is that the latter makes “racial representation…a far less labored affair” by parodying “in a manner that is…artfully blasé” (pg 71, 70).
- Hillenbrand defines parody as a balance of its two components: “simultaneous qualities of faithful appropriation and vengeful revisionism” (pg 62). Metacinema is a mode of filmmaking in which the film informs the audience that they are watching a work of fiction.
- I think the ideas behind this article provide an interesting viewpoint when discussing the movie Crazy Rich Asians. With an all-Asian-American cast, the wide array of characters that Asian American casts can take on is displayed in one feature film. We can see the diversity without having to compare it to a majority/Caucasian standard. The film also weaves an intricate fabric with Asian and American cultures: the clash of values between Rachel Chu and Eleanor Young, the introduction scene of Goh Wye Mun playfully pretending to speak broken, accented English, the very “American” bachelorette party scene contrasting with an Asian-heritage-specific scene like Rachel making dumplings with Nick’s family.
- In her piece Assimilation, Park discusses the complexities and history of the term assimilation. She brings up points of view arguing that assimilation is both an attempt to mitigate cultural diversity in the U.S. by normalizing whiteness and a system that awards minorities who fit the status quo of being the ‘good foreigners’ with a “secondary status” as an American . Park claims that assimilation is not all-natural and that the state/authorities play a hand in assisting minorities to assimilate in America. She also says that assimilation’s purpose is not to become reality but to serve as a distant end goal, thereby making its intention more of a focus than its definition.
- Park uses two minority groups to support her points: African Americans and Asian Americans. She references W.E.B. DuBois who asked the question “assimilation into what?”, bringing up the point that African Americans are already Americans and therefore should not need to conform to a white agenda (pg 1). This idea feeds into the notion that the state purposefully paints whites as the ‘ideal American’, “eradicating minority cultures” (pg 2). She then mentions how Asian Americans are seen as a successfully assimilated group (“enjoying high educational achievement, good (white) neighborhoods, and interracial marriages to whites”) because of the focus on the racial/social groups of Asian Americans who are known to be doing well (pg 3). However even the most accomplished Asian American cannot be categorized as a full-fledged American the same way a white person can.
- Assimilation is the process of a minority group learning the ways of and adjusting to “fit in” with the majority. Park suggests that assimilation is more accurately defined as a “normative measure[s] to center whiteness as the national identity” (pg 1). It is the erasure of minority culture in a futile attempt to gain a “secondary status” as an American. A model minority is defined as “assimilation exemplified…a myth strongly entrenched in the U.S. narrative of its national origins as a liberal democracy” (pg 3). In other words, it provides a facade of equality that covers the fact that it perpetuates racial inequalities and offers ‘good’ minorities the secondary status aforementioned.
- The story of many young Asian Americans in the Chop Suey Circuit (i.e. cabaret performers) of the 1930s-50s accurately reflect Park’s argument that “Asians in the U.S. hold an impossible position in which they are simultaneously projects of inclusion and exclusion” (pg 3). Despite the fact that many of these performers were born and raised in America and drew inspiration from American entertainers, they would have to pander to white audiences by accenting their “exotic-ness”. They could be considered successful by the curious crowds that they drew in, but never earned close to what any decently popular white performers made.
