Week 13: Transnational Spaces/Place-Based Activism and Social Change

(On Ong's Flexible Citizenship: The cultural Logics of Transnationality
and De Genova's "Locating a Mexican Chicago in the Spce of the U.S. Nation-State)

We read "Latino and Asian Racial Formations at the Frontiers of US Nationalism" by Nicholas De Genova during Week 3. I particularly liked this text the most out of the three text that we had to read during that week. Ngai's account of the history of immigration and Kim's theory of racial triangulation were very intriguing but many of the sentences of De Genova's text made a lot of sense to me. This week's text by De Genova, however, didn't similarly put a lot of my abstract impressions into words. Whereas the earlier text seemed more philosphical and provided more general insight, this text focused more and contextualized within the setting of what De Genova calls "Mexican Chicago."(Perhaps I wasn't able to relate as much because I've never been to Chicago for long to be able to observe and get impressions of what he describes.) As he explicitly lays it out for the reader, his text "considers the ways in which the spatial topograph of the Americas historically has become intrinsically racialized and involves a continuous work of reracialization" (96). Later, he states that he wants to "emphasize the production of Mexican Chicago as a conjunctural space with transformative repercussions in all directions [..] to assert with the idea of Mexican Chicago that something about Chicago itself has become elusive, even irretrievable, for the U.S. nation-state" (99). I don't have much knowledge about Chicago to reflect on his text well, but I have learned in pervious courses that the concept of ethnic enclave (by I-forgot-who) was based on Chicago with the black belt and immigrant communities. While it is true, as De Genova states, that space is racialized and there are repercussions, I would like to think that it has not become impossible for the U.S. to express or define or otherwise have a mental grasp of Chicago as a state. De Genova's assertion that Chicago should properly belong within Latin America seems controversial.

On the other hand, Ong describes the situation in northern California where what she calls the Chinese "money elite" lives in exclusive communities. (It's always interesting to note how more often than not the author belongs to the racial or ethnic group that he or she studies. Well, I'm assuming based on their last names.) I wasn't able to study this text in depth, so I'll add on more later...

Week 12: Prison

(On Ruth Wilson Gilmore's Golden Gulag Introduction and Chapters 3-5
and Film Screening: Prison Town, USA)

The documentary Prison Town really touched me in many different ways. It combined multiple stories of various groups of people, but I primarily cared about Jennifer and Lonnie's experience. When Jennifer first came on the screen was a mother who was struggling to keep her family together while her husband and her children's father was in jail, I didn't know to what extent the jail system influenced her family. The Crossroads provided food and shelter for inmates and their families who couldn't support themselves. Jennifer depended on the Crossroads while Lonnie, her husband, did his time 16 months for stealing food for his children. What I didn't know and later found out in the documentary was that both parents were imprisoned and their children were taken away by the CPS. It was extremely upsetting to say the least that they were almost forced into imprisonment. Lonnie lost his job as a professional aircraft painter due to 9/11 cutbacks so he couldn't provide for his children who were crying from hunger. Any parent would do anything to prevent their children from being distressed. Lonnie missed his younger son's first birthday and first word because he tried to feed him. Even after he finished his time and served parole under strict conditions, he had difficulty keeping his family together because the economy and society did not faciliate in any shape or form. Rather, Jennifer and Lonnie almost became homless because they weren't able to pay for their rent. Agencies and organizations like the Crossroads seem to be the only support that these people get. Coincidentally, I am working on a project for Introduction to Social Work and Social Welfare on industrial prison complexes. It was shocking to find out that U.S. would give 5-12times longer jail time and the majority of inmates are imprisoned for non-criminal deeds. I am not against punishment or having those who did something wrong get what they supposedly deserve. I am more concerned with the fact that inmates have very little or no protection for their rights and privacy. Also, industrial prison complex see to perpetuate criminal activities in certain cases where gangs have control over the community within the jail system.

The Golden Gulag addresses many of my questions and concerns by explaining the situation in California by looking at almost all aspects--"economies, governments, cities, communities, and households"--to understand the growth of California's prison system (5). I especially appreciated that Gilmore had a realistic perspective by regarding "resolutions of surplus land, capital, labor, and state capacity congealed into prisons" and then even putting further effort into conceptualizing "how alternative uses of the resources of everyday life might [ideally] otherwise have been organized" (28-9). Among chapters three, four, and five, Chapter 5 caught my attentiong the most. As Gilmore hints about in the Introduction by saying that "the book begans as [...] research projects undertaken [...] on behalf of a group of mostly African American mothers" (5), the chapter was opened by a powerful quoe that I particularly liked: "Now that you have touched the women, you have struck a rock, you have dislodged a boulder, and you will be crushed," Gilmore made a powerful statement (181). The chapter identified and dealt with the difficulties of transracial unity and mobilization as it has been discussed by Hong during the week of 'Mutlracial spaces and the politics of solidarity.' This issue seems to rise often and I wonder if multiracial communities can overcome racial boundaries and unite.

Week 11: 'What is a Camp?'

(On Giorgio Agamben's "What is a Camp?"
Mae Ngai's Impossible Subjects, Ch 5
and Amy Kaplan's "Where is Guantanamo?"

In one of my courses last year, I had the opportunity to discuss the concept of state in reference to Agamben's text on camp and exile. It was interesting to delve into that same text even more to apply his philosophy to race in the recent past and contemporary times by reading it with Ngai and Kaplan's texts. Ngai describes the internment and other mistreatment of Japanese Americans as a result of the sentiment during and after World War II. Kaplan similarly describes the situation Guantanamo and the experience of those involved with the space.

Agamben writes, "this institution is dissolved by the state of exception on which it was founded and is allowed to continue to be in force under circumstances. The camp is the space that opens up when the state of exception starts to become the rule.In it, the state of exception, which was essentially a temporal suspension of the state of law, acquires a permanent spatial arrangement that, as such, remains constantly outside the normal state of law" (389). There is a lot packed into those few sentences and I am far from thoroughly understanding what he means, but as far as I can tell, the nature of the concept of campe is based on the 'state of exception' and the consequential rearrangement to justify or blur the glaring discrepancy. This reminds me of Locke's theory of the natural state and transgressors as exceptions. Him as well as other thinkers seem to maintain the similar idea of exception and 'camp' to separate differences.

Week 10: Remaking Space through Activism

(On Biolsi's "The Birth of the Reservation:
Making the Modern Individual among the Lakota"
and Andrea Smith's "Rape of the Land")

As we got a glimpse of by screening parts of the film in class last week, this week's readings revealed the situation of Natives and their claim, or lack there of, on territories and lands. Biolsi focuses on the Lakota bands, which "had been sequestered on the Great Sioux Reservation, comprising the western half of what is now South Dakota" (Biolsi, 28). Administrative techniques, from recording "remarkable English translations of Lakota names [...] such as "Bad Cunt," "Dirty Prick," and "Shit Head"" to deeming them as those with "no individual identities in any practical administrative sense," eventually completely politically subdued the Laota bands by 1885 (28-9). Biolsi carefully unpacks and analyzes 'property ownership,' 'competence,' 'degree of Indian blood,' and 'geneology' to "explore the modes by which particular kinds of individuals were constructed among the Lakota by the discourses and practices of the OIA" (44). Instead of concluding that a distinct Lakota culture was erased or that the administrators intended to erase native custom, Biolsi ends on the note that "an autonomous Lakota culture survived and even thrived: [...] and indigenous form of political process" (44). I especially appreciated the last sentence in which Biolsi reconciles the conflict that the two parties are commonly thought to have and furthers the discussion by stating "the OIA made them [Lakota] into a new kind of self-governors, with a new way of doing things that would be just as difficult to escape. That is the essence of subjection." This concept of subjection and "the new definitions of the individual" is definitely what I want to delve into during class discussion.

On the other hand, in "Rape of the Land" Smith describes colonization and the subjection of Native Americans through the lens of 'sex' and 'rape.' She introduces the idea of "sexual colonization" and the violable nature of Native lands, and its connection to bodies, particularly those of women (55). Compared to Biolsi who focused a lot on politics, Smith rather highlights the environmental aspect of colonization. She discusses whether human beings can and should control and claim sovereignty over nature. Later she ties in the concept of race and sex, and the discrimination against such categories, hence racism and sexism. It was interesting to read Smith's research and new take on colonization, which is often described in terms of politics and economics.

Week 9: Environmental Racism in New York City

(Julie Sze's Noxious New York, p 1-12 of Introduction, Chapters 2-4 and 6)

Sze's research, as most researches do, attempts to delve into what has been previously "neglected in the acdaemic literature" (7). In this case, the subject is environmental and health inequalities in New York City. As we have studied during the week of Environmental Racism, Pulido covered the environmental inequalities in Los Angeles, but there hasn't been much scholarly attention to New York City. Sze focuses on four communities: Sunset Park and Williamsburg in Brooklyn, West Harlem in Manhattan, and the South Bronx. She also concentrates on a specific time period, the late 1980s and 1990s. Race enters this conversation as the transformation "from a solid manufacturing base to an economy based on finance, industry, and real estate [...] has had particularly disastrous impacts on African Americans and Puerto Ricans, many of whom were previously employed in the manufacturing sector" (8). Sze also studies environmental justice activism "because racial minority communities are at the front lines of resistance to policies and discourses valorizing the market and the private sector at the expensse of the public and community interests" (10).

In chapter 2, Sze lists multiple individual campaigns that are "largely undocumented in the academic literature" or if they are, they are "analyzed primarily in isolation, separate from the other issues unfolding in the same time frame." This makes it difficult or gives scarce chance to realize that these "individuals campaigns were linked through the discourse of environmental racism" (89). Though these individual campaigns lacked links among themselves, these resulted in the creation of "citywide coalitions that emerged in response to changing city and state policies on solid waste and energy" (90). Sze analyzes this more in detail in chapters 4 and 5, in which she brings in the discussion she mentions earlier in the introduction: "changes in garbage and energy systems as a result of privatization, globalization, and deregulation" (1). Among many other colitions, she highlights the Organization of Waterfront Nighborhoods (OWN) that was "founded by the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, a citywide organization focused on environmental justice issues" (115). OWN was at the forefront of "reformulating garbage as an environmental health and air pollution issue and in centering race and the lives of children of color into dicussions of garbage policy" and "enabled a much-needed discussiona bout the environmental impacts of the politics of consumption, the perils of corporate privatization, and the effects of globalization in and on local communities and communities of color" (141).

In chapter 6, Sze questions the function or perhaps the competence of community-based environmental justice initiatives. According to her, there are "two related but distinct forms of community-based action: environmental health research and planning in New York City" (177). The two fields of public health and urban planning reforms come together "in the arena of environmental racism and through the environmental justice movement [...] because of its growing recognition of the complexity o the relationship between race, class, health, and the urban environment" (177). Despite some some drawbacks of making broad generalizations, "for communities long disempowered from the political process [...] the act of coming together and envisioning their future is an important and a profoundly political and proactive act" (204).

The conclusion wasn't part of the selection assigned, but I like this paragraph on page 208.
Ultimately this study of environmental justice activism suggests what happens when you center the lives of those usually disenfranchised from the poicy process: the young and thd old, the working class and people of color. The answer, as the New York City experience shows, is better policy and environmental conditions for everyone. Without environmental justice activism, the North River sewage treatment plant would still stink daily (isntead of being reparid and closely monitored), the Navy Yard incinerator and the Sunset Park treatment plants would have been built to line the coffers of corporate investors, and the corrupt Bronx-Lebanon facility would have been still running with its daily violations of toxic releases. Garbage would be moved exclusivley by disel truck isntead of by barge (and perhapss someday by rail) and energy plants built wherever profits could be squeezed. All the while, asthma rates, deaths, and hospitalizations would continue to spiral for outh of color in partciular neighborhoods in the city.
I appreciate Sze asserting the need to empower the marginal population but her absolute stance (ie to say that it is better for 'everyone') is bound to elicit criticism or resistance from the other side of the argument.

Week 8: Gentrification and the Barrio

(On Arlene Davila's Barrio Dreams Introduction, chapters 1-3, and Conclusion)

I had the privilege to take a seminar taught by Professor Davila with less than ten other students. Barrio Dreams was one of many readings that illustrated and explained the spatial organization of Latino/as. We went over complicated nature of the particular 'ethnic group' in America due to its diversity. Although people view them all as belonging to one group, they separate themselves and relate more to those from the same country and/or place. Thus there are tension between, say, Puerto Ricans and Mexicans that are not addressed. This difference in affiliation and alliance brings in politics into the picture, which naturally involves power struggle. As a result, the spatial manifestation and commodified culture of Latino/as are the result of deliberate processes of gentrification and marginalization. Davila attempts to provide an insider's insight with knowledge and understanding that one can only have as a Latina.

As its title suggests, chapter one was about housing and the claim over East Harlem. We've been going over residential segregation and homeownership so housing didn't interest me as much as it did last year. It was, however, nice to add on information that I have learned since the last time I read the chapter. I was able to apply the knowledge that urban renewal, such as that by Robert Moses, and gentrification is the processes that allow "white yuppies" take over Manhattan and Spanish Harlem. Chapters two started making connections between culture and place, connections that were focused upon more in chapter three, in which Davila argued that culture is commodified to represent and sell space. Before the process of gentrification, before the development of "cultural industries and entertainment infrastructure, Upper Manhattan communities (comprising Washington Heights and West, Central, and East Harlem were left with marketing their culture and the ethnic and historical identification of their neighborhoods" (99). The resultant commodified Latino culture and "embracing these institutions came at a cost. Not only did they ease the path for new developments in the area, but they also fed into the dominant alternative multicultural history for East Harlem" (106). Davila ends the chapter discussing the opportunities and perils provided by tourism. Tourism and "tourist enthusiasts found themselves supporting projects implicated in the area's gentrification" and led to Edison project and the Museum for African Art.

Davila leaves "some final words" ending the book on a hopeful note that we will sooner or later be able to see contradictions that will guide "us toward more appropriate and equitable urban and cultural policies" (214).

Week 7: Multiracial Spaces and the Politics of Solidarity

(On Yamamoto's "A Fire in Fontana"
and Hong's "'Something forgotten which should have been remembered':
Private property and cross-racial solidarity in the work of Hisaye Yamamoto")

Yamamoto begins the account of his experience after the World War II with stating that "some kind of transformation" with lasting effects took place. He admits that it would be too much for him to say that he, "a Japanese American, became Black." The fact that he even begins his story with such a comparison between Japanese American and Black clearly points out the racial formation of those two races in relation to White, perhaps in the form of Kim's triangulization. It was interesting to note that Japanese Americans would further categorize themselves. When describing the event of getting his new job, he keeps comparing himself to a "Nisei." I learned from last year's World Cultures: Asian Pacific American that Japanese Americans group themselves according to, among other things, the degree of being Americanized. The word itself means second generation, but it represents how much of the Japanese culture they preserve. Third generations are called Sansei. Yamamoto continues to tell the readers about his re-integration into society as he goes to school and what not. At the end of the story, during which he depicts the moment he watches the Watts riot on television, Yamamoto says that he was "inwardly cowering" but "felt something else, a trickle of warmth of which he finally recognized as an undercurrent of exultation" (157). The riot "was the long-awaited, gratifying next chapter of an old movie that had flickered about in the black of his mind for years" (157).

Hong's analysis of Yamamoto's work particularly focused on, as it is evident in her title, private property and cross-racial solidarity. After opening her paper with a story, she states that "A Fire in Fontana" can "be read as a commentary on the relation between race and property" (292). According to Hong, Yamamoto "points to a basis for cross-racial solidarity by showing a relational connection," but "to say that African Americans and Japanese Americans have a common history is false" because "the U.S. nation-state creates and reproduces differences in the experiences of African Americans and Japanese Americans through the different ways in which these groups have been denied property rights" (292). Hong then continues to give specific exmaples and evidences to this difference in denial. At the end, Hong guesses that the intended effect of this memoir is to "remember the impossibility of equality in American democracy" and to "remind us of the unsolvable contradiction in demanding equal rights for people of color from a system created to protect white property rights" (307). Hong points out the "lack of resolution." Hong says that Yamamoto's article "could contribute to the maintenance of the state-sponsored racism of segregation" but does not "critique it" (308). Further, it does not fulfill the potential of being "the basis of an oppositional political project through its creation of an alternative collective memory, its imagining of a space where the cross-race solidarity that did not happen the past could be forged in the future" (308). By this end of Hong's paper I felt that Hong was being too harsh with Yamamoto. Yamamoto perhaps did not have such a powerful stance as she depicted her experience, but I believe that Yamamoto allowed her story to speak for itself, rather than trying to manipulate what happened to achieve her goal.