The Jimi Hendrix of the Ukulele

Jake Shimabukuro is a renowned fifth-generation Japanese American musician who has reshaped the public perception of the ukulele. Originating from Hawaii, Jake's music never remains confined to one specific musical category. He successfully plays jazz, funk, blues, classical, bluegrass, folk, flamenco and rock, all on a ukulele. As a musician, Jake serves as an iconoclast to the stereotypical Asian American image publicized in American pop culture.

Aside from several Hawaiian music awards, Jake has been an active promoter of US-Japan relations having served as an official promoter for Hawaii Tourism Japan (HTJ). He has also received an official commendation from the Japanese Foreign Minister for his grassroots work aimed at fostering ties between the American and Japanese people.

Jake has appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and has toured with famous musicians such as Diana Kroll, Fiona Apple, Bobby McFerrin, Jamie Cullum and Blues Traveler. The energetic ukulele star was also featured on Ziggy Marley's album Love is My Religion.

Here are some music clips of Jake:

"Let's Dance" (Flamenco influenced track)

"While My Guitar Gently Weeps" (Homage to George Harrison)

"Dragon"

You can find more of his music and clips on his personal website and YouTube.

http://www.jakeshimabukuro.com

YouTube Search

P.S. Since Jake Shimabukuro payed respect to The Beatles with "While My Guitar Gently Weeps", here is another YouTube treat featuring perhaps a future music star.

"Hey Jude"

Enjoy!

Sa-I-Gu: A Piece Of A Larger Picture

Sa-I-Gu successfully voices the frustration of Korean women who were directly affected by the LA riots.  However, amidst the anger and emotion expressed via film, I became increasingly frustrated with the director's zealous focus on the personal grief of the Korean women as objective and contextual information was never provided as supplementary material.  Despite the valid argument that the sole purpose of the film was to highlight the perspective of Korean women in LA at the time, their perspectives are representative of only one affected segment of the LA population.

From the perspective of the Korean women interviewed for Sa-I-Gu, the United States was no longer a perfect country.  The general sentiment of victimization as scapegoats for African American anger towards Caucasians, abandonment by the LAPD and indifference from city government overall echoed by all the women quickly shattered any preexisting notion of the United States as a great and prosperous nation.  Words infused with anger and pain evoked racist feelings towards the African American community as well as the Caucasian community revealed the high level of tension regarding race relations in Los Angeles and the United States as a whole.  However, Christine Choy did not attempt to expand on this topic and only added a minor addendum after the film ends to very briefly discuss the statements of the Korean women.  There was no additional research material revealed or interviews with academics and others who may have added to a greater understanding of how events spiraled out of control.

The statements in Sa-I-Gu raise questions about how different ethnicities perceive each other and what role the media has to play in the discussion.  Viewpoints tend to vary by generation, upbringing, connection to provocative events such as the LA riots, what individuals filter from media sources and a variety of other factors perhaps too extensive to comprehensively mention in this post.  Nevertheless, films such as Sa-I-Gu must cannot solely rely on the opinions of one particular group without providing sufficient attention to others involved in the situation.  African Americans were rarely interviewed in Sa-I-Gu.  Another issue that arises is a need for self-awareness on the part of the filmmakers.  Choy's film tends to favor the reactionary and emotional at times as opposed to objective and insightful analysis.  Sa-I-Gu had the opportunity to focus on the Korean women while simultaneously offering a holistic view of the riots.  Criticism aside, this film is not without merit.  

Sa-I-Gu allowed viewers to delve into the mindset of Koreans, particularly women, in the aftermath of the LA riots and follow their narratives.  The very existence of the film is another channel for hearing, seeing and understanding Asian and Asian American perspectives in a country whose media generally glosses over this demographic.  Despite the short length of the film, Sa-I-Gu adds to the discourse of race and socioeconomic class relations in the United States and American cities such as Los Angeles.  City politics, economics, the context of the early 1990s, African American and Latino viewpoints in LA, the Caucasian perspective, and an analysis of the culture of the LAPD and city police agencies are the additional pieces to the "puzzle" that are connected to Sa-I-Gu.  All the pieces need to be reflected upon in order to even attempt to answer the never ending question of "why?"   

Mississippi Masala

Principally, I was impressed with how the film provided a history of Indians in Uganda. Director Mina Nair was able to vividly portray how an individual's assumed identity can abruptly change as a result of large-scale political and social upheaval. These uncontrollable events are a major factor in international migration, and consequently force all the members of Meena's family to rapidly adjust to a different society. While Meena's father remains tied to the label of a Ugandan Indian, Meena and her mother attempt to adjust to living amongst South Asian Americans in the United States. Meena's assimilation appears to have occurred in a gradual and almost natural sense, as she was quite young when the family settles in Mississippi. However, Meena does not attempt to become another Asian American stereotype that works hard solely to end up at a prestigious university. Aware of her family's financial situation, Meena decides to forge her own path in life, disregarding the racial and social norms prevalent throughout the South and within the local the Indian American community. Meena's mother thus fills in the gap between the two character extremes. Overall, both Meena and her father struggle to find a sense of place while her mother attempts to live by the phrase, "home is where the heart is."

Behind the Scenes of Chinese Restaurants

Cheuk Kwan's documentary "Chinese Restaurants" offers great insight into the stories of Chinese restauranteurs across the globe.  Aside from topics of acculturation, assimilation, cooking methods and personal histories of the restaurant owners, Kwan was able to focus, albeit somewhat briefly, on the wait and kitchen staff in various Chinese establishments from Brazil to Norway.

    

I found that the opinions of restaurant owners towards the local staff regularly appeared condescending, regardless of location.  Many non-Chinese restaurant workers in the kitchens, with the exclusion of chefs, tend to hold menial or mundane tasks.  In Madagascar, the female restaurant owner clearly stated that the local staff (with the exception of "one or two skilled workers") were simply unable to learn how to properly prepare authentic Chinese dishes. However, a contradiction exists in her reasoning since many Chinese restaurants throughout the world prepare inauthentic Chinese food in order to please local tastes and preferences.  If the Chinese food produced by restaurants is "fake", then how will locals such as the aforementioned workers in the kitchen experience the true tastes of Chinese food?  If ignorance is shed through education, why disregard non-Chinese and non-Asian kitchen staff as simply "not skilled"?  While I acknowledge that many issues factor into the situation, ranging from issues of socioeconomic status to potential racism, such questions cannot be overlooked when discussing workers in Chinese restaurants. 

"Chinese Restaurants" revealed the various hardships restaurant employees face in modern times.  Many kitchen staff have similar immigration stories, fleeing their home country in search of a better life and greater economic opportunities.  While the restaurant owners received a majority of the camera's attention, many immigrant workers can easily relate to the difficult journeys the Chinese restauranteurs and their predecessors faced in order to survive.  Immigrant employees continue to face such hardships, particularly those that entered a country illegally.  Waiters and waitresses in Chinese restaurants, if not locals from the region, encounter comparable difficulties.

Overall, "Chinese Restaurants" provides much more than simple critiques of Chinese food, but a glimpse into the complex history and world of the Chinese diaspora in relation to the numerous Chinese restaurants open for business worldwide.

The Wedding Banquet: A Glimpse Into the Hypocrisy of Asian Societies

While watching Wedding Banquet, I was rather peeved over how Asian societies generally view homosexuality. The dramatic wedding ceremony was quite indicative of how tradition and patriarchy are emphasized and reminded me of how the heterosexuality of an individual is never questioned since it is supposed to be an Asian societal norm. Inherent hypocrisy within Asian communities exists in regard to homosexuals: on one hand Asian societies as a whole have been reluctantly open to the queer community, yet whenever a family member or sibling is "discovered" as a homosexual, the subject becomes taboo and the individual is negatively viewed and immoral. Wai-Tung's need to hide his sexual orientation from his family is a prominent example of what many Asians and Asian Americans continue to practice when around family members.

An example that comes to mind occurs within Thai society. I have seen firsthand how people labeled as "ladyboys", those who either undergo a sex change or dress and alter their body in the shape of a woman, are generally accepted in the country. However, at the same time there are many stories of closeted homosexual Thai men in their mid and late 20s to early 30s who are pressured to marry but continue to keep the facade of heterosexuality when in front of their parents. When around friends, however, they can openly identify as queer. The fear of "coming out" is clearly expressed through the character of Wai-Tung in the film and representative of closeted Asian and Asian American homosexuals. The continued reluctance to accept homosexuality is prevalent in many societies, particularly those that emphasize patriarchy and the need to produce male offspring.

Nevertheless, there has been somewhat of a shift towards accepting, albeit reluctantly, a more open perspective in regard to homosexuality. Wai-Tung's father and Simon's conversation near the waterfront clearly presents the fact that the older generations do comprehend the situation, regardless of their personal feelings on the subject. I believe that in this case, the importance of family in Asian society trumps all other prejudices or societal standards. While the selfishness of Wai-Tung's father is certainly arguable, he does seem to value family and the continuation of family. I wish Ang Lee would have continued following the parents onto the plane since I can easily imagine Wai-Tung's father disclosing all he knows to Wai-Tung's mother. As Wai-Tung's situation becomes gradually transparent to each character in the movie, it is only fitting that the parents would eventually discuss Wai-Tung together. How else will they kill the time on the airplane?

The Grand Illusion of the Enemy

Throughout the screening of Enter the Dragon, I could not help but focus on the "James Bond style" villain character of Mr. Han. Despite Bruce Lee's role as the protagonist and all the involved issues concerning sexuality, Asian masculinity and the angry Asian body, Mr. Han is presented as a direct contrast to Bruce Lee. Mr. Han is thoroughly emasculated through his usage of henchmen, technology (ex. the claws) and vast personal wealth.

However, the status of Mr. Han as the "patriarch" of his criminal organization, glaringly apparent when surrounded by his personal female guards, provides a grand illusion of a powerful, albeit evil, Asian male figure. As the self-made and de facto leader of all persons on his island, Mr. Han is able to manipulate the actions surrounding Bruce Lee and the other fighters. Nevertheless, Mr. Han's gun prohibitions on his own island originate from the lingering fear over the decapitation of his hand. Direct and supreme control is the only setting where Mr. Han's power is ensured in the film. The immense power of Mr. Han is thereby only an artificial construction, which may allude to a rather negative assumption that most Asian males require the traditional, patriarchal societal structure as a means of safeguarding masculinity and power. The presence of Bruce Lee's character may upon first glance undermine the aforementioned argument since Lee is an independent undercover agent, but even Bruce Lee is situated in a rather patriarchal system where head Shaolin monks and British police chiefs essentially have absolute control over him.

Returning to the subject of Mr. Han, viewers can cleary see that the martial art skills he utilized against Bruce Lee's character towards the end of the film did not allude to an angry Asian body but were rather a desperate attempt of self-preservation. Prashad states that "90 percent of Oriental self-defense is baloney...it's organized despair" (132). In the case of Mr. Han, this may prove true. Mr. Han thus embodied a pitiful archenemy and black market businessman clinging to pride and power.

The Idea of Setting

What first struck me about Flower Drum Song were the interesting background selections, particularly the private garden of the Wang family. The visually accurate recreation of a beautiful Chinese garden in San Francisco alludes to the immigrant desire to manufacture familiarity and a connection to the homeland. Whereas Wang-Ta’s father, Mei-Li and her guardian admire the beauty of the garden, the more assimilated characters tend not to reflect or spend a lengthy time in the location. Major social functions are generally the only moments when the younger Asian Americans in Flower Drum Song remain in the garden.

Wang-Ta’s younger brother epitomizes the lack of appreciation for Chinese aesthetics, and subsequently culture. He is always dashing out of the house for American social and cultural activities, ranging from baseball games to marching in a local parade dressed as an American revolutionary. Wang-Ta himself is barely in the house, clearly demarcating the generational divide in terms of mindset and culture. However, as the median between his stubborn Chinese father and American brother, Wang-Ta is forced into the role of mediator between the two extremes. The settings where Wang-Ta is the center of attention are thus either distinctly American or Asian, representing the oftentimes conflicting values of being an Asian American. The date scene with Linda Low on the hill in the Mercedes convertible is distinctly perceived as American, while the wedding scene with Mei-Li resembles a traditional Chinese marriage atmosphere. Interestingly, Helen’s apartment is an arguable safe haven from Wang-Ta’s perspective as an Asian American since the area is situated relatively far and isolated from Wang-Ta’s traditionalist father and the more Americanized Linda Low. Disregarding the romantic agenda of fellow Asian American Helen, the apartment is a temporary haven from the internal identity debate. The peace is short-lived due to Mei-Li’s appearance and Wang-Ta’s hasty departure. The little screen time in the apartment reflects the fact that Asian Americans have little reprieve from questions of identity.

As a Roger and Hammerstein production, Flower Drum Song is technically created for a white audience, and the presentation of settings and places support such a notion. Echoing Chan is Missing, the “foreign” Chinatown is again the primary setting of the movie. Nevertheless, the Chinatown and Chinese community presented in Flower Drum Song depicts a clean, orderly, civil realm anchored by a middle-class Asian population. The swift robbery scene then shatters the assumed peacefulness of the community fairly early in the movie. The actual setting of the robbery is not a major issue, but the refusal to report the crime to the police by Wang-Ta’s father reveals the preconceptions of institutions of authority from a hardened immigrant point of view. The general misconception that crime in actual Chinatowns was low is briefly confronted in Flower Drum Song. As the real Chinatowns were rather untidy and sometimes dangerous places, Roger and Hammerstein attempted to portray an idealized Chinatown that was consistent with a “model minority” community. Settings in the film were thus an essential component to the plot construction of Flower Drum Song.

Introducing...The Asian American Webcomic

(Via http://www.comics.com/sam)

As traditional newspaper readers continue to enjoy Sunday comics, many savvy Internet users are discovering a vast archive of online comics, commonly labeled “webcomics”. The majority of webcomics are published solely online, but a large number have been syndicated in various newspapers. The popularity of webcomics is generally due to the relative openness of the environment, creative freedom and lack of stringent censorship on the Internet.

Within this niche environment, Asian American webcomic artists are touching upon critical issues facing Asian Americans through the comic strip medium in an effort to communicate their frustrations and those of the larger AAPI community to a mass audience. However, most Asian American webcomics mainly try to address a diverse array of topics in order to increase or retain an extensive fan base. Asian American webcomic artist Jorge Cham of “Piled Higher and Deeper” (PhD) provides a humorous insight into the everyday lives of graduate students. Newspaper syndicated Tak Toyoshima centers “Secret Asian Man” on struggling artist Osamu “SAM” Takahashi, an Asian American who is married to a Caucasian woman and raising a Hapa son. Despite the broad scope of content within each webcomic, Asian American artists strive to add commentary that is tied to their personal lives, particularly in terms of identity, racism, and a host of other issues discussed in Asian American circles.

Each webcomic with an Asian American creator has a different focus and serves distinct audiences. Nevertheless, Asian American webcomic artists collectively provide a new medium of social expression and represent a new segment of the Asian American community in the Web 2.0 era.

Here are some webcomic links – click and enjoy!
Secret Asian Man
Sinfest
PhD Comics

Links to a variety of Asian American webcomics here.

Inventing the Oriental: The Twist

Artificial constructs of the Asian male stereotype arose from the historical, male-oriented perspective of Western societies.  White males, as the dominating force behind the creation of an emasculated Asian male image, attempted to invent specific attributes which would superficially define the Asian man in the West.  Many factors led to such a creation as we have discussed in class, ranging from the protection of White womanhood to the exaggerated crisis of White masculinity in the face of an ever-changing world.   The shifting of once rigid gender roles in society and disruption in the continuity of preexisting social norms were countered in the creation of stereotypes such as the aforementioned Asian male figure.  The "Yellow Man" Cheng Huan in D.W. Griffith's Broken Blossoms is a model visualization and portrayal of such an Asian or "Oriental" male stereotype.  Through cinema, as a new medium of communication, art and entertainment, directors and writers were able to evolve fiction into reality, or at least what appeared to resemble reality on screen.

Surprisingly, Asian males living in Western societies did not always attempt to dispel the foreign and meek stereotype.  Some Asians twisted a perceived negative characterization into a helpful facade.  Cheng Huan appeared defenseless and hopeless against Battling Burrows, but was able to defeat the brutish father/boxer towards the end of the movie.  The weapon of choice (the concealed pistol) may elicit a negative connotation (perhaps cowardice against a man using an axe) towards the audience's perception of Cheng Huan. Nevertheless, the end result was the death of Battling Burrows at the hands of a "Yellow Man". Other Asian males have similarly used negative stereotypes for their own benefit.  The Chinese cook in Chan is Missing and even Chan himself provide a somewhat more modern example of hiding the unique, true personalities of Asian male individuals.  Some interpreters, modern day AAPI activists and film critics may argue that hiding behind this type of "mask" is cowardice, but there is a possibility that using the stereotype as a type of shield is an alternative method in "maneuvering around" societal restraints without directly challenging such norms.  

Peter Feng touches upon the notion of excessive sensationalism and how Chinese males residing in New York City's Chinatown were able to play into a cultural farce of Oriental vice (think of the opium dens).  The 1908 film The Deceived Slumming Party (26) showed that Asian males were playing into an artificial stereotype purely for economic benefit from slumming tours.  The concept of putting on a show for tourists calls into question what each individual perceives in daily life, particularly on excursions (mainly tours and vacations) to foreign lands.  How can someone determine what is culturally authentic and what is purely a deceptive show?  Even amongst our everyday lives in the United States, individuals continue to choose to hide behind a stereotype for personal benefit.  Asian males are no exception.