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Hi Global Citizens ASTU! Our first year is gradually wrapping up, and I thought it would be fitting to write about the most important aspects of ASTU that I have learned this year. As the purpose of our ASTU vlogs next week will encapsulate the essential elements of ASTU, I want to use this blog entry as a sort of platform to get my ideas flowing.

For me, the main takeaway I will receive from ASTU is the aspect of ‘remembering’. In all of the novels that we have read, Persepolis, Safe Area Gorazde, Obasan, in particular, share this concept of selective remembering. Those memories that are worth remembering remain a memory, and those that become of lesser importance and/or significance are forgotten throughout history. All three of these books have themes of death, and the ideology behind remembering those who have died is a key argument made by the authors of each of those books.  

I have always loved learning about history through novels. The most enjoyable thing about ASTU was that when we covered very sensitive topics such as 9/11, the Iranian Revolution, Japanese internment, and the Bosnian War, our class discussions eased us into them. For example, I particularly enjoyed watching those videos about Muslims who have been victims of racism in the United States. They were so personal, especially in the way that it humanized the person speaking. It really made me aware of the lucky opportunity that I have when I walk around UBC campus without experiencing racism. I have become a lot more aware of xenophobia.

Another key concept that I will constantly be thinking about post-ASTU is this idea of “thinking globally and acting locally”. As mere students, we are constantly prone to ignoring large-scale problems rather than facing them—simply because it’s easier for us. I think that ASTU, and really Global Citizens as a whole is trying to teach my generation to take a call to action.

Welcome back to my blog! The past few weeks my CAP Global Citizens class has been focused on our final essays. We’ve been constructing them gradually, starting with our essay proposals and our introductions next Tuesday. For this blog entry, I wanted to use this time to do a close reading of a page in Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco, the research site for my essay. My essay topic is whether or not comedy can be used to interpret war. On a previous blog entry, I had wrote about comedy and war, and that topic actually inspired my essay.

From pages 24 to 28, the narrator is at a gathering with his friends. They are drinking, smoking, doing normalized actions that all young people do. It is at this party that the narrator, meets Riki, an enthusiastic soldier, and essentially the life of the party. Whenever Rikki is featured in the panel, Sacco shades in the panel to highlight Rikki in order to depict him as the main source of attention. Perhaps it is Riki’s towering stature or his hunched silhouette, but Sacco portrays him as appearing older than he most likely is. The wrinkles on his face show an exhausted complexion, of a man who has been tirelessly fighting on the battlefield. Yet, his expression seems inconsistent from panel to panel; in one panel Riki looks sullen, reflecting on his memories from the war. Immediately in the next panel, Riki is joyful and youthful, strumming his guitar while singing classic rock songs. Sacco’s handwritten captions are also proportionally different; he uses bold font captions for Riki’s lyrics, but then uses less defined captions when the characters are discussing the war conflict.

Riki is perhaps the most dynamic character in Safe Area Gorazde. To me, he is a metaphor for the war itself, and also the character I hope to target in my essay. He represents the vicious side of war, but also the vulnerable, lighthearted side. In a way, he is both a perpetrator and a victim of violence. Yet, he masks the atrocities he has witnessed in war by entertaining others. There are other characters in Safe Area Gorazde who have contributed to the comedic interludes within the story, however I think Riki is the most blatant example of how Sacco interlinks comedy with war.

Welcome back. The past weeks my ASTU Global Citizens class has been analyzing The Reluctant Fundamentalist, a novel by Mohsin Hamid. The American Dream, post-9/11 Islamophobia, and cultural stereotypes are amongst the many themes Hamid represents through the experiences of the protagonist, Changez.

How should a foreigner behavior in order to adapt to American cultural norms? Changez faces a constant reminder of his foreigner status from essentially everyone he encounters–ranging from his colleagues, his friends, even his girlfriend, Erica. Changez lacks an cultural identity even prior to 9/11; making his “smile” at the bombings on page 72 a gray area situation. We are introduced to Changez as a man who falls in love with the United States, fascinated by the American Dream and all of its opportunities. However, we are left unaware of which country Changez’ holds allegiance to. It is that “smile” that leaves the readers on the fence about his loyalty to the United States, and it cements our knowledge that Changez may not be who we originally thought.

Recently in our class discussion, my classmates and I analyzed the scene in the novel where Changez is travelling on a business trip to Manila. On this trip, Changez behaves and speaks like what he believes is a true American. He witnesses a glare from the limousine driver. Reasons for this glare are ultimately left unexplained, and Changez attempts to formulate a backstory for the “undisguised hostility” in the driver’s expression. He is confused by this look,  believing that he shares a “Third World sensibility” with the driver. (pg. 67) For an historical context, The United States had occupied the Philippines for 48 years, most likely causing the driver to have a deep-rooted hostility towards Americans. Changez faces racism when he is overly American, yet he also faces racism when he is not American enough. While reading The Reluctant Fundamentalist, I could not help but pity Changez. He does not have a sense of belonging in any country he visits–Pakistan, the United States, or the Phillipines. In the first chapter, I immediately associated Pakistan as being Changez’ homeland–the country where he ultimately returns to and considers his “home”. However, throughout reading the novel I began to realize that citizenship speaks volumes. With that being said, Hamid continuously reflects on the theme that citizenship does not comprise identity. To me, Changez is a nomad–a traveller who although is experiencing new cultures, never really develops his own, individualized sense of culture.

 

Welcome back! I hope everyone enjoyed their winter holidays. So far in our second term, my ASTU Global Citizens class has tackled Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco, a journalistic graphic book documenting Sacco’s experiences in Gorazde. While reading it, I couldn’t help but compare it to Persepolis, another book we had read last term, since they both included illustrations. Although both books reflect on the history of particular countries, Bosnia and Iran respectively, there were key elements that distinguished the two books. Although I enjoyed reading both, I especially loved reading Safe Area Gorazde, mainly because of the thoroughly detailed sketches, and the sophisticated adult humor that went into the captions. With Persepolis, I enjoyed the cheeky, child-like humor; for example, when Marji envisioned God as Karl Marx. In my opinion, Safe Area Gorazde offered a more relatable sense of humor. Since Persepolis’ humor is from a child’s perspective, therefore the humor is not as vulgar. Sacco’s wild experiences in Gorazde range from his escapades in the discotheque, his drunken nights with Riki and Edin, and his cringeworthy attempts at flirting with the ladies of Gorazde.

War is the common theme between Persepolis and Safe Area Gorazde. The atrocities witnessed by both Satrapi and Sacco are both lightened by its comedic narrators. Marji, the narrator the Persepolis uses her awkward puberty experiences such as smoking with her friends, to depict her failures and successes throughout her teenage years. Sacco provides humor with his comical, sometimes uncultured foreign remarks and his responses to Riki, a soldier obsessed with the Americana lifestyle. Another element we briefly discussed in class was this idea that since Persepolis was written from a child’s perspective, it lacked realistic blood and gore. When Marji imagines a victim being severed into pieces, it is almost geometrical–lacking rigid lines and spilled blood. Sacco, on the other hand, does not shield his readers from the atrocities; instead he carefully sketches the severed body parts and the disintegrating corpses.

Satrapi and Sacco employed humor in a respectful way that did not retract from the dark themes of their stories. I would say that both Satrapi and Sacco succeeded in this by dividing their chapters. For example, in Persepolis, Satrapi would go back and forth with her chapters; she begins with a comical chapter about Marji’s adolescence, characterizing her as a troublesome, curious child. The next chapter would weigh in on the casualties of the war. Sacco would start with a chapter on his rowdy night at the club or a good time with funny-man Riki. The next chapter bluntly depicts Muslims being slaughtered in masses. Both Satrapi and Sacco have manipulated the way in which they tell their stories, using humor at their disposal.

17 of November, 2016

Prior to reading Obasan by Joy Kogawa, I often associated World War II Japanese internment camps with the United States. Most likely this is because I grew up in the American school system, but it could also be due to the fact that Japanese internment camps was globally publicized in the United States. Growing up in Los Angeles, California, I knew that residents filtered into camps such as Manzanar. I’ve been to museums dedicated to preserving the memories of those imprisoned in camps. Because Los Angeles is a cultural hub of different ethnicities, the presence and pride of Japanese Americans is represented through Little Tokyo–the equivalent of a “Chinatown”, community centers, and history museums. Obasan opened my eyes to the realization that there has been atrocities committed against the Japanese people in the United States and Canada, and that the government refrains from speaking about a bleak time in their history.

The culture of Obasan revolves around the theology of filial piety’, a custom that exists in both Chinese and Japanese cultures. This idea of “respecting your elders” exists in Western culture as well, but it is not as heavily emphasized. Filial piety is a Confucian virtue that establishes respect for one’s parents, elders, and ancestors. Naomi Nakane has grown up with a pre-established respect and regard for the generational system, where each generation is defined by ‘issei’, ‘nissei’, and ‘sansei’. These terms identify identify what it means to be a Japanese Canadian; if one was born in Japan, they would be classified as an ‘issei’, second generations are ‘niseis’, third are ‘sanseis’, so on and so forth. Most respect achieved at the highest level ‘issei’, preserving Japanese roots. As Naomi is a Sansei, she struggles with her Japanese exterior appearance interfering with her identify as a Westernized Canadian. In Chapter 1, Naomi notes that strangers often assume that the is a foreigner whenever they first meet her. This is a struggle that I have gone through, and that numerous second or third generation Asian-Canadians/Americans go through: having an ethnic appearance, yet speaking perfect English and being bred in a complete Western environment. This is where I would raise the question—how many culture is enough culture? Where do you draw the line between being proud of your heritage, but simultaneously being proud of your identity?

13 of October, 2016

 

Case #1: The Mystery of Ondaatje

Welcome back! It is officially sweater weather. Fall is the best season to sit back, relax, and read something—whether it be a novel, newspaper, or in the case of our Global Citizens ASTU class at UBC–a memoir. Grab a cup of coffee and get cozy; for this week’s blog entry I wanted to focus on trying to answer a couple questions that have been on my mind ever since my class has started to read Running In the Family by Michael Ondaatje.

Do memoirs have to be true? Why would Ondaatje write a memoir about events that may or may not have happened in history?

Using Running in the Family as the prime example, author Michael Ondaatje, clearly writes a disclaimer in the acknowledgements section of his book about the truthfulness of his book. Since rumours and family gossip are not exactly considered credible sources, he admits that imagination has had a part in the construction of his memoir. Everyone is capable of imagining, so what constitutes Running In the Family as a memoir worth reading? Though both the eloquence within Ondaatje’s writing and the poetic detail used to describe memories make Running in the Family a fulfilling read, I had to stop and wonder why I was reading a memoir filled with events that may or may not have happened. To answer my question, Linda Hutcheon, a literary theorist, has classified Running in the Family as not exactly a memoir, but rather more of a “historiographic metafiction”, which works to “situate itself within historical discourse without surrendering its autonomy as fiction”. In other words, since Ondaatje followed a historical guideline of time and place, it left him free range to structure and build his memories around that. But then my mind went elsewhere, as I thought about how Ondaatje might bend his story in the slightest, which would ultimately have a huge impact on the truth of his story.  It would definitely play in Ondaatje’s favour to alter rumours and memories, maybe for entertainment purposes, or maybe for privacy reasons. Since Ondaatje had only interviewed the living members of his family, all the memories that had died with his ancestors will be passed down by second-hand witnesses. How often can you trust second-hand witnesses? Of course, it is not always possible to speak with the first-hand witness, the one who has lived through certain memories and events. I would like to refer back to my first blog entry; even though I focused more on Persepolis, the concept of history being rewritten through generations also applies to Running in the Family. People generally do not remember the minuscule memories of other people, such as their daily routine or emotions, making it highly likely that Ondaatje’s family members would tell him the essential events that they do remember, leaving out all the unnecessary bland details. What makes Running In the Family thrilling are all those jaw-dropping moments; for example, all of Mervyn’s audacious escapades and Francis de Saram’s drunken antics. For some reason, I can just imagine Ondaatje while writing Running in the Family, thinking to himself “maybe a little truth here, a little white lie there”. He may have telling the truth at some times, and other times fabricating the truth in order to entertain us—making Running In the Family all the more mysterious…I suppose as readers we will never truly know.

19th of September, 2016

Rewritten Through Generations

Post-dinner really is the best time for storytelling. I can imagine my great-grandparents in the 1950s with their sons, daughters, and their grandchildren casually sipping on coffee, recalling major events in history that had drastically changed the course of their life, whether it was for better or for worse. Topics I know would be part of the conversation would include the Massacre of Nanking or the Second Sino-Japanese War. Considering that these stories would be told from my great-grandparent’s perspective, and taking into account that at that particular moment all family members were of Chinese ethnicity, I would assume there would be vulgar, racist remarks towards the Japanese, thereby instilling a general distaste and overtly racist attitude towards Japanese people in their children. How much of those stories were altered to pleasure a Chinese audience? Flash-forward a few decades later, my grandparents are subtly racist. It is hard for my parents and I to not roll our eyes when my grandparents tell us those same stories, albeit omitting the derogatory remarks. When it comes to the time I will recount the stories to my own children, I have to take into account the fact that have not lived through that era. I have not been personally victimized. I currently live in a society where racism is not the cultural norm, and is often shamed. However, I have also not heard a Japanese perspective, either. When I pass on the stories to the next generation, naturally information will be lost and I will have to alter the stories as I see fit, considering all the history and relations Japan and China have had since the 1930s.

For me, it is that same storytelling aspect in Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis, that has it censored in Iran. There are an infinite amount of stories about the Islamic Revolution passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth, and much less in number when it comes to published works. Satrapi was someone who put her memories into writing and published it. That fear that Persepolis could spark another revolution and cause even more instability to Iran is what is preventing the widespread distribution of Satrapi’s memories. It is those memories that can shape Iran, a country in political turmoil since the 1979 revolution, and rewrite its future. Often times it is easier to relate to someone who has went through the same oppression as you. The Iranian youth who are prevented from reading Persepolis are inherently prevented from learning and challenging the same lessons that Satrapi had learned throughout her upbringing in a complex, unstable country. There are fundamental values to Iranian society that have shaped the country’s ideologies, and some of those values are crucial to Iran’s identity and should not be altered. On the other hand, I find it toxic when youth are not encouraged to criticize and challenge certain societal norms that are long due to be changed, by fear of being oppressed by the government. In a sense, the cycle of history, memories, and oppression becomes cyclical.  The act of retelling historical memories generation by generation is essential–whether it be through spoken word or by writing. I believe the retelling of memories should be kept truthful, but at the same time I also believe in tweaking the story. It is essential that the speaker keeps the current events of the world in mind, adjusting the story however necessary. It is the next generation’s job to pass along the story with their own mindsets.