Hello readers,

Lately in ASTU class we watched the film American Sniper, which follows the life of an American Navy SEAL on his various tours during the Iraq war. While watching this film, I found myself examining the portrayal of the Iraqi characters. I found that throughout the film, derogatory words, such as “savages”, were used to describe the Iraqis in order to make the audience empathize with the American soldiers and not the intended villains of the movie. The movie didn’t explain how the invasion of Iraq was unjustified, or give any explanation to why the Iraqis were fighting back, it only showed one side of the story. This reminded me about earlier in the year in ASTU when we discussed how collective memory is formed, and how it creates history. For some viewers, this film may be the only source of information that they have about the conflict, so their opinion is based on a one sided depiction of an individual’s point of view. This becomes problematic as the film does not place as much value on the Iraqi characters lives as compared to the lives of the American characters.

In ASTU we were reading the work of Joseph Darda where he brings up the concept of precarity and whose lives are grievable. I thought a lot about this while I was watching American Sniper, as the loss of life of an American was seen to be more important or emotional than the death of an Iraqi, even if the victim was an innocent civilian. I then thought about media portrayal of conflict on the news, and the quote “a single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic”, and how relevant Dardas argument is in society today.

American sniper may be an incredibly well made movie in terms of professional and technical quality, but I believe that it is also increasingly problematic today, as it does not represent all of the parties involved as equally precarious and it creates a one sided representation of a history that is intricate and complex.

Hello Readers,

I recently went to explore the Amazonia exhibit at the Museum of Anthropology which I found to be extremely intriguing as well as educational. Although I enjoyed the entire exhibit, one section of the exhibit really stuck out to me. In this section, there were objects from the Yanomami tribe who live on the border of Venezuela and Brazil. The reason I found this section interesting, was due to the bed of bullets that the objects were presented on. I thought the bullets were an interesting contrast to the beautiful baskets and feather objects that were presented in the same space. Although there was no direct explanation for the bullets, the description talked about how on Yanomami lands, three military bases have been installed causing problems with the local population, and I feel as though this representation in the exhibit shows the struggle for the Yanomami people to preserve their culture while under constant threat of violence. I believe that in this way, the exhibit is making a statement about the treatment of native peoples, and the lack of respect they receive with regards to their land. It is not- so -subtly raising awareness of the mistreatment of the native people, which I feel is also very relevant in Vancouver and the rest of Canada today.

Another reason I was drawn to this section of the exhibit was due to the baskets that were on display. They reminded me of similar baskets that are traditionally made in Kenya by my own tribe. I thought it was amazing that even though the Yanomami and the Kikuyu tribes are separated by thousands of kilometers, they create such similar art. This made me feel connected to a tribe I had only just learned about in the exhibit and therefore sympathize even more with how they are being treated.

In class we discussed the graphic narrative Safe Area Goražde by Joe Sacco, and although it takes place in Eastern Europe, I believe that there is a connection to be seen between the book and the exhibit. In Goražde, according to Sacco, the people were trapped and terrorized with the UN not doing all they could to help, and I am not saying that the exact thing is happening with the Yanomami people, but they, as well as all the other Amazonia people, are also being taken advantage of as the world watches on and doesn’t do anything to change the situation.

I enjoyed my time at the Amazonia exhibit and believe that it is important both as a work of art, as well as a form of activism.

Helpful Links:

Amazonia: The Rights of Nature

Hello Readers,

This Halloween, my ASTU class took a trip to the Rare Books and Special Collection section of the UBC library, where we had the opportunity to explore Joy Kogawa’s fond. There, I was able to go through various fan letters that Kogawa received shortly after the publishing of her first and most famous novel Obasan. I found it extremely interesting to read the letters as they led me to think about how the genre of fan letters has evolved from then to present day.

These letters were dated in the early 1980’s which is long before social media was a prominent method of communication and therefore, writing letters was the easiest way to reach important people you admired. What surprised me about the letters was how personal they were. Her fans were writing to her in a very open and friendly way as though they were well acquainted when in reality, they were strangers. The content of the letters in the collection was varied including a letter from a girl in high school asking Kogawa for advice on a school paper, which to me now seems like a strange thing to ask of someone you do not know well, let alone someone of the same status of Kogawa. Personally, when I think of writing letters to people with influence, I think of them as being very formal and saved only for important issues. For example, the only experience I have had writing letters to influential people was in my previous school where the Amnesty International club gathered students to write letters to government officials on behalf of people imprisoned for exercising, or fighting for their right to free speech. I however, do not see myself writing a letter to an author or celebrity simply to express my appreciation or admiration.

From my experience, the genre of fan letters today seems as though it has evolved greatly. It is not as necessary to write a fan letter when most celebrities have social media accounts from which they can be contacted. The situation has changed and so has the form required for the genre. I feel as though fan mail now has multiple forms. Fans can show appreciation for someone they admire by re-tweeting a tweet, sharing a Facebook status, or even liking a picture posted on Instagram. The possibilities have grown but I feel as technology advances, these methods of admiration seem less personal or meaningful. A fraction of the time it takes to write a letter is needed to communicate on social media. This means that the actions on social media take less effort and therefore less thought needs to be put into them as the action is easily replicated. I would make the argument then that although social media is more of a convenient method of communication, it does not hold the same value as a physical letter.

This is not to say that physical fan mail is completely obsolete. Although a higher percentage of communication is done online, there is a greater appreciation for mail that is sent physically. Multiple articles online encourage people to send more snail mail, such as an article published by The Pen Company titled 8 reasons to send snail mail today, promoting the idea that snail mail has a larger sentiment than online communication, and even makes the argument that “the joy it brings the recipient has increased over time” due to its rarity in present day.

Therefore, even though it was in an earlier time, I feel it speaks well to the work of Kogawa that her fans made the effort to send her fan mail to show their appreciation of Obasan. It shows that they were able to connect with what she had written and that the novel was incredibly relevant in Canadian society at the time.

Helpful Links:

8 reasons to send snail mail today

Hello readers,

Religion has been extremely prevalent throughout human history and has re-surged in a large way as a tool to separate and discriminate against certain people. In the graphic narrative Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi that we are discussing in ASTU class, it is seen that the main character Marji gives up on religion at a young age and embraces modernity. This caused me to question whether religion and modernity are compatible, and if religion is losing its authority in today’s society.

In Persepolis, Marji looked to God as a source of comfort and security, but when he was no longer able to provide those things for her, Marji looked elsewhere. I believe that religion was established as a way for us to get answers to fundamental questions that now it is seen science is better equipped to answer. I am not in any way implying that this is the only function of religion, or that this is the only perspective, this is my opinion generated from personal experience. I was raised in a catholic household and for a short period of time went to an all-girls catholic primary school. When I was younger, I considered myself catholic simply because that what was I was told I was, but as I grew older, in an effort to become more independent, I started looking at other options and questioned my beliefs. I realized that I trusted science and ‘modern’ ways of thinking more than I trusted the teachings of Catholicism. For a long time, I believed that the two were incompatible, however more recently I have seen moments where religion and modernity can coincide. In ASTU class, we were given articles based on Persepolis to analyze, and my groups assigned article, My Hijab Doesn’t Oppress Me, It Empowers Me, by Amber Rehman, took an interesting approach combining Feminism, a relatively modern idea, with Islam. In the article Rehman explains that deciding to cover her own body is a feminist statement, as she gives herself the power to take control of her self-image, and ultimately challenges the limited understanding a lot of us have of feminism. Here, I believe Rehman used religion to advance modern thought.

According to an article on the Daily Mail by Colin Fernandez, lower numbers of youth believe in a God, but surprisingly, more believe in the afterlife. Fernandez brings up that although the younger generation are less likely to participate in organized religion, there is an increase in what he deems “private spirituality” (Fernandez 2016).  I found this interesting as it showed me that even though my generation may be moving away from what previous generations defined religion to be, this could simply be how we interpret religion. Although this is only one article with a heavy western focus, I do believe that as the world becomes more globalized, more and more places are experiencing the same phenomena. All of this makes me wonder if religion is really dying, or if it is simply just changing its form.

Helpful links:

Hijab and Feminism Article from Class: www.huffingtonpost.ca/amber-rehman/feminism-hijab-canada_b_2808850.html.

Daily Mail Article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3504254/Is-religion-dying-Fewer-people-believe-God-30-years-ago-millenials-likely-faith-afterlife.html

Bibliography:

Fernandez, Colin. “Is religion dying out? Fewer people believe in God than 30 years ago – but millennials are more likely to have faith in an afterlife.” Daily Mail Online, Associated Newspapers, 22 Mar. 2016.

Rehman, Amber. “My Hijab Doesn’t Oppress Me, It Empowers Me.” HuffPost Canada, HuffPost, 5 May 2013.

Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis. Pantheon, 2003.

Hello readers,

Something that struck me from the joint lecture on the 15^th of September was my lack of knowledge of what took place here in Canada regarding the treatment of Japanese post Pearl Harbor. This got me thinking about how media plays a large roll in how and what we remember and the role geographical location plays. I am from Kenya, so moving to North America for the last couple of years has really opened my eyes to how media from different places affects our perception of the world. Things that are regarded as important in the western world are relayed to the media in Kenya as being important to us whereas only what is regarded as having the possibility to affect the western world is prevalent in the western media. This is most likely due to the dependence Kenya as a developing country has towards the western world, as issues that affect the west will inevitably affect us as well.

Unlike Kenya, I have noticed in North America the focus on international news is a lot smaller and targeted mostly to other first world countries. The media narrative towards Kenya or Sub-Saharan Africa in general is usually negative in a somewhat exaggerated way. For example, I recently had a conversation with my American roommate who was surprised to find out that although malaria isn’t fun, it is not necessarily a death sentence and that I know multiple people who have had malaria more than once and are completely fine. She grew up with media that taught her that she, as an American, was in a place to help the less fortunate children of Africa and media that was full of charity organizations that constructed their advertising to be a tool that incentivizes people like her to donate. The media was a big part of what helped form her perception of Kenya

Finding out about the treatment of Japanese people after Pearl Harbor, or the recent and terrible history of the treatment of indigenous peoples in Canada and the residential school system I realized that what even though Kenya’s media is highly focused on the western countries, countries like the USA and Canada can still filter exactly what information we get to receive. What is seen in the media can have a large effect on the memories we form of events and what becomes History. History books in the US and Canada that bring up Pearl Harbor are less likely to teach a history that portrays Americans and Canadians in a negative light, or teach what they tried to forget by keeping it out of the media (I have never taken a history class in North America though so this is mostly based on speculation).

I am left to wonder if such a thing as a global history exists. So much has been left out of media and forgotten that I find it difficult to believe that we will ever have accurate memories. But to what extent is forgetting a bad thing?

Some helpful links:

Video watched in class: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8jGdYMmwfQ