Writing for a Real World
Writing for a Real World
2011–2012
A multidisciplinary anthology by USF students
Tenth Anniversary Issue
Published by the University of San Francisco department of Rhetoric and language www.usfca.edu/wrw
Writing for a Real World (WRW) is published annually by the Department of Rhetoric and Language, College of Arts and Sciences, University of San Francisco.
WRW is governed by the Rhetoric and Language Publication Committee, co-chaired by Brian Komei Dempster and Michael Rozendal. Members are: Brian Komei Dempster, David Holler, Michelle LaVigne, Michael Rozendal, and David Ryan.
Writing for a Real World: 10th edition © 2013 The opinions stated herein are those of the authors. Authors retain copyright for their individual work. Essays include bibliographical references. The format and practice of documenting sources are determined by each writer. Writers are responsible for validating and citing their research.
Cover image courtesy of Erika Myszynski This image was taken in Mbale, Uganda (near Mt. Elgon), in southeastern Uganda on the Kenyan border.
Printer: DeHarts Printing, San Jose, Calif.
To get involved as a referee, serve on the publication committee, obtain back print issues, or to learn about submitting to W RW, please contact David Holler
Fair Use Statement: Writing for a Real World is an educational journal whose mission is to showcase the best undergraduate writing at the University of San Francisco. Student work often contextualizes and recontextualizes the work of others within the scope of course-related assignments. WRW presents these articles with the specific objective of advancing an understanding of academic knowledge, scholarship, and research. We believe that this context constitutes a “fair use” of copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material herein is made available by WRW without profit to those students and faculty who are interested in receiving this information for research, scholarship, and educational purposes.
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Editor David Holler
Executive Editor David Ryan
Assistant Managing Editor Giuliana Ferrante
Copy Editors Jenny Aronson Jade Batstone Jiordan Castle John Dwyer Giuliana Ferrante Alejandro Iribarren Kathleen Jemmings Kayla LaCour Caleb Mealey Nick Rihn Madeline Noelle Vanden Branden Laney Woodcock
Journal Referees Kristin Agius, Rhetoric and Language Veronica Andrew, Rhetoric and Language Bob Bathrick, Rhetoric and Language Brian Komei Dempster, Rhetoric and Language Karin Cotterman, Leo T. McCarthy Center Leslie Dennen, Rhetoric and Language Fran Ferrante, Rhetoric and Language Joe Garity, Gleeson Library Johnnie Johnson Hafernik, Rhetoric and Language David Holler, Rhetoric and Language Devon C. Holmes, Rhetoric and Language Ron Key, Rhetoric and Language Saera Khan, Psychology Leslie King, Biology David Latterman, Leo T. McCarthy Center Todd Lewis, Rhetoric and Language Tom Lugo, Rhetoric and Language Theodore Matula, Rhetoric and Language Mark Meritt, Rhetoric and Language Ana Rojas, Rhetoric and Language David Ryan, Rhetoric and Language Carol Spector, Gleeson Library Fredel Wiant, Rhetoric and Language
Program Assistants Crystal Chissell, Tara Donohoe
Publication Assistants Ana Kitapini, Estephanie Bautista Sunga 3 Writing for a Real World
Table of Contents
DAVID RYAN Celebrating WRW’s Tenth Anniversary 6
DAVID HOLLER Introduction to WRW’s Tenth Issue 11
Honorable Mentions 14
Dedication of Tenth Issue to Fredel M. Wiant 17
VY TRAN “A Minor Footnote”: The Other Lost Generation in The Book of Salt 18
JADE BATSTONE Occupy the Arab Street: The Uses of Strategic Nonviolent Action in the Arab Spring 45
PIERCE OGDEN Towards Automated Discovery of Protein Function 68
DEBORA SZETO The Life of a Second-Generation Child: Gastronomic Adventures and Cultural Exploration 81
MARTINA PERALTA Trouble in Paradise: Milton’s Portrayal of Gender Stereotypes in Paradise Lost 98
STEVEN SLASTEN The Double-Headed Scapegoat: A Look at the Cycle of Redemption in the Rhetoric Surrounding the Suicide of Tyler Clementi 117
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ALEXANDRA DE LEON Reassessing Japan’s War Memory Through its National Press 136
GAYLA FREEMAN What Koreans?: The Status and Marginalization of Koreans in Japan 150
EMILY BROWN Mountain Dew Mouth: A Look Into Solutions to Help The Invisible Minority of Central Appalachia 168
IENNA DELA TORRE Occupy Wall Street, Liberate America: The Social Movement for Re-regulation to End Wall Street Corruption 184
2012-2013 Submissions Information 204
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Celebrating Our Tenth Year
i t h this edition, Writing for a Real World turns 10 years old. In this brief retrospective, it is helpful to give some quantitativeW and qualitative information to better illustrate the work associated with this project. Certainly, this context only partially accounts for the innumerable accomplishments of the purely voluntary efforts of the students, staff, and faculty involved in creating this journal. For their collective work, we thank them for giving life to this student anthology. In 2002, members of the Rhetoric faculty pitched an idea to then Associate Dean Jennifer Turpin about starting a journal that celebrated undergraduate student writing at USF. Without hesitation, Dean Turpin wholeheartedly supported this project. After a series of meetings to theorize this journal’s shape and scope, a staff was born, duties were created, and a name christened. After a few years of collective effort, WRW distinguished itself alongside many of the fine projects on campus, earning a Team Merit Award in 2008. A key part of our success has been our ability to create and manage certain resources, one of which is relying on a group of experienced referees who dive head first into deep piles of student submissions and emerge with a recommended list of publishable papers. Our referees sincerely enjoy the stimulating challenge of reading student writing, and they have become quite adept at making difficult, qualitative distinctions between the terrific papers and the exceptionally well-written ones. Qualitative matters aside, our journal referees have collectively read approximately 1200 submissions and recommended publishing 143 papers. For the record, 139 of these papers are individually authored while four are co-authored by two or more students. Though a large portion of our published material come from Rhetoric and Lanugage courses, the majority comes from outside of our department. This broad disciplinary representation often means that writing assignments at USF are part of the norm of instruction because writing meets a common pedagogical and disciplinary need to measure student learning, even among disparate curricula.
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In our fifth anniversary issue, we noted that publishing WRW allowed us to compose a snapshot of the broad range of subjects that occupy our students and enabled us to better understand the varied student thinking related to “genre, context, lexicon, axioms and theory.” But our journal also compels us to better comprehend what students are thinking about when they synthesize and analyze principles and strategies related to process, organization, framing, and pragmatics. Just as important, reading many of the discipline- specific papers enables us to further affirm some important beliefs related to writing, such as our students have the capacity to write, writing needs to be taught effectively, and all teachers—regardless of discipline—can work to improve the reading and writing skills of their students. Quite tellingly, most of our papers are studied responses to written texts. In this respect, studying these papers allows us to reaffirm the belief that a student’s ability to read critically is fundamentally related to her ability to write effectively. Of course, this belief is essential to the teaching of writing—that a dialectical relationship exists between reading and writing. Pedagogically, it is common practice for writing faculty to place our students in a quintalogue of reading, thinking, discussing, writing, and revising to deepen and sharpen their rhetorical abilities. Our hope is that more non-writing instructors integrate strong, effective student models of writing from WRW in their curricula to create an inter- or intradisciplinary class where writing is taught as part of the required disciplinary knowledge. Student Writing
And what do our students write about? Here are some of the subject areas from past issues: heterosexism and homophobia in African-American communities, domestic violence in lesbian partnerships, maternal depression and intervention strategies, information technology in Latin America, outsourcing and resource conflicts in the United States, psychotherapy and foster children, the Greenbelt Movement, Just War Theory and the American military, and globalism and its relationship with self-determinism.
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There are also insightful textual and rhetorical analyses that focus on Judeo-Christian narratives, works of Aristotle, DeLillo, Derrida, Plato, Milton, Swift, and Shakespeare—as well as papers from the pop culture zeitgeist that focuses on television, music, film. Quite tellingly, this sampling indicates that our students are willing to cross boundaries and examine important relationships concerning independence and community, freedom and responsibility, youth and adulthood, activism and policy, subculture and culture, service and leadership. Though most of our published papers are careful responses to readings and research, there are several examples of more personal student-responses to situations, abstractions, ideas, and theories, and other experiential papers that focus on the emotions, personalities, characters, relationships, and values of the authors. Overall, the broad spectrum of published papers reveals a personal concern for public issues related to art, business, culture, economics, the environment, education, the future, history, policy, politics, science, and society.
Cover Art
Our earliest efforts at composing covers were creatively ill-defined until David Holler took over the cover design by using unstaged images taken from trips abroad. Most of our covers are colorful images of ordinary people in vibrant settings, capturing the subtleties beyond academia. Even though our cover images were composed independently of our written work, these images are, nevertheless, thematically connected to the very broad horizons cast from the real world subjects about which our students write. We are proud to feature as the cover of this issue an image taken by Erika Myszynski who traveled with USF’s Erasmus Program to Uganda. The image featured here of a banana farmer was taken in Mbale in southeastern Uganda near the Kenyan border. We hope to continue to feature the photography of students who have taken compelling images of the real world, whether it be here in the Bay Area or much further afield.
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WRW as a Research Tool
A few years ago, the folks at Gleeson Library digitized our anthology to make our issues more widely available. This kind of digital access not only permits students access to bibliographies and helps them identify important issues in their subject areas, but it allows teachers to assign specific papers or entire issues of WRW in order to help demonstrate how students have resolved research and writing-related problems. Book companies, as well, have used some of our more exemplary papers for their textbooks. In this respect, WRW not only provides models for instruction, but it can provide heuristics for student learning. Because of this scholarly exchange, we have recontextualized this celebratory journal as a literacy project, one that provides resources to broader learning communities.
The Future
Even the briefest of retrospectives would not be complete without contemplating the future. WRW’s established identity of publishing exemplary undergraduate writing at USF will remain its core purpose, but there is always the challenge of improvement, and such measures require fresh perspectives and abundant humility. Though WRW has included business and scientific papers with a modicum of success, even more outreach to these discourse communities seems necessary because they produce a copious amount of work, much of which goes unpublished in our pages. Our outreach must also tap into the ever- evolving work of new majors and minors because there is a wealth of specialized topics we have yet to see in our submissions stacks. With these challenges in mind, we look forward to broadening the context for publishing traditional as well as innovative academic papers.
Our Gratitude
With every issue, we re-express our gratitude to the people who support our journal. We are deeply grateful to Provost Jennifer Turpin; Marcelo Camperi, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences;
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and Eileen Fung, Associate Dean of Arts and Humanities, College of Arts and Sciences—all of whom continue to support this institutional project with unwavering enthusiasm. We also thank our class of student copy editors for their detailed review of manuscripts and layout of the journal. Our program assistants, Tara Donohoe and Crystal Chissell, and publication assistants, Estephanie Bautista Sunga and Ana Kitapini, deserve special mention for helping WRW meet its deadlines. We also gratefully acknowledge the work of Digital Collections Librarian Zheng Lu who helped digitize every issue of WRW. And the work of our computer whizzes Alexey Fedosov and Chris Brooks deserve special thanks for helping us digitize our submissions process. We would be remiss if we did not thank Norma Washington and John Pinelli for paying the bills. Additionally, the instructors of our authors are commended for composing their introductions during summer break, and our deepest thanks are reserved for those students who submitted their work. As our Honorable Mentions list illustrates on page 14, we received many more papers than we were able to publish. Congratulations to those who earned honorable mention, and, of course, congratulations to our winners, for all of our authors bravely enter the realm of writers writing for a real world.
Bon Voyage!
Finally, this issue closes as the final one under the stewardship of Fredel M. Wiant, our department chair. As she contemplates returning to the Centennial State, we express our most affectionate appreciation for her tireless encouragement and long-standing support for this project. For her guidance, we are eternally grateful. This special issue is dedicated to her.
—David Ryan
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Introduction to WRW’s Tenth Issue
o n o r i n g outstanding student writing is the duty of every university. Few institutions, however, honor this obligation withH as much enthusiasm as the University of San Francisco. Fully committing to a print journal like this one in an increasingly digital era is neither common nor simple. The work involved to create this journal by scores of student writers and editors as well as faculty reviewers and editors is enormous, and the expense is not negligible. Why, then, commit so many resources to this project? The answer is simple: this university is fully invested in the teaching and learning of writing as indispensible components of the kind of action-driven argument that can lead to real change. In these pages, then, as we have done for ten years, you will see inspired student writing across the disciplines on an impressive range of ideas. From literary studies we feature Vy Tran’s prize- winning piece on marginalized Vietnamese figures in Paris in the 1920s, as well as Martina Peralta’s mindful interpretation of Milton’s portrayal of Eve in Paradise Lost. From the sciences we present Pierce Ogden’s exciting advancements in automating computer prediction of protein functions. From Communication Studies we offer Steven Slasten’s fascinating application of a Burkean lens to the suicide of Tyler Clementi. From political analyses we feature Jade Batstone’s powerful defense of nonviolent protest among Arab Spring nations (a piece written, incidentally, while she was studying in Jordan). Also in the political realm we feature Gayla Freeman’s analysis of persistent problems facing Koreans living in Japan, and Alexandra De Leon’s thoughtful research on Japan’s post-war narratives (a piece written for this year’s Davies Forum). Deborah Szeto contributes a beautifully written piece exploring competing cultures through food. Emily Brown, whose yearlong work researching the Appalachian dental crisis, resulted not only in this fine essay but also in her commitment to work and study in Appalachia next year. Finally, Ienna Dela Torre rounds out our journal with an insightful treatment of the Occupy movement and how it might be indicative of a groundswell of support for more far-reaching financial regulation of the banking industry. In short,
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then, these ten pieces offer a glimpse in to the intellectual life of this university. We hope as editors that these essays will serve as models for future students; we hope as teachers, too, if we might presume to speak for our colleagues, that something of our intellectual legacy lives on in journals such as this as well. Fr. Urban Grassi, S.J. Award
The Department of Rhetoric and Language proudly announces that Vy Tran is our recipient for the Fr. Urban Grassi, S.J. Award for Eloquentia Perfecta, an award named after the University of San Francisco’s first professor of English and Elocution. This award is given annually to the highest rated entry. Our reviewers rated Vy’s essay, “ ‘A Minor Footnote’: The Other Lost Generation in The Book of Salt,” written for Professor Dean Rader, as the most outstanding. Congratulations, Vy, on this remarkable accomplishment! Notes on the Selection Process
Our selection committee of 23 USF staff, faculty members, and librarians received a total of 110 entries this year from many departments and disciplines. Every paper was assessed by at least two readers, and every winning submission had to receive high scores from at least four referees. No names appeared on the manuscripts and reviewers who recognized their students’ work recused themselves. Here, then, we present 10 outstanding papers written during the 2011-12 academic year, and we acknowledge 14 more papers as Honorable Mentions. We profundly thank all our new as well as experienced judges for reviewing the submissions with great care and patience. Our complete list of referees is on page 3. Profound Thanks to Our First Class of Student Copy Editors
As our Executive Editor David Ryan has noted, our journal has undergone tremendous changes in the last decade. One of our most important innovations, I think, was the decision to bring in a team of talented students to assist in copyediting and laying out the journal in a new class. The course, cross-listed between the English
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Department and the Department of Rhetoric and Language, as my 12 students can attest, was certainly among the tougher 2-unit offerings in Fall 2012. Students first acquired the basics ofcopy editing before learning the intricacies of page layout by working in InDesign. Every manuscript which ultimately made it here into print received at least two reads and every layout received at least two more. This was no easy task for a relatively short once-a-week class. I’d like to officially thank all of our copy editors for applying their eagle-eyed attention to every sentence, every quotation, and every bibliography that you’ll find in print here. They did far more than any editor could expect, and I think that many of our students who have done so much of the crucial behind-the-scenes work here clearly have the talent, tirelessness, and eye for ideas to earn high editorial positions one day. Future students of this course might be heartened to know that we will be offering a 4-unit editing course in Fall 2013. We look forward to ushering in to print the fine work that is surely to come our way at the end of Spring 2o13.
—David Holler
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Honorable Mentions
JADE BATSTONE “The Quest for National Cool: Can Japan Build a Pop Culture Empire?” Written for Davies Forum Hwaji Shin, Sociology and “It’s the Same World After All: Are We Really Headed Toward a Techno-Utopia?” Written for Introduction to Globalization Valerie Francisco, Sociology
IENNA DELA TORRE “Birth Control or Political Control?: The Religious and Secular Debate on Contraception” Written for Written and Oral Communication David Holler, Rhetoric and Language
MONICA DOBLADO “Constraining Muslim Feminist Thought” Written for Religious Ethics, Islamic Feminist Ethics Aysha Hidayatullah, Theology
LAUREN ESPINA “Majority Rules, Sometimes: A Rhetorical Analysis of the Supreme Court’s Decision in Cohen v. California” Written for Rhetoric of Law Sarah Burgess, Communication Studies
JASON JABER “ ‘The Story of Little Black Sambo’: An In-Depth Look at Racism in Children’s Books” Written for RHET 250 Moira Kuo, Rhetoric and Language
CLAIRE JASTER “An Awakening to the Harmful Effects of Fairy Tales” Written for Written and Oral Communication Devon Holmes, Rhetoric and Language
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MEGAN MCCARTHY “Not Black and White” Written for Language and Power Seminar Brian Komei Dempster, Rhetoric and Language
KALISSA MORGAN “Training Traditional Birth Attendants: An Attempt to Improve Maternal Mortality in Guatemala” Written for Global Issues and Community Health Linda Walsh, Nursing and Health Professions
JOHN PROIOS “ ‘Fuck Tha Police’: The Symbol of a Struggle” Written for San Francisco: Bohemia, Counterculture, and Subcultures Michael Rozendal, Rhetoric and Language
STEVEN SLASTEN “Chocolate-Covered Desire: A Look at the Relationship of Sex and Chocolate in a Dove Chocolate Commercial” Written for Feminist Thought Sarah Burgess, Communication Studies
MADELINE SWEENEY “Pope Denied Entry to Washington: Al Smith’s Rhetorical Challenges in 1928” Written for Rhetoric and Politics Seminar David Holler, Rhetoric and Language
DEBORAH SZETO “Examining Tiger Mothers (and Fathers)” Written for Language and Power Seminar Brian Komei Dempster, Rhetoric and Language
LEXINGTON WOCHNER “Saving Hart from Shapiro” Written for Philosophy of Law Manuel Vargas, Philosophy
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This tenth anniversary issue is dedicated to our retiring Department Chair and valued colleague, Fredel M. Wiant A Minor Footnote
WRITER’S COMMENTS
The seed of this essay came from Dr. Eileen Fung’s Asian American Women in Literature and Film seminar, in which I first read Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt, an optional text, and analyzed it for my fifteen-page final paper. One and a half years later, I decided to expand on the ideas I had explored in that essay for my undergraduate thesis as part of the Senior Seminar in Literature with Professor Dean Rader. I enjoyed working with The Book of Salt because it appealed to my interests in Asian American Literature, postcolonial literature, queer literature, metafiction, language, power and marginality, and indeed, the Lost Generation. I would like to thank Dr. Fung, Professor Rader, Fr. Dennis Recio, S.J., and Jon Boulier for their invaluable advice and support in assisting me throughout the process of writing “A Minor Footnote.” —Vy Tran
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
The irony of “A Minor Footnote” is that there is pretty much nothing mi- nor about it. Vy Tran’s essay is ambitious despite the fact that it focuses on only one novel by a relatively “minor” author. “Minor” is in quotes here because in the field of Asian American literature, there are indeed major figures, and part of what makes Vy’s essay ambitious is her willingness to en- gage a text that is not part of any canon and for which there are virtually no secondary sources. This means Vy had to rely on her own interpretive skills and her own sense of intertext between the lost generations in The Book of Salt and the famous Lost Generation of Ernest Hemingway and Gertrude Stein. Put plainly, there are a lot of ways things could have gone badly, but just the opposite happened. Vy wrote a brilliant essay that is nuanced and sophisticated on both scholarly and writerly levels. —Dean Rader, Department of English
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v y t r a n “A Minor Footnote”: The Other Lost Generation in The Book of Salt
n h i s m e m o i r of Paris in the 1920s, Ernest Hemingway immor- talized a quotation by Gertrude Stein: “You are all a génération perdueI . That’s what you are. That’s what you all are. All of you young people who served in the war. You are a lost generation.” The very term “Lost Generation” has come to represent, broadly, the gener- ation of young adults after World War I, and specifically, a group of expatriate American authors gathered in France who came of age during the Great War and whose drinking, wandering, and writing reflected their disillusionment with postbellum life. Many people know about Stein, Hemingway, and their associates, but few know about another “lost generation” that haunted Paris around the same time. In her 2003 novel, The Book of Salt, Monique Truong portrays this other generation of Indochinese expatriates and ex- iles primarily through her protagonist Bình Nguyen, who similarly suffers from disillusionment with colonial life. However, unlike the literary Lost Generation, Bình’s losses have not propelled him to fame. Instead, he and the generation he represents have been rel- egated to the margins of society and history. Adding to Bình’s sense of dislocation and alienation is his queerness. As a gay man, he is even on the outside of his own community, and thus twice removed from the Lost Generation’s social, cultural, and literary spheres. This essay uses Bình’s queer- ness as a kind of narrative map that helps chart his character’s status as a member of the colonized generation. Wenying Xu also uses this cartographic metaphor to argue that Bình’s identity is “constructed as a critical terrain upon which are mobilized over- lapping differentiations, such as race, class, and coloniality” (Xu
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132). I navigate this critical terrain by examining how colonial- ism affects the markers of Bình’s identity, and consequently the events of his life, through Bình’s relationships with other queer characters: his lovers, Chef Blériot and Sweet Sunday Man, and his employers, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. In these ex- aminations, I argue that the legacy of colonialism enforces much of its power through language and that Bình attempts to subvert this power almost as often as he is impoverished by it. Ultimately, by highlighting Bình’s subjection and subversiveness in The Book of Salt, Truong decentralizes the Lost Generation and shifts the literary focus to the other “lost generation.”
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In order to recognize Truong’s depiction of Bình and his cohorts as a forgotten generation, the reader must first become familiar with the famous Lost Generation that overshadows them. Further, it is impossible to understand the Lost Generation without realizing its origin within the context of World War I. Gertrude Stein appropriated the term “lost generation” from a French garage keeper, who once commented to her about the dif- ficulties of working with young veterans who had recently returned from the war. The garage keeper told Stein: “[The veterans] be- tween twenty-two and thirty … were spoiled, no good,” and called these men “une génération perdue” (Mellow 309). The concept of a “lost” generation thus emerged from the palpable challenge former war participants faced as they attempted to reintegrate into ordi- nary life, which was difficult for many of them to reconcile with their destabilizing experiences in the trenches. Rookie soldiers who came back from the Western Front, the ones who survived and knew that so many of their comrades did not, nevertheless felt that they were not the same people who had marched off to battle years before. Their loss was therefore a loss of self-stability, a crisis of identity that affected an entire generation. Before it became a literary phenomenon, however, the “lost generation” also acquired another critical context. According to Mary Habeck, in the aftermath of World War I, “there arose in
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all the major combatant nations an image of youthful talent de- stroyed in the trenches before it had time to flourish” (“Did the Great War Create a ‘Lost Generation’?” 186). For the first time in history, of the sixty million European soldiers mobilized through a combination of volunteer and conscripted service, there was a “dis- proportionate number of young victims [who] came from the uni- versity- and public-school-educated elite of Europe” (Habeck 187). Many of these young men were budding poets, writers, artists, oth- er intellectuals, and sons of statesmen who were prepared to take leadership positions throughout Europe. When people recognized that entire classes of university students and other young talents from Britain, France, and Germany did not return after the war, the loss of this generation consequently adopted a second meaning as a loss of potential—a loss of many of Europe’s privileged “best and brightest” (Habeck 188). Yet despite the génération perdue’s origin as an observation of Europe’s devastation, the Lost Generation is now most famously associated with a group of American authors, identified as such by Stein with her borrowed term. Stein moved to Paris in 1903 and lived there for most of the rest of her life with her lover and com- panion Alice Toklas, so she had experienced the European zeitgeist throughout the buildup and resolution of the conflict. When other American expatriates began to gather around her salon in Paris in the 1920s, she recognized in many of them the same qualities of loss that affected their European counterparts. Indeed, several prominent members of the Lost Generation had been veterans of the United States Army and had empirical evidence of the dam- ages of war: Hemingway and John Dos Passos had been ambulance drivers on the Italian and French fronts, and F. Scott Fitzgerald also had enlisted and fought. Other notable cohorts such as T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound never joined the army, but their major works, The Waste Land and Hugh Selwyn Mauberley, respectively, reflected their disillusionment with a world destabilized by war and affili- ated them with the post-war generation. These writers were bound together not as a literary school of thought but as a representation of the young generation whose lives had been distinctly divided into the periods before, during, and after the war. Unequipped to
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deal with postbellum reality, this generation’s losses permeated through all areas of their lives and trickled down to their works. In the period after the war, they shared the Europeans’ dual contexts of loss, but the Americans also began to view their homeland with new, often critical eyes, and struggled with what they perceived as pervasive hypocrisy and obsession with materialism encouraged by President Harding’s “Return to Normalcy” campaign and pro- business policies (Habeck 188). In the period after the war, young once-hopefuls had lost identity, lost potential, and lost faith. In the period after the war, members of the American Lost Genera- tion chose to remove themselves from their country and fled to Europe, where many of them settled in Paris in the presence of earlier expatriates like Stein and Toklas.
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However, disillusioned Americans were not the only expatriates who occupied Paris in the 1920s. In her perusal of The Alice B. Toklas Cook Book, Salt author Monique Truong found an account of “two ‘Indochinese’ men who cooked for Toklas and Stein at 27 rue de Fleurus and at their summer house in Bilignin” (“A Con- versation…”). Surprised and touched to see such an intimate Viet- namese presence in the lives of these two iconic women, Truong decided to use Toklas’s brief accounts of Trac and Nguyen, among descriptions of numerous other nameless cooks, as inspiration to construct her protagonist Bình. As a result, Trac’s “sea travel as a cook from Marseilles to his home and back again [informs] Bình’s experience of sailing from Saigon to Marseilles and then to Paris,” while Nguyen, like Bình, “was a servant in the household of the French Governor-General of Indochina” before he came to Paris (Xu 128). Therefore, although Bình is a fictional immigrant—an exile, Truong reveals as the story unfolds—he is derived from ac- tual contemporaries who shared Paris with the Lost Generation. A number of émigrés from Vietnam had also come to inhabit la ville-lumière around the turn of the century because of—among various personal reasons—a connection between France and the region formerly known as French Indochina through the coloniza-
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tion of Southeast Asia. French missionaries and businessmen had been present in Viet- nam since the early 1600s, converting the natives to Catholicism and establishing commercial ties with the country. However, it was not until 1887 that French Indochina was officially formed in -or der for the French to reap the potential fortunes that Vietnamese land and laborers had to offer. The new government immediately reorganized the Vietnamese economy to benefit the French and a Governor-General was assigned to make Vietnam a “profitable col- ony … to serve France in Asia” (Allen 5-6). Under French rule, the Vietnamese suffered from economic exploitation and harsh labor conditions, as well as cultural, political, and religious oppression. For example, in The Book of Salt, Truong references these realities of colonial life by juxtaposing Bình against his dead father, the Old Man, who serves as the antagonist of the novel by representing the primary voice of oppressive colonial mentality. In a psychologically fascinating scene early in the novel, while confronting his father’s haunting presence in his life, Bình bitterly confesses into the ether: “Sometimes I cannot give enough thanks to your Catholic god that you, my dear and violent ‘father,’ are now merely cobbled together from my unwavering senses of guilt and my telescopic memories of brutalities lived long ago” (Truong 12). The brutalities of Bình’s past may refer to his personal history with his abusive father, but by invoking his father’s Catholic god—not Bình’s—Bình also pres- ents himself in opposition to the coloniality of his homeland and hints at the brutalities that colonialism has inflicted upon him and his people through its inimical dynamic. Bình further unveils the detrimental effect of colonialism in his narration when he boldly states: “When the French are in their colonies they lose their natural inclination toward fraternity, equal- ity, and liberty. They leave those ideals behind in Mother France, leaving them free to treat us like bastards in the land of our birth” (Truong 137). This harsh treatment of the natives under colonial rule eventually contributed to the formation of the early twenti- eth-century cohort of Vietnamese youths who left their homeland for the sea or for their conquerors’ country, and who were also, in their own way, lost. Speaking in an interview about why she chose
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to write about this particular cohort, Truong notes that, compared to her own experience with the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 70s—and, indeed, to the Lost Generation’s experience with World War I—colonial Vietnam was a time of relative “peace”:
There are no military conflicts in my novel, there are no soldiers, there are no weapons. I suppose it is no coinci- dence that the first long-distance flight of my imagina- tion as a writer would take me to a time in history when Vietnam was more or less at peace. I think as a child of wartime, one of the questions that stays with me and that I’ve tried to answer for myself by writing this novel is what if there was not a war, what then would make a person leave the land of their birth behind? … The departure, the loss of home, that act of refuge-seeking, have everything to do with the themes playing them- selves out in The Book of Salt. (“A Conversation…”)
What makes this other generation “lost” if there was no war? Co- lonial Vietnam was not a time of war because there was no conflict between two opposing states; rather, one nation simply dominated the other and seized the other’s sovereignty. “Vietnam” became “French Indochina” and Vietnamese youths became Indochinese cooks and servants for their French masters. The European gé- nération perdue and the American Lost Generation felt they had lost their identity, their potential, and their faith; their Indochi- nese analogs had literally lost of all those attributes too, and their homeland. For this other “lost generation,” however, there was no clear divide of before, during, and after colonialism in their lives because colonialism spanned their lifetime. Furthermore, it was, at least in part, the disillusioning consequences of colonialism that pushed and pulled their migration from Vietnam to France, which forced them to be exiles or expatriates like the members of the Lost Generation. “But in the official history of the Lost Generation,” Truong comments in the same interview, “the Paris of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, these ‘Indochinese’ cooks were just a minor foot-
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note. There could be a personal epic embedded in that footnote” (“A Conversation…”). In The Book of Salt, Truong imagines the per- sonal epic of the exiled Bình and shows why Bình, along with the members of the other “lost generation” that he represents, have been considered only a “minor footnote” to the renowned liter- ary Lost Generation, despite their occupation of the same distin- guished time and place in history.
————
In the reimagined Paris in The Book of Salt, Bình and the Lost Gen- eration inhabit the same space. More than their physical connection to each other and to the city, however, it is the contrasts between their shared traits that—while identifying both parties as “lost”— illuminate a discourse about race, class, and coloniality. One distinc- tive attribute of the Lost Generation, which often also applies to the characters in their written works, is their penchant for drinking. Robin Room, author of “A ‘Reverence for a Strong Drink’: The Lost Generation and the Elevation of Alcohol in American Culture,” not- ing the relationship between drinking and literary culture, observes that “there seems to be a clear association of problematic drunken- ness not only with American writers but with a particular genera- tional cohort which came of age in the years 1909-1921” (540). In addition to the influence of the Roaring Twenties and the reaction against Prohibition in America, he also credits the Lost Generation’s unique association with France—and, in particular, Paris—for their heavy drinking. According to Room:
At the time, as indeed to this day, France had the highest recorded per-capita consumption of alcohol in the world. If the members of the [Lost] Generation had simply ad- opted French drinking styles, their overall alcohol con- sumption would have far exceeded American norms. But it seems rather that … they added the new styles and bev- erages onto their existing styles and preferences. (542)
25 A Minor Footnote
Room suggests that a combination of Parisian café culture, which had developed political significance as the “parliament of the peo- ple” (543), and a close community of politically and spiritually lost expatriate writers provided a supportive environment for drinking and drunkenness. For the Lost Generation, he argues, drinking served as “a rhetoric of emancipation, a symbol of liberation from the claims of an older America for moral hegemony” (Room 543). As a result, the writers sustained each other’s drinking and even incorporated drinking into their literary works, whether simply as a reflection of their own lives or, with more self-awareness, as a symbolic coping mechanism for the loss that they and their con- temporaries felt. Hemingway, for example, best illustrates the Lost Generation’s appetite for drinking along with a second distinctive trait—their spontaneous wandering—with the conception of the “moveable feast” in his quintessential Lost Generation novel The Sun Also Rises. Matts Djos, in “Alcoholism in Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises: A Wine and Roses Perspective on the Lost Generation,” provides the following summary of the novel:
[The Sun Also Rises] describes how Jake Barnes and his expatriate friends spend a good deal of time in Paris drinking and talking about drinking, how some of them make a hectic trip over the Pyrenees to Pamplona to go fishing and watch the bullfights [and drink], and how, after an astonishing series of affairs, foul-ups, and mis- understandings, they straggle back to Paris to talk some more and do some more drinking. (64)
In the process of suggesting that the characters in The Sun Also Rises mirror, if not exaggerated, the alcoholic profile of the Lost Genera- tion, Djos also highlights the cohort’s peculiar habit of wandering as aimlessly from country to country as they did from café to café. People wander, which suggests moving, traveling, or walking with- out a destination, for multiple purposes: they may wander, as an act of deliberate leisure, to pass the time, or they may wander, uninten- tionally, if they find themselves physically or emotionally lost. In the
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case of the Lost Generation, they might have wandered for both purposes. As expatriates, they were rooted in neither their country of origin nor their immediate place of residence. Without an anchor of home, but with financial possibility—because Americans could live very well in Europe on very little money at the time—the Lost Generation could drink, wander, and write—and write about drink- ing and wandering—as often as they desired. Like the members of the Lost Generation, Bình also has habits of drinking and wandering. However, these traits manifest them- selves in Bình’s life for different reasons and with different out- comes than the Lost Generation’s, in part because of Bình’s poorer financial and social statuses. Whereas many members of the Lost Generation could provide for themselves in Paris “because of the high value of the dollar compared to the franc” (Room 542), most Indochinese youths arrived in France with little more than the clothes on their backs. Many of them also did not have access to a network of compatriots and friends who could offer assistance the way that the Americans did. As a result, young men such as the historical Trac and Nguyen found jobs cooking, cleaning, or serving—or a combination of such menial work—in order to sup- port themselves. Bình falls in the same pattern in The Book of Salt. For Bình, his need and ability to drink or wander depend on his financial and social perimeters. For example, Bình self-depre- catingly jokes that his limited budget cannot sustain his “tolerance for alcohol” in Paris, which he calls “the City of Lights and Very Expensive Drinks” (Truong 259). Nevertheless, he laments: “When I am in Paris, I suffer from the delusion that drinking will help me think. It does not. I, unfortunately, did not remember this un- til I was broke” (Truong 259). Bình’s acknowledgment of his de- lusion that drinking will somehow inspire clarity of mind echoes the Lost Generation’s attempts at self-medication via alcohol and further, their metadiscourse of writing about drinking. However, Bình’s ability to lose himself in this delusion is contingent upon his wallet—a limitation of which he is deeply aware and which did not exist for most members of the Lost Generation. Similarly, while Bình’s wandering reflects his displacement as it does the Lost Generation’s, it is also rooted in his financial dispar-
27 A Minor Footnote
ity and his social status as an exile. Before Bình meets and begins to work for Stein and Toklas, he spends a number of years in Paris floating from household to household in order to look for work. In the following passage, Bình reveals how a typical interview with a Parisian family would transpire:
“In Paris, three years,” I tell them. “Where were you before?” “Marseilles.” “Where were you before that?” “Boat to Marseilles.” “Boat? Well, obviously. Where did that boat sail from?” And so, like a courtesan, forced to perform the dance of the seven veils, I grudgingly reveal the names, one by one, of the cities that have carved their names into me, leaving behind the scar tissue that forms the bulk of who I am. “Hmm … you say you’ve been in Paris for three years? Now, let’s see, if you left Indochina when you were twenty, that would make you …” “Twenty-six, Madame.” Three years unaccounted for! you could almost hear them thinking. (Truong 17)
From these potential employers, whom Bình recognizes from the outset as the type who would seldom hire him anyway, Bình ex- plains that he would often hear, “Thank you, but no thank you” (Truong 17), and so he would move on and keep interviewing. His wandering around Paris is therefore not a consequence of leisure, but the opposite—a need for work. Furthermore, the bitter, reluc- tant tone of the passage as Bình recalls his wanderings between Indochina and France—and the admission that the in-between lo- cales have violently left their marks on him—hint at the struggles that Bình faces as an exile. According to Bharati Mukherjee, the exile “brings with him the guilty reminders of suffering … [He] lacks the grandeur, the majesty, of expatriation… [His] stay is provisional and easily revoked” (“Imagining Homelands” 72-74).
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Truong supports this characterization of Bình in The Book of Salt with a poignant moment, after a string of unsuccessful job inter- views, in which Bình realizes: “I am, to them, nothing but a series of destinations with no meaningful expanses in between” (Truong 18). Because Bình is an exile, his narrative of transition is ultimate- ly different from those of expatriates, who willingly sustain their self-removal from their native country and have the option of re- turning home if they should choose it. There is another, more significant difference between Bình and the members of the Lost Generation. It is the primary rea- son why their initially similar losses diverge in different directions, making one generation famous for being “lost” while reducing the other to “a minor footnote” in the literary records. The privilege of language is something that defines the Lost Generation, and yet it is also something that people—the members of the Lost Generation themselves, their admirers, historians, literary critics and scholars—often take for granted because it has rarely, if ever before, been juxtaposed against a generation without a voice. But language separates the two generations, allowing only its masters to write about their experiences and transmit their loss to the pub- lic sphere. Bình does not have this privilege. Though he narrates beauti- fully with his internal voice, his dialogues are sparse, choppy, and uncertain. According to Bình, his inability to speak affects his live- lihood in Paris and his relationship with the city itself:
For every coarse, misshapen phrase, for every blundered, dislocated word, I pay a fee. A man with a borrowed, ill- fitting tongue, I cannot compete for this city’s attention. I cannot participate in the lively lovers’ quarrel between it and its inhabitants. I am a man whose voice is a harsh whisper in a city that favors a song. (Truong 18-19)
The “ill-fitting tongue” refers, in this passage, to Bình’s trouble with the French language, the language of his colonizers that he cannot conquer. In the larger context of the novel, however, it is also an apt description of his tenuous grasp of the English language,
29 A Minor Footnote
which remains to him a “locked door” (Truong 150), and even his native Vietnamese, which “trapped as it is inside [his] mouth … has taken on the pallor of the dying, the faded colors of the aban- doned” (Truong 117). Bình’s struggle with language is thus multidi- mensional: on one level, he literally is not, or is no longer, fluent in any languages, which automatically places him at a disadvantage when speaking with the other characters, especially those who are French or American. On another, related level, Bình’s clumsy mix- ture of French, English, and Vietnamese, his inability to articulate them, and his resulting silence, address and symbolize the colonial- ity of language—that is, how language is “also a place of struggle” (hooks 146) for marginalized people in a world that sustains colo- nial power. In this paper, I use both levels to interpret The Book of Salt as a work of postcolonial literature that interrogates the colo- niality of language while, at the same time, offering a protagonist who attempts to resist it through his perceived silence. I would like to return now to the earlier suggestion that one might use Bình’s queerness as a mode of cartography. By chrono- logically mapping Bình’s relationships with the three queer con- nections in his life via Chef Blériot, Stein and Toklas, and Sweet Sunday Man, I follow the development of Bình’s subjection and subversiveness from colonial Indochina to Mother France. I suggest that although these characters may be affiliated with Bình in terms of their sexual orientation, they dominate him as his employers, as members of a wealthier class, and as citizens of imperialist powers such as France and the United States. The language that they use with and against Bình therefore carries colonialist overtones that further marginalize him as a member of the colonized race. To support Bình’s resistance, I use part of bell hooks’s theory of marginality. hooks explains that “to be in the margin is to be part of the whole but outside the main body” (149). This corre- sponds with Bình’s status as a queer man in a heteronormative society, as an Indochinese exile in France, and as a cook and ser- vant to the hostesses of the literary Lost Generation. But accord- ing to hooks, marginality is more than just “a site of deprivation” (149), where the subaltern—a person outside of the hegemonic power structure—feels he must submit to the boundaries of his
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denial. hooks argues that the margin is also a space of resistance. Her theory is this: “[The] space of refusal, where one can say no to the colonizer, no to the downpressor, is located in the margins. And one can only say no, speak the voice of resistance, because there exists a counter-language” (150). For hooks, this counter- language is the transformation of the “colonizer’s tongue” (150) into something that, while resembling the oppressor’s language, has been irrevocably changed. However, because of Bình’s inabil- ity to articulate, let alone radically transform, French or English, I argue that Bình’s counter-language—what he uses to subvert his oppressors—is his silence. In that respect, I favor and integrate into my paper Marjorie Agosín’s theory that “mutism and silence can also be ways of evading authority, ways of taking refuge in the interiority of imagination in order to say only in this space what one wants to say” (Weldt-Basson 23). Bình even acknowledges this hidden power of silence when he defiantly insists, “Do not equate my lack of speech with a lack of thought” (Truong 153). Since Bình narrates The Book of Salt with his internal voice and shows his re- bellion, sarcasm, and wit through his thoughts only, his perceived silence is the tool he uses—perhaps it is the only one he can use— to resist the coloniality of language and claim his place alongside the famous Lost Generation.
————
Bình, like half of his historical counterparts, begins his career as a kitchen servant in the Governor-General’s household in Indochina where he meets Jean Blériot, a young Frenchman who assumes po- sition as the new chef de cuisine. The arrival of Blériot disappoints Bình’s older brother, Minh the Sous Chef, who has longed to earn the Head Chef position and has carefully studied both the language and craft of French cooking. Bình recounts of his brother: “[Minh] insist[s] that after Monsieur and Madame taste his omelette à la bour- bonnaise, his coupe ambassadrice, his crème marquise they would have no need for a French chef de cuisine to replace old Claude Chaboux” (Truong 14). However, Monsieur and Madame choose the handsome and undeniably French Blériot to be their chef because Madame’s
31 A Minor Footnote
strict motto is, “Everything here should be as if in France!” (Truong 46). The reality is that no matter how well Minh may have cooked French food and learned French words and adhered to Madame’s francophilic mantra, he is still a Vietnamese man. As a result, Bình watches as “Minh alone [stands] in agony, lashed and betrayed by all those French words he had adopted and kept close to his heart, wounded” (Truong 14) while Blériot claims the kitchen as his do- main. This is the first instance in which Bình witnesses Blériot im- perializing his brother as a colonized person, and certainly not the last recognition of their power imbalance. In fact, Bình assesses, “I had been working at the Governor-General’s house for about seven years by then. [Blériot] had been there for less than a month, but he arrived as the chef de cuisine and was, of course, French. Both things added up to a seniority beyond any of my earthly years” (Truong 59). Bình realizes that Blériot, despite being new to Vietnamese land, arrives with a position of authority over him—a position that the French chef does not necessarily deserve. However, the power imbalance between Blériot and Bình be- comes even more interesting as a narrative conflict when Bình quickly finds himself attracted to Blériot and engages in- ase cret affair with him. Soon after he inherits the Governor-Gen- eral’s kitchens, Blériot chooses Bình to accompany him on early morning runs to the market to act as a guide and as a translator. Throughout the development of their relationship over the course of these trips, Truong highlights their class and race differences with her portrayal of how the Indochinese public perceives Blériot and Bình. For example, Bình recalls:
All the market vendors knew his position—Chef Blériot, the chef de cuisine at the Governor-General’s house, a man who was more important than the Governor-General would ever be. […] As for me, they had seen me before, but now they really looked at me, wondering where my allegiance lay. Whether I was the kind who would betray his own to save his Monsieur the equivalent of a couple of centimes. Whether I lived off of their blood or his money. (Truong 62-63)
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The Indochinese market vendors recognize the power of their colonizer by his class and his race, which puts Bình in a precarious position. He is also one of the colonized. He is of their “kind” but they doubt that he is “their blood” if he escorts their oppressor to the market every morning. For his part, Bình claims that he is “nei- ther” (Truong 63) aligned with Blériot nor with the working-class Indochinese community, which shows Bình’s awareness of his own marginality. Truong’s clever juxtaposition of Bình’s disadvantaged position in relation to both the colonizer and the colonized indi- cate the basic struggles that Bình must face in Indochina. Bình’s sexuality, the only thing that allows him a connection with Blériot, alienates him from his people, who perceive him as traitor either for being queer and different or for associating with a Frenchman. Simultaneously, Bình’s class and race, while permanently tying Bình to his people, distinguish him from Blériot and disallow the viability of a potential relationship. Truong also shows the chasm between Blériot and Bình’s social differences through the choices they make in presenting themselves to the public. Blériot, in contrast to the market vendors, has no doubts about Bình’s place. He exerts his authority and control over Bình both verbally and through body language. Blériot always walks in front of Bình, never behind him or at the same pace. Bình com- ments: “He was behaving like a typical colonial official. He walked several steps ahead, keeping enough distance between us to say, We are not one. Yet he was still close enough to relay his exclusive con- trol over the … Indochinese who followed him” (Truong 122). In ad- dition, Blériot explicitly set forth rules for Bình pertaining to how he may act both in public and private: “No touching. No smiling” (Truong 123). In “Teaching Transnationally: Queer Studies and Im- perialist Legacies in Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt,” Deborah Cohler astutely notes: “This relationship with Chef Blériot illus- trates the dance between colonial servitude, sexual subjectivity, and resistance” (27). Indeed, Bình attempts to challenge the colonial- ity of Blériot’s verbal and body languages by refuting his authority within certain parameters. Regarding the rules, Bình says:
33 A Minor Footnote
The first I could understand, but the latter I thought absurd. A smile is like a sneeze, necessary and not with- in my control. Any effort to suppress it would only draw more attention to it. So I defied him and smiled anyway, and given the manner in which Blériot had us walking through the streets of that city, the pathways of that garden, he never saw. (Truong 123)
By allowing Bình to show his silent subversion through smiling, Truong portrays the complexities of colonial influence on Bình’s class, race, and sexuality, and simultaneously demonstrates how Bình navigates his subjection and subversiveness. On the one hand, Bình’s smiles show his delight at the romance with Blériot, which Cohler describes as “the imperialist control of the French- man over the Vietnamese kitchen worker” (Cohler 28). If their relationship had not been discovered, ironically because a chauf- feur notices their manner of walking rather than Bình’s secretive smiles, it is probable that Bình would have happily continued his clandestine affair with a man who would never recognize him as a lover or even as a friend. On the other hand, Bình also tries to defy class and race hierarchies by explicitly acting against Blériot’s demand, showing his refusal to be completely subjugated—even when infatuated with his subjugator. Bình’s relationship with Chef Blériot thus amounts to a constant test of his reaction to a colo- nialist force that, at best, rewards him with a few hours’ worth of attention and, at worst, betrays him by denying their involvement. The worst happens, of course, which leads to Bình’s dismissal from the Governor-General’s house and his eventual exile.
————
Following Bình’s exile from Vietnam, he wanders the sea and then Paris for a number of years before he meets and works for the ex- patriated Stein and Toklas (or “GertrudeStein” and “Miss Toklas” to Bình). Although they, as lesbian Jewish-American women, are fellow queers and minorities who have no relation to the French
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colonization of Indochina, they exhibit no particular sympathy for Bình’s situation. That is not to say that they treat Bình poorly, but Stein and Toklas nevertheless partake in a prejudiced, dismissive attitude toward Bình a majority of the time. Cohler notes:
It is in Paris that Truong’s novel illustrates most pow- erfully how gay/lesbian identities cannot alone produce solidarity across race, national, and class lines. […] Stein and Toklas are not queer allies for Bình, they are em- ployers who, more often than not, are revealed for their racist and classist biases as much as for their gender, sexual orientation, or artistic productions. (28)
While Bình’s queerness plays a dynamic role in the construction of his struggles and relates to the conditions of his class, race, and coloniality, the Steins—as the other characters in the novel refer to them—are “complacent, conforming, socially accepted in their same-sex arrangement” (Xu 135). Stein adopts the typical husband’s role, while Toklas takes the role of the wife. Stein is the worker, the writer, and the host of the Lost Generation’s salon, while Toklas carefully and proudly types out Stein’s manuscripts and entertains the wives of their visitors. Bình observes that Stein calls Toklas, “her ‘Sweetie,’ her ‘Queen,’ her ‘Cake,’ her ‘Cherubim,’ her ‘Baby,’ her ‘Wifie,’ her ‘Pussy’” (Truong 155), while Toklas refers to Stein as “her ‘King,’ her ‘Fattuski,’ her ‘Mount Fattie,’ her ‘Hubbie,’ her ‘Lovey’ ” (Truong 157). The gender roles they adopt, if not their sexual orientation, reflect society’s expectations and standards. Furthermore, as members of an elite, educated class, they do not share Bình’s experience of marginalization. In the following sec- tion, I argue that they even contribute to Bình’s subjection. Xu notes that Truong is “accurate in describing Stein’s and Toklas’ arrogance, ignorance of the culture from which Bình comes, and condescension toward him. Colonial attitudes are amply evi- dent in their narratives” (128). For example, Stein once refers to Bình as “her Little Indochinese” (Truong 142). Bình disapproves of this patronization, but as in the case of his objection to Blériot’s rules, he is only able to reveal his resistance through his internal monologue:
35 A Minor Footnote
Her Little Indochinese? Madame, we Indochinese be- long to the French. You two may live in France, but you are still Americans, after all. Little Indochinese, indeed. What you probably do not know, GertrudeStein, is that in Bilignin you and Miss Toklas are the only circus act in town. And me, I am the asiatique, the sideshow freak. […] The farmers are used to me by now. (Truong 142- 143)
Bình’s defiance in this passage once again shows the complexity and intertwinement of his subjection and subversiveness—this time with his employers rather than his lover. Although he rejects Stein’s colonialist attitude, he uses terms of colonialism to say: We do not belong to you because we belong to someone else. In addition, it is likely that the farmers in Bilignin are only “used” to Bình be- cause of imperialist legacies that have rendered Bình less alien to the French than the openly lesbian American women. In reacting against his employers, Bình finds that they not the only ones af- fected with colonial attitudes—he is, too. However, as Bình’s employers, Stein and Toklas are in a domi- nant position over him. His relationship with them is a “continual negotiation between control and respect” (Cohler 28). That is, Bình acts and responds to their requests out of respect for their authority, but they also have an unspoken power over him since they “sustain” him by paying his wages and housing him (Truong 209). Thus when Bình takes issue with one of his Mesdames’ re- quests, he must nevertheless “compromise” by fulfilling the task silently, or at least without objection. This negotiation is evident when Stein takes an interest in Bình’s “interpretation of the French language … [his] use of negatives and repetitions” (Truong 34). The first time Stein experiences Bình’s misshapen French first hand is when he attempts to ask Toklas if the household budget would allow for the purchase of two pineapples. Bình, forgetting the French word for “pineapple,” says: “Madame, I want to buy a pear … not a pear” (Truong 35). Stein delights herself in hearing Bình’s “elemental, bare-knuckled, breakdown” (Truong 34) of the French
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language and develops a habit of testing Bình’s skills. Though it is an amusing “after-dinner activity” (Truong 35) for Stein, it is exasperating and even humiliating for Bình, who often wonders how much longer he will have to keep naming objects. But despite Bình’s disdain of having to reveal his struggle with language to his Mesdames, he complies because he feels he must. In the only instance when Bình subverts Stein’s game of words, he does so silently. Stein asks him: “Thin Bin, how would you de- fine ‘love’?” (Truong 36). Her tone anticipates an amusing answer from Bình, whom she does not expect to understand the concept of or to have known love—perhaps because of her nickname for him, Thin Bin, which she thinks is an affectionate reference to his appearance. For Bình, who does not understand the English word “thin,” the mispronunciation of his name only makes him long to hear his name said correctly, so he repeats his name in his head with “readjust[ed] and realign[ed] tones that are missing or are sadly out of place” (Truong 32), thus reclaiming his identity. Then, answer- ing Stein’s question about his definition of love, Bình narrates: “I point to a table on which several quinces sit yellowing in a blue and white china bowl. I shake my head in their direction, and I leave the room, speechless” (Truong 36). By refusing to verbally de- fine “love,” Bình rejects the capacity of language to encapsulate his emotions and thoughts, which is something that Stein, as a writer and as someone with the privilege of language, does not neces- sarily understand. Furthermore, by leaving the room “speechless,” Bình effectively ends Stein’s language game on his own terms—in silence. Stein shows her ignorance and insensitivity toward her servant’s experiences by asking him to contextualize, with foreign words and their elusive meanings, a concept simultaneously as abstract and personal as “love.” Bình, in turn, refutes Stein’s expectations of his inability to understand love by following his narration of this scene with memories of not one but two romantic and sexual part- ners. As I have already examined Bình’s first lover, Chef Blériot, I will now uncover Bình’s relationship with his second lover, Sweet Sunday Man.
37 A Minor Footnote
————
Bình’s final queer connection inThe Book of Salt returns to a tale of ro- mance and betrayal with Marcus Lattimore, an American iridologist who comes to 27 rue de Fleurus pretending to be a “writer” (Truong 37). He charms the Steins and lets slip to them that he is in search of a part-time chef. Toklas recommends Bình to work for Lattimore on Sundays, the only day Bình does not cook for his Mesdames. Bình grows to love Lattimore during the weekly preparation of his Sun- day dinners, and begins to affectionately refer to Lattimore as Sweet Sunday Man in his mind and, consequently, his narration. The entrance of Sweet Sunday Man into the narrative is criti- cal to unraveling Bình’s personal development—and thus to the novel. Like Chef Blériot, Sweet Sunday Man begins an affair with Bình and betrays him at the end by using him to steal a notebook from Stein and then deserting him. But Sweet Sunday Man is also a more complicated character than Blériot. Sweet Sunday Man is mixed race, half-black on his mother’s side. Because of the racial tensions that exist in the United States at this time, he has a com- plicated history with his parents, especially his father, that echoes Bình’s own difficult relationship with the Old Man. For example, Sweet Sunday Man reveals to Bình in a surprising display of vulner- ability that his black mother has received money from his absent white father in exchange for her silence on their affair. Therefore, there is a suggestion in The Book of Salt that “a power equilibrium— however tenuous—exists between Bình and Sweet Sunday Man by virtue of their social marginalization as racialized subjects” (Troeung 118). Bình hints at his awareness of this tentative power equilibrium when he narrates, after their fallout:
I forget that you, Sweet Sunday Man, are flawed like me. You are a dubious construction, delicate but not in a fine- boned way. Delicate in the way that poor craftsmanship and uncertainty resulting from it can render a house or a body uninhabitable … I hide my body in the back rooms of every house that I have ever been in. You hide away inside your own. (Truong 151)
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Because Bình feels somewhat equal with Sweet Sunday Man throughout most of their relationship—despite the fact that they also have clear employer/employee roles—and because Bình is in love with him, he does not attempt to subvert the various ways that Sweet Sunday Man uses language to seduce, deceive, and even mar- ginalize him. For example, Sweet Sunday Man is the only character that attempts to teach Bình a language and thereby exerts power over him through affecting his speech. Bình recognizes what Sweet Sunday man is doing, but does not act against it. Bình thinks:
You, Sweet Sunday Man, have yet to teach me a practi- cal word. Your lessons are about their lush interiors, the secrets that words can keep. I have learned from you that the English word “please” can be a question, “May I?” and a response, “You may.” “Please” can also be a verb, an effortless act that accompanies you into every room. (Truong 110)
Sweet Sunday Man teaches Bình words of power relations, how to ask for permission, and how to give or receive it. Sweet Sunday Man is also “always the first to speak” (Truong 110). Bình explains: “I know you feel compelled to shoo silence away with your words” (Truong 110). But instead of defying these methods of Sweet Sunday Man’s control over him, Bình gives in, allowing the belief that they are kindred souls to cloud his judgment and extend his subjection. However, as Bình and Sweet Sunday Man continue to explore each other and their languages—the one they have in common (French) and the ones they do not (English and Vietnamese)—Bình slowly realizes that they are not equals. According to Bình, the dif- ference begins with the language they have in common: “Yours is a languid French, a vestige of your southern American and its rich cadences … My French is clipped and jagged, an awkward care- less collection, a blind man’s home, a drunk man’s stumbled steps” (Truong 111). Sweet Sunday Man’s more refined attempts at French, compared to his own rough handle on it, points to a difference in class that Bình only considers in hindsight. After Sweet Sunday
39 A Minor Footnote
Man has left him, Bình remembers how Sweet Sunday Man’s light skin and money, which he inherits from his mother, have made it possible for him to escape most discrimination and pass for a white man in Paris. On the other hand, Xu notes:
Bình bears the unshakable yoke of poverty in addition to that of race. The stratification among the colonized is made particularly apparent in Mother France, where poverty disallows Bình from assuming any identity oth- er than that of a domestic servant. (133)
Bình, unlike Sweet Sunday Man, is unable to escape from the markers of his identity. Partially because of Bình’s clouded judgment of Sweet Sunday Man and because of Bình’s attempt to hold onto him despite their differences, Bình begins to identify Sweet Sunday Man with an- other persona: his scholar-prince, a charming and educated Viet- namese man from his mother’s bedtime stories who has become for Bình a fantasy lover, an ideal into which Bình has poured the remains of his devotion, faith, and trust. To explain his initial rea- son for stealing Stein’s notebook for Sweet Sunday Man, Bình says, “Anything for my scholar-prince … how can I not imagine you in that role? Your interest in my Madame’s books is far from casual. Your desire to examine the writings in her notebooks is certainly academic in purpose” (Truong 225). By associating Sweet Sunday Man with his fantasy scholar-prince, Bình makes it increasingly difficult for himself to resist Sweet Sunday Man’s power over him. However, when Bình finally becomes aware of Sweet Sunday Man’s deception, he makes his only effort of subverting the last vestige of Sweet Sunday Man’s authority. As payment for the sto- len notebook, Sweet Sunday Man leaves Bình a receipt that he can exchange for a photograph of the two of them together, a visual re- minder of their false relationship. Bình, intending to cut the pho- tograph in half, takes the receipt to the photographer’s shop where he is startled to find a portrait of a man he once met on the bridge over the Seine. Bình finds out from the shopkeeper that this man’s name is Nguyen Ai Quoc, a clue from Truong that the Man on the
40 Vy Tran
Bridge may be a fictional representation of a young Ho Chi Minh, who would become the historical revolutionary leader that helped decolonize Vietnam with his independence movement in the early 1940s. Of course, Bình does not realize at the time that the Man on the Bridge—who is the first person he has ever identified as a scholar-prince, even before Lattimore enters his life—would even- tually free his people from their French colonizers. Nevertheless, in his only rejection of Sweet Sunday Man, Bình decides not to pay for the photograph of himself and deceitful ex-lover. Instead, Bình determines to save up enough money to buy the portrait of the Man on the Bridge, Ho Chi Minh—an equally quiet redemption of his submissive silence throughout his relationship with Sweet Sunday Man that may hint at a rejection of colonial forces.
————
There is a final way in which Sweet Sunday Man and Stein and Toklas have contributed to Bình’s marginalization, which circles back to the initial idea that Bình and the “lost generation” he rep- resents have only ever been “a minor footnote” to the literary Lost Generation. Near the end of the novel, Bình discovers that the notebook he steals from Stein for Sweet Sunday Man is in fact an (auto)biographical sketch of him, a manuscript entitled “The Book of Salt.” When Bình scans the pages of the notebook, he feels overwhelmed, as if “witnessing [himself] drowning” (Truong 214). He does not understand most of the words on the pages, but he recognizes “please”—that word of power relations that Sweet Sunday Man loves—and “Bin,” the Steins’ misspelling of his name. According to Y-Dang Troeung, “Since the story is written in Eng- lish, Bình is unable to tell how much of his story has been ‘com- pacted’ or ‘distorted’ to fit a generic, commodified mold” (“‘A Gift or a Theft Depends on Who is Holding the Pen’: Postcolonial Col- laborative Autobiography and Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt” 127). The only clue Bình receives is a bittersweet note from Sweet Sunday Man that reads: “Bee, thank you for ‘The Book of Salt.’ Stein captured you, perfectly” (Truong 238). Stein has appropriated
41 A Minor Footnote
Bình’s story for her own, writing an account of his life without his awareness or permission. Using the metafictional device of “The Book of Salt” within The Book of Salt, Truong thus suggests that it is easy for those with the privilege of language to take the voice of those without, perhaps to distort the stories of the silent in order to suit their own goals. Yet by telling a story that decentralizes the more famous Lost Generation by drawing focus to Bình’s subjection and subversive- ness, Truong has made the effort to finally give Bình andhis genera- tion their voice back. It is therefore important that Bình asserts, if only to himself, “I did not give you my permission, Madame, to treat me in this way. […] My story, Madame, is mine. I alone am qualified to tell it, to embellish, or to withhold” (Truong 215). Because this statement accompanies the revelation that there is a lost Gertrude Stein book—once in the possession of Sweet Sunday Man—enti- tled “The Book of Salt,” the reader must wonder, “Which Book of Salt am I reading? Who is the author? Who is the narrator? Who is the voice?” Truong does not offer any clear answers, but her con- struction of these characters, the coloniality of their languages, and Bình’s often subversive silence provide ample materials for the curi- ous reader to draw his or her own conclusions.
42 Vy Tran
Works Cited
“A Conversation with Monique Truong.” Houghton Mifflin Harcourt – A Reader’s Guide: The Book of Salt. Web. 26 Feb. 2012.
Allen, Joe. Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2007. Print.
Cohler, Deborah. “Teaching Transnationally: Queer Studies and Imperi- alist Legacies in Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt.” Radical Teacher 82.0 (2008): 25-30. Web.
Djos, Matts. “Alcoholism in Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises: A Wine and Roses Perspective on the Lost Generation.” The Heming- way Review 14.2 (1995): 64-78. Web.
Habeck, Mary. “Did the Great War Create a ‘Lost Generation’?” History in Dispute. Ed. Dennis Showalter. Vol. 8: World War I: First Series. Detroit: St. James Press, 2002. 186-192. Web. hooks, bell. “Choosing the Margin as a Space of Radical Openness.” Yearning: Race, gender, and cultural politics. Boston: South End Press, 1999. 145-153. Print.
Mellow, James R. Hemingway: A Life Without Consequences. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1992. Print.
Mukherjee, Bharati. “Imagining Homelands.” Letters of Transit. Ed. André Aciman. New York: Norton, 1999. 69-86. Print.
Room, Robin. “A ‘Reverence for Strong Drink’: The Lost Generation and the Elevation of Alcohol in American Culture.” Journal of Stud- ies on Alcohol 45 (1984): 540-546. Web.
Troeung, Y-Dang. “‘A Gift or a Theft Depends on Who Is Holding the Pen’: Postcolonial Collaborative Autobiography and Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt.” MFS Modern Fiction Science 56.1 (2010): 113-135. Web.
Truong, Monique. The Book of Salt. New York: Mariner Books, 2004. Print.
43 A Minor Footnote
Weldt-Basson, Helene Carol. Subversive Silences: Nonverbal Expression and Implicit Narrative Strategies in the Works of Latin American Women Writ- ers. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press, 2009. Print.
Xu, Wenying. “Sexuality, Colonialism, and Ethnicity in Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt and Mei Ng’s Eating Chinese Food Naked.” Eating Identities: Reading Food in Asian American Literature. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2008. 127-161. Print.
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WRITER’S COMMENTS
In the summer of 2011 I took part in a three-week study course called Beyond Bridges: Israel-Palestine. The course included trips from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, Haifa, Hebron, Tel Aviv, and beyond to meet with scholars and activists who challenged me to see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from dif- ferent angles often absent from mainstream discourse. It was during these travels that I met Fadi Quran—a Palestinian activist who is leading a youth movement to bring freedom, dignity, and justice for the Palestinian people through strategic, nonviolent action. Not only does nonviolent action refute the mainstream notion that violence is a necessary means to enacting revo- lutionary change, but also dispels Western perceptions of an Arab propensity towards violence due to cultural, religious, and historic roots. In the minds of many Americans, Muslims have become inherently linked with violent ac- tions committed in the name of Islam, a religion perceived as dangerous and militant. A one-dimensional view of Muslims is reinforced because the media remains silent until Muslims become a threat. Through this paper I hope to dispel the neat caricature of the turbaned militant and present my American peers with an honest view of Muslims and Arabs. I believe that tearing away the confining sense of otherness that too often defines interactions between Americans and their Arab and Muslim counterparts is essential in light of the Arab Spring. In order to engage with these nascent states, the U.S. will need to drastically change its approach. This foreign policy will require actually listening to Arabs as opposed to applying our own cultural biases and visions of democracy. —Jade Batstone
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
Jade demonstrated, throughout the class as well as her paper, exceptional academic skills and work ethic. She acclimated quickly to the new culture and immediately enriched the class with her thoughtful participation and excellent presentations. She is the quintessential “A” student and set an ex- ample for all of her classmates. In her paper, she passionately pursued the topic and devoted considerable effort to develop her ideas. In fact, the paper was rewritten a few times in order to refine and develop it in accordance with a high academic standard. During the course of writing her essay, she displayed and further developed important scholarly skills such as strong methodological research and analytical skills. Her paper is an important con- tribution to the subject. —Zaid Eyadat, Chair, International Studies Department at the University of Jordan, Amman
45 occupy the arab street
j a d e b a t s t o n e Occupy The Arab Street: The Use of Strategic Nonviolent Action in the Arab Spring
Introduction
e g i n n i n g in December of 2010 and continuing into 2011 the Middle East and North Africa captured the world’s attention asB the regions experienced a wave of pro-democracy movements and popular uprisings. “The Arab Spring” saw massive numbers of ordinary people taking to the streets to demand freedom, human rights, and an end to oppressive authoritarian regimes. The most significant and interesting aspect of these revolutionary move- ments was the broad-based application of strategic, nonviolent ci- vilian resistance. By employing a host of nonviolent tactics, Arab freedom fighters concurrently refuted two mainstream notions: the necessity of violence in revolutionary struggle and the natu- ral Arab propensity towards aggression. In Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Syria, Bahrain, Libya, and elsewhere, rational actors rejected vio- lence on purely pragmatic grounds. Ordinary Arab civilians chose to utilize the arsenal of nonviolent weaponry at their disposal. The power of their oppositional movement rose from “the street,” so to speak. Their actions validate that nonviolence is the most effective strategy of political action for increasing freedom and democracy in the Arab World. Contrary to popular belief, the recent uprisings fit within a history of nonviolent action in the Middle East, as well as a distinct nonviolent strain within the Islamic religious tradi- tion. Owning this homegrown movement allows Arabs to move past the “inferiority complex” traditionally suffered at the hands of the West and prove that it is in fact, “cool to be Arab.” The recent international Occupy movement speaks to these shifting cultural perceptions, revealing that the West can extract lessons from the
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Arab experience (rather than Arabs only imitating the West). In a recent Foreign Affairs article entitled “Understanding the Revolutions of 2011,” Jack Goldstone identifies the structural con- ditions which set the stage for revolutionary change to occur. These generally include a demonstrated incompetence and illegitimacy of the existing government, an elite class (often the military) who are disenchanted with the regime and are no longer willing to support its institutions, a mobilized populace representing a broad range of ethnic and religious groups as well as socioeconomic classes, and a permissive international system wherein foreign powers de- sist from supporting the repressive regime (Goldstone). He subse- quently concludes that “Revolutions rarely triumph because these conditions rarely coincide” (Goldstone). However, Goldstone’s theory is not a suitable model for the Arab Spring because it places too much emphasis on structural factors determining the outcome of a revolution. It was precisely this line of thinking that prevented the majority of Middle East- ern scholars from anticipating the Arab Spring—they believed that preexisting conditions uniquely exempted the region from experi- encing democratic change. Recent events, however, instruct us not to underestimate Arab civilians and the power of their actions. To borrow the words of Maria Stephan, author of Civilian Jihad: Non- violent Struggle, Democratization, and Governance in the Middle East, “the success of civil resistance is not a function of destiny, it’s a function of work.” In order to truly understand the Arab Spring, we must take a step back from Goldstone. Focusing on the change agents them- selves allows us to see how nonviolent tactics magnified the Muba- rak regime’s flaws, sowed a disconnected elite class, and spurred broad-based mobilization while bringing international respect for the pro-democracy movement. In other words, the actions of or- dinary Arab civilians mattered: their strategic agency directly pro- duced Goldstone’s vision of a revolutionary landscape. Thus, the ousting of dictators like Egypt’s Mubarak and Tunisia’s Ben Ali ultimately proves that structural conditions matter less than the actions of independent agents. Rather than lament that a dictator is too brutal or too repressive to allow for real opposition, Mid-
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dle Eastern freedom fighters can take heart in the fact that non- violence, as a revolutionary strategy, can succeed in any context. Regardless of the permissiveness of the state structure, the Arab Spring saw Arab activists concurrently validating the efficacy of nonviolent strategy and the strength of their own actions. Theoretical Framework
Much classical theory posits that violence is a necessary compo- nent of revolutionary processes. Articulating this notion in Rev- olutions and War, Stephen Walt claims that, “Mass revolutions are almost always bloody and destructive.” Similarly, in The Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels envisage an overturning of the existing world order which “would not be peaceful.” Violent revolution was also central to Barrington Moore’s study of regime change in West- ern democratic countries. She concluded that “revolutionary vio- lence was part of the whole historical process that made possible the subsequent peaceful change” (Moore). Echoing her sentiment, Samuel Huntington defines revolution as a “violent destruction of existing political structures” (Huntington). More than emphasizing the violent tendency of revolutions, the thrust of classical revolutionary theory to date has maintained that regime change could not take place without a serious upheaval enacted by guerillas and civilian militants. Not so in the case of the Arab Spring. One of the most distinguishing factors of the recent revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, and visible in the pro-democracy uprisings elsewhere in the Middle East, was the nonviolent tac- tics and strategies employed by civilians. As Arab activists drew on an artillery of nonviolent weaponry, they relegated the traditional revolutionary thought to the academic dumpster. Unfortunately, images of bottle throwing protestors and clashes with police of- ficers still saturated Western media depictions of the events. Nev- ertheless, the Arab Spring presented a victory for proponents of nonviolent methodology. Considered the father of this field, American intellectual Gene Sharp looked on with pride as nonviolent protestors gathered in Tahrir Square and elsewhere throughout the Middle East (Stol-
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berg). For decades, Sharp’s writings—most notably From Dictator- ship to Democracy, a 93-page handbook for ousting dictators—have outlined alternative methods of waging resistance movements and inspired dissidents the world over. His model involves ordinary people mobilizing collectively in order to enact political change without the use of violence. From this perspective, nonviolent ac- tion represents a logical choice for pro-democracy movements to utilize because, in his own words, “if you fight with violence you are fighting with your enemy’s best weapon” (Stolberg). Waging asymmetrical warfare, on the other hand, enables pro-democracy movements to harness the full power and potential of a civilian populace. Intrinsic to this concept is an understanding that power re- sides with the people and corrupt autocrats cannot rule without the consent and cooperation of the masses. Thus, nonviolent resis- tance consists of employing a host of tactics in order to undermine an opponent’s power base and raise the physical and economic costs of regime control (including strikes, boycotts, mass demon- strations, occupying public space, refusing to obey official orders among others mentioned by Sharp in “198 Methods of Nonviolent Action”). However, nonviolent actors must use Sharp’s methods only as a jumping-off point. As Stephen Zunes claims in “Recogniz- ing the Power of Nonviolent Action,” “there is no rule as to what the right tactics are.” Though activists can share ideas and inspire one another, one cannot assume the same tactic that worked in one country will achieve similar success in another. Rather, nonviolent strategists must adjust their tactics to account for local context (Zunes “Power of Nonviolent Action”). Following Sharp’s model, the kind of nonviolent action that took the fore in the Arab Spring represented a practical approach— not to be conflated with the spiritually driven variant of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. Instead, Arab activists rejected vio- lence on purely pragmatic grounds because nonviolence as civil resistance is effective. Scholars Maria J. Stephan and Erica Che- noweth confirm this strategic logic in their recent study of non- violent conflict. Providing aggregate data on major insurrections from 1900 to 2006, the scholars reveal that major nonviolent cam-
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paigns achieved success 53% of the time compared with 26% for violent resistance campaigns (Stephan and Chenoweth). Freedom House’s 2005 study, How Freedom Is Won: From Civic Struggle to Du- rable Democracy, reinforced these findings. The report drew on over 30 years of data from countries that experienced transition from a dictatorship to varying states of democracy, and demonstrated that “people power” movements brought about change in nearly 75% of the cases (Freedom House). By comparison, in only a small minor- ity of instances did armed struggle, top-down reform, or foreign intervention result in successful transitions to democracy (Free- dom House).
Nonviolent Action Is More Effective
Given its proven effectiveness, it was only logical that Arab activ- ists chose to leverage weapons of nonviolence to their advantage and target regimes where they were weakest. The calculated imple- mentation of nonviolent tactics validates that these movements were by nature homegrown, and not a mere adoption of Sharp’s western theoretical framework, which would not have succeeded without strategic local agency. When a coach wins a football game, for example, one does not credit his playbook, but rather his savvy choice to call upon certain strategies to break his opponent’s de- fense. In the same way, global onlookers shouldn’t deny agency to the individual actors themselves, who applied Sharp’s teachings to their own context in a strategic manner. For instance, Dalia Ziada, an Egyptian blogger and activist, attended a workshop on Sharp’s teachings several years ago in Cairo. She then used the concept of “attacking the weaknesses of dictators” to organize her own sessions (Stolberg). Ziada’s activism reveals inspiration rather than emulation—a fact corroborated by Sharp himself. In a recent Al Jazeera interview, the theorist stated that while the Egyptians validated his own theories for nonviolent action, “The people who actually do the struggles are the ones who deserve the credit, not me” (Q&A: Gene Sharp).
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A Homegrown Movement
Despite Sharp’s support, many Western journalists continue to search for a “Lawrence of Arabia” to explain the Egyptians’ success. In a recent New York Times article Abu Khalil, founder of the blog the Angry Arab News Service, described such attempts as “a colo- nialist attempt to deny credit to [Arabs]” (Stolberg). His outrage is not unfounded, due to the pervasiveness of claims similar to that of political theorist Hannah Arendt in Crises of the Republic: that civil disobedience is primarily an American tradition (qtd. in Howard). These Orientalist pundits would cast Arab activists essentially as Western agents utilizing external nonviolent models. Such views overlook a long history of nonviolent campaigns in the Middle East that prove the existence of an indisputably Arab arsenal of nonviolent tactics. Some of the earliest instances of civil disobedience actually oc- curred in the Arab world. As early as 1890, Iran witnessed a nonvio- lent uprising known as the Tobacco Strike, followed by the over- whelmingly nonviolent Constitutional Revolution of 1906 (Zunes “Power of Nonviolent Action”). Similarly, Egypt’s 1919 revolution against British imperial power inspired students, lawyers, and other ordinary people to organize on the streets and stage mas- sive protests demanding independence (Global Nonviolent Action Database). More recently, Lebanese civilians managed to bring an end to years of Syrian domination through nonviolent means in the Cedar Revolution of 2006 (Stephan). Iranian dissidents also followed the nonviolent path by utilizing social media and other nonviolent strategies to enact their Green Revolution in 2009 and 2010 (Stephan). These various historical instances prove that the Arab Spring was not a mere anomaly—a brief nonviolent interlude of Western imitation in a region characterized by violence and war. Rather, a recent Al Jazeera documentary entitled Egypt: Seeds of Change pro- vided visual evidence for the revolution’s native origins. The film traced the nonviolent organizing campaign of Egypt’s April 6 Youth Movement. The group began educating themselves on nonviolent tactics and conducting workshops three years before the first wave
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of revolutionary protests. Their activities confirm that the various uprisings this past year represent the natural evolution of a preex- isting phenomenon in the Arab world. Still, many choose to overlook the nonviolent elements of the Arab Spring because they perceive them to be antithetical to Arab culture and traditions. Scholars like John Waterbury, the for- mer President of the University of Beirut, have a large hand in perpetuating such Orientalist notions. In “Democracy Without Democrats?” Waterbury claims that “basic tendencies in regional culture and religious practices must be overcome rather than uti- lized in any efforts to promote pluralism and democracy [in the Arab world].” This paradigm assumes that intolerant religious be- liefs blind Arabs to rational decision making. It focuses on jihad—a concept largely understood in the West to mean “holy war” or vio- lent resistance waged on behalf of Islam. Scholars like Waterbury point to jihad as a major obstacle for nonviolent rhetoric to take hold in the region. However, contrary to dominant beliefs, “there is nothing whatsoever in the Islamic sources that describes war as holy,” says Qur’anic scholar Azzam Tamimi. In Hamas: A History From Within Tamimi reveals that the earliest appearance of the word “jihad” in the Qur’an was during the early Meccan period of Muhammad’s prophethood, when the Muslims were forbidden to use force. “Jihad at the time,” Tamimi claims, “involved no qital (fighting or combat)—it was entirely nonviolent form of struggle.” This “greater” form of jihad, “resisting oppression and striving for a just world,” remains largely in the shadows in comparison to its violent counterpart (due to frequent citings by terrorists and violent ex- tremists). Nevertheless, the primacy of nonviolent resistance cer- tainly holds a place in the teachings and history of Islam. Indeed, the Prophet himself once pronounced upon his return from battle, “We return from the minor jihad to the major jihad”—from mili- tancy to the nobler, nonviolent struggle to lead a life of freedom and dignity by the teachings of Islam (Kishtainy). Thus, far from posing a roadblock to nonviolent action, the religious discourse of Islam can serve as a powerful framework for
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Arab resistance. Accordingly, many of Yemen’s clerics issued fatwas in support of a peaceful revolution in the Gulf country and sev- eral have even declared nonviolent protest as displaying the holiest form of jihad (Liepert). Despite instances like these, the Islamic tradition of nonviolence is too often overlooked. In order to describe the strategic nonviolent actions of Arabs during the recent revolutions with a distinct “Muslim coloring,” Iraqi intellectual Khalid Kishtainy coined the term “civilian jihad.” Religious rhetoric in forms of political resistance such as boycotts, strikes, protests, and other acts of nonviolent defiance lends an inherently “Arab character” to such campaigns. Arabs, Kishtainy goes on to say, should take pride and ownership of the nonviolent tactics brought to the fore during the revolutions. Spotlighting the homegrown nature of their movement, in this way, refutes assump- tions of a natural Arab propensity towards aggression due to the violent nature of Islam (Kishtainy).
Powerful Nonviolent Weapons
Having established a framework for strategic nonviolent resis- tance—as a departure from conventional violent means—and dis- cerning that such actions were deliberate and locally driven, we may turn to the specific agents of the Arab Spring. Egyptian activ- ists and their counterparts across the Middle East not only shifted the revolutionary discourse and the world’s attention towards the efficacy of nonviolent strategic action, but also proved that Arabs— as rational individuals, are capable of enacting it. The tactics used were not chosen for their moral superiority or as a means of last re- sort. Rather, Arabs utilized nonviolent tools as the most powerful, effective strategy for combating dictatorial regimes. In doing so, they supported the strategic logic of nonviolent theory espoused by scholars Maria J. Stephan and Erica Chenoweth in Why Civil Re- sistance Works. Satisfying Goldstone, the activists’ methods directly created a political climate favorable to revolutionary change. The most notable nonviolent tactics that Arabs utilized were demon- strations, inspiring military defections and elite converts to their cause, the creation of parallel civil society structures, and organiza-
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tion using new technology. Referencing their research on nonviolent campaigns, Stephan and Chenoweth note that “mass mobilization—particularly mobi- lization where participation is broad based and the campaign is not dependent on a single leader—occurred in all cases of campaign success” (Stephan and Chenoweth). During 2011, Arabs took to the streets in huge numbers through protests and demonstrations. An Al Jazeera feature on the Egyptian Revolution portrayed women who professed to never having been politically active, preparing food and supplies for the protestors gathering in Tahrir Square (“The End of A Dictator”). The sense instilled by the revolution, that ev- eryone, regardless of age, gender, or social status, can contribute to the cause is an intrinsic component of waging nonviolent warfare. As opposed to violent campaigns—which solely enlist young, able- bodied men to fill the ranks of guerrilla armies—nonviolent action involves far more participants. In this way, nonviolent movements may harness the full support of the population and channel it to- wards their cause (Zunes “Weapons of Mass Democracy”). Draw- ing on a larger demographic is a strategic choice for Arabs because, as Zunes observes, “most repressive governments are well-prepared to deal with a violent insurgency; they tend to be less prepared to counter massive non-cooperation by old, middle-aged, and young” (“Weapons of Mass Democracy”). Noting this calculated and wide- spread engagement present in the Egyptian revolution, Al Jazeera reported that “one saw a social mix rarely seen in Egypt: middle- class men and women, some of them activists but most of them not; young and old, in suits, kefiyehs and jeans, alongside the gal- abiyas and long beards of the salafis; bareheaded women as well as munaqqabat” (Ryzova). Arabs thus drew power from the masses, channeling the ener- gies of diverse segments of their populace to demonstrate a broad based consensus on their demands. For instance, beginning in early February, tens of thousands of Bahrani demonstrators enacted a nonviolent encampment in the Pearl Roundabout—Manama’s main traffic circle and a symbolic center of the country (Diwan). Protestors set up tents in a mass sit-in (reminiscent of Cairo’s Tah- rir Square) aimed at demanding freedom, human rights, and an
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end to the repressive rule of the autocratic monarchy (Diwan). Notably, despite the country’s strong sectarian divides, Bahrain’s Shia and Sunni pro-democracy activists united to demonstrate and even prayed together in the square (Diwan). Instances of similar cross-sectarian coordination and ideological unity through orga- nized nonviolent methods occurred in Egypt’s revolution (where the signs and chants manifest during public demonstrations were markedly secular) and elsewhere. Thus, massive mobilization is not only strategic means of tapping into the full participatory power of ordinary people, but also offers venues for bridging societal lines of age, gender, class, and religion. These public displays enabled Arab activists to ideologically strengthen their cause and unify around a common sentiment—the regime’s illegitimacy. In Recognizing the Power of Nonviolent Action Stephen Zunes identifies the main goal of massive public demonstrations: “to arouse and inspire others to join and do something.” Accordingly, Arabs utilized majority support to erode the repressive apparatus of the state. A former police officer in Egypt named Haithem con- fessed the following to Al Jazeera: “[the regime] said ‘tomorrow is a critical day and we want you to beat the people. We didn’t agree, for we would be hitting my father, my brother, my sister, my moth- er, and our people” (“The End of a Dictator”). Haithem’s state- ment supports Gene Sharp’s ideology that “nonviolent means will increase chances of the soldiers refusing to obey orders” (Q&A: Gene Sharp). Security forces willing to fight in self-defense against armed militants will generally hesitate to shoot into unarmed crowds, especially if they suspect having, as Haithem noted, fa- milial connections to the protestors (Zunes “Power of Nonviolent Action”). When Arabs demonstrated this principled, nonviolent charac- ter, they utilized a strategy that Sharp has referred to as “political jiu jitsu”: leveraging state repression to advance the movement’s ends (Zunes “Egyptian Revolution”). The use of force against mas- sive throngs of unarmed people chanting, “peaceful, peaceful” will inevitably create greater sympathy for the regime’s opponents, inspiring further loyalty shifts among military forces and civilian
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bureaucrats. Additionally, such actions play up the regime’s weak- nesses. Cairo’s Al-Azhar University emphasized in its “Arab Spring Charter” guidelines for democracy in the Arab world that “the use of violence against peaceful citizens delegitimises the ruling au- thority and ends its raison d’etre” (Bishara). Thus, displaying their disciplined, nonviolent character was a logical choice for Arab ac- tivists; not only did it rob the regime of its human pillars of support (in the form of military officers and government officials) but also chipped away at its rhetorical foundations. Threatened with a loss of control over the state, regimes often point to the power vacuum that their absence will create; an at- tempt to illicit fears of chaos and anarchy. To prevent such rhetoric from taking hold, pro-democracy leaders must demonstrate them- selves to be organized and capable of running effective institutions. Arab activists did just that after liberating Benghazi, Libya, from the oppressive clutches of the Gaddafi regime. Popular democratic committees sprung up to function as interim local governments (Zunes “Carnage in Libya”). These civilian organizations consisted of judges, lawyers, and other professionals who effectively brought stability to Libya’s second largest city by coordinating groups of young people to control traffic intersections and provide for other basic services in lieu of an official government (Zunes “Carnage in Libya”). The creation of parallel civil society structures was a stra- tegic means of enlisting popular participation in order to wrest po- litical authority from the state and its institutions (Zunes “Carnage in Libya”). These Arab-run nongovernmental organizations gained legitimacy from their ability to serve as a substitute for state insti- tutions. Their effectiveness provided a basis for the formation of a post-revolutionary, civilian-run government. Ultimately, this organi- zational strategy allowed Arabs to undermine the repressive status quo by rendering regimes increasingly ineffective and unnecessary. Perhaps the most cutting-edge tool that the Arab activists uti- lized in the recent uprisings was new media and social networking sites. The use of sites like Facebook and Twitter—in contrast to many of the more pervasive nonviolent tactics deployed by Arab ci- vilians—received widespread media coverage. Such publicity over- emphasizes the enabling power of modern technology, and denies
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agency to the independent actors and the power of their actions. In “Credit the Egyptian People With the Egyptian Revolution,” Stephen Zunes reminds us that “the majority of Egypt’s population lacks access to Internet and during several key days of the pro- democracy struggle the Internet was entirely shut down.” Thus, while the Internet served a strategic purpose, its existence alone cannot account for the dramatic impact that Arab civilians made within their repressive states. Stephan and Chenoweth validate that “the creation and main- tenance of independent sources of media, that allow nonviolent actors to communicate internally and externally, is another way that governmental and nongovernmental actors can support non- violent campaigns.” Likewise, one Egyptian citizen told Al Jazeera, “we knew the government was going to use aggressive force … and this needed to be documented … and at the same time we knew the government was going to spread lies about the protes- tors” (“The End of A Dictator”). This activist represents a demo- graphic of intelligent, networked Arab youth who understand how their governments operate and devised strategic means of combat- ing repression. Many Arabs engaged in “citizen photojournalism” during the revolutions, taking reportage into their own hands by documenting instances of regime violence and uploading videos to public sites like Youtube (Stephan). This was a strategic means of getting around state-controlled media and refuting regime instilled propaganda that foreign agents were enacting the events and that people were getting paid to stay in the streets (“The End of A Dic- tator”). Arabs also opted to use social networking sites to communi- cate objectives and organize their actions. A recent New York Times article revealed the collaboration of Egypt’s April 6th Movement with Tunisia’s Progressive Youth of Tunisia via their respective Fa- cebook pages (Kirkpatrick and Sanger). According to the report, “young Egyptian and Tunisian activists brainstormed on the use of technology to evade surveillance, commiserated about torture and traded practical tips on how to stand up to rubber bullets and or- ganize barricades” (Kirkpatrick and Sanger). Arming civilians with
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laptops, rather than guns, drew new demographics into the politi- cal realm and provided a mouthpiece for the voices of ordinary Arabs to reach transnational information channels. The nature of the blogosphere allowed for increased, broad- reaching participation, leading some analysts to bemoan the vari- ous movements’ lack of a hierarchical leadership structure. How- ever, the decentralized character of the tech savvy pro-democracy forces actually served the movements strategic interests. Use of the Internet enabled Arabs to channel one of the region’s most abundant natural resources—its youth. People between the ages 15 to 29 make up the largest share of the population across the Mid- dle East, creating a regional phenomenon known as “youth bulge” (Sayre and Constant). In Egypt and Tunisia young people repre- sent 29% of the population, compared with 28% in Bahrain, 30% in Jordan, 31% in Algeria, and 34% in Iran (Sayre and Constant). As the largest existing constituency in the region, it is only logical that Arab youth should spearhead the means of struggle against oppressive regimes. Tapping into their intelligence and networking capabilities was the rational choice for enacting the successful pro- democracy movements.
Limits to the Efficacy of Nonviolent Strategy? The Libyan Case
In analyzing the Arab Spring, Libya presents an exceptional case with its decline into a brutal civil war fueled by foreign military intervention. The level of violence witnessed mars the image of what had been a largely nonviolent regional phenomenon. Was there simply an absence of the dynamic agents of change to em- ploy strategic nonviolent tactics? Many analysts call the Libyan pro-democracy movement’s failure an indicator that large-scale nonviolent action “can’t work” when faced with a brutal dictator. Worse still, some Orientalists assume that the tribal roots of many Libyans preclude them from waging nonviolent strategic warfare. A true examination of the actions that ordinary Libyans undertook during the uprising’s inception, however, reveals these to be equally false assumptions.
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Libyans did face additional challenges enacting their nonvio- lent resistance (compared to Egypt and Tunisia). Many of these structural obstacles originate in Libya’s “rentier state” economy, in which the government depends on oil revenues, rather than the la- bor and taxes of its people, to enrich state coffers (Zunes “Carnage in Libya”). Because the regime is less reliant on the cooperation of its people, popular nonviolent uprisings have less access to the re- gime’s power base, and resistance through non-cooperation is less effective (Zunes “Power of Nonviolent Action”). This state struc- ture also rendered a weaker Libyan civil society in comparison to states that experienced more successful nonviolent civil insurrec- tions (Zunes “Power of Nonviolent Action”). Unlike Egypt and Tunisia, where the regimes manipulated the elections and disqualified opposition parties, Gaddafi’s tyrannical rule prohibited the formation of any political parties whatsoever (Zunes “Armed Revolt”). Additionally, the regime banned any inde- pendently functioning human rights or nongovernmental organi- zations and routinely jailed, tortured, and murdered government dissidents (Zunes “Armed Revolt”). Still, despite this repressive environment, there are numerous cases to indicate that the original uprising against Gaddafi was pri- marily nonviolent. In early February, pro-democracy forces began to withdraw their compliance from the regime. In less than a week, the nonviolent movement took control of most of the cities in the eastern part of the country as well as many in the west (Zunes “Lessons From Libya”). Moreover, University of Michigan profes- sor Juan Cole also asserts that, prior to armed rebels “liberating” Tripoli from pro-regime forces, a large, unarmed civil insurrection “had already overthrown the regime” (qtd. in Zunes “Lessons From Libya”). Cole goes on to observe that “working class districts rose up, in the hundreds of thousands and just overthrew the regime” (qtd. in Zunes “Lessons From Libya”). Khaled Darwish also told of these unarmed forces in his August 2011 New York Times article. He described the mobilization of Tripoli’s civilians before rebel forces entered the city, rushing to the streets to fend off snipers and chanting anti-Gaddafi slogans over loudspeakers (Darwish). Meanwhile, as previously noted, pro-democracy forces in Beng-
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hazi were establishing interim local governments run by popular democratic committees. It was also during this nonviolent, early period of the Libyan revolt that thousands of soldiers defected from the army, pilots in- tentionally crashed their planes and refused orders to target pro- testors, and many cabinet members, ambassadors, and top military officers resigned (Darwish). These successes for pro-democracy forces continued until Gaddafi’s February 22, 2011, speech in which he threatened to mas- sacre those residing in rebel strongholds signaling the revolution’s violent turn (Zunes “Lessons From Libya”). Still, the early prog- ress made by unarmed Libyan civilians proves that nonviolence can be an effective tactic, regardless of repressive conditions. In order to explain why the initially nonviolent movement dissolved into armed revolt and protracted civil war, we must shift our attention from preexisting structural factors. Looking instead to the actual strategies deployed by Libyan ac- tivist, we see that the revolution veered from its nonviolent trajec- tory due to poor organization and miscalculations. In Civilian Jihad Maria J. Stephan asserts that, “as with any other skills based enter- prise, training leads to better outcomes for nonviolent resistance movements.” In order to wage a successful insurrection, activists must gain advantage by leveraging their weapons of nonviolence, using deliberate, strategic tactics in order to target the regime where it is weakest. According to Stephan, maintaining such a dis- ciplined movement requires creativity and strategic planning, the ability to adapt to regime oppression, and a clear means of com- municating goals in order to sustain the movement’s ideological momentum. The Libyan nonviolent movement struggled in this strategic decision-making process, stalling the revolution’s progress. Rami G. Khouri, director of the Institute for Public Policy and Interna- tional Affairs at the American University of Beirut, points out that concentrated forms of nonviolent action (like popular demonstra- tions) are easier for the regime to crack down on in comparison to less visible, dispersed nonviolent campaigns (qtd. in Stephan). This distinction is crucial when one has a brutal regime like Gaddafi’s,
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harboring little reluctance to slaughtering its unarmed protestors. Thus, the main error of the Libyan pro-democracy movement was a lack of diversification of nonviolent actions presenting the re- gime with minimal barriers to wiping out the opposition. Stephen Zunes confirms such tactical mistakes in his recent Huffington Post editorial. The scholar notes that “the largely spontaneous Libyan uprising, in its nonviolent phase, focused almost exclusively on mass protests, making them easy targets for Gaddafi’s repression, rather than relying on more diverse tactics—including strikes (which could have been particularly effective in the oil industry) boycotts, slowdowns, and other forms of non-cooperation.” Ultimately, the events in Libya do not reflect a flaw in the ef- ficacy of nonviolence, nor do they reveal the inability of Libyans to utilize nonviolent tactics. Accordingly, the Libyan case should not serve as fodder for those advocating a military solution as the only alternative to toppling a repressive Middle Eastern regime.
Nonviolent Action Matters
Arab activists not only broke repressive regimes—their use of non- violent, strategic action shatters many conceptual barriers. In his book, Arab Voices: What They Are Saying and Why it Matters, James Zogby articulates these generalized views. According to Zogby, one of the main “super myths” that most Americans hold regard- ing Arabs is that they are “fire breathers … angry and consumed by contempt for the West.” New York Times columnist Thomas Fried- man is among the foremost architects of this negative Arab ste- reotype. In his 2006 op-ed, “Mideast Rules to Live By,” Friedman presented fifteen unyielding rules intended to guide Americans in their political dealings with Arabs. With statements like “In the Middle East, the extremists go all the way and the moderates tend to just go away,” and, “The most underestimated emotion in Arab politics is humiliation,” Friedman casts an anti-intellectual pall over regional politics. This bleak and simplistic message re- duces millions of Arabs—be they farmer or CEO, taxi driver or computer engineer—to a tribe of angry barbarians. Rather than
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shed light on Arab diversity and humanity—which would enable Americans to understand some of the cultural roadblocks facing our relations—Friedman’s analysis depicts all of the region’s inhab- itants as untrustworthy extremists. These bigoted generalizations persist in the West because we rarely see anything to refute them. In Islamophobia Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg highlight the silence of the media around Arabs until they become a threat by committing acts of violence. The result is an immutable, crude view of Arabs, who become in- herently linked to terrorism owing to American’s sheer lack of fa- miliarity with any other aspects of their identities (Gootschalk and Greenberg). Hollywood is also a large purveyor of this villafied Arab cari- cature, as Jack Sheehan demonstrates in his groundbreaking docu- mentary Reel Bad Arabs. The film explores various degrading depic- tions of Arabs in American movies and TV shows—from barbaric desert dwellers and passive maidens to greedy pashas and explo- sives-laden “terrorists.” The persistence of such stock characters has over time, according to Sheehan, solidified prejudiced attitudes toward Arabs and Arab culture. Immersed in such imagery, it be- comes difficult for many to conceptualize Arabs as ordinary, ratio- nal individuals. Zogby’s assertion that “Arabs, just like anybody, are a mix of values, interests, and contradictory impulses,” is subsumed by the one-dimensional image of the turbaned militant. However, with the advent of the Arab Spring, a new vision of “the Arab” is emerging to replace this negative caricature. The Arab activists who orchestrated the various pro-democracy movements were educated, calculating, and mostly young—a far cry from the cartoon villain occupying the forefront of many Western imagina- tions. Through the use of strategic nonviolent action these rational actors contradicted the Western assumption that all Arab struggles are “unprincipled, raw struggles for power” (Zogby). Rather, Arabs are mastering technology and other creative, nonviolent means to enact revolution, challenging the Orientalist view (constructed by journalists like Friedman) that precludes them from such strategic, political thought. Nonviolent strategic action is thus overriding the traditionally assumed Arab propensity towards violence and
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extremism, presenting the Western psyche with a picture of Arabs as rational, intelligent people—people like Westerners. Such a view will not only shift Western perceptions of Arabs, but also alter how Arabs see themselves. The aforementioned ste- reotypes and negative international portrayals of Arabs have con- tributed to a pervasive inferiority complex suffered at the hands of the West (Zogby). Owning nonviolent action as a homegrown, native force for democracy may empower countless Arabs.
Future Implications
The Arab Spring represents a framework for grassroots, nonviolent resistance. Departing from the traditional, one-way flow of influ- ence from the West, the recent uprisings provide a model worthy of Western emulation. The first signs of these shifting cultural perceptions are visible in the wave of popular protest movements sweeping across the United States and other Western countries. Though the Occupy movement aims to combat corporate greed and inequality rather than oppressive regimes, many analysts have suggested that its origins lie in the Middle East. Articulating this view, a recent CNN article claimed that “like the “Arab Spring” uprisings that inspired its tactics, Occupy Wall Street is evolving” (Peppitone). With Tahrir Square as the new symbol for “people power,” important attitudinal changes are taking place worldwide, shifting the global spotlight from its usual focus in the region—po- litical violence, tyranny, foreign adventurism, and fundamentalism to Arabs demonstrating the successes of strategic nonviolent ac- tion (Stephan). Countless Western activists attest to the new model of “Arab cool” when organizing civilian resistance movements. The myth of the “irascible Arab” is being replaced by an intel- ligent, strategic actor, and that may impact the how the U.S. and other Western powers relate to the Arab World. Highlighting the significance of cultural perceptions, Jack Sheehan notes inReel Bad Arabs that “[Arab] images and politics are linked; they reinforce one another … policy enforces mythical images, mythical images
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help enforce policy.” As these various revolutions run their course and nascent Arab democracies take form, Western governments must reassess traditional policies in the region. Dr. David Lieper, author of The Optimistic Muslim, validates this point. Lieper cri- tiques modern diplomacy in the Arab world, saying it comes from “a ‘once upon a time’ where leaders held absolute power over their ignorant masses … those models just don’t reflect the world we live in today” (Liepert). Gone are the days of covert dealings with cor- rupt dictators—the events of the Arab Spring prove that true po- litical power in these states resides with people. Accordingly, any new foreign policy must cater to ordinary Arab people. Time will tell whether shifting cultural perceptions from uncivilized Bedouin to laptop-wielding revolutionary, and from irrational terrorist to strategic, rational actor will produce a spillover effect in the politi- cal realm. It stands to reason that once the view of Arabs as ratio- nal, calculating individuals takes hold, Western governments will structure their rhetoric accordingly and engage new Arab states in enlightened negotiations. This is a hopeful prognosis for Arab and Western relations where cooperation and coexistence is frequently opposed by cultural misunderstandings.
Conclusion
Ultimately, nonviolence as a revolutionary strategy is not antitheti- cal to Arab and Muslim culture and values, nor does a confluence of structural and geopolitical factors exclude regional actors from utilizing nonviolent means to achieving political ends. The Arab Spring demonstrates that nonviolence is an effective tactic for top- pling regimes and enacting pro-democracy struggles in the Middle East. It is precisely because of—not in spite of—the social, politi- cal, and religious make up of the region that nonviolent tactics rep- resent a rational choice for strategic Arab activists. Bringing Arab nonviolence to the fore, rather than exclusively focusing on vio- lence in the region, will both diminish the allure of violence as a revolutionary tactic and deepen Western understanding of a ratio- nal, intelligent people.
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Works Cited
Bishara, Marwan. “Egypt’s Aftershocks: Military vs The People.” Al Jazeera. 11 Nov. 2011. Web.
Chenoweth, Erica, and Maria J. Stephan. Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict. New York: Columbia UP, 2011. Print.
Darwish, Khaled. “When Libya Grew Wings.” The New York Times. 24 Aug. 2011. Web.
Diwan, Kristen S. “Bahrain’s Shia Question: What the United States Gets Wrong About Sectarianism.” Foreign Affairs (2011). Council on Foreign Relations, 2 Mar. 2011. Web.
“Egypt: Seeds of Change.” People and Power. Al Jazeera. 9 Feb. 2011. Television.
“Egyptians Campaign for Independence, 1919-1922.” Global Nonviolent Action Database. Swarthmore College. Web.
Freedom House. How Freedom Is Won: From Civic Resistance to Durable Democracy. 2005.
Friedman, Thomas. “Mideast Rules To Live By.” Opinion. The New York Times, 20 Dec. 2006. Web.
Gottschalk, Peter, and Gabriel Greenberg. Islamophobia: Making Muslims the Enemy. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2008. Print.
Howard, Dick. “The Resistance of Those Who Desire Not to Be Ruled.” Raison-Publique. 5 June 2011. Web.
Huntington, Samuel. “Revolutions and Political Order.” Revolutions: Theoretical, Comparative, and Historical Studies. Comp. Jack A. Gold- stone. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2008. Print.
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Kirkpatrick, David D., and David E. Sanger. “A Tunisian-Egyptian Link That Shook Arab History.” The New York Times. 13 Feb. 2011. Web.
Kishtainy, Khaled. “Nonviolence and ‘Civilian Jihad’.” Common Ground News Service. Web.
Liepert, David. “How To Really Help Yemen Stop Their Civil War.” The Huffington Post. 24 May 2011. Web.
Marx, Karl, and Frederick Engels. “Manifesto of the Communist Party.” Revolutions: Theoretical, Comparative, and Historical Studies. Comp. Jack Goldstone. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2008. Print.
Moore, Barrington. Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy; Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World. Boston: Beacon, 1966. Print.
Peppitone, Julianne. “How Occupy Wall Street Has Evolved.” CNN- Money. CNN, 6 Oct. 2011. Web.
“Q&A: Gene Sharp.” Interview. Opinion. Al Jazeera. 6 Dec. 2011. Web.
“Reel Bad Arabs.” Dir. Jack Shaheen. Media Education Foundation, 2007. DVD.
Sayre, Edward, and Samantha Constant. “The Whole World Is Watch- ing.” The National Journal. 21 Feb. 2011. Web.
Sharp, Gene. The Politics of Nonviolent Action, 3 vols. (Boston: Porter Sar- gent Publishers, 1973).
Stephan, Maria J. Introduction. Civilian Jihad: Nonviolent Struggle, De- mocratization, and Governance in the Middle East. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. 1-11. Print.
Ryzova, Lucie. “The Battle of Cairo’s Muhammad Mahmoud Street.” Al Jazeera. 29 Nov. 2011. Web.
Stolberg, Sheryl. “Shy U.S. Intellectual Created Playbook Used in a
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Revolution.” The New York Times. 16 Feb. 2011. Web.
“The End of A Dictator.” Special Series: The Arab Awakening. Al Jazeera. 23 Nov. 2011. Television.
Waterbury, John. “Democracy Without Democrats?” Democracy Without Democrats?: The Renewal of Politics in the Muslim World. By Ghassan Salaame. London: I.B. Tauris, 1994. Print.
Zogby, James J. Arab Voices: What They Are Saying to Us, and Why It Mat- ters. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Print.
Zunes, Stephen. “Libya: Was Armed Revolt and Western Intervention the Only Option?” The Huffington Post, 31 Mar. 2011. Web. 17 Oct. 2011.
______. “Credit the Egyptian People for the Egyptian Revolution.” The New York Times. 18 Feb. 2011. Web.
______. “Lessons and False Lessons from Libya.” The Huffington Post. 31 July 2011. Web. 17 Oct. 2011.
______. “Lessons and Signs of Hope Amidst the Carnage in Libya.” YES! Magazine. 25 Feb. 2011. Web.
______. “Nonviolent Action and Pro-Democracy Struggles.” Washing- ton, D.C.: Foreign Policy In Focus, 24 Jan. 2008. Web.
______. “Recognizing the Power of Nonviolent Action.” Silver City, NM & Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, 30 Mar. 2005. Web.
______. “Weapons of Mass Democracy.” YES! Magazine. Positive Futures Network, 16 Sept. 2009. Web.
67 Towards Automated Discovery of Protein Function
WRITER’S COMMENTS
As I progressed through my Molecular Biology degree, I began to notice what seemed like an exponentially fast growing association between computers, technology and biology. This connection interested me, and provoked me to take an interdisciplinary course with Professor Francis- Lyon in Bioinformatics, which eventually lead to my senior project on protein docking. In association with Professor John Irwin at UCSF, I took on a project which attempts to find new ways to correlate the proteins and their functions, throughout all species of life, based on the relation- ships we see in DNA. The amount of data building up in the world around us is astounding; with all this information, we should be able to use some of it to make new discoveries in protein function. This is the ambition of the project John and I set out to achieve one year ago, and here are the final results of the project. I would like to thank Professor John Irwin and Professor Patricia Francis-Lyon for this opportunity. —Pierce Ogden
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
Bioinformatics is a research-intensive field that sits at the intersection of computer science and molecular biology. In my Bioinformatics class Pierce added computer programming to his prior skills in molecular biology and chemistry. This enabled him to do research with John Ir- win of UCSF’s School of Pharmacy. The problem he investigated is an important one: advances in recent decade have revealed the composi- tion and structures of many proteins, which are key elements in all of our life processes. Can an automated process be developed to discover how these proteins function? Progress in science takes place not only through research, but through communication of discoveries to others so that future work can leverage new knowledge and approaches. Pierce has articulated his research in oral and poster presentations, and now in this article. His exposition is thorough, concise and clear: a good ex- ample of scientific writing. —Patrica Francis-Lyon, Department of Computer Science
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p i e r c e o g d e n Towards Automated Discovery of Protein Function
Abstract
Modern high throughput structure determination techniques have yielded an ever expanding database of over 80,000 three-dimen- sional protein structures, evidenced by the growth of the Protein Data Bank (PDB). Surprisingly, at least 2,000 of these have no function associated with them. Target-based virtual screening has emerged as a pragmatic way to discover ligands, and arisen as a way to gain insight into protein function. We created an automated high throughput method of docking to suggest compounds to test as ligands in the lab. DOCK Blaster1, a free public molecular dock- ing service, was used for docking. We docked ligands from ZINC2, a free database of commercially available compounds in ready to dock formats and subsets. First, a preliminary study of 100 tar- gets for which function and ligand were known was run to see if automation would be fruitful. We developed automated docking against these 100 targets for retrospective benchmarking, as a way of recapitulating what we already know. This automated system is now being used prospectively in an attempt to discover function of unknown targets. Here, an initial run of the benchmark proteins is profiled, and future use of automated docking is discussed.
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Introduction
o l e c u l a r d o c k i n g has emerged as a pragmatic approach for modeling protein-ligand interactions.1, 3-6 Tools such as DOCKM Blaster3 enable very high throughput screening of large molecule databases against a particular target in a time-efficient manner. Docking provides a template of molecules to begin test- ing and narrows the process of finding possible ligands greatly. In addition to ligand discovery, an application of molecular docking that has recently been used successfully is the prediction of pro- tein function4,7 based on top-scoring ligands. The idea is to dock metabolites and natural products and pick from among the top- scoring ligands that fit well, and in the case of an enzyme, are in a catalytically competent pose. Lots of time can be spent working with a specific protein only to find out that it is not candidate for imputing function from docking. However, in docking hundreds of proteins to thousands of ligands, the likelihood is high that we can shed light on the functionality of a small portion of the targets. Based on this knowledge, to facilitate protein function prediction using docking we have designed a semi-automated protocol. Here we describe the protocol, and its application to some proteins of unknown function. We adapted an available high throughput docking protocol nor- mally used for ligand discovery to the problem of function predic- tion. DOCK Blaster is the docking engine we used to dock a large number of molecules from our databases to our targets. This meth- od in itself already has very high throughput. However, we aimed to narrow the scope of ligands that were docked in this high through- put method. By using sequence homologies, we figured that there may be homologous proteins for which substrate interactions have already been characterized. It is our aim that through this informa- tion we may be able to find ligands we can associate with the target protein. If these ligands are higher scoring than the averages, they may serve to as a good starting point for lab testing. To benchmark our protocol we selected 109 well-characterized proteins for which ligand, ligand binding site, and protein structure were already well modeled and characterized. These 109 proteins,
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Figure 1. Flowchart depicting steps of our automated docking process. In cases where protein function is unknown, pockets are picked, and a large number of ligands are docked. The program needs only a PDB code to look up all pertinent information and automate the process.
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the DUD-E benchmark1, have been used to determine how accu- rately DOCK Blaster predicts protein-ligand binding. For each ac- tive site, 50 decoy molecules having similar physical properties yet different chemical properties have been employed. These should not be able to bind to the target site, further testing DOCK Blast- er’s accuracy.1 Bioinformatics techniques were used to see whether there was useful data available which could be correlated to these proteins and provide successful docking results. Having a success- ful test would be a strong indicator that these sequence homology techniques could lead to discovery of useful ligand data for dock- ing, and in turn help characterize different proteins’ functions.
Methods
Automation
Our program aims to automate all the steps associated with the search for and running of different programs, some of which are lo- cal, and some of which are available on the internet. At a high level, the user supplies a list of PDB codes from which the program will look up all the pertinent information, dock the ligands which bind to highly similar proteins, and provide a table of data for analysis. Figure 1 shows a flow chart of the steps of our automated dock process.
Data Collection/Sequence Alignment Query
For our sequence alignment query, we used BLAST, a widely used tool for sequence alignment and search8. BLAST takes its input in FASTA format, which was retrieved via python scripting from the PDB9 website. Once the FASTA-formatted sequences were retrieved, BioPython packages were used to execute the BLAST, and pass the information onwards internally. BLAST only looks at primary sequences, and there are many proteins for which the pri- mary sequence is known but there is no structure. The output was parsed to only include the homologies where there is also a known 3D structure associated with the sequence.
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Uniprot Identification and Ligand Database Construction
Using these PDB codes, we constructed a database of all known ligands associated, based off of the Uniprot system11. Uniprot aims to create a knowledgebase for individual proteins that holds all of the information associated with each protein, and it often groups these proteins into families of homologous proteins. Uniprot codes can be associated with numerous ligands and PDB codes11. By passing the ZINC database a Uniprot code, we were able to create a small database of all known ligands that are associated with each Uniprot code. If no ligands could be found, the protein was set aside and was not docked in the benchmarking study. We created multiple Uniprot codes and ligand databases for each pro- tein, which provided a plethora of potential ligands of homologous proteins to dock.
Docking and Analysis
Each ligand in the database is docked individually to the ligand site specified using DOCK Blaster1. For the specific DUD targets, the binding site for the original ligand is known, and thus used as our binding site. In unknown proteins, the binding sites are also gen- erally unknown, which forced us to use a pocket picker to deter- mine binding site location.12 This extra step adds another degree of complexity, since algorithmic pocket picking generally leads to multiple potential pocket sites. Results were initially analyzed by comparing the mean energy of ligands docked versus decoys. Re- ciever Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve analysis, using the decoy molecules as comparison, was then used to infer the binding site that corresponded to the ligands. Docking predictions were also analyzed visually to determine whether the they were sensible, by observing poses and molecule placement.
73 Towards Automated Discovery of Protein Function
PDBs 109 Total Uniprots Found 256 Working Uniprots for Docking 126 Mean Energy Uniprot Ligands -35.3425 Mean Energy Decoy Ligands -13.2914 AUC for Uniprots vs. Decoys 61.15 Log AUC Uniprots vs. Decoy 4.73
Figure 2. Uniprot Associated Ligands and their Energy Statistics
Figure 3. Exponential growth of the Protein Data Bank.
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Results
Initial results for the retrospective docking of 109 DUD targets were encouraging (see Figure 2). For the 109 targets, 256 poten- tial Uniprot codes were found to have homologies, and of those 126 yielded ligands for docking. Mean energy for these ligands was more than 2.5 times less than mean energy for decoys, showing that DOCK Blaster can successfully place associated ligand compounds in energy states which are much lower and thus more spontane- ous than decoys. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were plotted for 76 of the Uniprot instances. Area under the curve (AUC) was calculated for each plot to determine the probability that DOCK Blaster would dock a positive ligand versus a negative decoy. The average AUC value for the 76 working instances was 61.15, and log AUC was 4.738. In many cases molecule orientation and hydrogen bond loca- tions were also well conserved (see Figure 4). Key protein residues used for protein-ligand interactions were used repeatedly by the ligands as hydrogen bond donors and acceptors. Different high- ly polar functional groups, such as amino, carboxyl, keto groups were placed in similar orientations throughout the binding pocket, showing that DOCK Blaster often placed molecules in an ordered fashion. Aromatic rings were also often found in conserved loca- tions in multiple sites, over many ligands. Overall, this technique of ligand determination was successful and fruitful at picking prop- er molecules for docking.
75 Towards Automated Discovery of Protein Function
Figure 4. Adenosine deaminase (2e1w), part of the DUD and DUD-E bench- marks, complexed with ligands from associated Uniprot code P27847. Struc- tures are analogous and pose is conserved, as are the hydrogen bonding domains. Blue lines (top) indicate hydrogen bonds, which are contributed by 3 residues only. Phenyl groups are oriented to face out of the pocket in many instances. Results support the use of BLAST and UNIPROT for protein function determination.
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Figure 5. Example ROC analysis from dud targets 2OW0 (top) and 1SJO (bottom). Dotted line indicates 100% random result. Blue line indicates a plot of % Ligands found (true positives) vs. % Decoys found (false positives). AUC value is in bottom left corner of each graph. ROC plots indicate ligands were found at faster rates than decoys.
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Discussion
Docking has proven its place as a useful and widely applicable tool for biologists studying protein chemistry1, 3-7. Two main results emerge from this study. First, retrospective benchmarking studies against 109 targets were reassuringly good, showing that automat- ed docking does work in these cases where ligands are known and the protein has already been intensively studied. Second, prospec- tive docking of biogenic molecules against proteins of unknown function yielded many reasonable docked molecules, but we were unable to test these predictions experimentally during the short duration of this project. The prospective work was challenging. This is expected, as unknown proteins generally don’t have known ligands, making docking difficult. For this reason, an automated high throughput system, using sequence homology techniques, may prove useful for determining a small percentage of these pro- teins’ functions. Techniques are always being developed to help speed-up the very computationally expensive process of docking13. This will make automated processes used to discover function able to run at a rate more suited for program efficacy. An initial problem that needs to be researched in further depth is how to rank pockets picked by the pocket picker12. More research needs to look into the instances in which the pocket picker is effective, and what conditions its success is correlated with. There are thousands of protein structures without assigned functions14. This research is in its infancy, and is ongoing. As more and more structures are generated, it is imperative to use all avail- able data to help us determine function; enabling us to understand the intricacies behind life’s basic biological processes.
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References
1. Irwin, JJ, Shoichet BK, Mysinger M, Colizzi F, and Cao Y. Auto- mated Docking Screens: A Feasibility Study. Journal of Medicinal Chemistry [serial online]. 2009;52(18):5712-5720. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Published September 24, 2009. Accessed May 17, 2012.
2. Irwin JJ, Sterling S, Mysinger MM, Bolstad ES and Coleman RG. ZINC – A free tool to discover chemistry for biology. J. Chem. Inf. Model., Just Accepted Manuscript. doi: 10.1021/ci3001277
3. Laurie A, Jackson R. Methods for the Prediction of Protein-Li- gand Binding Sites for Structure-Based Drug Design and Virtual Ligand Screening. Current Protein & Peptide Science [serial online]. 2006;7(5):395-406. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ip- swich, MA. Accessed May 17, 2012.
4. Hermann J, Marti-Arbona R, Raushel F, et al. Structure-based activity prediction for an enzyme of unknown function. Nature [serial online]. 2007;448(7155):775-779. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Published August 16, 2007. Ac- cessed May 17, 2012.
5. Okimoto N, Futatsugi N, Taiji M, et al. High-Performance Drug Discovery: Computational Screening by Combining Docking and Molecular Dynamics Simulations. Plos Computational Biology [serial online]. 2009;5(9):1-13. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Accessed May 17, 2012.
6. Hermann J, Ghanem E, Yingchun L, Raushel F, Irwin J, Shoichet B. Predicting Substrates by Docking High-Energy Intermedi- ates to Enzyme Structures. Journal Of The American Chemical Society [serial online]. 2006;128(49):15882-15891. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Published December 13, 2006. Accessed May 17, 2012.
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7. Favia A, Nobeli I, Glaser F, Thornton J. Molecular Docking for Substrate Identification: The Short-Chain Dehydroge- nases/Reductases. Journal Of Molecular Biology [serial online]. 2008;375(3):855-874. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Published January 18, 2008. Accessed May 17, 2012.
8. Stephen F. Altschul, Thomas L. Madden, Alejandro A. Schäffer, et al. (1997), “Gapped BLAST and PSI-BLAST: a new genera- tion of protein database search programs”, Nucleic Acids Res. 25:3389-3402.
9. http://www.rcsb.org/pdb/
10. Peter J. A. C, Tiago A, Michiel J. L. de H, et al. Biopython: freely available Python tools for computational molecular biology and bioinformatics. Bioinformatics [serial online]. 2009;25(11):1422. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Ac- cessed May 17, 2012.
11. Magrane M. and the UniProt consortium. UniProt Knowledge- base: a hub of integrated protein data. Database, 2011: bar009 (2011).
12. Coleman R, Sharp K. Protein Pockets: Inventory, Shape, and Comparison. J. Chem. Inf. Model. 2010;50(4):589–603. doi: 10.1021/ci900397t.
13. Marcia R, Mitchell J, Wright S. Global optimization in protein docking using clustering, underestimation and semidefinite programming. Optimization Methods & Software [serial online]. 2007;22(5):803-811. Available from: Academic Search Premier, Ipswich, MA. Accessed May 17, 2012.
14. Gabanyi MJ, Adams PD, Arnold K, et al. (2011). The Struc- tural Biology Knowledgebase: a portal to protein structures, sequences, functions, and methods. J Struct Funct Genomics, in press.[doi:10.1007/s10969-011-9106-2]
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WRITER’S COMMENTS
Determined to write about one of my lifelong passions—food—for my second essay in Professor Dempster’s First-Year Seminar: Language and Power, I scoured our assigned anthology, The Writer’s Presence, for inspiration. I stumbled upon Geeta Kothari’s “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?” And thanks to Fusion, I was able to locate Chang- rae Lee’s “Magical Dinners,” an article I had originally read in The New Yorker several years before. As second-generation children of immigrant parents, Kothari and Lee share similar struggles in balancing tradition and exploration and in establishing an identity that amalgamates their heritage with American culture. Both authors examine their experienc- es honestly and poignantly, which naturally invited me, a two-and-a-half generation daughter, to do the same. Ultimately, my hope is that you will see food as much more than a biological requirement. Bon appétit! —Deborah Szeto
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
In this inventive analysis—one of the best first-year student essays I have read—Deborah creates a focused yet ambitious meditation on food. Demonstrating her command of synthesis, Deborah makes surprising connections between diverse sources: Japanese American wartime in- carceration memoirs, contemporary Asian American writing, psychoso- cial development theory, and research on nutrition. At opportune times, she spices her rigorous academic writing with personal experience. Her holistic approach and elegant style give merit to a subject that deserves more scholarly attention: the complex intersections between food, cul- ture, identity, and history. Through this multifaceted lens, Deborah un- derscores the vital role of food for both Asian American immigrants and their second-generation children. She shows us that food is not some- thing that we merely hunger for and eat: food is distance and comfort; assimilation and tradition; division and completion. —Brian Komei Dempster, Department of Rhetoric and Language
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d e b o r a h s z e t o
Life of a Second-Generation Child: Gastronomic Adventures and Cultural Exploration
w a s s h o c k e d to find out that Jessie had never had Spam. Spam— the notorious rectangular blue and yellow can with a pork and hamI amalgam popularized during World War II. “What’s Spam?” she asked, genuinely confused. I was willing to guess that the only Spam she had ever heard of was the kind that clutters your email inbox with offers for Viagra and proclamations of lottery winnings. “It’s like ... canned meat,” I tried to explain. “But it’s really not as gross as it sounds. It’s really good.” There is always at least one can of that stuff in our cupboard— an unhealthy rarity in my broccoli-consuming, oatmeal-devouring, health-concerned household. My dad regularly dices it up and throws it in with his fried rice, and it’s a staple at lazy weekend breakfasts—we always get our allotment of two thin, fried pieces of Spam with our scrambled eggs and toast. I thought for sure that everyone had tried it at least once. But not my friend Jessie, daugh- ter to two Asian immigrants, whose mother presumably cooked Chinese or Taiwanese style each night. “Nope, I’ve never had it,” she said. Still flabbergasted, I remember returning from school that day and telling my mom and dad that one of my friends had never had Spam before. Ever. Clearly, my naïveté had gotten the best of me. But after a short while, I began to understand why her negative, initially shocking answer was, in fact, reasonable. Food plays an extremely important role in virtually every world culture, not only as its own separate cultural entity, but also as one that intertwines with religion, customs, and even the arts. Food
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heals the afflicted and nourished our hungry ancestors. Food breaks our spiritual fasts, feeds our mystical deities, and never fails to show sacrificial love or exhibit transcendental beauty. Its cultural signifi- cance is heightened by the fact that we eat not only during holidays or religious observances or at special celebrations, but we make it an integral part of our daily lives. Most Chinese, especially those of the first generation, eat rice almost every day, sometimes for breakfast (congee), lunch, and dinner. Similarly, most Koreans ac- company the majority of their meals with kimchi. A sense of stabil- ity accompanies the constant consumption of certain foods; they are familiar and comforting—like a mother’s milk to a baby. They remind us of home, evoking images of the whole family around the dinner table and the distinctive smells of casseroles and stir-frys lovingly prepared by mom or dad. However, tensions often arise between immigrant parents’ de- sires to create a sense of home and preserve their culture through food with their second-generation children’s desires to not feed stereotypes and fit in with their American peers. Historically, even the American government played a role in assimilation through the forced obliteration of native culture, including eating habits. These conflicts over food—an ostensibly benign topic—present struggles for second-generation children. Pulled in every direction—by some forces that demand that they uphold their roots and others that demand assimilation—they must break free of this predicament and achieve the ideal resolution for both parties: appreciation for their heritage and a yearning to transmit it to their children. Immigrants to the United States, as well as their children, essen- tially face three choices when dealing with the acculturation pro- cess: resistance, conformity, or “biculturalism” (Kittler and Sucher 6). Relative resistance means staying “emotionally” rooted in their respective home country’s culture by “adopting some majority cul- ture values and practices” but surrounding themselves with people of the same heritage (Kittler and Sucher 6). For example, if you are the daughter of Indian immigrants, you might be encouraged to speak English and celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas, but you would be barred from marrying out of your ethnicity. Food-wise, this would probably entail consuming primarily Indian food, and
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because you hail from North India, dal, biryani, and chapati are all regulars at your dinner table. You eat potatoes diced up with cau- liflower and turmeric, not mashed with butter and cream. Dessert consists of gajar halwa, a mixture of shredded carrots, milk, and sugar—as far away from apple pie à la mode as you can get. There are various reasons for immigrants’ desires to remain ingrained in their native culture, and many wish to combat their loneliness by evoking feelings of home. In a sea of unfamiliar faces, sights, and customs, one method of preserving their heritage is by preparing and eating familiar foods, the scents and flavors sooth- ing to their homesick souls. Chang-rae Lee, in “Magical Dinners,” describes his parents’ yearnings for purely Korean cuisine:
The other reality is that my parents don’t want to eat non- Korean food; they want to hold on to what they know. What else do they have but the taste of those familiar dishes, which my mother can, for the most part, re-create from ingredients at the nearby A & P. (“Magical Dinners”)
As Korean immigrants into New York, and on top of that, the “sole permanent emigrants of either clan,” Lee’s parents have no money, no family in this country, and no safety net (“Magical Din- ners”). They have nobody to fall back on; their closest relatives are an ocean and thousands of miles away. They have most likely as- similated themselves to American culture in a few, necessary ways (e.g., Lee’s dad works as a psychiatrist at the Bronx Veteran Affairs hospital and probably dons a suit and tie), but so desperately hold on to pieces of a culture they know by heart—and by smell and taste. The “few cups of the ground red-pepper powder that friends brought over from Seoul” and the “proper oils and fresh tofu and dried anchovies and sheets of roasted seaweed” are foods they can only obtain every once in a while from a Sunday drive down to Chinatown; these are more than just precious Korean commodi- ties, they are little fragments of home, constencies in a world of uncertainties (Lee). Akin to the experiences of Lee’s parents are those of Geeta Kothari’s parents, particularly her mother, who, along with her
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father, are Indian immigrants from New Delhi. Kothari’s mother, whom she describes as the primary chef in “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?”, mainly cooks everyday Indian food such as yellow dal, rice, chapati, and bhaji for her family (136). Though she does attempt to learn how to make some American dishes from a catering class, Kothari writes that her mother “talks about ‘back home’ as a safe place, a silk cocoon frozen in time” where she and her sister “do not argue about food with [their] parents” (135). “Home,” Kothari explains, “is where they know all the rules” (135). Clearly, food is a way for her parents to battle wistful feelings for their homeland, where everything is comfortable and safe. There are no strange, new American foods to taint their palates, only In- dian spices they can pick out with their eyes closed and dishes that offer an unparalleled level of security. In this way, both Kothari’s and Lee’s parents utilize food as a way to meet more than their ba- sic biological needs. Food, to them, satisfies the next highest need on Maslow’s hierarchy: a need for safety, particularly for familial stability. Food also gives Kothari’s parents a way to maintain a sense of control—control extending over their lives and perhaps more sig- nificantly, over their identities. For Kothari’s mother to relinquish her “disgust of lobster” would mean “becoming, decidedly, definite- ly, American—unafraid of meat in all its forms, able to consume large quantities of protein at any given meal” (141). While portray- ing Americans somewhat stereotypically as carnivorous meat-de- vourers, Kothari’s mother makes a valid point: that renouncing her aversion for a quintessential American food would imply the subse- quent loss of some portion of her native cultural identity. For some first-generation immigrants, food may be one of the only ways to uphold a steadfast devotion to a faraway country. Additionally, while not a concern for Kothari’s family, disobeying religious cus- toms of not consuming meat may shape Indians’ eating habits. To take a bite of lobster after years of being a devout vegetarian would be sacrilegious to many. To even handle a lobster in the first place would probably be completely unorthodox. Interestingly, studies validate Kothari’s mother’s choices, in that “the Asian Indian im- migrant population is one that is particularly apt to maintain tra-
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ditional eating habits rather than adopting a completely new, Western diet,” perhaps out of loneliness, nationalistic leanings, religious beliefs, or a combination of all (Azar 483). Parents, however, have other, less self-centered motiva- tions to continue preparing ethnic foods. In essence, it is not all about them, but rather about their children, who they hope will not forget their heritage, their roots, their past. Cooking traditional food “serves as a fulcrum for historically construct- ed ethnic or nationalist identity” (Azar 483) as affirmed by Lee’s mother, who serves up a Korean feast on evenings after Chinatown trips, including “fluke or snapper sashimi … with gochujang sauce, then broiled spare ribs and scallion fritters and a spicy cod-head stew along with the banchan of vegetables and kimchi” (“Magical Dinners”). More than a way for her to sustain and carry on her Korean heritage and identity, Korean food is a way for her to feed some of that same pride to her son, Chang-rae. However, Lee craves American food because “it is food without association, unlinked to any past; its food that fixes us to this moment only, to this place we hardly know” (“Magical Dinners”). There are no memories, bad or good, at- tached to “Southern fried chicken and mashed potatoes, beef Stroganoff over egg noodles, lasagna” (Lee). For Lee, this em- bracing of American cuisine means living in the present, em- bracing unfamiliarity, and leaving the past where he believes it belongs—in the past. Kothari’s parents’ opinion is similar yet slightly different from that of Lee’s mother. Instead -of wor rying that Kothari will eventually fail to remember her roots, they are afraid she and her sister “would learn to despise the foods they loved, replace them with bologna and bacon and lose [their] taste for masala” (Kothari 141). Such rejection of food could imply a subtle disregard or even burying her Indian culture and an allowance of American culture take its place. The parental concern could be that Kothari will symbolically shun her Indian identity by rejecting Indian food, throwing away pieces of not only her childhood but also her parents’ traditions in the process. My dad, much like Lee’s and Kothari’s mothers, regularly prepares Chinese dishes as a way for him to maintain his heri-
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tage—and more importantly, spark an interest in and inspire me to maintain mine. Out of his three siblings, he is definitely the most “Chinese,” a fact he is not ashamed of. Not only can he speak Can- tonese the most fluently, and mandated my attendance at Chinese school every Saturday morning for 13 years, he shows the most ap- preciation for Chinese culture (our walls are covered with Chinese scrolls, for example) and, of course, is the clear master chef of Chi- nese cuisine. Interspersed with my mom’s lasagna and enchilada casserole are foo jook tong (bean curd sticks soup), jook (congee), and ketchup shrimp (an authentically Cantonese dish despite the name). Because my father places such a high value on not forget- ting his roots and passing on an appreciation for the Chinese cul- ture to the younger generation, it is not surprising, then, that one of many ways he accomplishes this is by preparing Chinese food— in hopes that I will enjoy it and be able to prepare it myself. I do, in fact, enjoy homemade Chinese food. I think I can en- joy it a lot more than Lee and Kothari did since both my father and mother frequently—more so than Lee’s parents and seemingly more so than Kothari’s—prepare American dishes as well, so I am not torn between two competing cultures. Over the years, I have learned to love and appreciate both ketchup shrimp and spa- ghetti, and I hope that one day my children will also be devouring ketchup shrimp cooked by yours truly. That is what really scares me though—not that I will eventually lose my taste for Chinese dishes and my desire for cultural transmission to my own children, but that I will not be able to replicate their flavors come late adult- hood, when I will be truly independent from my father. He has at- tempted to teach me, but my lack of time and my repeated failure to both realize the importance of preserving precious recipes and to properly record ingredients and techniques have combined to produce my current distress. Parents’ desires to create security, along with their yearnings to impart their culture onto their children through means of tradi- tional foods, however, can pose problems. Though the food can be psychologically calming—particularly for immigrants who desire a sliver of normalcy—they can also be restricting. Immigrant par- ents may use them as a security blanket, as the only things from home that they can still hold on to and wish to pass on. This, in
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turn, may have an adverse effect on their children, many of whom wish to not necessarily abandon the culture of their home country, but at least begin to assimilate into American culture through eat- ing habits. This “assimilation,” defined by Kittler and Sucher as people “[shedding] their ethnic identity and fully [merging] into the ma- jority culture,” would entail almost 100% conformity (6). Histori- cally, such assimilation frequently was the result of force. Many Japanese Americans, particularly right after the start of World War II, were products of such coercion; Japanese Americans were en- couraged to rid themselves of cultural signifiers, including photos, art, and even food. Yoshito Wayne Osaki recalls his family’s hasty shedding of all things Japanese—an involuntary decision purpose- ly designed to create a sense of unwavering loyalty to the United States and not to Japan. Immediately following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Osaki and other Japanese American families removed any- thing that would arouse the FBI’s suspicion. Photos of his family in Japan donning school uniforms “that looked too military-like” and any pictures of the Japanese flag or the emperor had to be discarded, lest someone be arrested and hauled off for patriotic in- clinations (Osaki 102). Osaki’s parents, Japanese language instruc- tors, had to be especially cautious. Osaki supposes that they were “saved by the American flag and portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln” they posted at the front of their classrooms, both educational materials as well as signs of assimilation (Osaki 103). As difficult as it may have been to assimilate into American culture, Japanese Americans knew it was the necessary thing to do. The fires had to be lit, the documents and photographs inciner- ated. After all, conformity (or lack thereof) could mean the differ- ence between life and death. The final cultural blow for the Japanese was incarceration in prison and internment camps, where the food served as another ethnic facet damaged by obligatory assimilation, courtesy of the United States government. Rice, fish, and pickled vegetables were replaced by potatoes, kidneys, and hot dogs (Kitchen Sisters). Sato Hashizume, a former camp prisoner who was accustomed to
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typical Japanese food, subsisted on “Army C rations from number 10 cans” (22). The “slimy spinach” and “overcooked string beans, tinted greenish-black” bore no resemblance to the “fresh produce [they] ate at home” (Hashizume 22). Traditional Japanese cuisine and the customary family gathering around the dinner table was eradicated. In place were “government commodity foods and cast- off meat from Army surplus” and chaotic, mess hall meals which separated parents, grandparents, and children; moreover, many teenagers wanted to eat with their friends (Kitchen Sisters). Essentially, food became symbolic of authority, of a power that forcibly gained control of innocent citizens. This eradication of both traditional cultural cuisine and dining customs points to an even greater complication: a loss of identity. Biologically, the prisoners were still Japanese, but psychologically and culturally— who were they? The Japanese blood coursing through their veins was tainted with foreign food. Metaphorically speaking, Ameri- can feeding tubes were inserted down Japanese peoples’ helpless throats. And there was no way out. Though rice was eventually added to the menu due to prisoners’ protests, “it was often pre- pared badly, served nearly raw or burnt” (Kitchen Sisters). Again, this virtually became another matter of life or death: resist con- forming to American eating habits and you will starve. This ef- fectively left Japanese camp prisoners and internees with only one choice: to begrudgingly eat the food of the country that was un- fairly persecuting them. Along with such historical forces, children are pulled toward assimilation by stereotypes that connect culture to food. Kothari, for example, was friends with a girl who “was surprised to hear” that her uncle was going to use a car, “not an elephant” to pick her up from the Bombay airport (140-141). Other friends inquired wheth- er she ate curry at home, as if to imply that Indian people subsist on that and nothing else (Kothari 136). Though that was 1973, I still hear some make offensive jokes about Indian people’s houses always “reeking of curry,” illustrating the fact that these stereo- types persist even today. With already embedded cultural stereo- types—that Indians’ main mode of transportation are elephants,
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for example—tainting others’ perceptions of them, children of im- migrants may not want to cause more damage by gastronomically perpetuating them. To eat stereotype-related food is conducive to being subjected to racism, however purposeful or inadvertent it may be, since food, like skin color, clothing, and language can be a significant element of difference between natives and immigrants. Sushi does not exactly look the same as a bologna sandwich. Nei- ther does aloo paratha. Or fried rice. It is only understandable, then, that immigrants’ children may want to blend in, to eat what they think of (or stereotype, somewhat ironically) as American food, to take a bite out of a tuna salad sandwich, the lunch Sally and Susan and Johnny’s moms packed for them yesterday. Why would you want to stick out even more when your eyes are already noticeably different shaped or when your hair is about 56 shades darker than everyone else’s, especially as you crave love and belonging—the level above the need for safety on Maslow’s hierarchy? Even if the food fails to elicit blatantly racist comments from their peers, it still distorts cultural images simply by way of asso- ciation. A European-American child who sees his Japanese friend frequently eating sushi for lunch may form the idea (which only gets reinforced by mass-media) that all Japanese people eat is sushi. Or that, for instance, Japanese food consists of either sushi or raw fish or both, since sushi is apparently synonymous with raw fish, the latter of which supposedly makes up 99% of the Japanese diet. “Do you want to go out for Japanese food?” I have frequently asked my friends. The all-too-common, capable of eliciting forehead-in- palm answer: “Well, I don’t really like raw fish.” Too many times, I have explained to my uninformed acquaintances that “there is more to Japanese food than raw fish.” And that not all sushi is raw. And that Japanese people’s diets are actually a lot more extensive. I am not Japanese and am certainly no expert on Japanese cuisine, but I know enough, especially with my Asian heritage, to be the frequent breaker of ubiquitous stereotypes which continue to warp opinions today. Thankfully, I never felt the same pressures to assimilate as some, nor did I fall into the same dilemmas Lee and Kothari faced. As an American by birth, a two-and-a-half generation daughter
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to parents who alternate between Chinese and American cuisine, and a member of a relatively non-discriminatory community, my gastronomic experiences were quite different. My lunches were the epitome of American lunches: sandwiches, fruit, carrot sticks, and a juice box. Consequently, I never felt pressure to assimilate, and my classmates were so diverse that assimilation was never a real problem. I was also lucky enough to never be subjected to the stereotypes Kothari dealt with and that I described above, per- haps due to time period (mindsets toward different races may have shifted since 1973) and geographic location (I grew up in Fremont, California, an extremely diverse city). But for the most part I am simply a special case graced by favorable circumstances. My American-born mother balances out my Chinese-born father. Even then, my father is relatively Ameri- canized since he immigrated to the United States at a young age, though he still tends to lean toward Chinese food—his reliable staple—over everything else when we eat out. However, other second-generation children are not so lucky. So, then, what are they to do? How do they reconcile the forces of homesick parents, the pressures to carry on their culture? What about an unfamiliar, sometimes racist, and frequently stereotyping culture that seems to demand assimilation, and in worst case scenarios, an oppres- sive government? How do they resolve internal conflicts that stem from these mixed messages—and who do they even listen to in the first place? These battles between preserving the first-generation traditions and assimilating into mainstream dominant culture ef- fectively puts children in a double bind, in which choosing one route may imply dishonor of the other. Finding a happy medium is easier said than done. Factors such as age or new environments can reverse a child’s desire to assimilate into dominant culture, shifting their affinity back to their heritage and its foods and subsequently, favor back to the parents. Developmentally, humans around the ages of 12- 18 undergo a psychosocial conflict deemed “identity vs. role con- fusion” (“Stage 5: Adolescence”). During this time adolescents wrestle with the question, Who am I?, in an attempt to find and
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establish their own identities and a sense of independence (“Erik- son’s Stages of Psychosocial Development”). When coupled with a completely new, different, and sometimes culturally inhospitable environment—ironically akin to the type of situation their immi- grant parents were and potentially still are in—adolescents may be- gin to examine their ethnicity more closely. Kothari, for example, is sent from New York to London to boarding school for junior high. Immediately, she experiences a bout of food-related culture shock. It takes her a year to finally comprehend what she was served for lunch on her first day: “sausage rolls, blood pudding, Spam, roast beef in a thin, greasy gravy, all the bacon and sausage I could pos- sibly want”—the quintessential English meal of steak and kidney pie (Kothari 137). Initially perceived as a “thin, overworked pastry in a puddle of lumpy gravy,” it is a far cry from her mother’s yellow dal and chapati and even from bologna and tuna salad sandwiches (Kothari 137). Her classmates “scoff, then marvel, then laugh at [her] ignorance”; her tour guide is “not used to explaining what is perfectly and utterly natural” (Kothari 137). Essentially, Kothari’s circumstances set her up perfectly for an identity tussle. She is 13, a prime age for self-development. Her surroundings are unwel- coming at best. And she has no desire to conform, “even as [she yearns] for acceptance” (Kothari 138). Therefore, she unsurprising- ly declares herself a “vegetarian” and “dooms [herself] to a diet of cauliflower cheese and baked beans on toast,” wondering whether she is “[her] parents’ daughter after all” (Kothari 138). Again, she is the outsider, and again, she sticks out among her classmates who have been eating steak and kidney pie their whole lives. However, for the first time, she makes a conscious decision to be that Fruit Loop in a bowl of Cheerios, eating herbivorously and subsequently affirming, albeit uncertainly, her native culture, the very culture she once tried to reject as a child. Progression into early adulthood beyond the initial psychoso- cial conflict of identity vs. role confusion can also modify children’s perspectives toward their native culture and native foods. For most children, there comes a day when they leave the nest. They grow up, establish their independence, and become adults. They may also be hit with the same realization Kothari comes to: that “one
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day, my parents will be gone, and I will long for the foods of my childhood, the way they long for theirs” (139). Finally, they under- stand what their parents must be feeling—why and how they can find a certain sort of comfort and security in ethnic foods, the reasons that masala and kimchi elicit a peace that bologna and lasagna cannot. They understand because they are placed in the same situation their parents faced many years earlier; the only difference is time. Away from home in an unfamiliar city, forced to establish a life and create some sense of normalcy in poten- tially adverse conditions, they, like Kothari, may begin to crave the cultural foods they know—or knew—so well and “regret the tastes [they’ve] forgotten, the meals [they] have inhaled without a thought” (139). Kothari attempts to “prepare for this day the way people on TV prepare for the end of the world,” not by “[gather- ing] canned goods they will never eat” but by “[stockpiling] reci- pes [she] cannot replicate” (139). I am worried too. Though I have never experienced life as a second-generation child and undergone internal conflict result- ing from competing forces, the fact that I am unable to replicate traditional Chinese recipes is a major cause for panic. I can bake a mean chocolate-chip coffee cake and whip up some darn good- looking cupcakes that might rival Sprinkles and Kara’s. I know my KitchenAid mixer like the back of my hand, how to properly measure wet and dry ingredients, and that for the softest, flakiest scones, it is absolutely necessary to start with ice cold butter. But I don’t know how to prepare fish Chinese-style. I failed the last time I tried, forgetting to rub the sesame oil onto the fish and wondering whether I needed to add pepper. I, unlike my dad, don’t have my grandmother’s methodology for making Chinese steamed meatloaf engraved in my memory. My hands are still clumsy with a cleaver, my mind—clouded with the brief moments I popped in and out of the kitchen to watch my dad dice Chinese mushrooms and sausage—is of no help. I have only devoured the fruits of my father and grandmother’s labor, never stopping to think about or plan for the future. I was only a kid after all. But I have come to realize that I don’t “want to be a person who can find [Chinese]
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food only in restaurants” (Kothari 139). With my grandmother’s age advancing, mental health declining, and my father 40 miles (per- haps even farther in the future) away, I have started to panic. I know that these are recipes that “should be, by now, engraved on my heart,” as familiar and natural to me as the process of whipping egg whites or creaming butter and sugar (Kothari 139). Forget as- similation. Forget attempting to blend in. Any remnants of these are long gone, surpassed by the pressing need to preserve and even- tually pass on such a precious part of my heritage. I was always in tune with my roots, but now there is some sort of invisible pull that seems stronger than ever. Success is within reach, however. Amidst the chaos of first- generation pulling and second-generation pushing, it is possible, as Kittler and Sucher suggest, to arrive at a middle ground—sam- pling equal parts of each culture so as not to discredit or disregard one or the other. You only need several cups of respect, a dash of give-and-take, and numerous heaping tablespoons of open minds and hearts. For Lee, this means accepting regular, post-Chinatown Korean feasts—foods he understands that have a special mean- ing for his immigrant parents, thousands of miles away from their true home. His mother and father, though, are willing to branch out, to live in the present while still not forgetting their past. Lee’s mother accommodates his cravings for American food, copying recipes from cookbooks from an “always smiling, blond-haired, broad-shouldered woman who hails from Vermont” (“Magical Din- ners”). Habitual Friday night dinners of lasagna, “iceberg-and-to- mato-and-carrot salad,” and garlic bread, represent “the unlikely shape of [their] life together—this ruddy pie, what we have today and forever” (Lee). There are most likely feelings of mutual respect between Lee and his parents which, though never explicitly men- tioned in “Magical Dinners,” probably leads to the ultimate resolu- tion: a multicultural Thanksgiving. Of course the majority of the table is laid with Korean food—“gu jeol pan, a nine-compartment tray of savory fillings from which delicate little crepes are made; a jellyfish-and-seaweed salad; long-simmered sweet short ribs; fried hot peppers stuffed with beef; and one of [Lee’s] favorites, thin slices of raw giant clam” (“Magical Dinners”). But there is also a
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turkey, the quintessential American Thanksgiving star, a “celebrity guest” at their meal (Lee). Lee’s father makes the first cut. It is deep, surprisingly easy, and perhaps representative of a definitive reconciliation of intentions and desires (parents and children both realize the significance of the past and present, especially to the opposite party, and arrive at the best solution: a balance) as well as a shared understanding of cultural respect and accommodation. Both parents and son know that while there will be integration of American culture, their Korean roots will never fade, forever immortalized not only in food, but also in Chang-rae. Though he never explicitly states any sort of internal compromise in “Magical Dinners,” the multicultural ending seems to imply that he success- fully navigates the maze of forces—internal, parental, societal, and even governmental—that pulls second-generation children every which way. He understands his parents, does not succumb to com- plete assimilation, and presumably will be eating both lasagna and kimchi as an adult, striking a sort of yin-yang between the compet- ing forces. Kothari paints a similar image of a blending of Indian and American food and culture—not on her Thanksgiving table, but in her kitchen cupboards in a home she shares with her Euro- pean-American husband. She reaches her resolution later in life, but she reaches one nevertheless. Her shelves are stocked with “basmati rice, jars of lime pickle, mango pickle, and ghee, cans of tuna and anchovies, canned soups, coconut milk, and tomatoes, rice noodles, several kinds of pasta, dried mushrooms, and unla- beled bottles of spices” (Kothari 141). She echoes her mother who learned how to make brownies and apple pie but whose first love was and always will be Indian cuisine (Kothari 137). Though, she no longer lives with her parents, they are still a part of her final reconciliation—if only in spirit. Their preferences for the foods of their homeland and wishes for their children to love the foods they loved and continue to love have influenced Kothari’s deci- sions, which illustrate her desire to remain at least partly rooted in her heritage. Additionally, her marriage to a European American works both ways: it keeps her grounded in the present and familiar with typical American tastes, but also ignites Indian pride as she
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coexists with someone who has completely different eating habits and a dissimilar culture. Me, well, I’m hoping to begin stockpiling those recipes soon. My desire to preserve and carry on my heritage has already taken me halfway, but now it is time to actually take action, and take their wisdom and skill with them before the distance grows too large or precious knowledge begins to fade or people pass on. My Thanksgiving table will be laden with homemade Chinese meat- loaf and turkey, my cupboards stocked with sesame oil, soy sauce, cayenne pepper, and bay leaves. I want my children to experience and appreciate both Chinese and American cultures, but I don’t want them to have to undergo inner turmoil to reach a comfortable resolution. I was blessed to grow up in an environment conducive to the former, so my hope is that I can create the same environ- ment in the future. Clearly, the role of food transcends basic fulfillment of our physiological needs. For all the Chang-rae Lees and Geeta Kotharis in the world, food gives rise to larger issues of cultural transmission and identity, of grappling between adherence to tradition versus exploration of the uncustomary. Entangled between multiple influ- ences, other second-generation children and I may find it hard to emerge victorious. We may question our identity, encounter un- inviting environments, clash with our parents, battle stereotypes, and feel disloyal, traitorous, or torn, but this is normal and often necessary. If anything, we should keep in mind that age and its by- products of maturity and new settings often temper situations. And we must remember that these thoughts and struggles are merely ingredients quietly simmering to produce a mindset and way of life that is both gastronomically and culturally satisfying.
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Works Cited
Dixit, Anjali A., Kristin MJ Azar, Christopher D. Gardner, and Latha P. Palaniappan. “Incorporation of Whole, Ancient Grains into a Mod- ern Asian Indian Diet to Reduce the Burden of Chronic Disease.” Nutrition Reviews 69.8 (2011): 479-88. Academic Search Premier. Web. 14 Mar. 2012.
“Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development.” AllPsych Online. AllPsych, 29 Nov. 2011. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.
Hashizume, Sato. “The Food.” From Our Side of the Fence: Growing up in America’s Concentration Camps. Ed. Brian Komei Dempster. San Fran- cisco: Kearny Street Workshop, 2001. 22-24. Print.
Kitchen Sisters, The. “Weenie Royale: Food and the Japanese Intern- ment.” NPR. NPR, 20 Dec. 2007. Web. 6 Mar. 2012.
Kittler, Pamela Goyan, and Kathryn Sucher. “Food and Culture.” Food and Culture. Belmont, CA: Thomson/Wadsworth, 2004. 6. Print.
Kothari, Geeta. “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?” The Writer’s Presence. Eds. Donald McQuade and Robert Atwan. 7th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2012. 132-41. Print.
Lee, Chang-rae. “Magical Dinners.” The New Yorker. 22 Nov. 2010: 68-73. Academic Search Premier. Web. 3 Mar. 2012.
Osaki, Yoshito W. “Yoshito Wayne Osaki with Sally Noda Osaki.” Mak- ing Home from War: Stories of Japanese American Exile and Resettlement. Ed. Brian Komei Dempster. Berkeley, CA: Heyday, 2011. 102-03. Print.
“Stage 5: Adolescence.” Erik Erikson’s 8 Stages of Psychosocial Development. Web. 19 Mar. 2012.
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WRITER’S COMMENTS
As we learned in Dr. Brown’s class, Renaissance in England, many of the period’s works cherished for their classic morals often carried sub- textual messages which were usually subversive or otherwise unpopu- lar—particularly when dealing with outsiders of society. John Milton’s Paradise Lost, an epic poem on the fall of man, offers two diametrically opposite interpretations regarding its portrayal of women: one, that it is a misogynistic piece in which Eve models many negative female ste- reotypes (i.e., vanity, lack of intelligence, codependency); or two, that it instead defends women’s capacity to exist as intellectuals and leaders. While immediate reactions to Milton’s explicit language tend to give the former interpretation, in the following essay, I argue that Milton reverses stereotypical gender roles in his Paradise. In Adam we see a manifesta- tion of all the negative traits that have so unfairly labeled women, and in Eve a graceful showcase of the best traits women have always cov- eted—which, unfortunately, our patriarchal society has always reserved for men. —Martina Peralta
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
In the Renaissance in England Honors class, one of the major topics we explore is the representation of women in the British literature of the Renaissance / Early Modern period. Although feminism and feminist theory became dominant concerns in the 19th and 20th centuries, seri- ous thought about the nature and situation of women occurred in the 15th century in Europe, especially France, and continued throughout the late 18th century. The phenomenon was labeled Le Querelle des Femmes (the debate about women), and it included writers who perpetuated and others who repudiated sexist views of women. Some directly ad- dressed the issues by writing polemics, for example; others did so more obliquely through their portrayal of female characters in their fictional writing. Although Milton has sometimes been viewed as a misogynist, Martina Peralta argues there is a feminist dimension to his portrayal of Eve, an indication he was most likely impacted by and responding to the debate about women. —Carolyn E. Brown, English Department
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m a r t i n a p e r a l t a Trouble in Paradise: Milton’s Portrayal of Gender Stereotypes in Paradise Lost
s p e o p l e of the twenty-first century, we do not have to look far to see the misogynistic attitudes that infect our society. WeA see it in popular music, where women are degraded by lyrics and compromising shots in music videos. We see it in commercials, where advertisements for home accessories feature the female housewife as the star. Sometimes we see it in the workplace, where many women who are doctors, lawyers, and business executives get paid less than their male counterparts. This is an unfortunate ob- servation to make, but perhaps what is even more unfortunate is that these societal constructs are deeply rooted in history. They go back to the diagnoses of Hysteria from the early days of modern psychology, farther back to the Petrarchan view of women as idols, and even farther back to the quarantine of women to the home in the days of antiquity. Where could these troublesome attitudes have originated? In the well-known biblical story of the creation of man, we see that the female sex has been the target of discrimi- nation since the legendary first woman. In 1674 John Milton ex- plored this concept in his epic, Paradise Lost. Considering Milton’s use of misogynistic ideas, coupled with the prevailing attitudes of the time in which he wrote, many read the epic as sexist. However, there are also many critiques that resist that traditional interpreta- tion. In Paradise Lost, Milton shows through Eve that the best hu- man traits are not solely reserved for men, but that women exhibit them naturally; simultaneously, he shows through Adam that men are perfectly capable of displaying the worst traits often historical- ly attributed to women. A close comparison of Milton’s Adam and Eve in the areas of vanity, intellect, codependency, and dominion
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suggests that Milton, in fact, overthrows the misogynistic gender stereotypes that his work has been claimed to promote. In order to understand the gender dynamic in play in Milton’s Eden, the reader first must ask what is masculine and what is femi- nine. Throughout the epic, Milton presents his human couple in the light of the prevailing gender stereotypes of his age. A look at Milton’s explicit descriptions of Adam associates that which is “manly” with “wisdom” and “dominion” (4.490-491). Descriptions of Eve, in contrast, support the stereotypical correlation of femi- ninity with “beauty” and “slackness” (4.490; 11.654). Generally used as a positive descriptor, feminine “beauty” gains women credit for her physical attributes. When overemphasized, beauty becomes a hindrance to women; it hinders the appraisal of her internal attri- butes and her mental and spiritual faculties, thus pigeonholing her as a solely aesthetic being. It makes her a shallow vessel—notice- able on the outside, but empty on the inside. Moreover, women’s confinement to aesthetic beauty results in an associated confine- ment to an aesthetic mind; her concerns, focused on the aesthetic, are superficial. Women must bear the stereotype of vanity, and—as I will later refer to in the pond scene in Book IV—many read Mil- ton’s Eve as such. In fact, to take the misogynistic interpretation of women’s fascination with bodily beauty one step further, it was commonplace in Milton’s day to characterize women as lascivious. Feminine “slackness,” of course, refers to a moral frailty, a lack of integrity and resolution, and ultimately, a dependence on what we can easily assume to be man’s guidance. Adam, and thus all men by association, are made out to be the more intelligent sex. Adam is portrayed as rational, practical, and deserving of his control and superiority over other beings—includ- ing women. Of course, Eve and all other women are comparatively made for beauty and softness; Eve is not expected to be a complex thinker but to be simply the “flesh” to Adam’s “head” (9.1155). She is fickle and depends on the protection and guidance of man. We first see through Satan’s eyes the introductory glance at the human man and woman:
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The image of their glorious Maker shone, Truth, wisdom, sanctitude severe and pure, Severe, but in true filial freedom plac’d, Whence true authority in men; though both Not equal, as their sex not equal seem’d; For contemplation he and valour form’d, For softness she and sweet attractive grace, He for God only, she for God in him. (2.292-299)
Indeed, we see here that Eve is to Adam what Adam is to God— the likeness, the subordinate. Conversing with the angel Raphael, Adam recounts his first impression of Eve: “Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, myself / Before me; Woman is her name, of man / Ex- tracted” (8.494-497). It is Eve’s misfortune to be described in terms of Adam. Here, woman is—in body and in name—a derivative of man. To Adam, she is “Sole Eve, associate sole,” (9.227) an associated entity but merely—solely—an associate to a more worthy subject. Her independent identity is lost in the context of Adam, and a simi- lar plight is extended to all women. This, as Adam tells Eve while they are tending the garden, is woman’s place: “to study household good, / And good works in her husband to promote” (9.233-234). To this hierarchy Eve concedes “how beauty is excell’d by manly grace, / And wisdom, which alone is truly fair” (4.490-491). As Adam ex- plicitly argues, the fairer sex is, by nature, inferior:
For well I understand in the prime end Of nature her th’inferior, in the mind And inward faculties, which most excel, In outward also her resembling less His image who made both, and less expressing The character of that dominion given O’er other creatures. (8.540-546)
Such is the distribution of gender traits in God’s paradise: to men, contemplation, valor, and dominion, whereas women receive fair- ness, vanity, and fickleness. Consequently, women are cursed with the unfortunate fate of being socially and domestically inferior to
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men. This is the premise under which Milton’s drama unfolds and the stereotypes that his characters eventually overturn. Traditional readings of Eve have long supported the general- ization that femininity equates to fairness and vanity. Professor of Renaissance Literature Ira Clark suggests that this preoccupation with the image is the direct cause of the fall: “Eve, seeing too much of God in herself, [foreshadows] the degradation of God’s image in man” (428). Eve, coming into consciousness at a pond, appears suspended in a moment of vanity:
As I bent down to look, just opposite A shape within the wat’ry gleam appear’d, Bending to look on me: I started back; It started back: but pleas’d I soon return’d Pleas’d it return’d as soon; with answering looks Of sympathy and love: there I had fixt Mine eyes till now, and pin’d with vain desire. (4.461-466)
Many have used this passage to associate Eve’s femininity with vanity. Clark, for example, labels the incident as, “the vanity of entrance- ment with her own ‘smooth watry image’ ” (428). Indeed, Eve herself uses the word “vain” to describe the incident. It is logical to read the passage as Clark does: Eve, “fixt,” is amazed to the point of immobil- ity at the sight of herself and upon meeting Adam, initially prefers to return to the image. The immediate reading of the text implies Eve’s preoccupation with her physical aesthetic. However, a deeper inter- pretation suggests that what has been called “vanity” can just as easily be called a search for identity, for self-discovery and understanding. In “Adam, Eve, and the Fall in Paradise Lost” Fredson Bowers writes:
The episode of Eve’s creation and her falling in love with her own image has been conventionally applied as an example of … vanity. The intent, I think, is otherwise. […] She wonders whence she has been brought, but no answer occurs to her. […] She sees life by reflection, he directly. Thus, she looks to God through him, as in a mirror. (266)
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It is important to note that Eve is not as concerned with the im- age as with the explanation for her existence. Her question of ori- gin has a deeper and nobler end, the answer to which—as with her question of the notion of God—seems only to be found through a reflection. Answers to God may be found through Adam’s reflec- tion. However, answers to her very being may be found through her own; here, Eve is not—for a moment—in the shadow of Adam. The image in the water is of a woman independent from a man. This is her initial, nascent state and implicitly, her most natural. It is no wonder that she later demonstrates an affinity for the image over Adam. The reciprocal “sympathy” and “love” attract her—sympathy and love such that she might only find from her own reflection and not, as becomes evident later, from her domineering male superiors. Furthermore, it is a precious moment of initial consciousness, one that even Adam has in “perusing” and “surveying” himself, “limb by limb” (8:267-268). In reply to Clark’s evaluation of Eve’s reflec- tion scene, Professor of English George Musacchio writes, “From Eve’s adoring her image in the water to her loving him whose image she is, there is no more ‘impulse to vanity and self-centeredness,’ no more ‘flaw,’ no more ‘dainty vanity’ in Eve than there is love of … balanced modesty, and ability to learn” (97). Clearly, the event tells more about Eve’s inquisitive, scientific nature and pursuit of learning, which we will examine in greater depth, than it does the stereotype of feminine vanity. Eventually, when Eve concludes that “beauty is excell’d by manly grace / and wisdom,” (4.490-491) the line may not necessarily mean that she concedes inferiority under men. Quite possibly, her admiration is not for that which is manly, but instead for that which is “graceful” and “wise”—traits that ap- pear to be reserved for men. As we read on, we see how Eve acts on her infatuation with the so-called manly traits of grace and wisdom and disproves that they are reserved for men alone; Adam, mean- while, acts as if they are not reserved for men at all. Interestingly, Adam himself might be charged with that very vanity that traditional readers incorrectly attribute to Eve; as God fashions Adam after his own image, Adam asks God to make an- other out of his own image, as well—one “manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair” (8.471). Is Adam so enamored with his own im-
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age that he needs another manlike human? Then, as we observe Adam at the first sight of Eve, he is admittedly “in all enjoyments else / superior and unmov’d; here only weak / against the charm of beauty’s powerful glance” (8.531-533). Again, Adam’s fixation with her beauty comes in a later scene in which, after having just awo- ken, Adam “Hung over her enamour’d; and beheld / Beauty, which, whether waking or asleep, / Shot forth peculiar graces” (5.13-15). With so much criticism suggesting Eve’s vanity, we must seriously question who, between the two humans, really has the preoccupa- tion with the superficial? We can see that Adam certainly is moved by the beautiful and the aesthetically pleasing. While the female sex is supposedly made for fairness—and the male for intellect—we can again see how Eve, in her pursuit of knowledge, overturns the accepted gender stereotypes. First, it is important to recall that Adam’s request to God is for a compan- ion who is “fit to participate / All rational delight” (8.390-391). The reader must then remember, in spite of the gender stereotypes and Adam’s insistence that Eve is his intellectual subordinate, that Eve is inherently equal to Adam in the rational and intellectual facul- ties. We are first introduced to Eve’s intellect and curiosity about the world when she inquires about the stars, stating, “wherefore all night long shine these … when sleep hath shut all eyes?” (4.657- 658). Clearly she is not, as a traditional reading may have it, vapid or superficial; instead, she has high order concerns and the capac- ity to ponder sophisticated problems. Diane McColley, in Milton’s Eve, argues that Milton shows Eve with a
strong sense of responsibility and … the abundant op- portuties of her calling. Her mind is not light; her con- versation mingles careful questioning, sober reflection, wit, and gentle gaiety. Her lot is not tedious; it is full of challenge, perplexity, and bliss … virtues directly op- posed to the weaknesses usually cited. (29)
Like the intellectuals of Milton’s time, she is a thinker; in fact, like the leading intellectuals, she, too, is an astronomer. Her character- ization is as a scientist, one who investigates the natural phenome-
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na around her. To question and to challenge, to explore and to infer, to wonder about and test her ideas about her world—all these hab- its comprise the scientific method that Eve employs in her ordinary thoughts. In fact, during the tempting when Satan commends the Tree of Knowledge as the “Mother of Science,” the same epithet might be applied to Eve. Already, the narrator and other characters frequently address her as the “mother of the human race” (4.475). In partaking of the fruit of knowledge, that mother, Eve, does indeed pass on the consequences of struggle and challenge to her future generations of children, but that also means the passing on of the human struggle to understand the environment. It is a propagation of her reason and scientific method. To make Eve echo the scientif- ic concerns of contemporary Renaissance astronomers is a socially progressive move on Milton’s part, as is his attribution of certain philosophical concerns to her. Milton further develops Eve’s capac- ity as a scientist and philosopher in the temptation scene, in which she shines as an inquisitive, investigative thinker. A closer look at Eve’s consumption of the fruit further reveals her fixation with knowledge, truth, and reason—a fixation eventu- ally heard in the Enlightenment movement that emerges a century after Milton gives Eve this voice. Eve consciously makes an edu- cated decision when she takes the fruit. Again, Clark asserts that “a consequence of Eve’s weakness is that Satan opens her temptation with flattery” (428). However, Eve is not so easily moved by exter- nal influence; she is initially skeptical and tells the serpent, “Thy overpraising leaves in doubt / The virtue of that fruit, in thee first prov’d” (9.615-616). She approaches the proposal with caution and recognizes the serpent’s tactic of flattery. Arguably, the decision to eat of the fruit is only introduced by the serpent, but her real mo- tive to do it comes from her own volition, as part of her pursuit of knowledge. In their decision-making processes there is a disparity; while Eve takes time to reason out the costs and benefits of partak- ing of the fruit, Adam does not think at all. Eve logically reasons out that nothing is stopping her with the justification that “good unknown, sure is not had, or had / And yet unknown, is as not had at all” (9.756-757). With her logic she tempts herself as much as Sa- tan does. In not having the fruit, she does not experience the tree’s
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knowledge and does not sin; if she does have the fruit and still does not experience knowledge, it is comparable to never having tried it and, more importantly, not sinning. She subjects the situation to scrutiny, questioning “what forbids [her] but to know?” (9.758). In other words, what has she got to lose? Finally deciding to eat, she exclaims:
What fear I then, rather what know to fear Under this ignorance of good and evil, Of God or death, of law or penalty? Here grows the cure of all, this fruit divine. Fair to the eye, inviting to the taste, Of virtue to make wise. (9.773-779)
Here we see what Eve truly values. She longs to know the differ- ence between “good and evil,” “God or death,” and “law or penal- ty.” Wisdom—not aesthetics—is what Eve finds “good,” “fair,” and “virtuous.” She scorns ignorance while praising “sapience” (9.797). Later, upon deciding whether to share the fruit with Adam, Eve considers:
Shall I to him make known As yet my change, and give him to partake Full happiness with me, or rather not, But keep the odds of knowledge in my power Without copartner? so to add what wants In female sex, the more to draw his love, And render me more equal, and perhaps, A thing not undesirable, sometime Superior; for inferior who is free? (9.817-825)
Eve might elicit the reader’s greatest sympathy and insight into her deepest desire—knowledge. For Eve, knowledge means “full happiness.” She understands that knowledge means “power.” She explicitly states that this knowledge—this power—is what “wants in female sex.” This is her defense of feminine virtue and, simul- taneously, her testament to the plight of women by their social
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limitations. As a woman she is inferior and lacks freedom; for her, knowledge is the key to superiority—or at the very least, equality. Had Eve not eaten the fruit, she states, “As good have grown there still a lifeless rib” (9.1154). We see that Eve is desperate. What she wants is independence, freedom. She wants to be recognized as a great mind more than a body. In short, she wants life as opposed to lifelessness, and knowledge guarantees her that. If we under- stand her desperation and motive, her appreciation of intellect and knowledge becomes even clearer. In contrast, we see that Adam, who is supposed to be the “head” for whom intellect is meant, is not much of an intellectual at all. This becomes immediately clear in Book V when Eve relates her dream about the temptation to Adam. She introduces her dream with worried words:
If dream’d, not, as I oft am wont, of thee, Works of day past, or morrow’s next design, But of offence and trouble, which my mind Knew never till this irksome night. (5.32-35)
She then follows this introduction with an impassioned, urgent, and troubling recollection of her dreamed encounter with Satan, won- dering what it could mean. Again, Milton showcases Eve’s depth of thought—she has the capacity to look into the deeper meaning of things, to interpret symbolism, and to process threats and react defensively. The author gives us more evidence of Eve’s inquisitive nature, advanced flow of logic, and investigative method of reason- ing. However, Adam gives her a simplified—perhaps even oversim- plified—response: “That what in sleep thou didst abhor to dream, / Waking thou never wilt consent to do” (5.120-121). Note that Adam, for all his intellect and logic, cannot detect the portending doom the dream foreshadows, and dismisses it with a devastatingly mistaken assumption. Apparently, Adam is able to make connections between “Reason” and “Fancy,” but he cannot seem to make the connection between a bad omen and its associated future misfortune. As early as this instance, Milton begins to deconstruct the notion of Adam as Eve’s intellectual superior, and as we read on we see how Milton
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further unravels the gender myths about intellect. We also see suggestions of Adam’s intellectual inferiority in a comparison of his consumption of the fruit to Eve’s. Unlike Eve who carefully weighs the pros and cons associated with the sin, “Adam took no thought” in committing it (9.1004). Adam suc- cumbs to temptation, perhaps due to the feminine superficiality the reader might more appropriately ascribe to the male. He, sup- posedly the more intellectually-endowed of the two, fails to use his reason to make the virtuous decision. In fact, Eve later challenges the doctrine of her inferior female weakness and his superior male judgment, bringing his failure to reason into question: “Being as I am, why didst not thou the head / Command me absolutely not to go?” (9.1155-1156). Note the derision in Eve’s tone. Eve, aware of the assumed female moral handicap, is also aware of the correlating male moral soundness; she knows what would have been the right thing to do—and she questions why Adam does not. Bowers offers the following answer:
Unlike Eve, Adam was not deceived as to the nature of the act, and since he was not deceived when he took and ate the fruit his preceding words justifying the deed had not themselves obscured his reason as Eve’s had ob- scured hers. He could not truly believe them, and so did not act upon them but only on his love for Eve which he irrationally placed above the love of God. (272)
The keyword in Bowers’ argument is “irrational.” Adam’s decision is influenced by his love for Eve. Being the man, Adam is supposed to be the thinker; however, neglecting any logical appraisal of conse- quences, Adam fails as the head. He makes his decision not based on cost-benefit analysis but on his fear of life without Eve. In doing so, he foregoes the male-dominant trait of wisdom while adopting in- stead the female trait of dependence. Here, Adam is more the feeler rather than the thinker. Eve’s fall is her escape from a life without knowledge; Adam’s fall is his escape from a life without Eve. Furthermore, there is an obvious difference between what each gains from the fruit. Eve, eating of the fruit, has an experience of
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“knowledge, nor was Godhead from her thought” (9.790). For Eve, it is an epiphany, a nourishment of the mind. For Adam, however, it is very much a carnal experience, a nourishment of the flesh. Eat- ing for Adam brings “carnal desire inflaming; he on Eve / Began to cast lascivious eye” (9.1013-1014). Again, the fruit sparks within Eve feelings of knowledge and power; for Adam, the fruit enflames lust. Gender stereotypes are overturned once more as we notice that in this couple the man, not the woman, is the more lascivious. He is not the “sapient king” (9.442) fit for the sapient Eve. As we see later in an examination of their dominion, Adam is not, in fact, much of a “king” at all. Also, while Eve eats the fruit for knowledge and “to add what wants in female sex,” in his book Naming in Paradise: Milton and the Language of Adam and Eve, John Leonard attests that Adam “does not eat the fruit out of a desire for knowledge. Adam desires ignorance. His is the pusillanimity of a man who chooses not to know what he dreads to acknowledge. Adam cannot face the thought of life without Eve” (227). It is an interesting claim that Adam would eat the fruit for the very ignorance that Eve de- tests. However, it provides insight into why Adam is overcome with feminine charm and why he eats the fruit without second thought. He, unlike Eve, is not pursuing higher knowledge but “the bond of nature” (9.956) that cannot sever the fate and flesh shared between them. He is afraid to know life without Eve and therefore hides himself behind the fact that they will share the same fate and suffer the same punishment—together. He is more overcome by his feel- ings than his thoughts which contradicts what the accepted gender stereotype would have—“Eve as a feeling creature and Adam as a reasoning creature” (Bowers 266). Adam, rather than Eve, makes a show of feminine caprice. Eve, meanwhile, takes on the role of the reasoning creature we expect to see in men. We see even more how our male Adam embodies the ignorance associated with Eve’s female sex, which greatly underlines Eve’s own embodiment of the masculine grace and wisdom by comparison. We arrive now at the idea of dominion in Paradise Lost and who, between the human couple, really holds the autonomous power. Let us first examine the scene of Satan’s temptation of Eve. Satan takes the form of a serpent to tempt Eve in the garden, to lead her
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astray from her primary purpose—to reflect the goodness of God and promote his works. He ultimately succeeds in his objective, impressing her with his ability as a beast to act in the ways of man. However, for a fleeting instant, their roles are reversed. She mo- mentarily makes him forget about his primary purpose there—to bring evil into God’s new world. Stalking her, Satan is moved by her goodness:
Her graceful innocence, her every air Of gesture, or at least action, overaw’d His malice, and with rapine sweet bereav’d His fierceness of the fierce intent it brought: That space the evil one abstracted stood From his own evil, and for the time remain’d Stupidly good, of enmity disarm’d, Of guile, of hate, of envy, of revenge. (9.459-466)
For that brief moment in Satan’s seduction of Eve, Eve instead seduces Satan. Overpowering him, she is in that moment, empow- ered. Returning to Adam’s first impression of Eve, we see both a foreshadowing of Eve’s disarmament of Satan, as well as a confir- mation of the feminine dominion that Adam disclaims:
Here passion first I felt, Commotion strange, in all enjoyments else Superior and unmov’d; here only weak Against the charm of beauty’s powerful glance … For well I understand in the prime end Of nature her th’inferior, in the mind And inward faculties, which most excel, In outward also her resembling less His image who made both, and less expressing The character of that dominion given O’er other creatures. (8.530-546)
Notice that to Adam, Eve is an inferior creature. He sleights her with his language, describing her as a “lesser” (8.543-544) being.
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She is less like their Creator than he is—less commanding, less a leader, and ultimately, less powerful. Yet despite this prescribed un- derstanding from God of Eve’s inferior nature, Adam cannot help his “weakness” against her feminine “charm,” and we can take this as a foreshadowing of Adam’s weakness in Book IX to the “female charm” (9.999) which ultimately tempts his sin. As we read on, the indications of Eve’s dominance become even more obvious:
Yet when I approach Her loveliness, so absolute she seems, And in herself complete, so well to know Her own, that what she wills to do or say Seems wisest, virtuosest, discreetest, best; All higher knowledge in her presence falls Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her Loses discount’nanc’d, and like folly shows; Authority and reason on her wait, As one intended first, not after made Occasionally; and, to consummate all, Greatness of mind and nobleness their seat Build in her loveliest, and create an awe About her, as a guard angelic plac’d. (8.546-559)
Adam’s suspension of logical judgment and discernment in Eve’s pres- ence is analogous to that of Satan when he himself is suspended in a moment of goodness. Note Milton’s usage of power words in the de- scription of Eve. She is called “absolute,” a term that echoes popular political theory justifying monarchy that Milton had dealt with in his own day, i.e., Charles I (1625-1641). Against her, male authority fails; she is the one who commands authority. As a truly empowered figure should be, she is noble. As we see with both Adam and Satan, Eve’s presence strikes them with “awe.” Most importantly, Adam concedes recognition of all which misogynistic stereotype denies Eve as a woman—wisdom, virtue, discreetness, and notably, superlative good- ness. Also, she is “in herself complete”; the self-fulfillment she enjoys (as opposed to needing fulfillment from a companion, like Adam) is a major indicator of her natural authority and autonomy which I’d
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like to discuss in greater depth later. Given the attributes of Eve’s dominion, Adam, as with Satan, is powerless against the control which she effortlessly imposes. Adam, in fact, is powerless against Eve’s dominion even in the moment of the fall; he takes the fruit, “fondly overcome with female charm” (9.999). He becomes subject, and loses the ability to use his better judgment against temptation from the woman. Ironically, the woman, created to be less express- ing of dominion than man, holds dominion over him. In the same vein, readers of Milton’s Adam and Eve may make the claim that Eve is—contrary to the gender stereotype—the more autonomous partner in the relationship while Adam is her dependent. Again, we start by looking back at Eve’s moment with her reflection at the pond. Upon seeing Adam, “less fair, / less win- ning soft, less amiably mild / Than that smooth wat’ry image: back [she] turn’d” (4.478-480). Eve, perfectly content in the solitude of her own company, is frankly unimpressed with her seemingly infe- rior counterpart—so unimpressed that she opts to return to that solitude rather than join Adam. It is not until Adam cries out loud for Eve, explaining that she exists to be “by [his] side” in an “indi- vidual,” or undivided, “solace” (4.485-486). Most likely, Eve would be able to stand alone, if not for the codependent Adam who re- quires a lifelong partner. We see Adam and Eve further demon- strate their respective dependence and independence in Book IV as they work in the garden. Eve implores Adam:
Let us divide our labors, thou where choice Leads thee, or where most needs … While I … Find what to redress till noon: For while so near each other thus all day Our task we choose, what wonder if so near Looks intervene, and smiles, or object new Casual discourse draw on, which intermits Our day’s work brought to little, though begun Early, and th’hour of supper comes unearn’d. (9.214-225)
It is clear here that Eve’s priority is practicality and productivity.
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She directs her efforts “where most needs” and targets that which must be “redressed.” At the end of the day, she seeks the satisfac- tion of a job well-done, not the comfort of “smiles” and “casual discourse.” This independent woman does not subsist off of the security of having her partner nearby, but rather the fruits of labor she produces with her own two hands. If that means working apart from her husband, Eve certainly expresses a readiness to do so. In contrast, the prospect of potential danger here “possesses” Adam— that is, the prospect that the “malicious foe, / Envying [their] hap- piness, and of his own / Despairing, seeks to work [them] woe and shame” (9.253-255). To Adam’s doubts, Eve replies, “If this be our condition, thus to dwell / In narrow circuit straiten’d by a foe … How are we happy, still in fear of harm?” (9.322-326). She continues, “And what is faith, love, virtue, unassay’d, / Alone, without exterior help sustain’d?” (9.335-336). Though the stereotypical gender dynamic in a heterosexual relationship holds that the woman is generally the more codependent one, our couple features here the male as the one who fears separation from his partner. Eve, on the other hand, is unafraid of wandering beyond the strictures of her relationship and, for that matter, the strictures of her cloistered paradise. Eve shines here as an independent body and, again—as we see in her discourse on the stars—an inquisitive individual seeking to explore that which she does not already know. She yearns to pursue an un- protected, unrestrained happiness that withstands the fear of the unknown. Ironically, we see Eve comfortable taking a masculine initiative while Adam remains in his prelapsarian comfort zone. Adam’s reluctance to accept responsibility for the fall only tes- tifies to his dependence on Eve’s correlating authority. Adam, re- sponding to God’s accusation, uses fifteen lines of circumlocution to articulate his unworthiness of God, the futility of denial, and the deception of Eve to ultimately come to the conclusion: “She gave me of the tree, and I did eat” (10.144). However Eve states, “not before her Judge / Bold or loquacious, thus abash’d, replied: / The serpent me beguil’d, and I did eat” (10.160-162). Her lines di- rectly echo Genesis 3:13: “The woman said, ‘The serpent deceived me, and I ate.’ ” Milton here emphasizes the sincerity and genuine “abash’dness,” or humility, of Eve’s response—as opposed to Adam’s
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description as only “half-abash’d” (8.595) when he converses with Raphael, which only serves to underline his passive and detached sense of responsibility for his actions. There is an undeniable sin- cerity in Eve’s confession. Her sentiment is as true to her humility as her expression is true to the original words in the Bible. Unlike Adam, Eve is in complete control and ownership of her actions and needs not to hide them behind flowery language. We see here Adam taking on the characteristics of frailty and weakness wrong- ly ascribed to women. Adam cannot summon the strength to take responsibility for his part in the fall, and this reveals his compa- rable weakness to Eve’s conviction and resolution. Of the tragedy to befall mankind Raphael states, “From man’s effeminate slack- ness it begins” (11.634). At this statement, we see Milton’s reversal of gender stereotypes. Milton has taken the best of the traditional male qualities and written them in Eve. She actually fulfills “what wants in female sex.” These qualities are lacking in Adam, who in- stead is a male characterized by the “effeminate.” He exhibits the worst of what are traditionally female qualities in a show of Mil- ton’s upheaval of the reigning gender stereotypes of the age. The result is underlined as God scolds the human couple for their sin. He asks Adam,
Was she thy God, that her thou didst obey Before his voice, or was she made thy guide, Superior, or but equal, that to her Thou didst resign thy manhood? (10.145-148)
Milton’s deliberate reversal of gender stereotypes becomes dis- tinct here. God’s words echo Eve’s, affirming that her aspiration to be “more equal … sometime superior” has been recognized and is, therefore, somewhat successful. Moreover, God’s derision of Adam’s manhood directly foreshadows Raphael’s later idea of man’s “effeminate slackness.” Adam has surrendered the masculine trait of a strong will to Eve who, after commanding dominion over her partner, has become like “God, that her [Adam] didst obey” (10.145). In this final showing, Milton portrays once more Eve with the masculine traits praised of men in contrast to Adam who por-
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trays the worst of effeminate qualities. Milton’s Paradise Lost is not the misogynistic work that many traditionally read but is instead a very progressive piece that over- throws gender stereotypes. His epic is a defense of Eve and, ulti- mately, womankind. The reader sees Eve portraying—rather than the stereotypically feminine traits of vanity, dependence, and weak- ness—traits of complexity, intellect, and power. The latter traits, while unfairly associated with men, happen to be absent in Adam who, incidentally, displays the worst traits often associated with women. Through this role reversal, Milton debunks gender stereo- typing and shows that women are very much capable and worthy of the best traits traditionally reserved for men, while men themselves are occasionally subject to the unfair characteristics commonly as- sociated with women. In their destruction of troublesome gender stereotypes, Milton’s ideas were ahead of their time and, in many ways, are still very much ahead of our own.
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Works Cited
Bowers, Fredson. “Adam, Eve, and the Fall in Paradise Lost.” PMLA, 84.2 (1969). 264-273. Web. 29 April 2012.
Clark, Ira. “Milton and the Image of God.” The Journal of English and Germanic Philogy, 6.3 (1969). 422-431. Web. 29 April 2012.
Leonard, John. Naming in Paradise: Milton and the Language of Adam and Eve. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990. Print.
McColley, Diane K. Milton’s Eve. Chicago: University of Illinois, 1983. Print.
Milton, John. Paradise Lost. New York: Fine Creative Media, Inc., 2004. Print.
Mussachio, George. Milton’s Adam and Eve. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 1991. Print.
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WRITER’S COMMENTS
Being bullied is nothing new for gay and lesbian youth. It is an act that still persists in our society as a socially tolerable norm. It is something that is joked about, yet is experienced by almost every gay and lesbian youth. With the advent of the Internet and social networking sites, it is easier than ever for gays and lesbians to be harassed. This technology makes violence obso- lete, and words are now capable of doing far more damage. In this new fron- tier of connectivity, how is bullying to be monitored? I became interested in this subject as news broke of the Tyler Clementi suicide. People my age use social media for almost everything, rarely stopping to examine how it will affect another person. Derogatory things are said frequently online—some people are insulted, and others just don’t care. Yet, in Tyler Clementi’s case, it led to suicide. By analyzing the media surrounding the case, and applying the lens of Kenneth Burke’s cycle of redemption, it became clear that the question was not who was responsible for the suicide, but rather to what degree that person should be held accountable. Was the person who posted the offensive comments about Clementi a murderer, or a product of our societal tolerance of homophobia? Was Dhuran Ravi just another abuser of the cyber-world? Did he intend to bully Clementi, or was he just insensi- tive to how his comments would affect him? The media frenzy that followed debated this question in different ways, but one thing remained clear: Cle- menti’s interpretation of his roommate’s actions led to his suicide, and our interpretation will lead to his roommate’s punishment. —Steven Slasten
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
Steven’s essay exemplifies the best of what Rhetorical Criticism as a form can offer: here is an insightful analysis of a collective struggle over meaning- making about a pressing, divisive political issue. As is often the case for high- profile crimes and trials, a social drama played out in the media coverage of Tyler Clementi’s suicide and its aftermath. Steven engages Kenneth Burke’s theory of scapegoating and redemption, drawing deftly from both primary and secondary sources. In clear and elegant prose, he argues that the public discourse surrounding Ravi’s trial has broader significance and, ultimately, troubling ramifications. —Marilyn DeLaure, Department of Communication Studies
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s t e v e n s l a s t e n The Double-Headed Scapegoat: A Look at the Cycle of Redemption in the Rhetoric Surrounding the Suicide of Tyler Clementi
“You’re going to meet a lot of people in your life. Some of these people you may not like. Just because you don’t like them doesn’t mean you have to work against them.” —Joe Clementi, Tyler Clementi’s father
N LATE SEPTEMBER of 2010, Tyler Clementi and Dhuran Ravi became names known throughout the country as the pro- tagonistsI in the end-all case of anti-gay cyberbullying. Clementi, a college freshman, had allegedly committed suicide after Ravi, his roommate, had spied on his sexual encounter with another man via webcam. While the exact reasons behind the suicide are still unknown, the media framed the suicide as a direct result of ho- mophobia and cyberbullying. As the case became national news, Dhuran Ravi was thrust into the limelight as the scapegoat for Cle- menti’s suicide. However, on March 16, 2012, after Ravi was found guilty of invading Clementi’s privacy and of committing a hate crime (bias intimidation), societal order had yet to be restored. Thus, the question must be asked: why was there no redemption or return to order after the verdict in the case was reached? Us- ing Kenneth Burke’s cycle of redemption and Brian Ott and Eric Aoki’s reflections on the Matthew Shepard case, I will argue that there was no return to order because, as a result of the public’s in- ability to decide if Ravi acted as a rational adult or as an immature minor, Ravi was not the perfect scapegoat.
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Finding Foundations: Theory
A trauma, or breach in the social order, creates a need for a soci- etal redemption. This is achieved through a cycle of redemption that attempts to alleviate the guilt that develops from breaking the societal order. In his Rhetoric of Religion, Kenneth Burke theorizes that:
Order leads to Guilt (for who can keep commandments!) Guilt needs Redemption (for who would not be cleansed!) Redemption needs Redeemer (which is to say, a Victim!) (4-5).
Thus, “when the individual fails to keep order he feels guilty,” clari- fies Rosemary Royston of Young Harrison College; “he then needs to redeem himself for his failing and either be the victim or name a victim for the shortcoming. In the end, redemption is needed to alleviate the sin or shortcoming” (Royston par. 4). In effect, the cycle of redemption can be broken down into five phases. The first phase is a violation in the social order (trauma); the second phase is the guilt that arises from this trauma. As a result of the guilt, the third phase develops. This is the identification of a punishable victim to assuage the guilt. Once the victim has been identified, redemption is achieved through the sacrificing of the victim. The attainment of redemption constitutes the fourth phase. With the punishment realized and order restored, the fifth phase is accom- plished. Therefore, in an event like the Tyler Clementi case, this cycle of redemption becomes important for the public to recon- struct order. In effect, it helps an unprepared society “feel better” about an event. Re-establishing societal order is something the public experi- ences as a whole, but the methods used in achieving this order are all highly influenced by the media. For example, the way a breach in order is presented to us, such as in the Tyler Clementi case or the Matthew Shepard case, is highly dependent on how the me-
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dia frames the incident. These frames must be analyzed to create an understanding of how the media develops a story to enthrall the public. For example, Brain Ott and Eric Aoki, authors of “The Politics of Negotiating Public Tragedy: Media Framing of the Matthew Shepard Murder,” argue that an understanding of me- dia framing is accomplished through frame analysis (485). Frame analysis “looks to see how a situation or event is named/defined, and how that naming shapes public opinion” and “it accomplishes this analysis by highlighting the inherent biases in all storytelling” (Ott and Aoki 485). In effect, understanding how a story is framed allows us to comprehend how it can capture the attention of an entire nation. Media framing and the cycle of redemption are intricately connected insofar as media framing guides us through the cycle of redemption. For instance, media framing happens in four stages: “naming the event, making a political symbol, expunging the evil within, and restoring social order” (Ott and Aoki 486). Using the language of the cycle of redemption, these four stages take on added meanings as to how the media colors our thoughts and sen- timents in a case that breaks order. In effect, naming the event comes to mean how the media defines a trauma, while making a political symbol constitutes how the media influences the guilt of the public. Expunging the evil within is related to the identifica- tion of a victim, and restoring social order signifies redemption and the re-establishment of order. Thus, understanding how the media frames an event gives us a deeper understanding of how the cycle of redemption plays out in particular cases. An instance of public trauma is due in large part to how the me- dia names the event. The way the event is named also contributes to how much guilt society experiences. Ott and Aoki argue that “how a story begins is crucial to how a story develops” (Ott and Aoki 486). In effect, the way the media begins to frame an event sets the tone for how the story will be interpreted by audiences throughout the case. For example, naming the Tyler Clementi case as a suicide by a gay youth who was provoked by anti-gay cyber- bullying instantly invoked correlations to the Matthew Shepard case and other homophobic hate crimes. In effect, the Clementi
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case was defined by Clementi’s homosexuality, and by cyberbully- ing. Furthermore, while the Clementi suicide was not as violent as that of the Shepard murder, depicting Clementi as an innocent young man with a full life ahead of him magnified the guilt. Much like Matthew Shepard, Tyler Clementi was portrayed as a harm- less youth who was wrongfully targeted for his sexual orientation. Thus, Clementi is made into a political symbol and societal guilt is manifested in the attack of his innocence. Assuaging societal guilt can only be accomplished with the identification of a victim onto whom all negative feelings of the case can be attached. For example, Burke in Permanence and Change, argues that “ ‘guilt’… calls correspondingly for ‘redemption’ through victimage” and that “the promoting of social cohesion through victimage is ‘normal’ and ‘natural’ ” (284). Consequently, to bridge the gap between guilt and redemption, a form of victimage must be present to absorb negative sentiment and allow the public to feel whole and pure again. The first choice we have for victimage is one’s self. Burke argues that this form of victimage is mortifi- cation, or the “scrupulous and deliberate clamping of limitation upon the self” (Burke qtd. in Burke Permanence and Change 289). In effect, mortification is the identification of one’s own selfas the cause of a societal trauma, whether physically or symbolically. One can feel mortification if he feels that he has symbolically com- mitted the same crime by allowing the situation to happen, or he can feel mortification at having physically committed the crime. For example, in the Clementi case, the trauma and the guilt stem from anti-gay cyberbullying and innocence respectively. One could experience mortification at having recognized the ability in one’s self to invade a classmate’s privacy because of homophobia. One could even experience mortification at having already invaded a classmate’s privacy. In effect, one’s self is identified for victimage. The more common mode of victimage is that of the naming of a scapegoat. The scapegoat allows one to blame someone else entirely for the trauma, and that person or persons become the epitome of societal hatred and loathing. For example, in examining Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf, Burke notes that “men who can unite on nothing else can unite on the basis of a foe shared by all” (“Rheto-
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ric of Hitler’s ‘Battle’ ” 193). Hitler used the Jewish population as a scapegoat for all of the societal and economic woes of post-WWI Germany. In doing so, he created “a ‘curative’ process that [came] with the ability to hand over one’s ills to a scapegoat, thereby get- ting purification by dissociation” (“Rhetoric of Hitler’s ‘Battle’ ” 202). By disassociating one’s self from the scapegoat, redemption is possible. For example, early media framing portrayed Dhuran Ravi as the scapegoat of the Clementi case. In allowing the public to distance themselves from Ravi’s perceived homophobia and in- vasions of privacy via webcam, society is meant to feel redeemed. Furthermore, Burke argues that this constitutes a type of “medi- cine,” because “in the projective device of the scapegoat … the ‘bad’ features can be allocated to the ‘devil,’ and one can ‘respect himself’ ” (Burke 196). In respecting one’s self, the evil within is all but expunged, and the trauma is all but negated. Societal order is once again possible. A lack of the perfect victimage translates to a lack of redemp- tion. For instance, redemption has yet to be found in the Tyler Clementi case because of a lack of certainty as to whether or not Ravi acted as a rational adult or as an immature minor, and conse- quently, a lack of certainty exists as to what the punishment should be. Furthermore, “a principle of absolute ‘guilt’ is matched by a principle that is designed for the corresponding absolute cancel- lation of such guilt,” asserts Burke, “and this cancellation … is cor- respondingly absolute in the perfection of its fitness” Permanence( and Change 284). We have already established that a punishable vic- tim must be identified to overcome guilt, and thus to wholly rid ourselves of the guilt, the perfect victim is needed. If a victim does not encompass the guilt fully, then order is not restored. There- fore, rushing into the “perfect” victimage poses serious problems. “Because the principle of a ‘perfect’ victim is so implicit in the very concept of victimage,” Burke later argues, “[men] are eager to tell themselves of victims so thoroughgoing that the sacrifice of such offerings would bring about a correspondingly thoroughgoing cure” (Permanence and Change 288). In effect, the wrong victim may be chosen and punished with the expectation that order will be restored. Just because the expectation is there, does not mean that the wrong victim will translate into the right re-establishment of
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order. The selection and framing must fit the bill, so to speak, or redemption is not possible.
Telling Tales: Naming the Event
As soon as news broke of Clementi’s suicide, the story was colored as an instance of anti-gay cyberbullying. As with the Matthew Shep- ard case, “local reporters covering the story immediately seized on the anti-gay aspect of the crime…that quickly drew the attention of the national press” (Ott and Aoki 487). For example, Edecio Martinez of CBS News reported that Clementi “killed himself, af- ter, police say, he learned that his roommate had secretly streamed video on the Internet of him in a sexual encounter with another man” (Martinez par. 2). In this instance, the focus was directed squarely at Clementi’s homosexuality, and the means by which he was driven to suicide. This is also reflected in other news stories, such as those by Emily Friedman of ABC News and Joel Rose of National Public Radio (NPR). Emily Friedman asserts that “[Cle- menti’s roommate] secretly filmed him during a ‘sexual encounter’ in his dorm room and posted it live on the Internet” (Friedman par. 1), while Joel Rose argues that Clementi “committed suicide after his sex life was exposed on the Internet” (Joel par. 1). In effect, the event is named not merely as an instance of anti-gay bullying, but of one involving the Internet. If the case was just an instance of anti-gay bullying, then it might not have even made the headlines of the local papers. However, the fact that Clementi committed suicide after having allegedly been cyberbullied gave reporters the angle they needed to construct a full-blown media spectacle. While cyberbullying helped set the story apart from most, this fact alone did not guarantee the Clementi suicide a spot in national headlines. Rather, reporters combined the age of those involved, the sexual orientation of Clementi, and the cyberbullying to create an event that the national media could not ignore. For example, Ty- ler Clementi, Dhuran Ravi (Clementi’s roommate) and Molly Wei (an accomplice in spying on Clementi) were all college freshman in September 2010 when the suicide took place (Parker 1-5). In effect, they were barely legal adults, straddling the line between immature
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youth and rational adults. Furthermore, as mentioned earlier, news coverage was insistent on honing in on Clementi’s homosexuality. It was painted in the press, and assumed by the public, that Ravi targeted him because he was gay. Furthermore, just the day before, on September 21, 2010, the announcement of the “It Gets Bet- ter” campaign as “a new online video channel [that reaches] out to teenagers at school who are being bullied for being gay” was made public (Parker-Pope par. 1). Clementi was automatically tied into the project as being arguably the most recent, and public, instance of anti-gay bullying since Matthew Shepard. He was also attached to four other suicides committed by gay and lesbian youth in the month or so before Clementi’s own suicide. The media essentially framed his homosexuality as the only reason why Ravi would have targeted him. While Clementi’s homosexuality was framed as the reason why his roommate targeted him, it was the combination of the cyberbulling and his sexual orientation that is portrayed as lead- ing to his death. Cyberbullying is an event that is hard to regulate and even harder to prosecute. For example, Andrew Mach of The Christian Science Monitor analyzed the five most public and debat- ed cyberbullying crimes of the past decade right before Dhuran Ravi was to receive his verdict. He analyzed the United States v. Lori Drew (2008), the State of Indiana v. A.B. (2007), Ryan Dwyer v. Ocean School District (2005), J.S. v. Bethlehem Area School District (2002) and Killion v. Franklin Regional School District (2001). In all of these cases the person charged with cyberbullying crimes was either acquitted or given a light punishment (Mach 1-5). Even Lori Drew, who bullied a 13-year-old girl on Myspace, was acquitted be- cause “ ‘if she was found guilty of this,’ the judge said, ‘an Internet user who didn’t follow the terms of agreement of a website could suddenly face criminal charges’ ” (Mach 1). In effect, the charges were dropped because cyberbullying was such a new and unique category that prosecuting instances of it were almost impossible. Yet, none of these cases were nearly as big as the Clementi case. The cyberbullying angle, along with the sexual orientation of Clementi and the youth of those involved, combined to create a case that could set the precedent for future cyberbullying crimes.
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Therefore, the trauma, or disruption in social order, became that of a serious new way of bullying, and the introduction of a serious new form of anti-gay bullying. The question became whether or not crimes based on sexual orientation (as defined in the “Matthew Shepard Act” of 2009) could be considered hate crimes if commit- ted in the cyber world. Does anti-gay cyberbullying that leads to a suicide constitute a hate crime, or even a crime at all?
Manufacturing Martyrs: Making a Political Symbol
As the story began to unfold, Clementi became an easy figure to associate with anti-gay bullying because he was predominately framed as a shy and innocent young man. For example “Clementi was bright but shy—he wasn’t one to brag,” claimed John Lorenz, principal of Ridgewood High School where Clementi was an alum, in an interview with NPR: “he wasn’t that loud, boisterous person” (Lorenz qtd. in Joel pars. 6-7). Clementi’s former violin teacher, Arlene Locola, added that “the violin was his voice … he played almost immediately with an energy and fire and passion” (Locola qtd. in Joel pars. 9-10). In effect, Clementi was portrayed as a young man who was internally focused. He was a music-lover and a shy individual who would not have created conflict. For instance, Ede- cio Martinez describes Clementi as a “violinist” who, in request- ing a dormroom change, was not interested in conflict (Martinez pars. 1-2, 4). Consequently, Clementi was made into the epitome of innocence. He was a lover of the arts, not of parties. He was shy, and not the bragging type. He liked peace, not conflict. Could the media have created a better martyr figure? The portrayal of Clementi as martyr allowed the public to see Clementi as the shy student who everyone could identify with, but no one wanted to help. He was the person picked on in class for being a little too quiet or a little too into orchestra. This cre- ated a feeling of societal guilt. This person, who fit so well into the shy student motif, committed suicide because no one stood up for him. Furthermore, it is the worst fear of the bystander to know that he could have stopped such a tragic incident, yet did not raise
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his voice to help. Even though a follower of this story probably could not have helped Tyler Clementi, that person could probably think of someone that he let get teased instead of helping. In es- sence, the guilt is one that runs deep and requires a quick way to be assuaged. As societal guilt grew, many celebrities and politicians issued statements to increase awareness of anti-gay bullying. For exam- ple, U.S. Secretary of Education Arnie Duncan claimed that “this week, we sadly lost two young men who took their own lives for one unacceptable reason: they were being bullied and harassed be- cause they were openly gay or believed to be gay” (Duncan qtd. in Knickerbocker par. 7). In effect, Duncan ties Clementi’s suicide into that of a more general trend of gay and lesbian suicides that arose from anti-gay bullying. Talk show host and public lesbian fig- ure Ellen DeGeneres furthers this with a video she posted to her website entitled, “It’s Time to End Teenage Bullying.” She claims that Clementi “was outed as being gay on the Internet and he killed himself” (DeGeneres). In effect, she is arguing that Tyler Clementi could be any youth. She invites the public to imagine what it would do to a youth to have his biggest secret outed publicly. Therefore, she is really saying, “Tyler Clementi’s biggest secret was his homo- sexuality.What is yours? Imagine how you would feel if everyone suddenly knew that secret and it was on the Internet, so it could never be taken away?” Thus, both women augment societal guilt in an attempt to urge the public to confront the issue of anti-gay bul- lying head on. They are both hoping for societal guilt to be strong enough that this challenge can be met. And the way to meet this challenge is to punish Dhuran Ravi to the fullest extent of the law, and charge him with an anti-gay hate crime.
Banishing Blame: Expunging the Evil Within
Almost overnight Dhuran Ravi became the scapegoat for the sui- cide of Tyler Clementi, and as scapegoat, all anger and rage over the case was placed on his shoulders. For example, New Jersey Gover- nor Chris Christie asserted, “I don’t know how those two folks are going to sleep at night, knowing that they contributed to driving
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that young man to that alternative” (Christie qtd. in Parker par. 5). Thus, Ravi, as well as Wei, are identified as punishable perpe- trators in the case. Furthermore, Steven Goldstein, the chairman of Garden State Equality (a gay and lesbian rights group in New Jersey) argued, “we are heartbroken over the tragic loss of a young man … and we are sickened that anyone in our society … might consider destroying others’ lives as a sport” (Rose pars. 19-20). Goldstein takes a hard-line approach in regards to the character of Ravi, claiming that not only is he the rightful scapegoat, but that he found pleasure in committing the crime. Moreover, both Christie and Goldstein do everything in their power to implicate Ravi of a hate crime. Thus, he ceases to straddle that line between immature kid and responsible adult. Christie and Goldstein make it clear that he acted as a responsible adult and should be tried as one. It is as this responsible adult that Ravi was truly separated from society and allowed to bear the wrath of the public. For ex- ample, in all but one of the five cyber-bullying cases that Andrew Mach analyzed, the perpetrators of the alleged crimes were mi- nors: three were in middle school and one was in high school. The only perpetrator considered an adult was Lori Drew, a 49-year-old woman who pretended to be a 13-year-old boy to bully her daugh- ter’s alleged bully. In effect, she created a character on the social networking site Myspace who was under 18 (Mach 1). Furthermore, Drew’s case was the only one of the five to receive major media at- tention, and she was later acquitted. However, it is interesting to note, that she acted in the character of a minor when committing the crime she was charged for. A separation was made between her rational adult self and the immature youth that she created in the cyber-world. Unfortunately for Ravi early on in the case, he did not have this separation. When he was first identified as the scapegoat of the case, he was portrayed as an intelligent 18-year-old, a college student at Rutgers, capable of making adult decisions. Most damning to Ravi’s early portrayal as scapegoat was that he did not commit the crime once, but twice. The first time was an “accident”; however, the second time he posted on Twitter with the message, “Anyone with iChat, I dare you to video chat me be- tween the hours of 9:30 and 12. Yes, it’s happening again” (Ravi qtd.
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in Parker 10). Ravi had set his iChat to automatically open when someone called, and since he had his webcam pointed at Clementi’s bed, anyone who called him would have seen what Clementi was doing (Parker 11). Moreover, the first time when he glimpsed Clem- enti with M.B.(the unidentified male who was with Clementi those two nights) he was not expecting to see a sexual encounter, he just wanted to see what was going on his room. While this is an invasion of privacy, this does not constitute a crime arising out of Clementi’s sexual orientation. The fact that he wrote on Twitter about this in- cident also does not qualify his actions as a hate crime. Where Ravi ran into trouble was when Clementi asked for the room a second time, and Ravi chose to allow others to spy on Clementi as well. He was going to allow others to view Clementi involved in a same-sex sexual encounter, which implies a crime driven by a person’s sexual orientation. This second instance of invading Clementi’s privacy is the hate crime for which Ravi would be tried. Furthermore, while Clementi stopped this second incident by unplugging Ravi’s web- cam, Ravi’s actions imply the thought patterns of a rational adult. He had planned to spy on Clementi a second time; he had intent. This intent allowed the public to unload all moral shortcomings on to Ravi. In this unloading, the public was able to distance itself from the crime, and in effect ended any self reflection that had been happening up to that point. With the start of the scapegoat process came the loss of all the anti-gay bullying work that Duncan and DeGeneres had started. The public stopped seeing themselves as responsible for the guilt that came with the crime any longer. Instead of identifying as the bystander who feels guilt at not having tried to stop the crime, they now identified as the authority figure who steps in and pun- ishes the bully. Thus, with the scapegoat process came the power to punish. And everyone knows that when the teacher steps in and reprimands the bully, the game is over. The bully is sent to the prin- cipal’s office, and everyone gets back to his or her day. But what of the victim? The teasing will continue until he is pushed just a little too far and suicide becomes a possibility. It is not an uncommon reality for gay and lesbian youth to commit suicide over such bully- ing; yet, the public is eager to put the blame on an isolated incident
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that caused the event. The Tyler Clementi case is no different. The public was originally all for Ravi being tried as an adult—an adult who pushed Clementi just a little too far.
Arranging Amity: Restoring Societal Order
With the verdict of the case on March 16, 2012, redemption should have been achieved and societal order should have been restored. But it was not. Dhuran Ravi was tried and found guilty of invasion of privacy and bias intimidation, with sentencing to begin on May 21, 2012. Mark Trumbull of the Christian Science Monitor asserted that bias intimidation, or in Ravi’s case, “anti-gay intimidation, [is] a hate crime in New Jersey that could carry a prison term of up to 10 years” (Trumbull par. 1). Consequently, Ravi was not only charged with invading Clementi’s privacy with his misuse of the webcam, but his actions were found to be motivated by anti-gay sentiments. Interestingly enough, Kashad Leverett, a juror during the trial, argued that “in my opinion, I didn’t think it was a hate crime until we were presented with an indictment (that explained the law)” (Leverett qtd. in Loyd and Curry par. 11). In effect, Lev- erett’s statement seems to imply that the law forced the jurors into convicting Ravi of a hate crime. His statement makes it seem that if it were not for the specificity of the law, then the hate-crime conviction would not have been given to Ravi. However, this raises the question as to whether or not the jurors—or even the public— wanted Ravi to be charged with a hate crime. The ensuing media in them months that followed seems to suggest a resounding “no.” As the case dragged on from late 2010 to early 2012, media coverage began to shift in dominant explanations as to what crime Ravi actually committed. The two main charges that Ravi faced were invasion of privacy and bias intimidation. At the start of the case each charge seemed to carry equal weight as to the rational intent displayed in the execution of each. Ravi had invaded Cle- menti’s privacy with the webcam and his actions seemed to stem from homophobic bullying. However, the tide began to change when Ian Parker of The New Yorker released a full-length story en-
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titled “The Story of a Suicide” on February 6, 2012, that examined the characters of Ravi and Clementi, their friends and even their actions. Text messages, Twitter posts and even other forum posts were analyzed, all in an attempt to create an unbiased picture of what had actually transpired between the two roommates. For the first time, Ravi and Clementi were portrayed as they actually were: first semester college freshmen. While Parker made no judgments as to the character of Ravi, from this point on it seems that Ravi was portrayed in a different light by the media. No more was he the rational adult who bullied Clementi for his homosexuality, but rather he was described as an immature minor who took a prank too far. For example, more and more media attention was given to the invasion of privacy violation, and not, as Pam Spaulding of CNN called, the “ ‘prank’ seething with homophobia” that Ravi committed (Spaulding par. 3). At the same time, Clementi’s sexual- ity became less and less important to the story as the cyberbullying angle gained momentum. Thus Ravi’s perceived immaturity, cou- pled with the cyberbullying angle, helped obscure the importance that anti-gay bullying once held in the case. After Ravi’s conviction, the public began to see Ravi as the vic- tim of an overly severe verdict. As Michael McLaughlin of the Chris- tian Science Monitor explains, “Calls for a lenient punishment appear to be growing. A ‘Support Ravi’ event was scheduled for tonight in Edison, and former New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey, who is gay, had said that Ravi shouldn’t be sent to prison” (McLaughlin par. 13). In effect, a whole “Support Ravi” movement has sprung up since the verdict and openly gay public officials have been coming out in support of Ravi. This seems at odds with the media portrayal of Ravi at the start of the case, in which a rational adult who was heavily influenced by homophobia, committed these actions. Thus, as the emphasis on Ravi’s immaturity took hold, more and more of the public began to view Ravi as a victim, not as a scapegoat. As the cyberbullying angle rose to prominence, using Ravi as scapegoat became less and less perfect. For example, Ravi’s defense attorney Steven Altman asserted that,“why we’re here is because on Sept. 19, and Sept. 21, 2010, an 18-year-old boy, a kid, a college
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freshman, had an experience, had an encounter that he wasn’t ready for” (Loyd and Curry par. 30). In effect, Ravi was painted as an immature kid who was not homophobic, just unprepared to see a same-sex encounter. On the other hand, “Middlesex County Prosecutor Julie McClure tried to build a case that Ravi spied on Clementi’s date because his roommate was gay … describing his actions as an anti-gay hate crime” (Loyd and Curry par 27). The court battle became one between painting Ravi as an immature minor and Ravi as rational adult. The courts decided to go with the latter, but the public was not swayed. In the public’s mind, especially after the in-depth analysis done by Parker, Ravi was not the perfect scapegoat any longer. He was not a rational adult who had targeted Clementi for his sexuality, but just an immature mi- nor whose prank went too far. As a result of this rift between judicial logic and public sen- timent, the verdict caused a divide between the effectiveness of the punishment. For example, “if Mr. Ravi spends years in prison, his case will set an alarming precedent of disproportional punish- ment,” Emily Bazelon of The New York Times argues, “the spying he did was criminal, but it was also, as his lawyer put it, ‘stupid kid’ behavior” (Bazelon par. 11). Bazelon explicitly frames Ravi’s ac- tions as falling into the category of those committed by immature minors, and so they were an excusable byproduct of youth. She allowed Ravi to be classified as a youth who fell victim to a “nation on high alert over bullying [that] go[es] after teenagers who acted meanly, but not violently” (Bazelon par. 4). In effect, Ravi’s case was tied into a general trend of overly strict cyberbullying laws. He became the innocent martyr figure, and Clementi was all but forgotten. Even Ravi’s old high school classmates wrote letters as “part of the ongoing defense campaign to characterize Ravi’s ac- tions as a bad prank gone awry” (McLaughlin par. 4). These letters fit perfectly with statements made by Ravi’s friends early on in the case. For example, his friend Jason Tam claimed that “he’s [Ravi] so much of a jerk that it may seem like he’s a homophobe but he’s not” (Tam qtd. in Parker 5), while another friend, Michael Zhuang, asserted that “he’s very very open minded and he, like if it had
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been a girl in the room it wouldn’t have been any different” (Zhuang qtd. in Friedman par. 21). In effect, Ravi was painted as just another immature youth who loved to play pranks. The general sentiment of these statements created the idea that Ravi’s prank merely went too far, while Clementi’s sexuality was just an unfortunate detail that brought about a media spectacle. While many people supported Ravi and his defense of im- maturity, there were others who hailed this verdict as a landmark decision in how cyberbullying cases could be prosecuted. William Glaberson of The New York Times argued that “lawyers said the con- viction gave new potential to hate crime prosecutions for cyberbul- lying and digital spying largely because it seemed to repudiate the notion that youth was a defense” (Glaberson par. 3). Therefore, the verdict considered youthful immaturity a non-factor when dealing with cyberbullying crimes of this magnitude. The “I didn’t know any better” excuse became null and void. Furthermore, Suzanne B. Goldberg, a gender law expert at Columbia Law School, argued that “this reinforces that social media can cause great harm and that its misuse can be criminal” (Goldberg qtd. in Glaberson par. 15). For the first time, the use of social media in bullying gained national attention and allowed for a discussion to be had as to “the rising prominence of social media forums like Twitter in daily life” (Trumbull par. 4). In effect, cyberbullying became the main focus of the case and created a situation in which Ravi did not fit the bill of scapegoat any longer. Thus, with no scapegoat, there could be no societal redemption and consequently, no restoration of order. Societal disorder still exists in this case as a result of the mis- characterization of Ravi as the perfect scapegoat. He was framed to fit the category well, but he did not fit into the categoryperfectly . This is a direct result of society’s inability to decide if Ravi acted as an immature minor, or as a rational adult. He fit the bill for the invasion of privacy charge as a rational adult, but he also fit the bill for the bias intimidation as an immature minor. In the eyes of the public, Ravi still straddles that line between immaturity and ratio- nality, and thus he could never fit the mold of the perfect scapegoat for which Kenneth Burke argues. Redemption and order may never be achieved in this case, be-
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cause society cannot decide on which version of Ravi deserves its guilt. If it is the rational adult Ravi, then the punishment is valid and order can be restored. If it is the immature minor Ravi, then the punishment is invalid and must be altered before order can be restored. Furthermore, anti-gay bullying has now been cast a mi- nor role in this case, and thus the self-reflection on the societal tol- erance of homophobia has dried up since cyberbullying took the forefront. Tyler Clementi’s sexuality seems to now be cast as noth- ing more than an interesting angle on the case; an almost unfortu- nate angle that was responsible for an “overly harsh” sentence for Dhuran Ravi. Instead of being understood as guilty for perpetuat- ing homophobic bullying and societal tolerance of homophobia, the public now sees him as the victim in the case. Despite what the verdict might say, Tyler Clementi is now viewed as nothing more than the catalyst that began a discussion of cyberbullying, not a victim who was driven to suicide. If anything, he has become yet another casualty of societal tolerance of homophobia.
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Works Cited
Bazelon, Emily. “Make the Punishment Fit the Cyber-Crime.” The New York Times. 20 Mar 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
Burke, Kenneth. Permanence and Change: An Anatomy of Purpose. 3rd ed. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
_____. “Rhetoric of Hitler’s ‘Battle’.” The Philosophy of Literary Form. 2nd Ed. Louisiana State University Press: Baton Rogue, 1967. 193-220. Print.
_____. Rhetoric of Religion. Beacon Press: Boston, 1961. Print.
Friedman, Emily. “Victim of Secret Dorm Sex Tape Posts Facebook Goodbye, Jumps to His Death.” ABC News. 29 Sept. 2010. Web. 12 April 2012.
Glaberson, William. “Rutgers Verdict Repudiates Notion of Youth as Defense.” The New York Times. 18 Mar. 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
“It’s Time to End Teenage Bullying.” The Ellen Degeneres Show. Warner Bros. Television Distribution, Burbank. 30 Sep. 2012. Television.
Knickerbocker, Brad. “Tyler Clementi Suicide: Reaction is Swift and Widespread.” Christian Science Monitor. 3 Oct. 2010. Web. 13 April 2012.
Loyd, Beth and Colleen Curry. “Dhuran Ravis Own Words Led to Con- viction, Juror Tells ABCNews.” ABCNews. 16 Mar. 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
Mach, Andrew. “Tyler Clementi and cyber-bullying: How courts ruled in five other cases.”Christian Science Monitor. 22 Feb. 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
Martinez, Edecio. “Tyler Clementi Suicide: Rutger’s Student Apparently Sought Room Change.” CBS News. 4 Oct. 2010. Web. 12 April 2012.
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McLaughlin, Michael. “Dharun Ravi Seeks Probation in Tyler Clementi Case.” Huffington Post. 04 May 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
Ott, Brian L. and Eric Aoki.“The Politics of Negotiating Public Tragedy: Media Framing of the Matthew Shepard Murder.” Rhetoric & Public Affairs. 5.3 (2002): 483-505. Print.
Parker, Ian. “The Story of a Suicide.” The New Yorker. 6 Feb. 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2012.
Parker-Pope, Tara. “Showing Gay Teenagers a Happy Future.” The New York Times. 22 Sept. 2010. Web. 12 May 2012.
Rose, Joel. “Rutgers Student Remembered As Shy, Gifted Violinist. Na- tional Public Radio (NPR). 01 Oct. 2010. Web. 13 Apr. 2012.
Royston, Rosemary. “Positive Identification Through Being the ‘Oc- casional Asshole’: A Burkeian Analysis of ‘Dear John,’ by Poet Tony Hoagland.” KBJournal. 7.2: (2011). n. pag. Web. 10 May 2012.
Spaulding, Pamela. “Why Did Tyler Clementi Die?” CNN. 30 Sep. 2012. Web. 13 April 2012.
Trumbull, Mark. “Dhuran Ravi Guilty of Anti-gay Hate Crime in Rut- gers Spycam case.” Christian Science Monitor. 16 Mar. 2012. Web. 07 May 2012.
135 Reassessing Japan’s war memories through its natiional Press
WRITER’S COMMENTS
I began my final research paper for the Davies Forum knowing only that I wanted to deconstruct the complex web surrounding Japan’s memories of the Asia–Pacific War. When beginning my research, I was first struck by the shocking war crime denials of conservative Japanese politicians. However, my Davies Forum professor Dr. Shin encouraged us to approach our research objectively, without preformed opinions. As I did more research, I found that popular opinion surveys of war memory issues suggested that attitudes were much more diverse and complex. From Philip Seaton’s scholarship, I was inspired to draw paral- lels between popular war memory in Japan and the opinions presented in Japan’s national papers. While available research can only provide a partial picture of the complicated state of war memory in Japan, I be- lieve further research into media representations of war memory can bring more clarity to the diverse opinions within the population and their ramifications for Japanese national identity. —Alexandra De Leon
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
Collective memory is a controversial topic, especially in East Asia where Japan’s erstwhile colonies and enemies tend to remember the shared past very distinctively. Alexa’s paper reminds us that divergence in col- lective memory about historical events exists not only between nation– states, but also within the nation–state. In a careful review of the existing literature and research on collective memory in Japan, she meticulously absorbs and combines core concepts, data, and historiographies. Then she very intelligently demonstrates how multiple forms of collective memory about World War II manifest among people in contemporary Japanese society and from where they derive. What makes Alexa’s paper so spe- cial is that she pushes her questions one step further. She analyzes how such multiple forms of memories or the lack of unified memories impact the ways in which people in Japan construct their national self-image. By fleshing out the linkage between collective memories and collective identity, Alexa boldly dives into a highly specialized, complex, scholarly debate on nationalism, collective memories and the state–civil society relationship. Her well-informed paper also urges readers to ponder how fragile yet powerful our memories can be. —Hwaji Shin, Department of Sociology
136 Alexandra de leon
a l e x a n d r a d e l e o n Reassessing Japan’s War Memories Through Its National Press
Introduction
s s u e s r e l a t i n g to Japan’s collective memory appear intermit- tently but persistently in international news; often they relate to controversiesI surrounding public figures denying or downplaying Japan’s war atrocities in the Asia–Pacific War. Takashi Kawamura, the mayor of the Japanese city of Nagoya, made international news February 2012 when he announced publicly to a friendship dele- gation from Nanjing that he believed the Nanjing massacre was a fabrication and only “conventional acts of combat” took place during the Japanese invasion of 1937 (Armstrong 2012). The CNN. com article about the incident includes official responses of Chi- nese representatives as well as the responses of ordinary Chinese, who made comments on China’s social media site Sina Weibo (Arm- strong 2012). Armstrong ends his piece with a quote from a Nagoya official which, Amstrong believes, “attempted to repair the dam- age” done by the mayor’s controversial denial (Armstrong 2012). I found it problematic, however, that the opinions of ordinary Japanese people and citizens of Nagoya were left out. Regardless of the reason for the omission, the result is the suggestion that the opinions of Japanese officials can be taken to represent the opinions of the Japanese people. Previous scholarship in the field of Japanese war memory has tended to focus narrowly on the gov- ernment or state-centered point of view. I think it is important to separate the state’s point of view from the views of the people. Even though the government’s perspective on war memory and the popular perspective of war memory can influence each other, they cannot be equated. In order to understand the kinds of contrast-
137 Reassessing Japan’s war memories through its natiional Press
ing perspectives on popular war memory that exist in Japan, I will examine public opinion surveys and how war memory issues have been represented in the national press. In my research, I studied the following questions: Within Ja- pan, is there a dominant perspective on the Asia–Pacific War in popular memory? If not, what kind of contrasting perspectives are there? How does popular memory in Japan differ from the “official
narratives” and why?* How has popular memory been represented in the Japanese press compared to the foreign press? What factors have shaped popular memory of the Asia–Pacific War in Japan? Fi- nally, what implications does the multiplicity of war memory have on Japanese national identity? I will argue that the lack of an acceptable myth of the Asia– Pacific War in popular consciousness in Japan has created complex and contested perspectives on war memory that often differ from the conservative stance taken by the government. Although sig- nificant research has been done on issues of war memory in Japan, they have focused on the official position of the government or extremist viewpoints espoused by public figures rather than stud- ies of popular memory itself. This has led to misrepresentation in foreign and English language media of popular war memory in Ja- pan as following the conservative or nationalistic line. However, Japan’s own national press, when used as a model for assessing rep- resentations of popular memory, suggests that Japanese historical consciousness is both more moderate and more diverse than has been suggested in previous scholarship and popular media. Finally, I will argue that the diversity in war memory views represented in the national papers reflects how Japan’s post-war identity has been fragmented alongside its war memories.
* The “official narrative” is the point of view suggested by the Japanese government’s statements, official apologies, and policy decisions. In general, “Conservatives have maintained a grip on the official war narrative of the Japanese government” due to their greater political power (Seaton 2007:36). See “Five Broad Categories of Memory” on pg. 136 for elaboration on the conservative perspective.
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Method and Data Discussion
My research is primarily a secondary literary analysis. In assessing the media content of Japanese press articles, I have relied heav- ily on the research and content analysis of Hokkaido University Associate Professor Philip Seaton in his book Japan’s Contested War Memories: The “Memory Rifts” in Historical Consciousness of World War II. His book ambitiously tackles Japan’s war memories with an interdisciplinary, integrated approach. Seaton is pioneering in using media analysis to explore war memory in Japan; before his work, no large scale studies had been done on representations of war memory through Japan’s media. Despite the newness of the research field, I feel that a country’s own media is more- repre sentative of its population’s perspective than outside media. In supporting and deepening Seaton’s arguments, I analyzed recent peer-reviewed articles which explore the causes of Japan’s divided war memories and provided valuable insight on the relevance of the United States–Japan relationship in complicating war memo- ries. Ian Buruma’s 1994 book The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan also provided insight on the long-lasting effects of the post-war period and the ineffectual Tokyo Trials on dividing opinions on war memory. I also examined the history of the Japa- nese press and the “press club” phenomenon through De Lange’s 1998 book A History of Japanese Journalism: Japan’s Press Club as the Last Obstacle to a Mature Press, which was referenced by some of my other sources. I reviewed A Public Betrayed: An Inside Look at Japa- nese Media Atrocities and Their Warnings to the West by Adam Gamble and Takesato Watanabe, which provides valuable information on press clubs and the state of modern Japanese journalism despite the presence of some Orientalist arguments. Although I initially wanted to present several case studies of press reactions compared to popular reactions of war memory con- troversies, due to the limited length and scope of this paper I have narrowed my analysis to two issues: Yasukuni Shrine worship and the textbook crises. My research indicates that an analysis of other press issues such as the Comfort Women compensation policy and
139 Reassessing Japan’s war memories through its natiional Press
the Parliament’s 50th anniversary statement** would have similar findings.
Historical Background
Many have considered the Allied occupation of Japan and its after- math to be significant factors in the fragmenting of Japanese mem- ories related to the Asia–Pacific War. The Allies had specific goals in mind for the occupation which didn’t prioritize closure for the Japanese people. Ian Buruma writes that the Tokyo Trials “instead of helping the Japanese to understand and accept their past, left them with an attitude of cynicism and resentment. Political trials produce politicized histories” (Buruma 1994:166). Even though most Japanese had little sympathy for the criminals, the trials were per- ceived as the victor’s one-sided justice because “many people were wrongly accused of the wrong things for the wrong reasons” (Bu- ruma 1994:166). The overly hasty trials in the end provided little clo- sure at all. Instead, American forces were eager to turn Japan into a strategic ally. Harry N. Scheiber, professor of law and history at Uni- versity of California Berkeley, states that from 1947–1948, American policy goals for the Japanese Occupation shifted from an emphasis on reform and punishment to one of “speedy economic recovery and restoration of Japanese autonomy” (Scheiber 2002:243). This emphasis on economic recovery was further stimulated by the Cold War and the “red peril” of Communism in East Asia, leading to a “reverse course” aimed at aligning Japan with America in the Cold War (Scheiber 2002:243). Occupation policies on press control and censorship also affected the way the Japanese people understood the war. The Allied press code required all news to be “truthful” and uneditorialized and prohibited “falsities or destruc- tive criticism concerning the Allied Forces” or discussions of its activities before official announcements (De Lange 1998:169).
** In 1995, the statement passed by the Japanese parliament to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the war was widely criticized for refusing to acknowledge aggression (Seaton 2007:94). The Asahi newspaper called the resolution “Shameful. Sad. Unbearable” (qtd. in Seaton 2007:94)
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Scheiber also argues systematic insulation of Japan’s gov- ernment and its public-at-large from the impact of opinion in the Allied nations other than America itself” (Scheiber 2002:243). Indeed, it was not until after the death of Emperor Showa in 1989 that revelations of Japan’s crimes during the war “grew from a trickle to a cascade” of gruesome horrors (Kings- ton 2007:300). Since then, “The divisions over history among Japanese have developed over six decades and the ongoing debate has polarized positions” (Kingston 2007:316). Inconsis- tent occupation policies and the vast inadequacies of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and Tokyo Tribunals contributed to a Japanese population deeply at odds with its own history.
Findings
Diverse and Contentious War Memory
Many factors probably contributed to the creation of divided war memories in Japan, including censorship and insulation in the Occupation period, inadequate war trials, the influence of the United States on Japan’s post-war political agenda, and the difficulty in reconciling the World War II nationalist pro- paganda with the reality of defeat. Seaton suggests a simple explanation: that the only two times a truly dominant narra- tive of war can be created is when there is unity in judgmental memory, either when a war is victorious, particularly against an enemy that can easily be seen as an “atrocity-soaked” aggres- sor or when war is conducted to expel an invader (2007:209- 210). However, neither of these are the case with Japan in the Asia–Pacific War. Instead, opinions remain divided. In a 1993 study about 60 percent of Japanese people agreed that the Asia–Pacific War had been an aggressive war, and well over 50 percent that some form of compensation should be paid to its victims (McCormack 2001). Figures show that there is still contention about the basic nature of the war. Jeffrey Kingston, director of Asian Studies at Temple University’s Japan campus, comments:
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Interpreting the causes of the war, what actually hap- pened during the war and the aftermath are divisive questions in contemporary Japan. There is vigorous de- bate about this period, active media coverage of the con- troversies and a high level of awareness about opinions in other countries. Just because some groups in society favor air-brushing the inconvenient and unappealing as- pects of Japan’s wartime record does not mean that this is a widely embraced point of view. (Kingston 2007:312)
Sixty years after the war’s end, there is still no consensus on inter- pretations of events of the war and how they should be remem- bered within Japan.
The Five Broad Categories of Memory and National Identity
According to Philip Seaton, we can categorize war memory into five main categories. The largest four positions have been roughly equal in size in the Japanese population since the 1990s, with about 20-30 percent of the population falling into each group. Seaton la- bels these as follows: (1) the progressives, (2) the “progressive-lean- ing group,” (3) the “don’t knows and don’t cares,” and (4) the con- servatives (2007:22). There is also a fifth group of ultra-nationalists who support historical revisionism at the far right of the spectrum, but they are estimated to be only 3-5 percent of the population (Seaton 2007:22). Seaton states that the progressives believe that Japan fought an “aggressive war” in Asia and committed “aggressive acts.” They are critical of Japanese official apologies and see “compensation” as in- adequate; they also consider that Japan was overall more of an ag- gressor than a victim (2007:22). According to Seaton, the progres- sive-leaning group agrees that the China War was an aggressive war but considers Western colonial powers to share responsibility for the outbreak of the Asia–Pacific War resulting in a “comparatively watered-down version of war responsibility” (2007:23). While they support additional apologies and compensation to Asian nations, they feel “a degree of moral equivalence” between Japanese actions
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and Allied actions such as the firebombings and A-bombs (2007:23). In essence, they support the position that “Japan was both victim and perpetrator” (Seaton 2007:23). The conservative group uses util- itarian reasoning to claim the war was justifiable but admits unjust conduct. Conservatives maintain that appropriate reparations have been already made and focus on narratives of victimhood and sacri- fice of the military (Seaton 2007). Finally, Japanese nationalists deny any aggressive acts—including the Nanjing Massacre. They argue that the Allies were the aggressors and Japan doesn’t owe an apology to other Asian nations. They focus on the bravery and sacrifice of the soldiers who fought against “foreign aggression” (2007:24). How Japanese people view their own history in the war also af- fects their sense of national pride and identity. However, progressives are not necessarily “masochistic” about Japanese history as national- ists have claimed. Seaton suggests that for progressives, “[national] pride stems from having the courage to acknowledge past wrongs and squarely face the past. It is also about breaking down narrow- minded and confrontational nationalism through transnational iden- tification” (Seaton 2007:24). Nationalists, in contrast, must deny cul- pability in order to maintain their pride in Japanese militarism and economic success. Conservatives base their pride on patriotism and “precious sacrifice” of the war generation; for them, “pride is based on the purity of spirit and the idealized ‘Japaneseness’ of the war generation” (Seaton 2007:25). According to Seaton the progressive- leaning group bases its pride in “moralistic pacifism” while for the “don’t know and don’t care” group, war history “plays little, if any, role in their national pride and self-identification” (2007:25). How a person perceives their national identity and how they view war memory are closely related to each other as well as to their own self-identity. Just as views of war memory has been fragmented with- in the Japanese population, so has their views of national identity.
Diversity of War Memory Opinions in National Newspapers
Content analysis of Japan’s five daily newspapers reveals that each publication’s position on war memory essentially align with these
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five categories of war memory. Newspapers in Japan are area- sonable medium through which to examine the varied trends of war memories in Japan. Japan has a comparatively high newspa- per readership; in 2004, Japanese newspaper readership was 644 newspapers per 1,000 adults, compared to 263 in the U.S. and 332 in the UK (Seaton 2007). Furthermore, Seaton argues that the press is highly influenced by profitability thresholds. Media aimed at the widest markets, such as television dramas and films, focus on Japanese victimhood to maximize the market (Seaton 2007). In contrast, newspapers can present a more narrow position which coincides with their potential market. Seaton writes, “When more ideological progressive and conservative positions are represented in the media, the potential receptive audience drops to under 30 percent. Newspapers’ profitability thresholds neatly coincide with this size of potential market” (Seaton 2007:34). In other words, it is most profitable for newspapers to aim their content to a specific audience, thereby inherently creating diversity. However, Japan’s press has faced substantial scholarly criticism in the past. Critics of the Japanese media claim that Japan’s press is overly conformist and undemocratic and point to “press clubs” as a source of self-censorship. Press clubs are criticized for their exclusivity and their power to control what information goes out and who gets the information (Gamble 2004). Seaton, however, ar- gues that these “arguments made about the ‘homogenizing effects of press clubs’ are not always consistent with content analysis of Japanese media,” a point which is supported by the analysis of war memory in the news (Seaton 2007:33). Overall, the five dailies can provide a window into the different kinds of war memory within Japan. Seaton claims “the five national dailies have clearly identifiable stances on the war, which are con- gruent with the broader divisions within Japanese war memories” (Seaton 2007:106). The Asahi is progressive and criticizes the gov- ernment regarding “inadequate” official compensation and apolo- gies, the Mainichi has voices from across the board but tends to be progressive-leaning, the Yomiuri is conservative and “frequently toes the government line,” while the Sankei is nationalistic and
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critical of the government for “apologizing too much.” The Nikkei, a primarily business-oriented newspaper, tends to have little cover- age of controversial political issues (Seaton 2007: 85).
Case Study: Yasukuni Shrine — Responses to “Official” Worship In August 2001, the daily newspapers exhibited a range of stances on war memory in response to Prime Minister Koizumi’s visits to the Yasukuni Shrine. The shrine is famous for instigating contro- versy due to its interment and “honoring” of Japanese war dead including convicted war criminals. However, conservative groups continually assert that it is only right to honor those who died for the nation. For groups such as the War Bereaved Association, with ties to the conservative majority Liberal Democratic Party, “paying obeisance at Yasukuni is … a political litmus test” (Kings- ton 2007:304). When Prime Minister Koizumi made his first visit to the shrine, it sparked a variety of press responses. The Asahi “criticized Yasukuni Shrine’s role in Japanese aggression in Asia” and the Mainichi “agonized … over where Japan’s relations with its neighbors could go from there” (Seaton 2007: 92). The Yomiuri supported Koizumi’s decision not to give in to international pres- sure about worshipping and acknowledged that Yasukuni worship should be negotiable for prime ministers (Seaton 2007). Finally, the Sankei openly supported Yasukuni worship and indicated skepti- cism concerning Japanese war guilt (Seaton 2007). The newspapers echoed the diversity and division within public opinion regarding Koizumi’s visits to the shrine. Polls showed that in 2001, 40 per- cent of Japanese opposed his worship while 50 percent supported it (Seaton 2007). It is important to note, though, that “support for official Yasukuni worship does not necessarily equate to national- ism” and “Support for official mourning of the war dead” is not equivalent to “affirming the aims and conduct of the war” (Seaton 2007: 26). Nevertheless, after the outrage provoked across Asia, opinions regarding the worship experienced a moderate reversal, with 53-54% opposing continued worship in 2006 (Seaton 2007).
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Case Study: “Tsukurukai” Nationalistic Textbook — Responses to Textbook Crisis To show that this is not an isolated example, I will also examine pub- lic and newspaper responses to the “Textbook Crises.” The Textbook Crises in Japan have generally been struggles between progressive scholars such as Ienaga Saburou, who fought to have “more concrete references to Japanese atrocities in textbook,” and conservatives who want to correct “biased,” “unpatriotic,” or “masochistic” views of Japanese history (Seaton 2007:100). The most recent textbook crisis was in 2001 and surrounded the textbook produced by nation- alist group Atarashii Rekishi Kyoukasho wo Tsukurukai or the Japanese Society for History Textbook Reform. The textbook they produced took a nationalistic standpoint on the war and omitted the “comfort women” issue completely. Before the textbook was even approved, the Asahi condemned it as “unbalanced” and “ignoring the victims of Japanese aggression” (Seaton 2007:101). The Mainichi criticized the textbook for its avoidance of instances of Japanese aggression but didn’t think the book should be further revised after it has been ap- proved (Seaton 2007). The Yomiuri did not openly state it support of the textbooks’ statements but supported the Tsukurukai’s right to produce the textbook and for education boards to select it (Seaton 2007). The Sankei was “understandably supportive of the textbook given that the textbook’s publisher, Fusousha, is part of the Sankei media conglomerate” and “welcomed a new era of diversity in Japa- nese education” (Seaton 2007:102). The newspapers varied responses portray the textbook as a contentious issue within Japanese society. A study showed about 28% of the Japanese public supported the textbook’s group, Tsuku- rukai, while 44% opposed the group (Kondo qtd. in Seaton 2007: 26). Textbook revisionism has been one of the most criticized as- pects of Japanese nationalism. However, the reality is that many Japanese people opposed the revisionist textbooks. The books were so controversial that they were “almost completely boycot- ted” and only a few out of thousands of schools used the national- istic textbook (Seaton 2007:102).
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Conclusion
Japan has faced harsh judgment in the foreign media and scholar- ship related to its “historical amnesia” and nationalistic outbursts by public figures. However, an analysis of Japan’s press and its treat- ment of war memory reveal that ultra-nationalism is a minority viewpoint in Japan. Even though there is no unified narrative of war memory, there are several perspectives which are well represented in Japan’s five daily newspapers. Still, the lack of a widely accepted narrative of the war has contributed to a nation with divided views of its own history, and thus, identity. Memories are an integral part of identity, at an individual and collective level. How citizens remember their nation’s past influ- ences how they perceive their national identity, relations with other nations, and their place in the world. Japanese war memory and its perception by other nations continues to play a vital role in Japan’s relations with its neighbors, especially China and Korea. However, the liberal forces of Japanese politics do not yet have enough influ- ence to majorly impact war memory policy. Seaton writes that the conflict is an:
ongoing clash between, on the one hand, a politically powerful conservative lobby whose war stance in recent times (since the 1970s) has been a minority opinion but which has maintained control over the official narrative and policy, and, on the other hand, a politically weak progressive lobby which has had the support of a small majority of public opinion but has failed to turn that support into the political power necessary to chance the official narrative. (Seaton 2007:36)
However, in the 2007 and 2009 elections, the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) which has maintained political power al- most continuously since its formation in 1955 lost its majority in Parliament. While the public was interested in bread-and-butter issues like jobs and the economy, LDP Prime Minister Abe Shinzo pursued ideological issues like constitutional reform leading up to
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the elections. Although his last-straw moment was his admittance that the government has lost millions of pension records, his “gaffes over history—quibbling about the level of coercion used in recruit- ing Korean teenagers to become sex slaves for the Imperial armed forces, and trying to force textbook revisions to downplay the role of Japanese soldiers in instigating group suicides of Okinawans— undermined confidence in his judgment” (“Contemporary Japan” 2010). But despite the regime change, the Japanese public remains focused on the “bread-and-butter” issues and ideological change to war memory policy is not an issue that will gain politicians support from the public. Nevertheless, in the future Japan’s war memory will likely be reevaluated and policy will gradually change. Seaton states that by the time of the 70th or 75th anniversary of the war’s end, the generational shift to second-hand memories will be final- ized. He point out that “after the postwar generations have taken full control of the nation’s war narrative, it is conceivable that much of the heat will be taken out of the issue” or “alternatively, a new conflict (perhaps involving North Korea) may reset the ‘post- war clock’ to zero” (2007:210). Regardless, war memory policy and divisive views of war memory within the public will change and adapt to the issues relevant to Japan in the future. It is unlikely that war memory will ever be buried due to the unrelenting pres- sure of China and South Korea, and new generations of Japanese are increasingly aware of the international criticism. Ultimately, the reality is that change will occur when circumstances and the Japanese public demand it.
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References
Armstrong, Paul. 2012. “Fury over Japanese Politician’s Nanjing Mas- sacre Denial.” CNN. Retrieved April 18, 2012 (http://www.cnn. com/2012/02/23/world/asia/china-nanjing-row/)
Buruma, Ian. 1994. The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.
“Contemporary Japan: 5 Questions for Historian and Author Jeffrey Kingston.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, 29 Sept. 2010. Retrieved May 12, 2012. (http://www.britannica.com/ blogs/2010/09/contemporary-japan-5-questions-for-historian-and- author-jeffrey-kingston/)
De Lange, William. 1998. A History of Japanese Journalism: Japan’s Press Club as the Last Obstacle to a Mature Press. Richmond, VA: Japan Library.
Gamble, Adam, and Takesato Watanabe. 2004. A Public Betrayed: An Inside Look at Japanese Media Atrocities and Their Warnings to the West. Washington, D.C.: Regnery Pub.
Kingston, Jeff. 2007. “Awkward Talisman: War Memory, Reconciliation and Yasukuni.” Pp. 295-318 in East Asia: An International Quarterly 24 (3) Academic Search Premier. Retrieved April 20, 2012.
McCormack, Gavan. 2001. The Emptiness of Japanese Affluence. Revised ed. Armonk, NY: Sharpe.
Scheiber, Harry N. 2002. “Stefan A. Riesenfield Symposium 2001: Taking Responsibility: Moral And Historical Perspectives On The Japanese War-Reparations Issues+.” pg. 233. Berkeley Journal Of Inter- national Law 20. LexisNexis Academic: Law Reviews. Retrieved April 20, 2012.
Seaton, Philip A. 2007. Japan’s Contested War Memories: The ‘Memory Rifts’ in Historical Consciousness of World War II. London: Routledge.
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WRITER’S COMMENTS
In Professor Kruze’s Politics of China and Japan course, we were asked to write about a topic in either Chinese or Japanese politics. Among all the foreign relations and economic topics that were popular with the class, I decided to bring a longtime suffering population to light: Zainichi Koreans or ethnic Koreans living in Japan. Zainichi Koreans have suffered a vari- ety of injustices due to their lack of Japanese ethnicity, and consequently, Japanese citizenship. Zainichi Koreans have and continue to face discrimi- nation in such areas as employment and marital prospects and are often associated with criminal activity. My paper explores the ways that Zainichi Koreans have and continue to be oppressed by the Japanese government as an attempt to create historical amnesia among the populace about the atrocities that Japan committed during World War II. —Gayla Freeman
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
American Presidents from Truman to Obama have praised Japan as a na- tion that shares our values of liberalism, free markets, and democratic institutions. But Gayla Freeman, an Asian Studies major at USF, tells a dif- ferent story: it is a narrative of entrenched racism, ethnic discrimination, and denial of citizenship to long-standing residents of Japan, known as the Zainichi Koreans. Through no fault of their own, they remain an “internal colony” of approximately a million people whose life choices, educational opportunities, and employment possibilities remain limited and circum- scribed. Gayla’s account provides a historical analysis of the origins of this community dating back to Japan’s colonial seizure and occupation (1910- 1945) of their next-door neighbor Korea. It details the specific laws and psychological rationales developed by Japan’s political elite after the 1950s to justify the continuing marginalization of immigrant Koreans, many of whom were either coerced or fooled into emigrating to Japan in the first place. Gayla finally links this effort to the Japanese elite’s continuing denial, evasion, or minimization of its war responsibility, hoping that denial will make inconvenient issues disappear. Ms. Freeman’s work combines many disciplines, ranging from history and politics to anthropology and psy- chology, to reveal a part of Japan that many Japanese themselves remain blissfully unaware of or indifferent to. It is also a work that highlights the importance of linking issues of social justice to careful scholarship. —Uldis Kruze, History Department
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g a y l a f r e e m a n What Koreans?: The Status and Marginalization of Koreans in Japan
m a g i n e that you are an illegal immigrant who has lived in the United States for 10 years. Sick of living in fear of immigration authoritiesI and living in the shadows, you finally decide to apply for U.S. citizenship. But instead of progressing in the application process, your application stops at the permanent residency stage. You remain in that stage for several years, even though you obey all laws and pay all taxes. You are stuck in legal limbo. You have rights as a permanent resident, but all the rights that U.S. citizens enjoy remain elusive to you. In Japan, Zainichi Koreans, or ethnic Koreans who permanently reside in Japan, lack full Japanese citizenship. Zainichi Koreans are stuck in a perpetual state of permanent residency, despite once hav- ing Japanese citizenship as Japanese colonial subjects. Many Zainichi Koreans obey all Japanese laws and call Japan “home,” but the Japa- nese government has remained unwilling to extend full citizenship to Zainichi Koreans. Yet Japan allows foreigners of other ethnicities and nationalities to apply for citizenship without undergoing a “dif- ficult procedure” as described by Yumi Lee, a Zainichi Korean who is interviewed in the writer and economist George Hicks’s book, Japan’s Hidden Apartheid (Lee qtd. in Hicks 86-87). The denial of the Japanese government to bestow Zainichi Ko- reans with Japanese citizenship is but one of the myriad of ways that Japanese society has mistreated Zainichi Koreans. Among other things, it is hard for Zainichi to find employment in Japa- nese corporations, banks, and in government sectors, according to post-graduate student Tomoko Matsumoto (85, 89). In order to avoid bullying and harassment at school and work, Zainichi Ko-
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reans have to create a false “Japanese” identity (Matsumoto 165). Like other minority groups in Japan, such as the Burakumin, ethnic Japanese who are the descendants of those who performed duties that are considered to be unclean (like butchering), and the Ainu, Zainichi Koreans live in a shadow society, hidden away from the view of most Japanese. The main question that I have always had regarding Zainichi discrimination is Why? Why would the Japanese continue to harbor ill will towards their former colonial subjects? This is something that I have always failed to understand; there were few protests against Japanese rule, and most of those were led by Korean Christians, who, among other things, objected to the oppression of their faith, according to James Huntley Grayson, Professor Emeritus of East Asian Studies at the University of Sheffield (15-16). In this paper, I explore the various ways that Zainichi Koreans have faced hardship at the hands of the Japanese. I conclude that several of these forms of discrimination can be linked to the Japanese government trying to create a sense of amnesia regarding atrocities committed by the Japanese Imperial Army against Koreans during World War II by pushing them to the margins of Japanese society.
The Beginnings of a Korean Population in Japan
The history of Koreans in Japan began when Korea became a for- mal colony of Japan in 1910 (Hicks 45). Matsumoto asserts in her thesis that Korea was colonized in order to provide Japan with a steady supply of labor—consequently, all Koreans were given Japa- nese citizenship (9). However, despite being Japanese citizens, the amount of Koreans who migrated to Japan was small, barely reaching 5,000; most of which consisted of students and wealthy farmers whose occupation in Japan was actually either “laboring or peddling” (Hicks 46). After 1916, the Korean population in Japan tripled and continued to rise yearly until World War II (Hicks 47). University of California at Berkeley Professor of Sociology John Lie describes Korean migration to Japan as essentially “voluntary” until the 1940s, when World War II sparked a drive for human la- bor (Zainichi 6).
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Japanese colonization provided no ambiguities when it came to the legality of Koreans—they were Japanese subjects—albeit inferior ones. But once World War II came to an end, Japan sur- rendered and relinquished Korea as well as its other colonies, such as Taiwan. Koreans became free and could leave Japan and never return, at least in theory. While many Koreans left Japan or were strongly considering it, two factors particularly shattered the dream of Korea as the “Promised Land”: possession limits imposed by the United States coupled with poverty in postwar Korea (Hōmu Kenshūjo qtd. in Lie Zainichi 34). Koreans hoping to leave Japan with all of their possessions had their hopes dashed when U.S. of- ficials limited them to only carrying “1,000 yen and 250 pounds of luggage” back to their homeland (Hōmu Kenshūjo qtd. in Lie Zainichi 34). If they did manage to pare down their belongings to include only the necessities and successfully made the trip, the “generally impoverished, unhealthy, and unmodern conditions in post-Liberation Korea also repulsed some returnees, who made a U-turn back to Japan” (Lie Zainichi 34). Mark E. Caprio, Professor of History at Rikkyo University and Yu Jia, post-doctoral fellow at Chung’ang University in Seoul, describes the predicament in detail that Koreans faced at the end of the war:
Koreans remaining in Japan, entangled in postwar con- fusion, found it challenging to secure basic essentials such as food, housing, and employment. Added compli- cations arose from the ill-prepared Occupation forces that arrived in both Japan and southern Korea. Repa- triated Koreans discovered a situation in Korea even more troubling than what they left in Japan. Despite its inhospitable environment, Japan at least offered the option of continuing a semblance of the lives they had built since crossing over. Many of those who returned to the Korean peninsula arrived with little, if any, eco- nomic, social, or even cultural foundation upon which to start new lives. (22)
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Thus, Koreans had to choose between continuing their lives in a nation that considered them to be inferior subjects or to start anew in their ancestral homeland without a job, proficiency in the Ko- rean language, or knowledge of Korean culture (which the Japanese colonial government had suppressed). All of which was worsened by the lack of significant social contacts (Matsumoto 9). Given the freedom to choose which fate they wanted to pursue, Koreans only had the two options, leaving them trapped. Still, a reluctant 600,000 Koreans decided to stay in Japan, which would become the beginnings of the Zainichi population in Japan today. As such, it is appropriate to declare “the period between August 1945 and August 1946 as the [start] of Zainichi history” (Lie Zainichi 36).
The Issue of Citizenship
Now that the war and subsequently the colonization of Korea was over, the Japanese government had to determine how to legally classify Koreans still residing in Japan, as they were no longer the “Emperor’s subjects” and therefore no longer under Japanese juris- diction. Without the mask of Japanese citizenship, Japan saw the Koreans residing in its borders in a rather xenophobic light: they were and never would be, Japanese; they would always be Kore- ans, foreign immigrants who would never completely assimilate or adopt Japanese ways (Lie Zainichi 37). The stain of Korean blood could never be washed away, it would forever be on their skin and clothing. Following that logic on April 19, 1952, the Japanese gov- ernment issued circular no. 438, officially stripping Koreans (and Taiwanese) of their citizenship (Onuma qtd.in Kashiwazaki “The Politics of Legal Status” 23). The provision came a little more than a week before the San Francisco Peace Treaty was to go into effect, which reinforced the end of Japanese colonial rule in Korea, accord- ing to Chikako Kashiwazaki, Associate Professor of Economics at Keio University (“The Politics of Legal Status” 23). Koreans then became foreign nationals (Kashiwazaki “The Foreigner Category for Koreans in Japan” 128). Now Koreans had to apply for Japanese citizenship like any other foreigner who wanted to experience as an accepted member all of Japanese civil society.
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Very few people would disagree with the fact that circu- lar no. 438 and its perpetrator, the Japanese government, was in error over how it treated Koreans in regards to nationality. Hicks asserts that by depriving Koreans of Japanese citizenship and therefore nationality, the post-War World II Japanese gov- ernment acted “illegally, immorally, and unwisely” (51). Hicks’s argument highlights how Japan’s Americanized Constitution defines nationality and international law:
Japan’s American-drafted Constitution states that nationality is to be determined by law, rather than administrative decision. Secondly, the usual inter- national practice allows individual choice of nation- ality when territorial changes occur (e.g., Austrians in post-war Germany were given a choice of nation- ality). In this case, however, Japanese officials took the power of choice away from the individual. It was also irrational to make no distinction between other aliens entering Japan with foreign nationality, and former colonial subjects who had come there, often forcibly drafted, as Japanese nationals. (51-52)
By denying Koreans the option of choosing whether to hold Japanese or Korean nationality, the Japanese government treated the Koreans as if they were still colonial subjects. This defied accepted practices and customs of international law by leaving Koreans involuntarily left stateless and hence without many basic legal rights (guaranteed by citizenship to a state). Adding salt to the wound, despite their painful history with Japan, Koreans were put on the same level as foreigners who came to Japan of their own free will. The Japanese govern- ment ignored the suffering and contributions of Koreans and failed to at least allow them to remain citizens of a country, the country in which most of them built their entire lives and fortunes. Koreans were once declared the “Emperor’s subjects,” but they lost this status once World War II was over and the San
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Francisco Treaty signed. During the war, Koreans worked in in- dustrial fields such as mining and construction, as well as in fac- tories: working environments known to be where workers were most prone to serious injury, respiratory illness, or death (O qtd. in Lie Zainichi 38). Since Korea was colonized in order to pro- vide Japan with a stable workforce, Koreans arguably played a small part in developing Japan’s economy. Taking all of this into consideration, it is rather harsh that the Japanese government outright rejected all the efforts that Koreans had made for the betterment of Japan, even though their work was forced upon them under the colonial structure. By taking away their citizen- ship, the Japanese government left Koreans stateless while com- municating to Koreans that they had served their purpose under Japanese rule and were now free. With their new freedom, the Japanese government encouraged that they should go back to Korea (Kashiwazaki, “The Politics of Legal Status” 23). Although three-fourths of Koreans repatriated, a stubborn 600,000 re- mained despite the dominant line of thought (Lie Zainichi 33).
Permanent Residency
Even though the Japanese wanted Koreans to return to Korea, Koreans lacked Korean passports. Even if they were to possess one, “Korea” was now divided into North and South, neither of which Japan had diplomatic relations with (Hicks 52). Due to these reasons, the Japanese government passed Law 126 in 1952, which allowed Koreans who lived in Japan before Japan’s formal surrender on September 2, 1945, along with their chil- dren, to stay in Japan “indefinitely” (Hicks 52). “Indefinitely” in the minds of most Japanese, as well as most Koreans, was not very long: a period of two to five years during which one could amass enough money to afford the journey back to Korea (Lie Zainichi 33). In fact, the term Zainichi came into existence around this time to describe the “temporary nature of Koreans’ residence” (Lie Zainichi 38). Zainichi literally translates to “stay- ing in Japan.” While term does not specify what foreign group
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is staying in Japan temporarily, it is almost always used in reference to permanent resident Koreans. No one thought that those two to five years would turn into a lifetime; no one wanted it to turn into a lifetime. As Lie puts it, “the idea that Japan might be a perma- nent home for ethnic Koreans—a place to be buried or a country in which descendants will live long and presumably prosper—was alien and abominable” (Zainichi 33). For the Japanese, the reason was most likely related to the deeply held colonial-era notion of Japan as an “ethnically homogeneous ‘family nation’ with the em- peror as the head … [there was] no place for non-Japanese people except as assimilated imperial subjects with complete loyalty to the emperor;” since Koreans were no longer imperial subjects, they were excluded from being apart of this “family” (Kashiwazaki “The Politics of Legal Status” 13). Law 126 applied to all Koreans, whether they had origins in North Korea or South Korea. However, once Japan established diplomatic relations with South Korea via the 1965 Normaliza- tion Treaty, permanent residency was extended only to those who were registered citizens in South Korea, leaving out the majority of the Korean population, whose roots were in North Korea, caus- ing them to have no legal standing (Hicks 55; Lie Zainichi 32). Even today, Zainichi who have origins in North Korea have to declare South Korean nationality in order to receive permanent resident status and have some legal foothold in Japan, according to Sonia Ryang, Professor of Anthropology and International Studies at the University of Iowa and the Director of the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies at the University of Iowa (68). For Koreans, Japan typically reminded them of the more than three decades that they were brutally suppressed as a people; their culture and ways of life where stifled in favor of the ‘superior’ Japa- nese culture. The Japanese had no desire for the impure Koreans to live in the same country that they did and destroy the notion of an ethnically pure Japan. These diverging viewpoints still led to the same conclusion—no one, including Koreans themselves—wanted Koreans to permanently settle in Japan.
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Discriminatory Policies Towards Koreans
Since it was grudgingly accepted that the approximate 600,000 Koreans living in Japan were not leaving anytime soon, the Japa- nese government decided that it had to systematically track them somehow. Perhaps as one of the earliest postwar discriminatory policies toward Koreans in Japan, fingerprinting was initially de- signed as a way to track the movements of all foreigners in Japan (of which all but five percent were ethnic Koreans) (Matsumoto 10- 11). Taken during alien registration, the process involved dipping one of the person’s fingers in black ink and rotating it a full 180 degrees on a piece of paper just as the police fingerprint criminals (Matsumoto 10). Fingerprints had to be retaken at a five-year in- terval (Matsumoto 10). The fingerprinting policy effectively com- municated to foreigners, Koreans especially, that they were to be treated as criminals. Their crime? They were not Japanese and were not in possession of Japanese citizenship, making them untrust- worthy. Thus, it is not uncommon in Japanese society to blame foreigners and Koreans for social ills such as unemployment and rising crime rates (Lie Zainichi 37). Branded as criminals, Koreans were marginalized, ignored, and shunned by most Japanese and segregated to all-Korean enclaves in industrial cities, such as Osa- ka (Lie Zainichi 38). By labeling Koreans as criminals, the Japanese government demonized them and made efforts to separate them from mainstream Japanese society as outsiders, persecuting them similar to what was done to the Burakumin. However, due to severe protests by foreigners and Zainichi alike, the fingerprinting policy was abolished in 2000; yet the traumatizing psychological effects remain in the minds of those old enough to remember what it was like (Matsumoto 10-11, 85). For Zainichi Koreans who have attended or currently attend Japanese schools (a very small number of Korean schools, which are usually politically affiliated with North Korea, exist), school was or is an unwelcome place, fraught with discrimination and bullying by their classmates (Lie Zainichi 77). This trend will continue, un- less the Zainichi Korean adopts a tsūmei, or pass name (Matsumoto
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165). One’s pass name is created by adding one Chinese charac- ter to one’s Korean surname, for Japanese surnames consist of two Chinese characters, whereas a single character makes up a Korean surname (Matsumoto 160). It is not uncommon for Zainichi Kore- ans to have two names: their Korean name and their Japanese alias (Matsumoto 161). Common tsūmei include Kaneda and Kaneshiro, both derived from the very common Korean name Kim (Lie Zain- ichi 21). Their Korean name is used for legal documents and their tsūmei is used in social environments, such as school or work, where they need to give off the appearance of being Japanese (Matsumoto 165). Pass names are a necessity in order for Zainichi Koreans to avoid discrimination in Japanese society; yet many question why anti-Korean attitudes are so strong, to the point that they need to construct an entirely new identity (Matsumoto 170). Maybe pass names provide Zainichi Koreans with the opportunity to be in- cluded in wider Japanese society in a way that they normally would not be able to do otherwise. Still, it is rather troubling that ethnic Koreans in Japan have to fabricate and conceal their true identities in order to gain full access to Japanese society. When Zainichi Koreans do go to school with their Japanese peers, they most likely will receive a monocultural and monoeth- nic education (Lie Zainichi 77). Berkeley’s John Lie comments that Zainichi Korean children “learned to act and be Japanese” and that the lack of multicultural sensitivity and education was “glaring in the 1960s and 1970s” (Lie Zainichi 77). Discrimination against Zain- ichi Koreans will continue to occur if they remain absent from the school curriculum—after all, if Japanese children are taught that only Japanese people live in Japan, then that will cause them to think that Zainichi Koreans are not Japanese, even if they speak Japanese fluently and are steeped in Japanese culture. They will al- ways be foreign, even if they have never been outside Japan or tak- en a bite of kimchi, a fermented vegetable dish that is the staple of Korean cuisine. Unless the school curriculum is changed, Zainichis will continue to be perceived as outsiders from Japanese society. Koreans also experience discrimination in the working world, as they are often barred from working at Japanese companies due to their ethnicity, resulting in Zainichi Koreans having a near mo-
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nopoly in certain sectors of employment, such as the service indus- try (Lie Zainichi 72). Zainichi-heavy establishments include “yakini- ku (barbecued meat) restaurants and pachinko parlors” (Lie Zainichi 73). Zainichi Koreans owned an estimated seventy to eighty percent of a total of 18,000 pachinko parlors and at least ninety percent of a total of 20,000 yakiniku restaurants in the 1990s (Nomura qtd. in Lie Zainichi 73). Zainichi Koreans are often pushed into these businesses because it is difficult to get employed anywhere else: positions in Japanese banks and major corporations are closed to Zainichi Koreans, and one needs Japanese citizenship in order to be eligible for work in the government or in government-related professions, such as a public school teacher, firefighter, or police officer (Matsumoto 85, 89). Shutting out Zainichi Koreans from the stable sectors of employment only emphasizes the idea that Zainichi Koreans were not expected to remain in Japan for a long period of time. The lack of positions open to Zainichi Koreans in the government suggests that the Japanese government does not want them to be involved in the legislative process and that they consider them to be non-citizens. But if the discrimination experienced by Zainichi Koreans is so great, then why are so few becoming naturalized citizens? Lie states that naturalization “[threatens] the very definition of Zain- ichi”; for if a Zainichi naturalizes, then in effect they have become Japanese and no longer are a Korean permanently residing in Japan (Zainichi 86; emphasis is mine). Then the former Zainichi loses the commonality that he shared with other Zainichi and is demonized as a sellout, says writer and economist George Hicks (18). After all, to become a Japanese citizen, one must swear allegiance to the Japanese Constitution, which still lists the Emperor as the symbol of Japan, the same Emperor who “presided over Korea’s colonial subjugation, from 1925 to 1945, continued on the throne for nearly half a century following Japan’s defeat” (Hicks 18). To both elderly Koreans who lived during Japanese colonial rule and young Koreans who have heard stories about that era from their parents, grand- parents, and other relatives, the Emperor is the embodiment of all the oppression and suffering that their people had to endure. Lie goes on to further explain that naturalization “implied exchanging
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the soul of Koreanness for that of the ideological enemy,” similar to the well-used phrase, “selling your soul to the devil” (Zainichi 87). The symbol of the Emperor is one reason that Zainichi Ko- reans refuse to naturalize, but another is that the Japanese gov- ernment “subtly requires all foreigners to acquire Japanese names when they naturalize their citizenship, even though the law does not explicitly require foreign nationals to change their names and adopt Japanese names in order to acquire a Japanese citizenship” (Matsumoto 164). Adopting a Japanese name forces the newly natu- ralized foreigner to assume a Japanese identity in order to be ac- cepted as Japanese, which is rigidly defined as someone who prac- tices Japanese customs, fluently speaks Japanese, and has Japanese ancestry/blood (Matsumoto 8). The definition of Japaneseness is based on ethnicity and cultural identity, so even if one were to sat- isfy the first two criteria, he or she is still of non-Japanese blood and is therefore not a true Japanese—that is probably why Zainichi Koreans who naturalize are still viewed as foreigners even though they speak fluent Japanese and are ignorant of Korean culture. The critical piece—ethnicity—is missing, and naturalization does not switch a Zainichi’s Korean blood with Japanese blood (Lie Zain- ichi 86). Unfortunately, due to the blood aspect of the definition, Japanese-ness remains exclusive only to those who were fortunate enough to be born within the bounds of its definition.
No Apologies
Another addition to the woes of Koreans in Japan is the refusal of the Japanese government and Japanese society at large to apologize for atrocities committed during World War II. Berkeley Professor of Sociology John Lie states that “no politician has publicly apolo- gized for Japanese atrocities in Asia, such as the Nanking Massacre” and that even when Emperor Hirohito, who was at least indirectly responsible for Japan’s actions during World War II, died in 1989, it “engendered little discussion of his war responsibility” among the Japanese (“War, Absolution, and Amnesia” 302). While it could be said that no one expected apologies during the period of American Occupation of Japan (1945-1952) where the wounds of war were still
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fresh, a little more than six decades have passed since World War II ended and it has been a little more than five decades since the Occupation ended. So why has no apology been issued? Reasons listed by Yasuaki Onuma, Professor of Law at Meiji University, in- clude Japanese preoccupation with their own suffering during the war and the lenient judgment toward war criminals in the Tokyo Trials (“Japanese War Guilt” 604). Japanese suffering included not only deaths on the battlefield, but civilian deaths caused by the nu- clear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). Since the Japanese thought of the war as “nothing other than a great evil, which destroyed their lives and imposed great suffering on them,” they were too focused on their suffering to even begin to consider what their military did to the Chinese and Koreans (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). Some Japanese probably even thought that they suffered the most out of their neighbors – after all, atomic bombs were not dropped on Chinese or Korean cities. Sure, the sufferings of the Chinese and Koreans were great, but the Japanese thought theirs was greater. The Tokyo Trials only resulted in a few being tried and the rest set free (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). Even Emperor Hiro- hito was mysteriously exempt from trial (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). After six key leaders were found guilty of war crimes and executed, “the process of judgment all but ended” (Lie “War, Absolution, and Amnesia” 309). The Japanese were called to col- lective responsibility for the war, but most failed to see how they played a part in the events that transpired or failed to identify with the war criminals (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). Tojo Hideki and other convicted war criminals were seen as having engaged in the war on their own, and ordinary Japanese saw themselves as the innocent bystanders—in essence, they separated themselves from the criminals morally (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 604). The people responsible had already been dealt with, so the Japa- nese citizenry cleansed its hands of the matter and failed to do any moral self-examination themselves (Lie “War, Absolution, and Amnesia” 308). An example of where this attitude is present is in Japanese history textbooks, wherein the Japanese are portrayed as
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victims, not aggressors, and Japanese war atrocities are conspicu- ously absent as if they never happened (Lie “War, Absolution, and Amnesia” 309). It was as if the execution of Tojo Hideki and his comrades signaled the end of reflection and thought about Japa- nese actions during the war. The government seems to think that ignoring the problem will make it magically disappear (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 610). However, by looking away from the proverbial elephant in the room, the Japanese government misses a great opportunity to bring awareness of the plight of Koreans to the public. Koreans have been suffering from injustices committed by the Japanese government for a while now, but all the politicians hold the same attitude in which the Zainichi plight is swept under the tatami mat and sustained by the hope that by sleeping on the issue it will re- solve itself. However, Onuma notes that even if the government addressed the historical grievances of Koreans publicly, “the prob- lem of war guilt is the kind of problem which the government of- ficials are most incapable of solving” (Onuma “Japanese War Guilt” 610). The government certainly has the authority to address the problem, but they probably lack the cultural sensitivity and knowl- edge of accurate historical facts necessary to make an impact on how Japanese society views Koreans. Most of the government of- ficials with the most power are senior citizens and were educated in a school curriculum that featured distorted historical facts that were in favor of Japan and that depicted Koreans as criminals and living in poverty (Lie Zainichi 81). Unless they did some outside reading themselves, they are limited to what they know about Ko- reans from their school days. Therefore, the government has no choice but to rely on time to offer a solution to the problem.
Judgment Day
Ever since Korea became a Japanese colony in 1910, Koreans have had to endure a lot of hardships brought on by the Japanese, even when colonial rule ended. When they once had Japanese citizen- ship, they saw it taken away, their social status plummeting from
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“Emperor’s subject” to unsavory pauper. As a consolation prize, they received permanent residency, something close to, but not quite, their previous citizenship. They had to go to the police sta- tion even though they may not have committed a crime to get fin- gerprinted. In order to have an easier life, they have to give them- selves a Japanese name, also known as a tsūmei or pass name in Zainichi circles. Throughout their lives, they face discrimination at school, when they’re looking for employment and housing and even by their own peers if they naturalize their citizenship. When I began researching Zainichi Koreans, I wondered why the Japanese government went through all this effort to separate them from the rest of Japanese society. By pushing the majority of Koreans into ethnic enclaves in urban centers such as Osaka or into small villages across the Japanese archipelago, the Japanese government has isolated them to the effect that they fail to pose a threat to how Japanese society sees them. Isolation also breeds invisibility—if the larger society does not think that a minority group exists, then recognition will remain elusive for said minority group. Zainichi Koreans remain invisible in Japanese society be- cause, from the Japanese standpoint, they look identical to native- Japanese (Lie Zainichi 17). Zainichi even talk and act Japanese. No longer do speech and culinary differences act as a signifier of a per- son’s Korean identity—Zainichi Koreans can articulate the pa pi pu pe po sounds in perfect Japanese pitch (Lie Zainichi 17-18; italics are mine). Now kimchi has become a food item enjoyed by both Koreans and Japanese, albeit the kimchi sold in Japan is probably less spicy due to the sensitivity of Japanese taste buds (Lie Zainichi 18). There is no accurate test to determine if Mr. Kaneda is really Korean or a Japanese who just so happened to have a common Zainichi name (Lie Zainichi 18, 21). Due to government policies that singled out and marginalized Koreans and made them invisible, the Japanese government subtly allowed its citizens to forget about the suffering endured by Kore- ans during the Japanese colonization of Korea and World War II. If there is no test to determine who is Korean and if all Koreans look and speak like Japanese, then technically there are no Koreans in Japanese society because if there were, those individuals would
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speak Korean and have distinct Korean facial features. In essence, they would be drastically different from ethnic Japanese. If there are no Koreans, then there is no need for reconciliation between the Japanese and comfort women (women, in which most of whom were Korean, who were forced to provide sexual services for the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II), male Koreans who were forced into the Japanese army, or any other Korean victims of Japanese war atrocities, according to Sonia Ryang, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Iowa (78-79). If there are no Ko- reans currently in Japan, then the Japanese can erase their previous history with Korea and Koreans from their mind. An area of research that has yet to be explored is whether the younger generation of Zainichi and Japanese view each other in the same way that the older generations have. With Korean cul- ture currently rising in popularity around the world, young Japa- nese are sure to have at least a glimpse of what a Korean looks like, either through Korean dramas or actual travel to South Korea —do they compare the faces of the Korean people that they have seen to those of their classmates? Do they know the truth of the history between Korea and Japan? If they found out that one of their classmates was Korean, how did they react? For Zainichi, the main question would be whether they feel any underlying animos- ity towards Japan and the Japanese for what they did to members of their ethnic group. These questions may provide a new window into the Zainichi experience—that between young Japanese and young Zainichi. Despite all the negative things that have happened, things are starting to become slightly better for Zainichi—Japan’s desire to continue to be part of the “advanced societies” group and pressure by human rights organizations led to the outlaw of overtly discrim- inatory policies such as fingerprinting (Lie Zainichi 152). The Zain- ichi have become a small blip on the Japanese’s radar screens (Lie Zainichi 152). They can vote in local elections as of 1995, and almost half of the wealthiest people in Japan are Zainichi (Lie Zainichi 152- 153; Miyatsuka qtd. in Lie Zainichi 154). However, it has to be said that the main obstacle to complete equality for the Zainichi is “the ruling party and government bureaucracy’s unwillingness to apolo-
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gize and make amends” (Wada qtd. in Lie Zainichi 154). Zainichi have achieved several small victories, but they are still waiting for the day when they get full Japanese citizenship, not to mention the day when they are able to introduce themselves to their Japanese peers using their Korean name. It seems that no matter what they do, Zainichi Koreans will be disliked or despised by someone—for they are “too Korean for Ja- pan to accept them but also too Japanese for South Korea even to contemplate taking them back,” according to writer George Hicks (54). They are caught between two dueling identities, where pick- ing either one has consequences. If they choose to be Japanese, then they live in fear of when they will be ousted as a fraud. If they choose to be Korean, they gain the support of their grandparents, but have to deal with the cruelties of a society that still lacks the capacity to completely accept them. If they go to South Korea, they will be only recognized as Japanese. Perhaps one day Zainichi Koreans can comfortably be both Japanese and Korean without sacrificing either identity; unfortunately for the foreseeable future, the Zainichi will remain marginalized and persecuted.
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Works Cited
Caprio, Mark E. and Yu Jia. “Occupations of Korea and Japan and the Origins of the Korean Diaspora in Japan.” Diaspora Without Home- land: Being Korean in Japan. Eds. Sonia Ryang and John Lie. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2009. 21-38. Print.
Grayson, James Huntley. “A Quarter-Millennium of Christianity in Ko- rea.” Christianity in Korea. Ed. Robert E. Buswell Jr. and Timothy S. Lee. Honolulu: University of Hawaii, 2006. 7-25. Print.
Hicks, George L. Japan’s Hidden Apartheid: The Korean Minority and the Japanese. London, UK: Ashgate, 1997. Print.
Kashiwazaki, Chikako. “The Foreigner Category for Koreans in Japan: Opportunities and Restraints.” Diaspora Without Homeland: Being Korean in Japan. Eds. Sonia Ryang and John Lie. Berkeley, CA: Uni- versity of California Press, 2009. 121-146. Print.
______. “The Politics of Legal Status: The Equation of Nationality With Ethnonational Identity.” Koreans in Japan: Critical Voices From the Mar- gin. Ed. Sonia Ryang. New York: Routledge, 2000. 13-31. Print.
Lie, John. “War, Absolution, and Amnesia: The Decline of War Respon- sibility in Postwar Japan.” Peace and Change 16.3 (1991): 302-315. Wiley Online Library. Web. PDF File.
______. Zainichi (Koreans in Japan): Diasporic Nationalism and Postcolonial Identity. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2008.
Matsumoto, Tomoko. Zainichi: Belonging, Identity Negotiation and Represen- tation Among Korean Japanese. MA thesis. California State University, Long Beach, 2008. Print.
Onuma, Yasuaki. “Japanese War Guilt and Postwar Responsibilities of Japan.” Berkeley Journal of International Law 20.3 (2002): 600-620. HeinOnline.org. Web. 29 Oct. 2011.
Ryang, Sonia. “Visible and Vulnerable: The Predicament of Koreans in Japan.” Diaspora Without Homeland: Being Korean in Japan. Eds. Sonia Ryang and John Lie. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2009. 62-80. Print.
167 Solving Central Appalachia’s Dental Crisis
WRITER’S COMMENTS
When Professor Holler assigned our Rhetoric class to research and attempt to solve a contemporary problem, I knew I wanted to explore the challenges of Appalachia. Soon enough, I was reviewing statistics and testimonies related to some extremely depressed communities throughout “America’s oldest mountains.” I was drawn to understanding the underlying factors contribut- ing to the very real problems of poor dental hygiene and toothlessness that reinforce an unfortunate Appalachian stereotype. I was surprised to learn that many families in the region are lacking in survival basics—including clean drinking water—and the effects are both detrimental and cyclic. In fall 2012 I have been meeting with a group of students to prepare for an Arrupe Justice Immersion Program trip to Appalachia during March of 2013. This immer- sion will explore the impacts of harvesting Appalachia’s coal, natural gas, and alternative energy to feed the needs of the region, nation, and world. We will also see firsthand some of its consequential effects, including the contamina- tion of the local stream water, which directly correlates to many of the public health problems plaguing the area. This trip feels like a natural next step. —Emily Brown
INSTRUCTOR’S COMMENTS
Simply put, Emily Brown did extraordinary work in my Written and Oral Communication class in Fall 2011. As often happens in that course, Em- ily chose a theme that she stuck with for an entire year. Her patient and compassionate work here on the intersection of Appalachia’s many poverty- related problems demonstrates, I think, something that this university excels at—research that serves to aim a klieg light on social injustice. It might not surprise you to learn, too, that Emily will soon be serving in Appalachia her- self. This, I think, will be just the first of her many extraordinary altruistic acts; and this essay, I hope, will be just the first of many she will publish. —David Holler, Department of Rhetoric and Language
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e m i l y b r o w n Mountain Dew Mouth: Solving Central Appalachia’s Dental Crisis
Abstract
According to ABC News, Central Appalachia is number one in the nation in toothlessness. Many factors contribute to the epidemic, but the root of the problem is that kids drink Mountain Dew soda all day long (in place of water), which in turn causes tooth decay by their teen years. This constant drenching, plus poor dental educa- tion, contaminated tap water, a depressed local economy, low fam- ily income, and a lack of local dental care all result in an endemic spreading throughout the generations. Due to the lack of political will from the government, the solution relies on philanthropic aid. This report explores the possible solutions to relieve the suffering and invisible minority of Central Appalachia. Solutions range from educating the vulnerable population to implementing fluoridated water bottles in schools. The most immediate dental relief for Cen- tral Appalachia is the legalization of dental health aid therapists. Though legal and currently practicing in remote, Alaskan Native villages, the American Dental Association refuses to let dental therapy spread into other rural, impoverished regions throughout the United States. The training and employment of dental practi- tioners is a solution which can both please the American Dental Association and aid the children in Central Appalachia.
Keywords: oral health care crisis, health services accessibil- ity, Central Appalachia, dental health aid therapists, rural health services.
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h e Ap p a l a c h i a n Mo u n t a i n Ra n g e is the oldest mountain chain in North America, with glorifying nicknames such as theT Blue Ridge Mountains, the Great Smoky Mountains, and even the Majestic Mountains. National Geographic Magazine invites tour- ists to come and explore the small, hillside farms and orchards, hike along the 2,000 mile Appalachian Natural Scenic Trail (the longest trail on the east coast), or even take a balloon ride over the scenic forests (National Geographic). There is no doubt that the Ap- palachian mountain region is rich in natural beauty, so it is a cruel irony then, that these steep hollows, old pines, and raging creeks comprise one of the most disadvantaged regions in America, home to many of the poorest people in the United States (Sawyer, 2009). Central Appalachia (eastern Kentucky and West Virginia) has up to three times the national poverty rate; astounding rates of pre- scription drug abuse, cancer, chronic depression; and the shortest average life span in America (ABC News, 2009). But perhaps most concerning is the age-old stereotype rooted in a terrible fact: Cen- tral Appalachia is number one in the nation in toothlessness (ABC News, 2009). It is not uncommon for teenagers to pull their own rotted teeth with household pliers, or for two-year-olds to smile, revealing twelve cavities in their first row of baby teeth (Sawyer, 2009). According to many dentists, the main cause is Mountain Dew soda. With 50% more caffeine than Coca Cola or Pepsi, Mountain Dew is often used as a kind of anti-depressant for the children in the hills (Mendenhall, 2001). With so much hype tied to the harmful effects of soda pop in today’s world, how does this endemic continue to spread throughout generations of the Appa- lachian people? Sadly, the history of the toothlessness epidemic is directly wo- ven into the history of the region as a whole. When the Appala- chian Mountains were settled by American citizens in the 1800s, land and mineral rights owners “extracted coal wealth from the area, but this wealth was not used to develop the local area, instead it went to modernize and industrialize the rest of the country” (Bahr, 2006). The small number of coal operators dominated the region (and local economy), keeping other industrial development out, so that labor costs could be kept low (Bahr, 2006). In addition
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to the single industry domination by the coal companies, the rug- ged, mountainous terrain prevented the region from experiencing the industrialization that the rest of the nation enjoyed. In 1968, Robert F. Kennedy traveled to Eastern Kentucky to bring national attention to this desperate region. Since then:
Great progress has been made throughout the Appa- lachian region in developing an infrastructure of good highways and interstate access, industrial development zones, and a sound education and health care system. But conditions in the Central Appalachia’s still lag be- hind the rest of the nation. (Bahr, 2006)
Roughly 40% of Appalachia’s central population is still stuck in poverty, as compared to the national average of 20% (Sawyer, 2009). The coal and other resources generate revenues into the billions of dollars, but these huge profits go to companies in other states and counties, not to Central Appalachia. This leaves the re- gion with little to no tax base to help fund schools, create jobs, and most importantly—support health care. On the following page is a map from the Appalachian Regional Commission identifying the distressed economic status of Appalachian Counties from October 1, 2011–September 30, 2012.
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As if the mining doesn’t create enough economic problems, it also directly affects the health of the Appalachian people: The- min ing contaminates the streams that supply local tap water to the people (Appalachian Poverty Project). The water is so dirty that it is deemed unsanitary and undrinkable. Families are too poor to afford any type of water purification system, so instead they give their children Mountain Dew soda to drink—in the morning, after school, during dinner, and before bed. Perhaps most horrifying, parents also cannot afford infant formula, so they resort to- fill ing their baby’s bottles with Mountain Dew. On top of the stalled economy and the contaminated tap water, schools in these regions
171 Solving Central Appalachia’s Dental Crisis
Figure 1: County Economic Status in Appalachia, Fiscal Year 2012. This map classifies the counties of Appalachia into five economic levels ranging from “attainment” to “distressed.”
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are also too poor to operate solely on government funding. They gladly welcome corporate sponsorship from companies such as PepsiCo, which can seemingly provide a win-win solution: Schools get additional money, while PepsiCo gets to distribute its products to hundreds and thousands of children (ABC News, 2009). When looking at a child’s typical day, they are drinking soda sunrise-to-sunset (at home, at school, at community events), prac- tically bathing their teeth in the high fructose corn syrup and phosphoric acid. This results in tooth decay when the bacteria in- side the mouth feed on the sugar from the soda, producing highly acidic waste that erodes the protective enamel (Mendenhall, 2001). Normally, the natural minerals in saliva can re-mineralize teeth, but this is only after the acid is removed by brushing and flossing. When kids have no opportunity to brush their teeth, the results are disastrous (Mendenhall, 2001). The dental dilemma in Kentucky is that nearly one in two of the state’s children are enrolled in Medicaid, but barely a quarter of den- tists actually accept this insurance (ABC News, 2009). Dental care is scarce. Without any education about the importance of dental hy- giene, and years and years without a dental check up—in addition to the constantly soaking their teeth in Mountain Dew—kids often have completely rotted teeth by the time they are teens. When one child was asked how he felt about dentures, he responded, “Grand- ma had dentures, mom had dentures, it’s just inevitable that I’m go- ing to end up with dentures” (as cited in ABC News, 2009). As overwhelming as the problem may seem, small changes can make a huge difference. For example, educating the vulner- able population. Toothlessness is not only a result of bad habits, but also a direct result of parental influence. This generation of Central Appalachian parents were themselves deprived of crucial dental care, as well as necessary information about dental self-care and tooth decay prevention. Their teeth likely rotted at an early age, an irreparable situation by the time they have children of their own. Thus, this generation of children likely do not learn self-care habits (i.e., to brush their teeth, floss, and stay away from sugary soft drinks) through modeling. If children are not able to receive this information at home or a dentist’s office, then it is essential
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to their health that elementary school teachers incorporate dental hygiene into their lesson plans. Kids would then have a better understanding of how their teeth rot, and in turn gain knowledge as to how to prevent it—even if the knowledge is simply to brush twice a day. Dentists certainly stress the importance of daily brushing, but if schools provided the supplies and five minutes of time necessary for their students to perform this at school, then the children’s health would signifi- cantly improve. It may be unrealistic to expect the schools to be able to afford all of the supplies, but perhaps major dental corporations such as Oral-B or Colgate, could aid the schools and donate the supplies. A larger-scale solution is to host an additional free dental clinic at school once or twice every year. One night this past October in Grundy, Virginia, the Remote Area Medical Clinic hosted a free health clinic, including dental care. In one night, they were able to serve hundreds of patients (PBS NewsHour, 2011). Grundy, Vir- ginia, was able to pull this off in large part because of the number of trained, local dentists. This does, unfortunately, pose a prob- lem for Central Appalachia, where the dentist-to-population ratio reaches as high as 1:8000 (National Public Radio, 2009). But if schools implemented this on a smaller scale, and made it continu- ous (the same 3-5 dentists that travel to a different school, every day, all year), then children would finally receive adequate dental care and education to stop the toothlessness from continuing in their generation. Another solution that can be initiated without government in- volvement is the implementation of fluoridated water bottles in schools, which would dramatically decrease the total amount of Mountain Dew consumed by children daily. Fluoride helps prevent and even reverse the early stages of tooth decay by getting incorpo- rated into the structure of developing teeth and protects the sur- face of the teeth (Dowshen, 2011). According to KidsHealth.org:
Fluoride prevents the acid produced by the bacteria in plaque from dissolving, or demineralizing, tooth enam- el, the hard and shiny substance that protects the teeth.
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Fluoride also allows teeth damaged by acid to repair, or re-mineralize, themselves. Fluoride cannot repair cavi- ties, but it can reverse low levels of tooth decay and thus prevent new cavities from forming. (Dowshen, 2011)
Opponents of water fluoridation question its safety and effec- tiveness; however, there has been little evidence to support these concerns. Today, water fluoridation is estimated to reduce tooth de- cay by 20-40% (Dowshen, 2011). The United States Public Health Service (USPHS), the American Dental Association (ADA), the American Academy of Pediatric (AAP), and the World Health Or- ganization (WHO) all endorse community water fluoridation, and the Center for Disease Control (CDC) recognized fluoridation of water as one of the ten greatest public health achievements of the 20th century (Dowshen, 2011). Because poverty-stricken Central Appalachia does not have the resources to filter and directly fluo- ridate their polluted tap water, the region relies on the aid from national water companies to intervene and relieve its suffering. In fact, PepsiCo (the owner of Mountain Dew) also owns Aquafina, a major bottled water company. Not only is bottled water cheaper to manufacture than soda, but there are no toxic effects on children’s teeth. If PepsiCo were to instead distribute the bottled water to company-sponsored schools, then the amount of Mountain Dew consumed by children daily would drastically decrease. Perhaps the most immediate solution to decrease the growing levels of toothlessness is to extend the areas of service assisted by those working in the National Health Service Corps. The National Health Service Corps has a Loan Repayment Program that offers the repayment of student loans in exchange for recently graduated primary care medical, dental, and mental and behavioral health providers to serve in impoverished communities. I conducted my own investigation into the opportunities for dental services in Central Appalachia by matching the communities officially recognized as belonging to Central Appalachia (according to the Appalachian Regional Commission) to the job listings on the National Health Service Corps Loan Repayment Program website: Of the 55 counties in Kentucky that are considered part of the Ap-
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palachian region, 47 of those counties offer positions for medical professionals to serve through the National Health Service Corps, but only three of those counties offer dental positions.While it is indeed important that Central Appalachia receive adequate medi- cal care, many of the medical problems are a direct result from the lack of dental education and services plaguing the community. The government has a responsibility to provide these needed dental services. One common excuse for the lack of dental care provided through the Loan Repayment Program is the shortage of dental facilities. The simple addition of one dental chair and sup- plies to the already erect medical facilities would, when combined, provide better service in both health fields. Central Appalachia is extremely rural and isolated, making extra errands a dreaded, and often dismissed, task. Some areas still lack paved roads connecting their towns to other communities and cities. If patients were able to combine their two visits into a single appointment, the ineffi- ciency of rural dental care could be ameliorated. After thorough researching, I believe the best long-term so- lution to this problem is the legalization of Dental Health Aide Therapists. DHA therapists are legal in 42 other countries around the world, and according to the World Health Organization, “Every industrialized country in the world except for the U.S. is employing this kind of dental therapy in some form” (National Public Radio, 2009). DHA therapists aren’t dentists; they are mid-level providers who do a lot of procedures licensed dentists do, such as drillings, fillings, basic cleanings, and in some cases, tooth extraction. Sur- prisingly, the United States is in fact using DHA Therapists in the highly remote, southwestern Tooksook Bay in Alaska, an isolated village home to 500 Yup’iks. The Yup’ik people live today the way they have for generations: few stores, no paved roads, and no way in or out except by air or barge (PBS NewsHour, 2011). The condi- tions there are, in many respects, similar to those in Central Ap- palachia: children also drink a lot of soda pop due to the scarcity of clean water, and the babies are fed sugary Jell-O water instead of infant formula. The difference between the two impoverished communities is that the Alaska Native Health Consortium has funded the training of numerous DHA therapists, and they now
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serve over 35,000 Alaskan Natives (PBS NewsHour, 2011). The federal government recently identified more than 4,500 regions in all 50 states where there are critical shortages of dental care, but the American Dental Association refuses to let this prac- tice extend beyond the remote villages of Alaska. Dr. William Cal- non, President of the ADA, responded rather passive-aggressively during a PBS interview when asked the reasoning behind his legal- ization hesitations:
I can’t imagine after having only 18 months of education, after getting my high school diploma and with a limited amount of training or coaching, even being comfortable extracting teeth on my patients. And I believe that any patient in Alaska really deserves to have someone who has more thorough education and background, so that you can manage problems as they arise. (PBS NewsHour, 2011)
But when pressed on whether the ADA actually had any evi- dence or any concrete examples of anything that’s ever gone wrong regarding DHA Therapists, he defensively responded, “To my knowledge, there is no documentation at this point, but we are dealing with so few people. There are not that many people in the program in Alaska” (PBS NewsHour, 2011). While Dr. Calnon in- deed makes a valid argument that the transition of a few DHA Therapists in Alaska to a fleet capable of serving a large portion of the rural population in the United States could prove problematic, the crisis is too large to be dismissed without further discussion. We need more dental care providers who can deliver basic ser- vices in rural areas like Central Appalachia. When the alternative is no care at all, the basic preventive maintenance and educationial methods of DHA Therapists are the perfect bridge between rural populations and private dentists. These mid-level programs cre- ate a professional class of young people who can use their skills to serve in their own communities, in their own customs, with their own people. However, the American Dental Association’s ambivalence to
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certify DHA therapy is about more than just safety. According to Betty Ann Bower, news correspondent for PBS NewsHour:
A recent survey of over 100,000 of the ADA’s members showed the majority of dentists feel some level of uncer- tainty about their economic stability … if large numbers of providers who aren’t dentists started doing routine procedures, charging lower fees, the traditional dental office model might be threatened (Bower, PBS News- Hour, 2011).
When taking into account the demand and conditions in Cen- tral Appalachia, combined with an anxious and uncompromising American Dental Association, one solution remains which can please both sides: the training of Advanced Dental Hygiene Practi- tioners (ADHPs). The American Dental Hygienists’ Association’s House of Delegates has already legalized the newest dental posi- tion, recognizing the lack of access to oral health care afflicting millions of people in the United States, and they plan to employ dental practitioners to provide basic, preventive, and restorative dental health care in a more cost-effective manner to a greater number of people (American Dental Hygienist’s Association, Press Room). Granted, this does involve some government compliance, the majority of the work lies with the American Dental Hygienists’ Association and their curriculum planning and commitment to the training (which unfortunately, could take years). Ideally, the duty of the dental practitioner is similar to that of a nurse practitioner, which is to “answer the need for cost-efficient, easily accessible primary health care in rural, underserved areas” (American Dental Hygienists’ Association, Press Room). Essentially this could mean that instead of only allowing dentists to care for Central Appala- chians, dental practitioners would be a certified and licensed ex- tension of dentists’ arms, with similar duties, but serving a greater number of people. If the American Dental Association took the epidemic of toothlessness in Central Appalachia more seriously, then they could help to provide many immediate dental practitio- ners to the area. If dental practitioners do gain popularity in the
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coming years, then their duties could even expand to serving in the free dental clinics in schools. Not only is toothlessness unacceptable in a wealthy nation like the United States, but it is also treatable and preventable. It is con- venient to forget about this problem, and tell ourselves that “some- one else” will take care of it; someone more influential, someone with more money, or someone more eager. But due to the lack of political will from our government, the solution now relies on phil- anthropic efforts from informed citizens like ourselves. Human compassion is not dead, and neither is the hope inside the children of the mountains. The Central Appalachian people are not living in a developing country: they are living in one of the wealthiest na- tions in the world. We cannot afford to wait for “other people” to step in and fix this, we must educate all the compassionate hearts and help this invisible minority.
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References
‘A hidden America: Children of the mountains’ - ABC News. (2009, February 10). ABCNews.com. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=6845770 A look at oral health disparities in Appalachia. (2009, March). NIDCR Home. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http:// www.nidcr.nih.gov/Research/ResearchResults/Interviews- OHR/COHRA.htm
American Dental Hygienists’ Association, Press room. (n.d.). Ad- vanced dental hygiene practitioner frequently asked questions [Press release]. Retrieved November 8, 2011, from http://www.adha. org/media/backgrounders/adhp.htm An overview of poverty in Appalachia. (2009). Appalachia Service Project: Life-changing, Turn-key Mission Trips. Retrieved Novem- ber 01, 2011, from http://asphome.org/learn_about_appala- chia/overview_of_poverty
Appalachian poverty - Appalachian Poverty Project. (n.d.). Home - Appalachian Poverty Project. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http://www.app-pov-proj.org/igive.html Appalachian Regional Commission (2011). Country economic status in Appalachia [Economic map], Retrieved December 8, 2001, from: http://www.arc.gov/research/MapsofAppalachia. asp?MAP_ID=55 Baby bottle tooth decay. American Dental Association - ADA.org. (n.d.). Home - American Dental Association - ADA.org. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http://www.ada.org/3034.aspx
Bahr, D. (2006). About Appalachia. Appalachia Committee. Re- trieved October 26, 2011, from http://www.appalachiacommit- tee.org/about.html
Bahr, D. (2006). Why is there poverty? Appalachia Committee. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://www.appalachiacom- mittee.org/poverty.html
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Baran, M. (2004, June 17). Poverty still pervasive through- out much of Appalachia. The NewStandard. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http://newstandardnews.net/ content/?action=show_item
Blue ridge free dental clinic. (n.d.). Blue Ridge free dental clinic: Charity providing critical dental care to needy in western North Carolina. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://www.blu- eridgefreedentalclinic.org/
Counties in Appalachia. (n.d.). Appalachian Regional Commission. Retrieved November 08, 2011, from http://www.arc.gov/coun- ties Developing a nurse practitioner-run center for residents in rural Appalachia. In Caring for the vulnerable: Perspectives in nursing theory, practice, and research (3rd ed., pp. 421-428). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning. de Chasnay, M., & Anderson, B. A. (2012). Developing a nurse practitioner-run center for residents in rural Appalachia. In Caring for the vulnerable: Perspectives in nursing theory, practice, and research (3rd ed., pp. 421-428). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Discover Appalachia. (n.d.). National Geographic. Retrieved De- cember 08, 2011, from http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ appalachia/index.html
Dowshen, S. (2011). Fluoride and water. KidsHealth. Retrieved No- vember 07, 2011, from http://kidshealth.org/parent/general/ teeth/fluoride_water.html Gray, K., & Diaz, J. (2009, February 13). Mobile clinic treats ‘Mountain Dew Mouth’ - ABC News. ABCNews.com. Re- trieved October 26, 2011, from http://abcnews.go.com/Health/ story?id=6863173 Hoag, C. (2011, October 20). Dental, vision care see biggest demand at free LA medical clinic, expected to draw 5,000. News from The Associated Press. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FREE_ HEALTH_CLINIC?SITE=NVREN
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In Alaska: The dental therapist will see you now [Radio broadcast]. (2008, April 29). In The Bryant Park Project. National Public Radio.
Mendenhall, D. (2001, September 4). Watch what you Dew! Post- Gazette.com. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://www. post-gazette.com/healthscience/20010904hsoda0904p4.asp Mountain Dew Mouth ruining children’s teeth. (2011, March 8). NewsInferno. Retrieved November 1, 2011, from http://www. newsinferno.com/health-concerns/mountain-dew-mouth/ mountain-dew-mouth-ruining-childrens-teeth/ PBS NewsHour (MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, Producer). (2011, November 14). Bringing dental relief for Appalachia’s poorest [Video]. Retrieved December 08, 2011, from http://www. pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2011/11/in-a-town-called-grundy- some-dental-relief-for-appalachias-poorest.html PBS NewsHour (MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, Producer). (2011, November 16). Program brings dental care to remote Alaskans, but some dentists are skeptical [Video]. Retrieved December 8, 2011, from http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/july-dec11/ alaskadental_11-16.html Riggs, M. (2008, November 10). Toothless in Appalachia - Hit & Run. Reason Magazine. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http://reason.com/blog/2008/11/10/toothless-in-appalachia
Sawyer, D. (Producer/Host). (2009, February 15). Children of the Mountains [Video]. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http:// abcnews.go.com/2020/video/history-appalachia-6885766 Surgeon General report summary on dental disease in children. (n.d.). Childrens Healthy Smile Project, a Dental Health Non-Profit Organization. Retrieved November 01, 2011, from http://www. childrenssmileproject.org/home/the_facts
Tooth decay - American Dental Association - ADA.org. (n.d.). Home - American Dental Association - ADA.org. Retrieved Octo- ber 26, 2011, from http://ada.org/3031.aspx Trahant, M. (2011, July 28). Dental care that works in rural
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Alaska. Daily Yonder. Retrieved December 5, 2011, from http://www.dailyyonder.com/dental-care-works-rural- alaska/2011/07/26/3448 Watson, S. (2010, January 31). Free dental clinic - volunteering at a free dental clinic. Dentistry - Your Guide to Dentistry and Dental Care. Retrieved October 26, 2011, from http://dentistry.about. com/od/careersindentistry/a/volunteer.htm
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Writer’s Comments
In Rhetoric 130, we were assigned to write an argumentative paper that required us to come up with a resolution to a problem—“a call to action” that would urge readers to join our proposition—so I instantly jumped at the chance to cover Occupy Wall Street, which seemed to offer an exciting opportunity for change. From catching glimpses of the movement through news clips and headlines, to discussions in my poli- tics classes and even unintentionally ending up in the middle of a dem- onstration, I found that I deeply resonated with Occupy’s central issues (especially coming, as I did, from a family that always struggled to make ends meet financially). Examining the events that sparked Occupy Wall Street ultimately led me to believe that re-regulation of the financial industry is the best way to restabilize the economy and bring decency back to our democracy. By reinstating congressional acts such as Glass- Steagall, or strengthening the more recent Dodd-Frank Act, I believe, we have a reasonable chance to protect our citizens. Overall, Occupy Wall Street proved to be a movement bold enough to mobilize citizens to call for crucial reforms to reinvigorate the national economy; however, its longevity as a social movement is certainly still in question. —Ienna Dela Torre
INSTRUCTOR’s Comments
During Fall 2011, Occupy Wall Street occupied all three of my classes (all of which had a politics focus). Ienna’s piece, however, was the most ambitious of the many Occupy-inspired essays I saw that fall. Her work here not only attempts to describe the movement, but also to trace its roots. This essay, then, as you’ll see, is not your typical first-year prob- lem-solution piece laden with platitude and simplistic answers; instead Ienna here is really trying to puzzle out the anfractuous nature of spon- taneous rage at America’s persistent economic inequalities and to offer a solid, policy-based fix. The sad part, of course, is that Occupy, with all its paradox and promise, seems to have flamed out (unless of course another Temporary Autonomous Zone—to cop Hakim Bey’s phrase— should rise again in its place). I should note here that Ienna first wrote this piece as the Occupy movement was at its peak; after this essay was selected by this journal’s referees in May 2012, and long after Occupy’s apparent evanescence, she spent considerable time and effort continu- ing to work on this essay. I applaud her efforts. —David Holler, Department of Rhetoric and Language
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i e n n a d e l a t o r r e Occupy Wall Street, Liberate America: The Fight for Economic Justice and Re-regulation
Abstract
Part one of this essay traces the rise of Occupy Wall Street. Part two analyzes the more recent events, from November 2011 to the summer of 2012. Throughout the essay I assess the strategies that Occupy activists employed to capture the nation’s attention, as well as the corporate elite’s greed and influence on the economy. I also explore government policies, and their resulting effects on the middle and lower classes. By the end of my research, I under- stood that Occupy Wall Street was, and still is, a bold and inspiring movement that managed to call to action the hearts and minds of many American citizens, urging the nation to unite and commit to reviving a government vested in the interests of the majority of its people.
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n 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt enacted the Glass-Steagall Act to save the collapsed banking system, which had already wipedI out the life-savings of millions of Americans. Before the act was passed, investments and commercial banking activities were intertwined—commercial banks took risks with depositors’ money, prioritizing personal profit at the expense of their clients. Their recklessness and greed cost millions of Americans their hard- earned money, homes, and jobs, while leaving the United States in a financial crisis with debt and credit unaccounted for. Fast-forward 75 years: many banks collapse, Americans lose their life-savings, homes are foreclosed, Americans are in debt. Why? Bank deregula- tion. As one of the biggest and final decisions in deregulating the banking system, the Glass-Steagall Act—the bill created to keep banks from preying on their clients—was repealed in 1999. Now? We now head down the same path toward the Great Depression that paralyzed the 1930s. Big banks once again prey upon consum- ers, maximizing profit at the expense of others. As always, money speaks in politics, and these days banks can afford to pay lobbyists to prevent regulation of the banking system, further widening the gap between the rich and the middle class. So how do common American citizens rally against corruption and for equality? Enter Occupy Wall Street. On September 17, 2011, approximately 1,000 people gathered in the Financial District of New York City. They marched through the streets to Zuccotti Park, starting an encampment to “occupy” Wall Street. They were “the 99 percent”—protestors for the Oc- cupy Wall Street movement seeking to make a statement against the growing disparity in wealth and banking corruption behind the recent global financial crisis (Greenberg). Seemingly emerging from nowhere, protestors drew the idea for the movement from Vancouver-based, anti-consumerist magazine Adbusters. Inspired by the Egyptian Tahrir Square uprising and Spanish acampadas, the magazine encouraged Americans to take to the streets for change. According to senior editor Micah White, they “floated the idea in mid-July into [their email list] and it was spontaneously taken up by all the people of the world” (Fleming). Although Occupy Wall Street is often defined as a liberal move-
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ment, led by the unemployed or young college students, the de- mographics of participants ranged in a fairly large spectrum. Two Occupy Wall Street activists, business analyst Harrison Schultz and Professor Hector Cordero-Guzman from the Baruch College School of Public Affairs, conducted a study of approximately 1,619 visitors to the Occupy Wall Street site, including some who already participated in Occupy protests across the nation (Captain). Con- trary to popular belief, the protests were not wholly supported by youngsters: approximately one-third of protestors were over thirty-five, with one-fifth over forty-five. Nor were protestors all students: 8 percent earned high school degrees, 26.7 percent were enrolled at least part-time in college, and a mere 10 percent were enrolled full-time. Additionally, only 13.1 percent of the partici- pants of Occupy Wall Street were unemployed; half of the respon- dents were employed full-time, with 20 percent employed part- time. Finally, only about 30 percent of protestors were affiliated with political parties; contrary to the belief that Democrats and Liberals largely dominated the movement, 70 percent of protes- tors identified themselves as independents (Captain). The deregulation of banks is said to be one of the primary factors causing the global recession and one of the primary issues of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Deregulation began in the 1980s with the election of President Ronald Reagan, but its final piece came with the Financial Services Modernization Act (FSM) of 1999 under the presidency of Bill Clinton. It was the most sweeping bank deregulation in all of U.S. history, lifting virtually all restraints on giant monopolies from dominating the financial sys- tems and doing away with restrictions on the integration of bank- ing insurance and stock trading imposed by Glass-Steagall in 1933 (McLaughlin). The government ultimately ordered the separation of banking and the stock exchange in response to the revelation of giant banking houses’ gross corruption and market manipulation; in contrast, the FSM increased the degree of monopolization in finance, further tying together the banking and insurance system. This worsened the position of consumers in relation to their credi- tors and destabilized the U.S. stock market, ultimately leading to the significant plunge on Wall Street that caused the whole finan-
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cial system to crash (McLaughlin). The recent global financial crisis was also caused in part by the collapse of big banks, such as Lehman Brothers and Goldman- Sachs. Goldman-Sachs in particular was found guilty of several ac- counts of fraud and corruption. According to Charles Ferguson’s documentary Inside Job, Goldman-Sachs sold “toxic CDOs” (collat- eralized debt obligations) which are essentially insurance policies for consumers making risky purchases on homes, etc.—to clients while knowing the deals did not actually hold much credit. Once these CDOs were sold, Goldman-Sachs bet against the securities to earn more money; as clients lost more money, Goldman-Sachs would gain more profit (Inside Job). At the peak of the financial crisis in 2008, several bankers, including Goldman-Sachs executives Dan- iel Sparks and Lloyd Blankfein, were questioned about prioritizing the sale of unreliable deals and betting against their clients’ securi- ties and mortgages. Neither denied the claims. The company Mor- gan Stanley also gained millions of dollars by manipulating hedge funds and incorrectly rating loans with a AAA grade, the highest possible credit rating which ensures the debtor will meet their fi- nancial commitments (Inside Job). In the early 2000s, the banks’ fiscal irresponsibility began to have serious global economic consequences. In 2004, a mortgage fraud epidemic struck the nation, leading housing prices and sub- prime loans to dramatically decline a year later. The peak of the United States’ financial crisis came with home foreclosures in 2008, which left banks with property they could not sell. Despite the signs of an impending recession, however, former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson remained nonplussed. At a meeting of the G7—an international finance group consisting of the finance ministers of France, Germany, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom, Can- ada, and the United States—held that year, Paulson repeatedly as- sured his colleagues that the global economy would remain stable (Inside Job). It was not until September of 2008, however, that the econom- ic crisis reached a crescendo. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, govern- ment-sponsored housing corporations intended to provide lower housing costs and better access to home financing, were delisted
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from the New York Stock Exchange and The Lehman Broth- ers went bankrupt. Meanwhile, the United States prioritized wealthy, corporate banks, while leaving middle class America to fend for itself. Paulson and two other members of the 2008 Federal Reserve Board, Timothy Geithner and Ben Bernanke, asked Congress for $700 billion to bail out these banks, affirm- ing French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s theory that: “at the end of the day, the poorest—as always—pay the most.”
Feeling the Effects of Corporate Greed
As of late 2011, we are still in the midst of this financial crisis. Jobs, especially in the manufacturing base, have dramatically de- clined. While high-paying careers in the information and tech- nology sectors remain in demand, jobs in these industries require a college degree. Unfortunately, as the cost of tuition increases year-by-year, many citizens are unable to afford the education needed to pursue these jobs. Public university tuition, like those of the University of California and California State University systems, continues to rise while rewarding fewer scholarships. On November 16, 2011, Cal State trustees voted to raise tuition by 9 percent by the year 2012, bringing the annual undergradu- ate tuition to just under $6,000 per year (Rivera). To make matters worse, American tax policies have shifted to favor the wealthy: the Bush administration sharply reduced taxes on investment gains and stock dividends in addition to eliminating the estate tax (Inside Job). As the government imple- mented these tax cuts (which primarily benefit the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans), spending cuts affected the middle-class across the nation. As a result, the United States has become one of the most unequal economies in the world. Worse still, for the first time in U.S. history, the average citizen now holds fewer educational opportunities than their parents did, and as a result, will arguably be less prosperous (Inside Job). In 2008, voters were hopeful that then presidential can- didate Barack Obama could make a change. Despite rally- ing for regulatory reform and the prosecution of banks for criminal fraud, however, Obama only managed to enact the
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Dodd-Frank Act during his first term in office. Signed into law in July of 2010, the Dodd-Frank Act placed the regulation of the financial industry into the hands of the government. Although the act made several provisions to ensure financial stability, many economic critics argued that the reforms were insufficient to prevent the possibility of another financial -cri sis. Additionally, they claimed that the new legislation did not stop large government bailouts for big financial institutions (Financial Services). Despite a precedent set by many interna- tional governments at a G-20 meeting (consisting of finance ministers and central bank governors of the world’s 20 ma- jor economies) in 2009, the U.S. neglected to impose simi- lar regulations on the compensations that banks can receive from advising stints or other outside resources. In fact, the White House still has yet to make such major regulations and continues to avoid prosecuting CEOs like Goldman-Sachs and other huge financial institutions for their criminal fraud (Inside Job). As a result, banks have only strengthened their grip on po- litical power while the U.S. sinks deeper into a financial cri- sis. Many former CEOs of major banks have even managed to take government positions through their lobbying influence- buying efforts. As Inside Job reveals, the three government of- ficials responsible for the $700 billion bailout—Hank Paulson, Timothy Geithner, and Ben Bernanke—were all former heads of major banks (Goldman-Sachs, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and the United States Federal Reserve, respective- ly). These individuals, and their corporate cohorts, also spent millions of dollars lobbying elected officials, especially on the issue of bank regulation. According to Edward Yingling, for- mer chief lobbyist for the American Bankers Association, bank regulation was “the most heavily lobbied, most expensive is- sue” in Congress during the late 1990s and early 2000s. J.P. Morgan in particular was notorious for organizing corporate mergers for its own profit, and awarding access to share issues to favored politicians (McLaughlin).
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A Movement Is Born
Occupy Wall Street arose as a grassroots response to this financial mess. At its core, Occupy stands for regulatory reform and the prosecution of big banks for the economic repercussions of their criminal fraud; it opposes tax breaks and loopholes that benefit the wealthiest 1 percent and create an ever-widening gap between the wealthy and the poor; it recognizes that money speaks in politics, and that it can ultimately influence elected officials and lobby for legislation that ultimately serves the rich. But above all, Occupy sees what was originally an American democracy slowly devolving into a plutocracy—an oligarchy of “Wall Street govern- ment” that favors the wealthy and leaves 99 percent of its people underrepresented and dependent on government aid. There are several steps that the U.S. government could take to halt this growing crisis. One possibility would be to reregulate the economic sphere with a stronger version of the Dodd-Frank Act. Alternatively the government could reenact FDR’s Glass-Steagall Act or introduce new, progressive government reform to once again separate banking insurance from stock trading and prevent monop- olies and big financial systems from taking advantage of consumers. As American economist Jeffrey Sachs once observed, progressive movements (such as the New Deal) have proven that countries can implement a working market economy while maintaining fiscal de- cency, reducing the poverty gap, and upholding the law. Ultimately, the Occupy Wall Street Movement is not an at- tack on the market economy, but rather a call for a return to de- cency in our democracy. How did Occupy Wall Street go about this? How did they establish their movement and express their frustrations to the public and the media? Most importantly, were their strategies effective?
Organization and Strategic Tactics
Occupy’s General Assemblies and human microphones created a new means of expression, communication, and amplification and
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opened Occupy up to the convergence of multiple views and previ- ously exclusive ideas. Ultimately, these methods allowed Occupi- ers to rise above partisan politics and ideological debates, giving well-educated men and women the means to express themselves in a new political way (Harcourt). One of Occupy’s greatest strengths was its effective means of communicating and framing its struggle. The hyper-inclusive slo- gan, “We are the 99 percent,” appealed to the pathos of protestors and onlookers alike because it recalled the idea of “a group of us, versus one of you”—the 99 percent versus the 1 percent. The slo- gan generated a sense of strength in the majority, lending a sense of inevitable victory over the 1 percent of U.S. citizens who earn more than approximately $516,000 a year (New York Times). Finally, their welcoming slogan invited a wide demographic of individuals to join the movement; Occupy accepted anyone, from any social standing, age, or culture. As a protest led by the people, for the people, the voices of the activists themselves remained the driving force behind the Oc- cupy Wall Street movement. These fundamental values were em- bodied by their General Assemblies, when anyone and everyone had the opportunity to speak and have their voices heard through “mic-check” (also known as “the people’s mike”). Mic-check was a direct “repeat-after-me” method that involved all participants in a collective speech (Greenberg). Because everyone was expected to repeat a person’s speech phrase-by-phrase, Occupiers paid close attention to what an activist had to share and internalized their message. In effect, Occupiers formed a mini-democracy, success- fully consolidating the opinions of many without limiting anyone’s freedom to share his or her opinions. Another tactic that the Occupy protestors pursued was refus- ing to release an official set of demands. They wanted to keep their focus broad so as to avoid being co-opted by political parties, poli- ticians, or public officials. They also sought to detach themselves from any of these entities, who could potentially taint the other- wise democratic movement led by common American citizens. By employing these various strategies, Occupy Wall Street gained momentum, instigating protests across the nation and all over the world. In the Bay Area, Occupy chapters cropped up in
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the downtown Financial District of San Francisco, Oakland, and even at the University of San Francisco (USF) (facilitated by several politically active undergraduate students). Other big cities in the United States such as Los Angeles and Boston, saw Occupy protests as well. Internationally, London and Rome were among the Euro- peans cities hit with large Occupy demonstrations. Yet, despite this global reach, one of the main criticisms of Occupy persisted: the movement’s lack of leadership. Contrary to popular belief, however, the movement was not necessarily anti-leadership. Several analysts observed that the 99 percent movement was actually brimming with leadership through the voices of everyday Americans. The movement invested in the power and skills of thousands of these people and encouraged com- mon citizens—who had previously felt left out of the political pro- cess—to become leaders in a widespread movement. In this way, Occupy gave single mothers, construction workers, recent college graduates, and even the homeless a platform on which to articulate their goals and work with others to achieve them (Kohn). Occupy also made up for a lack of centralized leadership by leveraging the power of modern technology. As a movement that valued peer-to-peer networking over the conventional, top-down hierarchy, social media perfectly catered to Occupy’s organizational structure. Using social media as their primary means of organiz- ing and communicating enabled Occupy to grow a movement with many leaders instead of just one. This proved to be an advantage for Occupy, allowing them to avoid the challenges that movements of the past would face when specific leaders were murdered or ar- rested (Sifry). Above all, Occupy Wall Street’s organizational model allowed the movement to create a truly participatory democracy in which everyone plays a vital role. Despite these strategic advantages, however, the Occupy move- ment faced many obstacles and obstructions. Police brutality became a major issue. For instance, peaceful protestors at Occupy demon- strations held in the financial district of New York and more recently at the University of California, Davis were met with pepper spray (Penny). Meanwhile, many cities also began to crack down on their respective Occupy sites. Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York,
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for instance, ousted protestors from Zuccotti Park on November 15, 2011. Later that month Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa fol- lowed suit by setting a midnight deadline on the night of November 25, 2011, for all protestors to evacuate Occupy LA. Rather than allowing these obstacles to derail their movement, Occupiers drew renewed strength from the various efforts made to suppress them. As political commentator Keith Olbermann said in a November 15 Special Comment on Current TV :
Pick any moment in our history as a country founded by and invigorated by and re-invigorated by protests— and you will find men like George Wallace and Joe Mc- Carthy … America has not flourished in spite of these [people] in history, but flourished because of them— because they overreacted, because they under-thought, overreached, under-understood. We owe them our tra- ditions of protest. We owe them our freedoms. We owe them our very independence. None of them ever under- stood that suppression always creates the opposite of the effect desired.
With this precedent of social movements succeeding against the odds, it’s no wonder that Occupy Wall Street became the big- gest protest movement of this country’s recent history. This eco- nomic civil rights movement pitted common citizens against the corporate elite, who gained power over the past thirty years by slowly taking over political issues in government, widening the gap between the wealthy and the middle-class, and preying on the fi- nancial instability of consumers. How do we restore our economy and find decency in our de- mocracy when bank CEOs and other top-earners in in this country maintain a well-to-do lifestyle while the middle-class suffers from the recession’s aftermath? The solution is to reregulate the eco- nomic sphere in order to protect citizens and their investments. Whether by the passage of stronger acts like Glass-Steagall or pro- gressive reform of government, the United States needs to enact regulations that will help out the middle-class—the 99 percent.
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This is what Occupy called for and, by joining the movement and bringing even more public awareness to corporate crime today, we can continue to strive for a more fair and equal United States. While big banks might say that these financial issues are too complicated to understand and cynics may claim that we are too embroiled in this conflict to fix it now, Occupy Wall Street has a different mes- sage for the people of the United States. At its core, Occupy Wall Street is a movement with the potential to reinvigorate the United States and stabilize the economy.
One Year Later: Requiem for Occupy?
Since September of 2011, Occupy Wall Street has kept hold of the nation’s attention (especially through its literal occupancy of Zuc- cotti Park) and set the stage to force through change in America’s social, economic, and political spheres. They held various events that took a direct stance against corporate influence and highlight- ed the imbalanced socio-economic state of American Society. The movement certainly faced its fair share of obstacles: police at each and every protest, a lack of centralized power, the lack of an official set of demands, and eventually, the loss of public inter- est. The protestors were forced to make some tough decisions: how would they overcome these obstacles? Would they finally collabo- rate with politicians to make direct government change by endors- ing candidates for the presidential election of 2012? Would they generate new strategies to avoid police brutality and recapture the American people’s attention? The answers that the protestors came up with would ultimately determine whether the movement would continue to thrive, or merely fade away by its one-year anniversary. From December 2011 onward, Occupiers employed new tactics in a spree of protests. According to Michael Greenberg’s article, “What Future for Occupy Wall Street?,” protestors began to stage “flash oc- cupations.” During these types of demonstrations, protestors would quickly transform a particular public space into “temporary revolu- tion zones” before dispersing to form again someplace else. They also utilized another new form of radical protest on De- cember 6, 2011. In order to take a stance against corporate greed,
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Occupiers reclaimed vacant, bank owned homes in poor neighbor- hoods by reinstalling families who were evicted or whose homes were foreclosed. Then, on December 12, 2011, Occupy organized a march against the notorious big banking firm Goldman-Sachs in Manhattan. Un- fortunately, police squads caught onto the patterns of these “false protests,” and soon arrived on the scene in full riot gear, prepared to clear protestors out. So as to avoid scenes of police brutality being displayed in the media, police officers blocked off reporters before crackdowns and even arrested some persistent ones. For instance, during a November 15, 2011, rally police grouped journal- ists together and ushered them off the scene (New York Times). Ad- ditionally, 20 reporters were arrested and a CBS News helicopter was ordered to leave the airspace above the protest. A month later, at another protest on December 17, 2011, reporters were once again handcuffed and arrested. But tension between police and protes- tors truly reached a boiling point during a protest on New Year’s Eve 2011, when the police went so far as to physically harass report- ers and protestors alike (Greenberg). Such police crackdowns should be understood as attempts by the established powers in this country to instill fear in the people and discourage them from joining the Occupy movement. Unfor- tunately this strategy succeeded on some of the less devoted Occu- py supporters, resulting in a decrease in the number of participants to approximately three to five hundred demonstrators. Another serious issue that the Occupy Wall Street movement faced was the lack of an official set of demands, resulting in the public perception that the movement was just “a group of free- lance activists with no reliable power base or allies” (Greenberg). Greenberg further sums up the movement’s problem as follows:
If Occupy Wall Street is to become the embodiment of public conscience, it will have to pose similar questions that defy moral evasiveness … The problem for protes- tors is that, while severely limiting corporate power in government is a worthy goal, it’s morally abstract, with little visceral impact. And economic justice is a vague
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and sweeping term that invites both personal grievances and broad interpretation.
After the Zuccotti encampment was uprooted in mid-Novem- ber, one of Occupy Wall Street’s labor experts, Jackie DiSalvo, did in fact advocate for a set of demands to define the movement and bind the various activists together. DiSalvo had hoped that the movement would endorse presidential candidates in 2012 (just as the Tea Party platform had endorsed congressional and local candi- dates in 2010) but was finally forced to admit that endorsing candi- dates was out of the question for Occupy (Greenberg). Another attempt for unification surfaced in October of 2011. Several Occupiers attempted to form a “Demands Working Group,” but even as some members began to go public with sug- gestions, the General Assembly of demonstrators tried to vote the group out of existence, stating on the Occupy Wall Street website that: “This group is not empowered by the NYC General Assem- bly. This group is not open-source and does not act by consensus. This group only represents themselves” (Greenberg). This is not to say that Occupy protestors remained complete- ly disconnected. On May 1st of 2012, both Occupy activists and demonstrators from other established activists groups marched to- gether to mark the historic event of Chicago’s Haymarket Square strike (during which a bomb was set off and police fired on several demonstrators) (Knafo). The May Day protests took place in Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco, and various other cities across the nation. Most of the events proved to be peaceful, consisting of nothing more than meditation in public parks and anti-corpo- ration song and dance routines (Abrahamian and Berg). Even so, many police forces responded to the protests with excessive force; in Oakland, police used tear gas to retrain demonstrators who threw objects at them and defied their orders. Likewise, New York Police Department arrested 30 protestors, Portland’s police force arrested 12, and the Los Angeles Police Department made a total of 10 arrests that day (Abrahamian and Berg). Still, Occupiers continued to hold massive demonstrations. On July 4, 2012, starting at the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, protes-
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tors embarked on a six-day march to Zuccotti Park to mark both America’s Independence Day and also the birthday of late folk singer and songwriter Woody Guthrie (Wall Street Journal). On July 8th, Occupy Wall Street made its first incursion on the politics of the presidential election by holding a protest at the Southampton summerhouse of Mitt Romney supporter David Koch. An oil bil- lionaire and poster boy for money-in-politics, Koch offered Rom- ney $75,000 to attend three fundraisers at the private homes of several rich Hampton residents (Lennard). According to Occupy supporter Nick Maurer, two hundred activists ventured to Koch’s beachfront home as an anti-corporate protest. Emphasizing that the demonstration was a protest against excessive corporate fund- ing in politics, rather than an endorsement of Obama or any other presidential candidate, Maurer said: “This isn’t about Republicans or Democrats” (Lennard). On September 17, 2012, hundreds of protestors returned to Zuccotti Park to celebrate Occupy Wall Street’s one-year anni- versary. Legba Carrefour, an activist visiting from D.C., described the morning activities as “underwhelming,” but noted that the protest gained momentum in the afternoon and staged as many as four mini-marches. The several hundred Occupiers remained in the streets, facing down police squads, for the rest of the day. According to The Washington Post’s Annie Gowen, approximately 181 protestors were arrested due to disorderly conduct. Still, this particular event acquired little to no media coverage. Worse still, a July poll by Ipsos/Reuters revealed that 45 percent of respondents did not identify with the movement “at all,” and only 9 percent “strongly” identified with its ideals. With public opinion eroding and city authorities evicting Occupy camps, after only a year the movement began its slump into irrelevancy.
Occupy’s Legacy
Did Occupy Wall Street manage to achieve its goals? Despite the protestors’ best efforts to address corporate influence within the government and economic sphere, the government has yet to pass
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any legislation around banking reregulation following the Dodd- Frank Act. CEOs and other top officials of those greedy and fiscally irresponsible banks and insurance companies have yet to be indict- ed for their crimes against the American people. According to The New York Review of Books’ Jeff Madrick and Frank Partnoy, lobbying is mostly to blame for the ongoing lack of reregulation and pros- ecutions. For instance, financial firms spent approximately $1.3 bil- lion lobbying Congress during the passage of the Dodd-Frank Act, resulting in a watered-down version of the original bill, especially in the areas of derivatives trading and shareholder rights (Madrick and Partnoy). Additionally, Federal prosecutors are reluctant to put up cases against bankers because it is much more difficult to prove financial fraud than most other crimes (Madrick and Partnoy). Fi- nally, some argue that punishing banks too harshly may undermine the current economic recovery; a former Fannie Mae official told the New York Times, “I am afraid that we risk pushing these guys off a cliff and we’re going to have to bail out the banks again” (Madrick and Partnoy). On the other hand, Madrick and Partnoy believe that a few winning cases against corporate fraud could set a powerful precedent, encouraging more ethical practices on Wall Street, de- tering fraud, and conceivably preventing future economic crises. The question remains: has the Occupy Wall Street movement accomplished anything worthwhile? Jared Bernstein, a senior of- ficial at the Center on Budget Control and Policy Priorities and former chief economist for Vice President Joseph Biden, would say that it has. Bernstein declared that Occupiers “can take credit for starting a national conversation about the increasingly inequi- table distribution of growth that stands as a profound economic problem in our country” (Katel). Moreover, Douglas Schoen of The Daily Beast writes that the movement “seized control of this year’s political debate,” allowing Obama to effectively make class warfare the central theme of his reelection campaign. During his State of the Union address at the beginning of 2012, Obama focused on the need for a redistribution of wealth and income in order to protect Americans from big corporations (Schoen). Later that year, after the Senate rejected the Buffett Rule (a proposal to increase taxes for the wealthy to at least 30 percent) Obama declared that conser-
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vatives had chosen to protect tax breaks for the wealthiest Ameri- cans at the expense of the middle class (Schoen). Even a prominent Republican commentator and Occupy op- ponent, Rich Lowry, now admits that the advent of the Occupy movement highlights the recession’s effect on joblessness, as well as the dysfunctional and expensive healthcare and higher-education systems (Katel). Lowry goes on to say that the movement raises le- gitimate questions, like why citizens are “losing decent paying jobs and finding nothing comparable” (Katel). He also notes that the topic of income inequality soared in frequency from approximately 91 mentions in the news before the Occupy demonstrations to 500 a week in early November 2011. In sum, Occupy Wall Street managed to change discussions na- tionwide and make the general public, as well as important public officials, recognize the issue of economic inequality in this country. Unfortunately, the movement was unable to avoid police brutal- ity, failed to construct a substantial set of demands, and eventually forfeited the hearts and minds of the American people. For these reasons, the Occupy Wall Street Movement paled in comparison to the bold, inspiring force that called its citizens to action in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks in September of 2001. Still, the movement marked its place in history. As Sachs says:
Twice before in American history, powerful corporate interests dominated Washington and brought America to a state of unacceptable inequality, instability and cor- ruption. Both times, a social and political movement arose to restore democracy and shared prosperity.
Occupy focused public attention on the slow economic recov- ery and unequal repercussions that both caused and further resulted from the recession. It spotlighted criminal fraud by corporate banks, denounced the widening gap between the wealthy and the poor, and opposed lobbying and election-buying. Now that the movement has faded from its original vitality, we may take a step back in order to see that Occupy Wall Street is only the first step towards a third American Progressive Era of social activism and political reform.
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Works Cited
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Fleming, Andrew. “Adbusters Spark Wall Street Protest.” The Vancouver Courier. 27 Sept. 2011. Web. 31 Oct. 2011.
Captain, Sean. “The Demographics of Occupy Wall Street.” Fast Com- pany. 19 Oct. 2011. Web. 31 Oct. 2011.
Greenberg, Michael. “In Zuccotti Park.” The New York Review of Books. 13 Oct. 2011. Web. 14 Nov. 2011.
_____. “What Future for Occupy Wall Street?” The New York Review of Books. 12 Jan. 2012. Web. 09 June 2012.
Harcourt, Bernard. “Occupy’s New Grammar of Political Disobedience.” The Guardian. 30 Nov. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2011.
Heakal, Reem. “What Was The Glass-Steagall Act?” Investopedia. 16 July 2003. Web. 14 Nov. 2011.
Katel, Peter. “ ‘Occupy’ Movement.” CQ Researcher 13 Jan. 2012: 25-52. Web. 15 July 2012.
Knafo, Saki. “May Day Protests Show Occupy Wall Street, Liberal Es- tablishment Bonds.” The Huffington Post. 01 May 2012. Web. 09 June 2012.
Kohn, Sally. “Occupy Wall Street’s next move.” CNN. 15 Nov. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2011.
Lennard, Natasha. “Crashing David Koch’s Party.” Salon. 09 July 2012. Web. 13 July 2012.
Leu, Melissa, and Stephen Ceasar. “LAPD Officers, Occupy L.A. Pro- testers Clash during ArtWalk Downtown.” Los Angeles Times. 13 July 2012. Web. 13 July 2012.
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McLaughlin, Martin. “Clinton, Republicans Agree to Deregulation of US Financial System.” World Socialist. 1 Nov. 1999. Web. 14 Nov. 2011.
“Occupy Guitarmy: NYC Rally Honors Woody Guthrie.” The Wall Street Journal. 11 July 2012. Web. 13 July 2012.
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Penny, Laurie. “Occupy Wall Street: Police Violence Reveals a Corrupt System.” The Guardian. 15 Nov. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2011.
Rivera, Carla. “Cal State Trustees Vote to Raise Tuition by 9 percent for 2012.” Los Angeles Times. 16 Nov. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2011.
Sachs: OWS Movement Marks Change. Perf. Jeffrey Sachs. CNN. 15 Nov. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2011.
Schoen, Douglas. “Occupy Wall Street Has Seized Control of This Year’s Political Debate.” The Daily Beast. Newsweek/The Daily Beast, 28 Apr. 2012. Web. 09 June 2012.
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Occupy Wall Street | NYC Protest for American Revolution. Web. 26 Oct. 2011.
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Vitchers, Tracey E. “Occupying—Not Rioting—Wall Street.” Huffington Post. 26 Sept. 2011. Web. 26 Oct. 2011.
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Call for Submissions Writing for a Real World 2012–2013
We announce our call for submissions for our eleventh annual Writing for a Real World anthology, which will be published in Spring 2014. Undergraduate writing completed during the 2012–2013 academic year is welcome. WRW reviews not only essays and research papers but also scientific, business, and technical reports.
The deadline for submitting work is Friday, May 10, 2013. Students may submit two essays written throughout the academic year.
First, see our guidelines here: http://usfca.edu/wrw/
Then enter your two best papers here: https://gnosis.usfca.edu/wrw/
Complete back issues of Writing for a Real World can now be found on USF’s Digital Collections here: http://www.usfca.edu/library/dc/wrw
Notifications take place during Summer 2013.
Manuscripts will be edited and put into layouts during the Fall 2013 semester in the Writing for a Real World Editing Workshop (RHET 325 / ENGL 325), a 4-unit course taught by WRW’s Faculty Editor, David Holler ([email protected])
Each published writer will receive two copies of the journal and an individual award; winners and their guests will be invited to an awards reception in Spring 2014.
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