UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO After the I-Hotel: Material, Cultural, and Affective Geographies of Filipino San Francisco A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnic Studies by Thea Quiray Tagle Committee in Charge: Professor Sara Clarke Kaplan, Chair Professor Curtis Marez, Co-Chair Professor Patrick Anderson Professor Kirstie Dorr Professor Kalindi Vora Professor Daniel Widener 2015 Copyright © Thea Quiray Tagle, 2015 All rights reserved. The Dissertation of Thea Quiray Tagle is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ Co-Chair _______________________________________________________________ Chair University of California, San Diego 2015 iii DEDICATION In loving memory of my best teachers: Aurelio Muñoz Quiray Rosemary Marangoly George Candice Tamika Rice (Thank you.) iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page.………………………………………………….…………........... iii Dedication.……………………………………………………………………….. iv Table of Contents.………………………………………………………………... v Acknowledgements………………………………………………………………. vi Vita……………………………………..…………………………...……………. xii Abstract of the Dissertation……………..…………………………..……………. xiii Introduction.………………………………………………………………………. 1 Chapter 1 Filipino/American Blues: Al Robles’s Manilatown and Fillmore……... 45 Chapter 2 Picket Fences and Martial Law: Barbara Jane Reyes and the East Bay Suburbs…………………………………………………….….... 97 Chapter 3 Worlds in Collision: Carlos Villa and the Absence of the International Hotel…………………………………………...….………… 140 Chapter 4 Embodying Community: Respatializing the South of Market Through Performance……………………………………………………... 194 Coda “To Organize the World, To Make It Universally Accessible and Useful”... 256 Works Cited…………………………………………………………………….…. 271 v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This has been a long road, and I have been lucky to have many travelers beside me for part or all of the way. A special thanks to the following friends, colleagues, co- conspirators and guides. My dissertation committee members have shown me how very important mentorship is for young scholars with unruly minds. I am thankful Sara Clarke Kaplan agreed to advise me early in my graduate career. Her knowledge of deep space reanimated my childhood love of maps and travel, and introducing me to feminist critical geography has changed the course of my academic career. Curtis Marez’s love for film and the fantastic, and his ability to steer the proverbial ship, give me hope that being in academia does not have to mean sacrificing one’s sense of joy and their humanity. I have learned so much from Patrick Anderson about performance, trauma, empathy and sight; his teaching and writing breaks my heart and inspires me to do better. Kalindi Vora has been the most careful and thorough reader of my work; her insights have shaped my thinking about gender and justice immeasurably. Kirstie Dorr and Daniel Widener have each produced brilliant scholarship on culture, space, and social justice; their work has been a beacon. I miss Rosemary George’s laugh and the shake of her head when I tried to talk my way out of a difficult question; she made thinking about that most fraught place, home, something to look forward to. Thank you. The UCSD Ethnic Studies Department has some good ones. Professors Denise Ferreira da Silva, Ross Frank, Lisa Park, David Pellow, and Wayne Yang were early vi supporters of my research, and for that I am grateful. Yolanda Escamilla and Christa Ludeking answered my confused questions and made paperwork happen faster than blink—these little things were truly gifts. Michael Lujan Bevacqua, José Fusté, Rebecca Kinney, Angela Kong, Traci Voyles Marante, and Theo Verinakis have been informal mentors, cheerleaders, and kind friends. They make me proud to be counted, now, as one of them. I hope that my fellow cohort members Eugene Gambol, Rashne Limki, Kit Myers, Ayako Sahara, and Angelica Yañez are all as happy as I am to be finished! The world was not made for a woman of Candice Rice’s caliber. I rage for you and miss you often, Candice. I could not have made it through graduate school without Josen Diaz, Cutler Edwards, Ashvin Kinney, Joo Ok Kim, Yumi Pak, Chris Perreira, Amanda Solomon, and Davorn Sisavath. Their true friendship and sometimes-unwanted real talk kept me in line, I think. I am so appreciative for the feedback of early drafts of my project from writing group buddies Anita Huizar-Hernandez, Joo Ok Kim, Chien-ting Lin, and Michaela Walsh; and for the encouragement from Adrian Arancibia. I miss writing at Twiggs with you all. UCSD’s campus community centers were my only true homes on campus. The staff members and student interns of the Cross-Cultural Center, LGBT Resource Center and Women’s Center giving all students the necessary support that the university systematically refuses to do. I am extra grateful for the friendship of past and present staff members Edwina Welch, Nancy Magpusao, Joseph Ramirez, Victor Betts, and Marnie Brookolo. vii I have had much support both locally and globally—the wonders of technology make the distances feel less vast. Nick Mitchell needs to be thanked first for his late-night FaceTime academic advice, karaoke sing-a-longs to Destiny’s Child, and risotto cooking lessons. Thanks for everything, really. Academic writing dates, happy hours, and job market strategy sessions with Sampada Aranke, Tallie Ben Daniel, Zachary Levenson, Nick Mitchell, and David P. Stein reminded me I was still a scholar, and not just a grading machine. Douglas Ishii, T.J. Tallie, and Terry Park were a neurotic trio of fellow job seekers, and I was happy to be going crazy along with them. The unexpected generosity of Christa Gallego and Benjamin Cilia always astounds me. Yalie Kamara, Molly Porzig, Catrina Roallos, and Yvonne Tran have made Oakland feel a little more like a home. Wherever Elisa Armea, Deborah Hur, Tristan Jones, Vivian Loh, and Kim Persaud are can be a home. Eric O’Brien, Inez, Kali, and Orby always will be my home. Thank you. The professional opportunities I have been given in the Bay Area have made me a far better teacher, advocate, and scholar than before. Alissa Bierra and the UC Berkeley Center for Race and Gender gave me much-needed institutional support in 2012-2013. Nicole Archer, Claire Daigle, Tania Hammidi, and the students, visiting faculty, and staff of the San Francisco Art Institute quite literally have supported me since 2012. I could not have asked for a better place to adjunct than in the Interdisciplinary Studies department at SFAI. Raquel Gutiérrez tricked me into an amazing opportunity to work with artist Eliza Barrios, and youth and elders in the South of Market from 2013 to 2014; The Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’s In Community Program was lucky to have her fierceness in the house. Katya Min of YBCA and Marc Mayer of the Asian Art Museum viii have believed in me as someone who can talk to the public about Filipino/American art; their support is humbling. Outside of the Bay, Mariam Lam, Sarita See and the Center for Art + Thought have given me opportunities to write about what I love. There are actually too many Filipino/Americans to thank in a brief space: it is a problem we should all be so lucky to have. Long chika sessions with Josen Diaz, Jason Magabo Perez, Tom Sarmiento, Amanda Solomon, Harrod Suarez, and Michael Viola remind me of the political and ethical stakes of Filipino American Studies. My former students in UCSD’s Kamalayan Collective taught me why Filipino American Studies matters, especially Carmela Capinpin, Chris Datiles, Janice Sapigao, and Gracelynne West. Easter isn’t the same without Andrew Amorao, Brandon Cabaguing, Erwin Mendoza, Lily Prijoles, Rhonalyn Santos, Jonathan Valdez, and the rest of the Kuya Ate Mentorship Program (KAMP) crew in San Diego. Kuttin Kandi demonstrates how to be a people’s scholar every day. Melissa Sipin-Gabon and Dorothy Santos have a way with words. I want to grow up to be a Filipino American Studies scholar like Christine Balance, Jody Blanco, Kale Fajardo, Theo Gonzalves, Martin Manalansan, Robyn Rodriguez, Sarita See, and Karen Tongson. The imprint of their thinking is all over the pages of this dissertation. Sarah Raymundo, Roland Tolentino, and the teachers of CONTEND are changing the Philippines’s higher education system for the better. The women of Gabriela Philippines—especially Emmi de Jesus, Liza Maza, and Joms Salvador—are the first and best models of feminism I have ever known. Without the following writers, scholars, performers, visual artists, and community groups in the Bay Area, this dissertation would be actually nothing: the late Carlos Villa, the late Al Robles, Barbara Jane Reyes, Gigi Otálvaro-Hormillosa, Mail Order Brides ix (Eliza Barrios, Reanne Estrada, and Jenifer K. Wofford), Estella Habal, Allan Manalo and Bindlestiff Studios, Alleluia Panis and Kularts, Cece Carpio, Dirty Boots, Oscar Peñaranda, Leny Strobel, Kidlat Tahimik, Vangie Buell, Annie Panlibutan Barnes, Carmencita Choy, Allyson Tintiangco-Cubales and PEP, Dawn Mabalon and FANHS, Dorothy Cordova and the late Fred Cordova, Tony Robles and POOR Magazine, Evelyn Luluquisen and the Manilatown Heritage Foundation,