If you’re in Portland on May 3rd and you love writing, you will want to attend the Ed Lin Writer’s Workshop, presented by the Asian American Journalists Association–Portland and Thymos, co-sponsored by Friends of Portland Chinatown. It is a writing workshop, and Ed will be working to help attendees find their writing muse. It takes place at the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association on May 3rd, 6pm, at 317 NW Davis in the heart of Portland Chinatown. It’s FREE, and there will be food. Much thanks to everyone who is putting this together.
Ed Lin is a New York-based novelist who wrote Waylaid, This is a Bust, and the recently published Snakes Can’t Run. His novel Waylaid became the award winning movie “The Motel” by Michael Kang and starring Sung Kang.
It’s been an exciting year since the 44s entered its last year and then officially retired. 44th President, and now Superbowl 44. Even in retirement, the 44s are relevant as ever.
What happened during that second half? I was cheering for the Saints, but I figured they were going to get blown out. I left for a dinner engagement after the second half when the Colts were winning 10-3, and then I find out that the Saints blew out the Colts. Wow. I missed an exciting second half.
Check out Scott Fujita above. He’s one the Saints’s linebackers. He’s a White guy with the last name “Fujita.” His story is that he was adopted by a Japanese American father and Caucasian American mother, but he was raised Japanese. See some of the story here. His father was born in an internment camp, and his grandfather fought for the 442nd.
I rarely meet people who major in literature and artsy humanities, but when I do, I sometimes joke about Claude Levi-Strauss. Regardless of we studied–French lit, Spanish lit, Philosophy–everybodywith a humanities major has read Claude Levi-Strauss. Tristes Tropiques is a classic, as well as a fascinating read into “primitive” cultures and how they share similar societal structures with so-called modern society. The idea of universal structuralism itself is great because it shows that one can learn about oneself by studying others. In my trips overseas, I’ve certainly found that to be true.
The article states, “But Mr. Lévi-Strauss’s version of structuralism may end up surviving poststructuralism, just as he survived most of its proponents. His monumental work “Mythologiques” may even ensure his legacy, as a creator of mythologies if not their explicator. ”
I agree. Although we’ve spent most of our lives in the current postructuralist or deconstructionist phase of American society’s evolution, and although such thinking was necessary to fully democratize our society, I’ve noticed that many of us are beginning to return to our roots, embracing the ideas of structures, mythologies, and symbols that make us wholer than the anti-whatever movements of the past.
Here’s a thoughtful post by Roger Fan (Breeze Loo!) on being Asian-American in Hollywood and the upcoming remake of Red Dawn. The entire site, “You Offend Me You Offend My Family” is worth checking out. They’re the new (more popular, more successful, more well-adjusted) 44s! :P
The original Red Dawn was filmed in the 80s, and was about the Russians invading the US. They make their way to a town where local highschool students decide to band together to fight back under their athletic banner, the “Wolverines”. For the remake, since the threat of the Cold War is long behind us, the enemy will instead be the Chinese. And all of the requisite Hollywood trademarks for asians are there — hordes of enemy asian guys who don’t speak English and a hot asian cheerleader on the American team.
Roger talks about what happened when he was invited to a script reading to play the enemy Chinese.
An interesting Scientific American article on how constant self-monitoring can have disadvantages, specifically as it pertains to race-relations. Everybody’s just got to relax.
Try a Little Powerlessness—Pitfalls of Self-Control
We admire self-discipline, but could too much control be a bad thing?
By Wray Herbert
Self-control is one of our most cherished values. We applaud those who have the discipline to regulate their appetites and actions, and we try hard to instill this virtue in our children. Think of the marketing slogans that key off the desire for restraint: “Just say no.” “Just do it.” We celebrate the power of the mind to make hard choices, despite our emotions or other temptations, and keep us on course.
But what if we can’t just do it? What if “it” is too difficult or if our strategy for success is misguided? Is it possible that willpower actually might be an obstacle rather than a means to happiness and harmony? Can we have too much of a good thing?
Two Tufts University psychologists believe there may be some truth to this possibility. Evan P. Apfelbaum and Samuel R. Sommers were intrigued by the notion that too much self-control may indeed have a downside—and that relinquishing some personal power might be paradoxically tonic, both for individuals and for society. They decided to test this idea in the laboratory.
Not sure how long this is going to last, but the Onion has finally been sold to the Chinese Amalgamated Salvage Fisheries and Polymer Injection Corp., Yu Wan Mei.
It’s absolutely fucking brilliant.
Read all the articles. Here’s a sample, and remember, China is strong.
PHOENIX—Christopher Pierson, a glassy-eyed, slothful lump of a child who still watches cartoons despite being tall enough to reach a polymer-injection molding station, was endlessly praised Monday for recalling the scant 26 letters in the American alphabet.
Pierson reportedly rattled off the short series of guttural vowels and lumbering, artless consonants after 10 minutes of prompting, a feat that—judging from his overly indulgent teacher’s reaction—must rival the great triumph of launching a satellite into orbit. Though witnesses said the unremarkable 4-year-old may also have slurred the letters “L” through “O” into one continuous stream of nonsense, he somehow avoided immediate expulsion and reassignment to a rural millet farm.
“Good job, Christopher!” said teacher Heather Warner, lauding the child for his meager and wholly meritless accomplishment. “You can go play with your blocks now.”
I had the opportunity yesterday to record a podcast with Boston City Councilor Sam Yoon, who is running to become the next mayor of Boston. Check it out here. I was highly, highly impressed with the drive that Mr. Yoon put into his candidacy, the force behind his desire to make Boston a better place, and his focus on the importance of education. In the podcast, he shares his ideas about education and politics, his views on the fiscal crisis and the news media, and his thoughts on his experiences as an Asian American political leader.
The incumbent Menino has been in power for 16 years and has no intention of ever leaving. There are no term limits, and with the good ol’ boy network in place, Sam has a tough fight ahead of him. However, I have no doubt that he’s right for the job. Sam is the first Asian American ever to run for public office in Boston, and he won on his first try. With votes from Boston and money from Boston and beyond, I believe he can do it again. Please send this to your networks and encourage your friends and family from Boston to vote.
“Uighurs are spoiled like pandas. When they steal, rob, rape or kill, they can get away with it. If we Han did the same thing, we’d be executed,” he said.
Damn pandas!
It seems as though the Uighur/Chinese situation has some parallels with that of North Americans and Aboriginals.
By Chris Buckley
URUMQI, China (Reuters) - Chinese President Hu Jintao abandoned plans to attend a G8 summit in Italy on Wednesday, returning home early to deal with ethnic violence that has left at least 156 dead in China’s northwestern region of Xinjiang.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry said on its website that Hu had left for China “due to the situation” in energy-rich Xinjiang, which borders central Asia, where 1,080 were people have been injured and 1,434 arrested in unrest between Han Chinese and Muslim Uighurs since Sunday.
State Councilor Dai Bingguo will attend the G8 summit in Hu’s place, the ministry added.
Urumqi, Xinjiang’s regional capital, woke up on Wednesday after an overnight curfew that authorities imposed after thousands of Han Chinese stormed through its streets demanding redress and sometimes extracting bloody vengeance for Sunday’s violence.
Long-time member evil-FUX sent me an interesting article from MSNBC which discusses how an understanding of consciousness is crucial to understanding the universe. While I agree with that general premise, I found some of the content to be problematic. The authors either grossly misunderstand how reality works, or are writing in a very oversimplified style, which hurts their argument. e_F asked me what ol’ Ken Wilber (and presumably, I) would think of this article. You’ll have to read the article in its entirety to understand my response, which follows.
Good to hear from you, very interesting article!
I looked this Lanza guy up, and apparently he’s a scientific super-star, so I say everything with the proviso that I know he’s probably way smarter than me. I agree with his thesis as presented here to the extent that he says properly understanding consciousness is crucial to understanding the universe. I do have a problem with his argument, though, as well as the fact that he says he has an explanation without seeming to have one.
This is a fantastic article from the New Yorker on the effectiveness of relentless effort and unconventional technique, as it applies to basketball, war, and life. It reminds me of two things: first, a study a genius buddy told me about which concluded that most of the top guys in any given field were the relentless ones, not the most talented. This article goes much further than that conversation, though. Second, a while back there were a few articles on the new “white flight” in California where parents were moving their kids away from certain school districts because they didn’t like how academically competitive the Asians were. The article discusses not just the strategic consequences, but also the social consequences of playing by a different set of conventions (but the same “rules”) as the majority and beating them.
My friend who sent it to me had this to say:
I highly recommend you all check out the article “How David Beats Goliath” by Malcolm Gladwell.
| Permalink
download the new Decyplz album - FREE
get the new Notorious MSG EP
Entries (RSS)
