2024-03-29T14:48:47Zhttps://escholarship.org/oaioai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6mr790782023-11-30T10:47:02Zqt6mr79078Contributor BiosManaging Editor, JTAS2023-01-01transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6mr79078articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt88h0r2fn2023-11-30T10:47:01Zqt88h0r2fnThe Ever-Changin' Times and Myth of Bob DylanSato, YoshiakiKnighton (translator), Mary A.2023-01-01This is a commissioned translation of "The Beginning of Our Times—A Myth" by Yoshiaki Sato, which was originally published in Japan in 2010.Bob DylanJapanese reception of Bob Dylantransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/88h0r2fnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7cf704bv2023-11-30T10:47:00Zqt7cf704bvOn the High Art of Folk Poetry: What Jorge Luis Borges and Bob Dylan Have in CommonCara, Ana C.2023-01-01Extended and translated for JTAS's Reprise section. Ana C. Cara, “¿Qué tienen en común Jorge Luis Borges y Bob Dylan? Sobre el elevado arte de la poesía popular,” originally published in Palabras Enlazadas: Estudios en Homenaje al Profesor
Lászió
Scholz, 2018.Bob DylanJorge Luis Borgespoetryfolk traditiontransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7cf704bvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4nm7m7z52023-11-30T10:46:59Zqt4nm7m7z5Odysseus in LiverpoolDetering, HeinrichKontos (translator), Hannah2023-01-01Translation of "Odysseus in Liverpool: Bob Dylans 'Roll on John.'" In Weltliteratur interkulturell: Referenzen von Cusanus bis Bob Dylan, edited by Heike C. Spickermann, 129-140. Heidelberg: Winterverlag, 2015.Bob Dylanapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4nm7m7z5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9jv3b7682023-11-30T10:46:57Zqt9jv3b768BanditsGoenawan, MohamadLindsay (translator), Jennifer2023-01-01The Indonesian poet and public figure Goenawan Mohamad published "Bandits" in the magazine Tempo, which was also published in the English version of Tempo. Reprinted by permission in the Journal of Transnational American Studies.Goenawan MohamadBob Dylantransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9jv3b768articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2jf9d1b92023-11-30T10:46:56Zqt2jf9d1b9DylanGoenawan, MohamadLindsay (translator), Jennifer2023-01-01The Indonesian poet and public figure Goenawan Mohamad published "Bob Dylan" in the magazine Tempo and it was also published in the English version of Tempo. Reprinted by permission of the author Goenawan Mohamad and the translator Jennifer Lindsay.Goenawan MohamadBob Dylantransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2jf9d1b9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt15k9x17f2023-11-30T10:46:55Zqt15k9x17fNothing Synthetic about It: Translating Bob Dylan’s Domestic and International Civil WarsRoberts, Brian Russell2023-01-01Reprise Editor's Introductiontranslation and transnational American studiesBob Dylanapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/15k9x17farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1j6535gv2023-11-30T10:46:53Zqt1j6535gvExcerpt from Sing and Sing On: Sentinel Musicians and the Making of the Ethiopian American DiasporaShelemay, Kay Kaufman2023-01-01“Communities,” from SING AND SING ON by Kay Kaufman Shelemay. Used by permission of The University of Chicago Press. © 2022 by The University of Chicago. All Rights Reserved.musicians in exileEthiopian revolutionEthiopian American musiciansBlue Nile Restaurantapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1j6535gvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt30f7r0r12023-11-30T10:46:52Zqt30f7r0r1Introduction from Telling America's Story to the World: Literature, Internationalism, Cultural DiplomacyStecopoulos, Harilaos2023-01-01Stecopoulos, H., 2023.
Telling America's Story to the World: Literature, Internationalism, Cultural Diplomacy.
New York: Oxford University Press. Excerpt used with approval of Oxford University Press.cultural diplomacyUS literaturepropagandainternationalismtransnational American studieshistoryapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/30f7r0r1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1j69v7rf2023-11-30T10:46:50Zqt1j69v7rf"Exploring Japanese-Mexican Relations in Los Angeles and the US-Mexico Borderlands" from Transborder Los AngelesTokunaga, Yu2023-01-01Excerpt from Transborder Los Angeles: An Unknown Transpacific History of Japanese-Mexican Relations, University of California Press, 2022. © 2022 by Yu Tokunaga. All Rights Reserved. Permission must be sought from University of California Press for additional uses.Transpacific historyJapanese-Mexiccan relationstransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1j69v7rfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4jd4m2b22023-11-30T10:46:49Zqt4jd4m2b2Introduction from Framing the Nation: Claiming the HemisphereHeide, Markus2023-01-01Markus Heide, 2022. Framing the Nation, Claiming the Hemisphere: Transnational Imagination in Early American Travel Writing (1770–1830). Stockholm: Stockholm University Press. https://doi.org/10.16993/bca © 2022 by Stockholm University Press.Early American travel writingtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4jd4m2b2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2d2557162023-11-30T10:46:48Zqt2d255716Forward IntroductionReimer, Jennifer A.2023-01-01Forward Editor's Introductionapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2d255716articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5vw8x7d02023-11-30T10:46:47Zqt5vw8x7d0Introduction to Y-Dang's Refugee Lifeworlds: The Afterlife of the Cold War in CambodiaTroeung, Y-DangPatterson, Christopher B.2023-01-01This year's Shelley Fisher Fishkin Prize is awarded posthumously to the scholar Y-Dang Troeung for her 2023 book Refugee Lifeworlds: The Afterlife of the Cold War in Cambodia, an excerpt of which we are honoured to reprint in the journal. Professor Troeung's work is introduced by her husband, Christopher B. Patterson.CambodiaCold WarY-Dang TroeungChristopher B. PattersonRefugee Lifeworldslegacies of US imperialismFishkin Prize 2023transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5vw8x7d0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6cx2p4vf2023-11-30T10:46:46Zqt6cx2p4vfStuck in the Middle With(out) You: How American Immigration Law Trapped “Defective” Immigrants Between Two WorldsZaves-Greene, Hannah2023-01-01In 1891, the United States Congress codified a harsher version of the 1882 public charge provision. Commodifying health and pathologizing poverty, the public charge law excluded and deported immigrants termed “likely to become a public charge” according to its conflation of physical, mental, and economic status, shaping America’s image across the world. Though public charge implicated all immigrants, its impact on eastern European Jews captured the attention of pro-immigration American Jewish advocates. My article analyzes American Jewish attorneys and reformers who emphasized that public charge endangered Jewish immigrants who sought admission to and citizenship in the United States. Contesting the administration of the law—and especially the discretion that state officials possessed to enforce it—as un-American and antidemocratic, this coalition endeavored to liberalize public charge by promoting new interpretations of its terminology, reducing its reach, and contesting it through the courts, while contending with the ever-evolving concepts of borders and nationalist restriction. Public charge particularly victimized young Jewish women and girls, whom immigration officials often diagnosed as “mentally defective” despite evidence to the contrary. To illustrate this trend, I explore a case of a Jewish immigrant girl named Esther, diagnosed as insane, subjected to illegal medical examinations, and threatened with imminent deportation over the course of eleven years. I consider how American Jewish communal luminaries intervened on this immigrant’s behalf, simultaneously integrating disability into the field of American Jewish history and investigating how these advocates challenged the premise that illness and impairment disabled immigrants from becoming Americans.Immigrationdeportationgender studieswomen’s historydisabilitydefectinsanitylawpublic chargeeugenicsAmerican Jewish historycitizenshipUnited Statesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6cx2p4vfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4v0239nj2023-11-30T10:46:45Zqt4v0239njHygiene, Whiteness and Immigration: Upton Sinclair and the “Jungle” of the American Health Care SystemBanerjee, Mita2023-01-01Upton Sinclair’s novel The Jungle has been read as a critique of unfettered capitalism in the urban space of Chicago at the beginning of the twentieth century. This essay argues that this capitalist critique may gain further depth when read through the intersection between transnational American studies and medical humanities. Through the perspective of the Lithuanian character Jurgis Rudkus, the narrative turns on its head xenophobic claims of immigrants as a health menace to the US American nation. In so doing, it engages the field of medicine in two significant ways. It counters the claim that immigrants have no knowledge of hygiene by looking at white tables through immigrant eyes; and it critiques the fact that the US medical system has become inhumane in its increasing economization. Reading Sinclair’s novel in dialogue with historical studies of migration and contagion at the beginning of the twentieth century as well as with other naturalistic texts such as Frank Norris’s The Octopus, I suggest that The Jungle anticipates current debates about health care and health justice, as they have recently been addressed in Barack Obama’s autobiography A Promised Land.Upton Sinclairnaturalismhygieneimmigrant medical knowledgehealth justiceapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4v0239njarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt98t708562023-11-30T10:46:44Zqt98t70856Migration in Times of Pandemic: Mark Twain’s “3,000 Years Among the Microbes” and the Prospect of Planetary HealthHöll, Davina2023-01-01Mark Twain’s novel fragment “3, 000 Years Among the Microbes” (1905) tells the story of the formerly human, now microbial protagonist “Huck” Bkshp. Huck reports from the retrospective of three thousand years of microbial time on the challenges of existence as a microbe in the body of the Hungarian immigrant and “tramp” Blitzowski. Migration and epi- and pandemic events enter into an often-fatal relationship. For many migrants, the desolate health care systems of their home countries were often one of the reasons for leaving in the first place. However, both during transit and on arrival at their destinations, they are exposed to no less precarious situations. Moreover, they are often perceived as a threat themselves. Against the backdrop of the lived pandemic experience of nineteenth-century cholera, Twain’s text depicts the hardships of migration in a literary original way and thus can be read as a paradigmatic literary manifest for the meeting point of transnational American studies and the Medical Humanities. In Twain’s novel fragment, the human-microbial protagonist Huck carries cholera, one of the deadliest pandemic threats of the nineteenth century. When immigrating into his host’s immigrant body, Blitzowski, he also becomes a carrier of the disease. That migrants bring fatal diseases is a topos not only in the (hi-)story of American immigration. Border closures and entry bans are often the first measures during disease outbreaks. However, epi- and pandemics cannot be excluded. As the impossibility of containment is a central topic of Twain’s narrative, I argue, it also can be seen as an early imagination of the emerging concept of “Planetary Health,” which, especially by focusing on recent microbiome research, rethinks the entanglements of human and more-than-human migrations in the face of current and future states of crisis.CholerapandemicmicrobiomeMark Twainmigrationplanetary health19th centurytransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/98t70856articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5qg9r3p72023-11-30T10:46:43Zqt5qg9r3p7Jack London’s Medical Migrations to a Pan-Pacific AllianceHornung, Alfred2023-01-01Jack London’s life and career represent an exemplary case for the interrelation of transnational American Studies and medical humanities. In the short period of the forty years of his life he traveled the world and encountered a great number of illnesses and diseases, those of others and his own, from his infancy in 1876 to his premature death in 1916. Although he was born in San Francisco and died on his ranch in the Sonoma Valley of California, he was constantly on the move in a series of national and transnational migrations to Asia, the Canadian Northland, Alaska, Europe, Hawaiʻi, the Pacific Islands, Australia, North and South America. The principal motive for these kinds of unusual migrations is the miserable conditions of life in isolation and poverty, considered a social disease, which he tries to overcome by seeking adventures on land and sea trusting in his good stamina to improve his material situation. It is the experience of these unhealthy conditions of physical and social conditions, which brings about his career as a writer and makes him transform the contemporary Anglo-Saxon perception of the superiority of “the inevitable white man" into a plea for the acceptance of diversity and the realization of the need for a safe environment in the biosphere. In this contribution I will focus on four decisive episodes in Jack London's adventurous life in which the combination of medical and social issues are stages on the road to his eventual vision and formulation of a healthy environment and an egalitarian alternative society. In my reading of these medical migrations he serves as a prime example of living transnational American Studies.Jack LondonAnglo-Saxon ideologyIndigenous knowledgestransnational medical encountersmultiethnic societiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5qg9r3p7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8787c1242023-11-30T10:46:42Zqt8787c124Mental Illness as Cultural Narrative: Dementia, Im/migrant Experience and InterAmerican Entanglements in David Chariandy’s SoucouyantRaussert, Wilfried2023-01-01The article discusses David Chariandy’s novel Soucouyant (2007) in the context of critical disability studies and hemispheric American studies. In particular, it explores dementia as a cultural narrative that links the protagonist’s personal case of dementia to her traumatic experiences of US violence, abuse, and exploitation in the Caribbean, her forced migration in Trinidad, and unfulfilled hopes of integration into Canadian society after having immigrated in the context of Canadian labor and immigration programs in the early 1960s. The article explores the various levels of meaning dementia unfolds in Chariandy’s novel as critical reflection on memory work, racism, and colonial as well as neocolonial exploitation. It also relates the narrative structure of the novel to recent geriatric life-telling therapy used to restore individual dignity and identity to people suffering from dementia.InterAmerican studiestransnational American studieshemispheric studiesentanglementdementiatraumamigrationmemory workDavid ChariandySoucouyant 2007application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8787c124articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5zp7f31w2023-11-30T10:46:41Zqt5zp7f31wIntroduction: Diagnosing Migrant Experience: Medical Humanities and Transnational American StudiesBanerjee, MitaHöll, Davina2023-01-01Special Forum Editors' Introductionmedical humanitiesmigration and healthMark TwainUpton SinclairJack LondonDavid Chariandypublic charge provisionAmerican Jewish historytransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5zp7f31warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9st6225b2023-11-30T10:46:40Zqt9st6225bMark Twain on the Soviet Silver Screen: Stalinist Laughter and Antiracism in "Tom Soier"de Oliveira, Cassio2023-01-01This article is an analysis of the Soviet film Tom Soier, an adaptation of Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn released in 1936, at the height of the Stalinist period. In the article, the author places the film in the context of the Soviet support of the Black struggle against racial segregation in America by showing how Tom Soier creatively combines the plots of Twain’s novels in order to propagate an antiracist message. Furthermore, by casting African American actors in the roles of Black enslaved characters, the film also engages with what Steven Lee has called the ethnic avant-garde, i.e., the complex of transnational and multiethnic artistic exchanges and collaborations that took place in the interwar period and which had its nexus in the Soviet Union. The author argues that the seemingly progressive message of the film is nevertheless undermined in part by its evocation of racist practices of blackface in a key episode in the final scene. The author links the use of blackface as a punitive action with Stalinist cultural codes, and specifically with modalities of humor and the carnivalesque that overlap with some of the most violent periods of the Soviet Terror. The result is a film that updates the message of Twain’s novels to the then-current struggle for national self-determination and racial equality while also reflecting the darkest facets of Soviet Stalinist culture.Mark TwainThe Adventures of Tom SawyerThe Adventures of Huckleberry FinnSoviet cinemafilm adaptations of American literatureSoviet views of AmericaSoviet antiracismStalinist cinemaStalinist laughter and carnivalesqueBlack American actorsapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9st6225barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6jn4d3fn2023-11-30T10:46:40Zqt6jn4d3fnAuthenticity and Autofiction: John Updike’s “The Bulgarian Poetess”Glavanakova, Alexandra K.2023-01-01This article provides an innovative perspective on John Updike’s visit to Eastern Europe in the 1960s, including Bulgaria, as reflected in his short story “The Bulgarian Poetess” first published in The New Yorker on March 13, 1965. The inspiration for this interpretation is as much academic as it is anthropological. It comes from Updike’s use of my own surname, Glavanakova, which is not a common Slavic one, for the fictional character of the real-life Bulgarian poetess he met, whom researchers have established to be Blaga Dimitrova. Many have delved into the text aiming at a detailed and, more significantly, an authentic reconstruction of events, places and people appearing in the story (Katsarova 2010; Kosturkov 2012; Briggs and Dojčinović 2015). A main preoccupation of these analyses has been to establish the degree of factual distortion in Updike’s representation of the people and places behind the Iron Curtain. The pervasive imagery of the mirror, implying both its reflecting and doubling function, and the repetitive use of cognates associated with truth and honesty in the story suggest the focus of this article, which falls on the dynamics between authenticity and artifice from the perspective of autofiction by way of illustrating how one culture translates into another “at the opposite side[s] of the world” (Updike, “The Bulgarian Poetess”). In my interpretation, autofiction opens ample spaces for representations and discussions of identity and self-/reflexivity in a transcultural context.John Updikeautofictiontravel writingBulgariatransculturalapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6jn4d3fnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4704p93f2023-11-30T10:46:39Zqt4704p93fBlack Elk Faces East: Beb Vuyk, Cultural Translation, and John G. Neihardt's Black Elk SpeaksKelderman, Frank2023-01-01This essay examines the work of the Dutch-Indonesian author Beb Vuyk in producing one of the first foreign-language translations of John G. Neihardt’s Black Elk Speaks: the 1964 Dutch edition Zwarte Eland spreekt. Published in the Netherlands, Vuyk’s translation connects the 1932 as-told-to autobiography of the Oglala Lakota heyoka Black Elk to the career of one of the most important Dutch-Indonesian authors after World War II, who had a prominent voice in debates on Indonesian decolonization. Linking the literary history of two different colonial contexts, Vuyk’s edition also connects Black Elk Speaks to a Cold War-era history of transnational literary exchange, which both mobilized and contained global anticolonial intellectual work. Her translation of Black Elk Speaks exemplifies that its global mobility did not necessarily engender a liberatory, decolonizing discourse, even as it produced new frameworks for Indigenous representation within a transnational intellectual history. As the Dutch-language edition offers a remarkably distinct representation of Black Elk’s narrative—and Neihardt’s textualization of it—Vuyk’s previously unremarked work as a translator demonstrates how acts of translation shape to transnational uptake of American Indian writing. Vuyk’s edition of Black Elk Speaks lends the book a previously unremarked place within transnational networks of decolonizing writers and intellectuals during the Cold War. At the same time, her linguistic and compositional choices demonstrate how the mediation and (mis)translation of literary texts contributes to the overwriting of Indigenous literature, in an expansive literary field marked by linguistic, cultural, and colonial hierarchies.Transnational Indigenous studiesBlack Elk memoirJohn NeihardtBeb VuykNative AmericanIndigenousLakotaDutch-Indonesian LiteratureTranslationTransnationalismDecolonizationNative American life writingTransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4704p93farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4n23s5ng2023-11-30T10:46:38Zqt4n23s5ngIssue Introduction: Translating and Transnational American StudiesHornung, Alfred2023-01-01Introduction to Vol. 14, No. 2 of the Journal of Transnational American Studiestransnational American studiestranslationapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4n23s5ngarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt35x9f2bw2023-06-07T07:08:55Zqt35x9f2bwAbout the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2023-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/35x9f2bwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4pj4n4t22023-06-07T07:08:54Zqt4pj4n4t2The Americas: A Relational or Abyssal Geography? An Interview, Barbara Gfoellner and Jonathan PughGfoellner, BarbaraPugh, Jonathan2023-01-01This interview between Barbara Gfoellner and Jonathan Pugh explores archipelagic thinking, transnational American Studies, the concept of islandness and recent debates in Black Studies. Notably, it draws out two distinct ways, or analytical approaches, in which American Studies can be taken beyond understandings of the nation-state as a fixed and bounded object. Both seek to move beyond modern frameworks of reasoning, a linear telos of progress, fixed grids of space and time, which are widely argued to have supported American exceptionalism. The first, more common analytical approach, can be situated within the broader “relational” and “ontological” turns that have swept across the social sciences and humanities in recent decades, involving turns towards such tropes as assemblages, networks, flows, mobilities, post- and more-than-human approaches. The second analytical approach, what Pugh (in his current research with David Chandler) calls “abyssal thought,” has yet to emerge as prominently, but poses a significant challenge to the relational and ontological turns. Central for abyssal work is how, as we learn from W. E. B. Du Bois, Frantz Fanon, and Aimé Césaire, the world cannot be separated out from the violence that forged the antiblack modernist ontology of “human as subject” and “world as object.” For abyssal work, however, the task is not to rework the subject of modernity in terms of relational ontologies and epistemologies, but to problematize and to undo the human and the world. This interview explores how the abyssal project is thus nonontological and nonrelational, deconstructive rather than productive, deworlding as opposed to world-making.archipelagic studiesabyssal geographyJonathan Pugh interviewislandnesstransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4pj4n4t2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6mh4z71j2023-06-07T07:08:53Zqt6mh4z71jA Sea of Stars? Towards an Astropelagic Reading of Outer Space with Jacques Lacan and Hannah ArendtGanser, AlexandraTemmen, JensRettenbacher, Clemens2023-01-01Starting from the fact that the International Outer Space Treaty (Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies/UNOOSA, 1967) has been modeled on international laws of the seas, this essay investigates the epistemic consequences of conceiving outer space archipelagically, or, more specifically and following Craig Santos Perez, terripelagically. By reversing center/periphery structurations in line with both archipelagic approaches to and philosophical theorizations of outer space by Jacques Lacan and Hannah Arendt, the article critiques the current discursive transformation in both science and popular culture of celestial bodies into desirable territories of capitalization, exploitation, and imperialism, and it suggests the term astropelago as an alternative conception. We argue that as a continuation of imperial exploratory mobilities, terripelagic outer space projections, which are becoming increasingly real, demonstrate the need for an outside of capitalism on ever new frontiers to continue ecological—human and nonhuman—exploitation on Earth. In a second part, we explore the initiative “For All Moonkind” and the TV series For All Mankind and the ways in which they center Mars and Earth’s moon respectively as spaces that reaffirm and renew imperial desires.International Outer Space TreatyCraig Santos PerezJacques LacanHannah Arendtapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6mh4z71jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2jb2p3q12023-06-07T07:08:51Zqt2jb2p3q1"Near enough to smell and far enough to desire”: Archipelagos of Desire in Canisia Lubrin’s Voodoo Hypothesis and Dionne Brand’s In Another Place, Not HereGfoellner, BarbaraThomsen, Sigrid2023-01-01Both the 1996 novel In Another Place, Not Here by Trinidadian Canadian writer Dionne Brand and the 2017 poetry collection Voodoo Hypothesis by St. Lucian Canadian poet Canisia Lubrin are concerned with desires spanning the Caribbean archipelago, to Canada and back again. The narrators and protagonists of Brand’s text migrate across this archipelago while navigating various desires—for places, people, a sense of belonging, and revolution—that serve as a way of bridging distances between bodies, continents, and moments in time. Lubrin shares in that project by not only writing about the archipelago’s historic echoes and present connections, but by explicitly dedicating one of her poems to Brand. In this article, we read desire and the archipelagic in these works not just together, but through one another, conceptualizing what we call an “archipelago of desire.” The notion of the archipelago proves useful due to the concrete geographical constellation that forms the Caribbean and that can, in extension, be used to explore not merely one or two forms of mobility, but a plurality of im/mobilities, such as these speakers’ crisscrossing paths. In using the archipelago to grasp desire, we see different desires as fragmented and interwoven; they are part of not a whole but of something which resists being a whole, much like an archipelago resists being subsumed into one category; desire is then a way of assembling these things together while affirming their fragmentary nature.Canisia Lubrintransnational Caribbean Anglophone literatureDionne BrandVoodoo HypothesisIn Another PlaceNot Hereapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2jb2p3q1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0zb9z8r72023-06-07T07:08:50Zqt0zb9z8r7AlterNative Archipelagos and the 1952 Caribbean Festival: Musical Mobilities Escaping ALCOA’s Extractive TourismSheller, MimiMartin, Andrew R.2023-01-01Caribbean cultural tourism is deeply entwined with American empire and its transoceanic mobilities, yet transnational Caribbean cultural production constantly exceeds and escapes such limiting constructs. In this article, we combine the insights of a cultural sociologist (Sheller) and a musicologist (Martin) to interrogate the meanings of the first Caribbean Festival of the Arts, held in Puerto Rico in 1952, in shaping divergent archipelagic spaces and competing musical itineraries that formed Black Atlantic soundscapes, both imperial and anti-imperial. Following the travels of musical production, dance performance, and cultural tourism marketing around the Caribbean and into North America, we argue that beneath the currents of imperial transnational tourism and cultural consumption there were also countermobilities forming an “alterNative archipelagic” imaginary that connected the Caribbean with Africa and Black America. We trace the ways in which Caribbean music entered North American bodies, with Caribbean musicians bringing surprising trends such as steelpan and Calypso into United States musical performance circuits beyond tourism. The music itself, as well, changed culture and moved people, all over the world, forging other kinds of mobilities and connections contra American imperialism. Music inspired a vision for radical Caribbean and Pan-African unity against the imperial interests of the United States and extractive industries in the region. This tale of an imperial archipelago and its countervailing alterNative archipelagoes suggests that archipelagic formations are open to definition, difficult to stabilize, and always extending outwards beyond the horizon. Constituted by mobilities as much as by islands, archipelagoes are a matrix of transnational cultures capable of remixing, expanding, and resisting imperial power.Caribbean studiesBlack Atlantic soundscapesmusic studiestourism studieshistory of steelbandCaribbean music festivalextractive capitalism in the CaribbeanALCOA1952 Caribbean Festival of the Artstransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0zb9z8r7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3s37421w2023-06-07T07:08:49Zqt3s37421wNarrating the Isthmus: Mobilities and Archipelagic Memory in Texts about the Panama CanalPisarz-Ramirez, Gabriele2023-01-01The essay uses an archipelagic lens to explore narratives of mobility and relationality surrounding the Panama Canal Zone. In the early twenieth century, the various projects of creating an interoceanic route culminated in the territorializing project of the Panama Canal that was organized around the colonization of land and ocean spaces and tied to the imperial expansion to the Caribbean and the Pacific, making the isthmus a crucial link in the imperial archipelago. After briefly discussing Willis J. Abbot’s popular history of the canal, Panama and the Canal in Picture and Prose (1913), the essay explores two texts by Black writers that question dominant representations of the canal and of the migrant Caribbean workers who built it: Eric Walrond’s collection of stories, Tropic Death (1926), and the bilingual prose–poetry history of Black West Indians in Panama, An Old Woman Remembers (1995), by Carlos E. Russell. I argue that these texts practice “archipelagic memory” by evoking an archive of submerged historical experiences that relates the Canal Zone to other spaces, and by making visible spectral presences and the sediments of imperial history submerged in the waters of the canal.Panama Canal Zonerace and imperial spaceterritorializationWillis AbbotEric WalrondCarlos E. RussellPanama and the Canal in Picture and ProseTropic DeathAn Old Woman Remembersapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3s37421warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt36p422dv2023-06-07T07:08:48Zqt36p422dvLayered Maps: Carceral and Fugitive Archipelagos in Walter Mosley’s Down the River Unto the SeaWaller, Nicole2023-01-01This essay offers an archipelagic reading of Walter Mosley’s detective novel Down the River Unto the Sea (2018). I argue that the spatial imaginary of the novel constitutes a layered map of the Americas that registers continental visions of the US nation-state but cognitively remaps and breaks up this space into various archipelagic constellations. I read the novel as contributing to a specifically African American mode of the archipelagic, which I trace along two trajectories: a focus on carceral archipelagos and im/mobilities, and a negotiation between what David Chandler and Jonathan Pugh have called “interstitial” geographies, which focus on relationality, and “abyssal” geographies, which posit and critique antiblackness as the world’s foundational violence. In my reading, both trajectories sit firmly within the concerns of archipelagic studies but significantly extend the paradigm’s scope. The first trajectory depicts the US nation-state both as imperial continent and as racialized carceral archipelago and sets these layers off against visions of fugitive archipelagos that afford Mosley’s characters temporary islands of safety or respite, but never grant them the contiguity that undergirds Western fantasies of nation-state sovereignty. The second trajectory employs both interstitial and abyssal analytics to address the question what an "imagined community" can mean in a starkly antiblack world. Via the intertwined stories of two protagonists, the detective Joe King Oliver and the prisoner A Free Man, Mosley’s novel envisions African American responses to systemic betrayal within the US—being sold Down the River—and pushes, geographically and ideologically, beyond constellations of the nation-state and citizenship—Unto the Sea.mobility studiesantiblacknesscarceral geographiesarchipelagic American studiesWalter MosleyDown the River Unto the SeaJonathan Pugh and David Chandlerinterstitial geographiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/36p422dvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0s40806k2023-06-07T07:08:47Zqt0s40806kUnmasking Maps, Unmaking Empire: Towards an Archipelagic CartographyWöll, Steffen2023-01-01On the surface, maps enable the planning and development of human dwelling, the visualization of connections, and drawing of boundaries. Throughout human history, however, maps have also acted as antidotes to chaos by generating spatial imaginations as pathways to meaning, belonging, and yearning. Exploring both theoretical and practical trajectories of transnational mappings, this article traces cartographies through the spatio-cultural nodes of the mainland United States, Hawaiʻi, and Micronesia. By revealing hidden connections, interstices, mobilities, memories, flows, and polysemic knowledges, it argues that an archipelagic approach to cartographic creation and interpretation reveals the significance of ‘minor’ spatial imaginations, mobilities, and historical practices. Although these may appear interspersed, fragmented, or insular, I suggest that they form nodes in archipelagic networks of resistance against colonizing cartographic regimes that aim to homogenize, police, and commodify spaces according to imperial logics—thus casting doubts on the authority of continental, national, and imperial/colonial geographic vocabularies. The article’s findings make apparent the need for a methodological turn that takes into account the methodological relationality and social agency of maps as actors in the generation and interpretation of discursive networks of spatial imaginations. Engaging with these imaginations, it becomes clear, means reevaluating and redefining conventional understandings of oceans, islands, continents, archipelagos, as well as those yet unnamed, unmapped, and unwritten places that exist between or submerged below these categories.mapmakingarchipelagic studiestransnational American studiesmaps of Micronesiamaps of Hawai'imaps of the USapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0s40806karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt45m979mr2023-06-07T07:08:46Zqt45m979mrArchipelagic Translation: Mobility amid Every Language in the WorldRoberts, Brian Russell2023-01-01This article proposes a three-way reinflection among the categories of mobility, archipelagic thought, and translation. It draws on the work of several island-oriented thinkers, including Alice Te Punga Somerville, Édouard Glissant, and Craig Santos Perez. Via Te Punga Somerville, I develop a conceptualization of archipelagic translation that is decolonizing, decontinentalizing, and reliant on interisland waters as places of being and meaning. Subsequently, via Glissant’s emphasis on translation as a crucial form of archipelagic thinking, I emphasize a translation less of betweenness (from one language to another) and more of amidness (a translation in the presence of every language of the world). Finally, and by recourse to Perez’s from unincorporated territory poetry series, I elaborate on a view of archipelagic translation as a renaming of the world in which translational equivalents break down and translation happens amid the push and pull of materiality and metaphoricity. Thus, Perez’s work offers both a conceptual template for and an example of archipelagic translation. As I navigate through the work of these three thinkers, the article’s three major preoccupations—mobility, archipelagic thinking, and translation—exist in a constant, reinflecting, and reconstituting dynamic in relation to one another. In the conclusion, I turn toward the potential for the mobilities of archipelagic translation to reroute recent work in Transnational American Studies that takes up questions of language, multilingualism, and translation. Further, the conclusion looks toward the archipelagic’s sense of amidness as key to a planetary restructuring of scholarly approaches to mobility, archipelagic spaces, and translation.translation poeticsCraig Santos PerezAlice Te Punga SomervilleEdouard Glissantfrom unincorporated territory poemsarchipelagic American studiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/45m979mrarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5v99h98b2023-06-07T07:08:45Zqt5v99h98bArchipelagic Thinking: The Insular, the Archipelago, and the Borderwaters – A ConversationRoberts, Brian RussellStephens, Michelle Ann2023-01-01In this public conversation, Brian Russell Roberts and Michelle Ann Stephens talk about their work in the field of Archipelagic American Studies and about the intersections of this field with Mobility Studies. They discuss archipelagic thinking, islands and the insular, the borderwaters, alternative mapping, and the ways in which thinking with the archipelago foregrounds relational entanglements and mobilities. The conversation was part of the workshop “Archipelagic Imperial Spaces and Mobilities” that took place in Leipzig in July 2021.archipelagic American studiesmobility studiestransnational American studiesinterview Brian Russell Roberts and Michelle Stephensapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5v99h98barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3450q1f32023-06-07T07:08:44Zqt3450q1f3Introduction: Conceptualizing Archipelagic MobilitiesWöll, SteffenGfoellner, BarbaraPisarz-Ramirez, GabrieleGanser, Alexandra2023-01-01Introduction by Special Forum editors.mobility studiesarchipelagic studiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3450q1f3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7rc956n92023-06-07T07:08:43Zqt7rc956n9Huck in the Balloon, Huck in the Divan--The American Child and the Cartographic Scripts of EmpireMayar, Mahshid2023-01-01In the following essay, I discuss what is transnational in the book-length query that Citizens and Rulers of the World explores, as it starts and ends with Huckleberry Finn; and in the edited excerpt from my book, sit with Huck Finn in three settings, exploring what I term “scripts of empire.”cartographytheories of mapmaking and -reading19th c pedagogyHuck Finntransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7rc956n9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84b477p72023-06-07T07:08:42Zqt84b477p7Losing LeninInst Internationalism in Claude McKay’s Lost NovelWelang, Nahum2023-01-01Vladimir Lenin, leader of the Bolshevik movement, believed that a flourishing Black proletariat consciousness was the catalyst needed for a Communist revolution in the United States of America at the turn of the twentieth century. Thus, the Bolshevik egalitarian ideology of antiracism attracted Black Americans and anchored support for the global Communist agenda of Leninist Internationalism.After Lenin’s death in 1924, his protégé Joseph Stalin becomes the new leader of Soviet Russia and signs and sustains a strategic arms alliance with Italy. In his Harlem-set lost novel Amiable with Big Teeth (AWBT), Jamaican-American writer Claude McKay chronicles how this decision places Stalin at odds with the Black American allies of Leninist Internationalism.Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini invades Ethiopia in 1935 and because Stalin remains committed to the Italo-Soviet Pact, the Black American community in AWBT views this commitment as an endorsement of the colonial suppression of Ethiopia’s Black sovereignty and thus a violation of Lenin’s antiracism ideology.With the demise of Leninist Internationalism in the Stalin era, AWBT argues that the Pan-Africanist agenda of Black-led organizations is more adept at forging antiracist and antiimperialist transnational bonds. However, Blackness is not a monolith and McKay’s lost novel must soon confront the uncomfortable reality that even within Black-led organizations, ethnic differences can easily supersede racial allegiance.AWBT is ultimately a story about the arduous, and sometimes impossible, task of building an ideological identity across diverse national borders and racial groups.Pan-Africanism in the Stalinist eraBlack American InternationalismClaude McKayAmiable with Big Teethtransnational American studiesInternationalismCommunismapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84b477p7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt76w5n3hv2023-06-07T07:08:41Zqt76w5n3hvDoing Transnational American Studies AbroadHornung, Alfred2023-01-01Issue introduction by the journal's editor in chief.transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/76w5n3hvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt46z2f4cc2023-06-07T07:08:41Zqt46z2f4ccMary Church Terrell, The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, and Germany’s "schwarze Schmach" Campaign, 1918 - 1922Banks, Noaquia Callahan2023-01-01This article centers on Mary Church Terrell’s membership in the first transnational feminist organization following World War One and the ways race shaped the participation of this prominent African American feminist with extensive ties to Germany – and that of other African American women’s participation – in the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. In tracing Terrell’s activities, the article unpacks her response to Germany’s Rhineland Campaign – which erupted into an international scandal and debate on race, sex, and claims to national citizenship after World War One. Terrell’s intervention made her a broker of German-American transatlantic diplomacy via conversations about race. Of equal importance, the essay explores the complex threads of the “schwarze Schmach” (Black Shame), as it unearths the motives that precipitated white American and European feminists’ willing involvement. With African American participation in World War One and its aftermath as the backdrop to Terrell’s intervention in the Rhineland Campaign, the article traces the arc of African American women’s activism from a domestic-focused agenda to an international-focused agenda. It argues that Terrell’s approach to the international arena redefined African American women’s potential role in transnational organizations and debates.Mary Church TerrellAfrican American feminismtransnationalmodern Germanyschwarze SchmachWomen’s International League for Peace and Freedomsexualized racismapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/46z2f4ccarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 14, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1q93c2gj2023-01-23T21:10:38Zqt1q93c2gjAbout the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2022-01-01transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1q93c2gjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84s7j0pj2023-01-23T21:10:37Zqt84s7j0pjInsect Poetics: James Grainger, Personification, and EnlightenmentsAllewaert, Monique2022-01-01Originally published in Early American Literature, Volume 52, Number 2. Copyright © 2017 by the University of North Carolina Press. Used by permission of the publisher. www.uncpress.orgJames GraingerEnlightenment concepts of personificationinsect lifeapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84s7j0pjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3v34p3452023-01-23T21:10:35Zqt3v34p345Insects, War, Plastic LifeMawani, Renisa2022-01-01Renisa Mawani, “Insects, War, Plastic Life,” in Plastic Materialities: Politics, Legality, and Metamorphosis in the Work of Catherine Malabou, ed. Brenna Bhandar and Jonathan Goldberg-Hiller, 159–87. Copyright 2015, Duke University Press. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of the copyright holder and the publisher. www.dukeupress.edu insectshuman an more-than-human entanglementsplastic as nature-cultureCatherine Malabouwartransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3v34p345articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5d73g5702023-01-23T21:10:34Zqt5d73g570Poe’s Gold Bug from the Standpoint of an EntomologistSmyth, Ellison A., Jr.2022-01-01Originally published in The Sewanee Review 18, no. 1 (January 1910): 67-72.
entomology in Edgar Allan Poeshort story "The Gold-Bug"research on existence of the Gold Bugapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5d73g570articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt34r5x31j2023-01-23T21:10:34Zqt34r5x31jExcerpt from The More Known WorldTsao, Tiffany2022-01-01Chapter 10 of Tiffany Tsao’s The More Known World is republished with permission from the copyright holder, Tiffany Tsao.The More Known Worldapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/34r5x31jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt50h6d9502023-01-23T21:10:32Zqt50h6d950Introduction--Americanist and Planetary Wormholes: The Insect and America in the WorldRoberts, Brian Russell2022-01-01Reprise Editor's Introductioninsect lifehuman and insect coexistenceVinland mapwormholesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/50h6d950articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt762112652023-01-23T21:10:31Zqt76211265Introduction and Forms of Memoir: Four Case Studies In Movement, Migration, and Transnational Life WritingManeval, StefanReimer, Jennifer A.Hili, Ikram2022-01-01From Forms of Migration:
Global Perspectives on Im/migrant Art & Literature, edited by Stefan Maneval and Jennifer A. Reimer. © 2022 by Falschrum Books. Used with permission of the Publisher. Publisher website: https://www.falschrum.org/forms-of-migration.htmlmigration and arttransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/76211265articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt978957n12023-01-23T21:10:29Zqt978957n1Documenting the American Student Abroad: The Media Cultures of International EducationHankin, Kelly2022-01-01From Documenting the American Student Abroad: The Media Cultures of International Education by Kelly Hankin. © 2021 by Rutgers University Press. Used with permission of the Publisher. Publisher website: https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/documenting-the-american-student-abroad/9781978807686
American students studying abroadtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/978957n1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0z52t7d82023-01-23T21:10:28Zqt0z52t7d8Introduction from The Beats in MexicoCalonne, David Stephen2022-01-01From The Beats in Mexico by David Stephen Calonne. © 2022 by Rutgers University Press. Used with permission of the Publisher. https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/the-beats-in-mexico/9781978828728Beat poetsCharles OlsonYucatanMexican influences on Beat movementTransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0z52t7d8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt92v980nt2023-01-23T21:10:27Zqt92v980ntIn the NewsSerrano, Aoife Rivera2022-01-01An excerpt from The Quickening of Albizu Campos: How Fenianism Galvanized the Last American Liberator, by Aoife Rivera Serrano,
New York: Ausubo Press, 2022.© 2022 by Aoife Rivera Serrano. Used by permission of the publisher. Publisher website: https://www.spdbooks.org/Products/9781932982008/the-quickening-of-albizu-campos-how-fenianism-galvanized-the-last-american-liberator.aspx
Pedro Albizu CamposIrish home rule and US imperialismPuerto Rico and US citizenshipIreland and Puerto Ricotransnational American studiesel último libertador americanoapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/92v980ntarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt68d207jg2023-01-23T21:10:26Zqt68d207jgInternational Clientele, from Dressing Up: The Women Who influenced French FashionBlock, Elizabeth L.2022-01-01From Dressing Up: The Women Who Influenced French Fashion by Elizabeth L. Block. Copyright © 2022 by MIT Press. Used by permission of the publisher. Publisher website: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262045841/dressing-up/
couture and diplomacyUS-European diplomacywomen and French fashionParisian couture housesluxury fashion in 19th centuryactresses and fashiontransnational fashionwomen and diplomacytransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/68d207jgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2766x0ch2023-01-23T21:10:24Zqt2766x0chThe Specter of the Pandemic: Politics and Poetics of Cholera in 19th-Century Literature--An IntroductionHöll, Davina2022-01-01In the nineteenth century, cholera made a deep impression on the collective memory of entire generations. As a human-medical borderline experience, it was a scientific driving force, a political destabilizing factor, and a challenge to poetics. At the interface of literary studies and medical history and by using nineteenth-century literary texts from North American, British, and German authors as examples, this transnational study shows for the first time comprehensively, that despite a supposed “impossibility of narration”, the traumatic pandemic experience of cholera found its way into contemporary literature, particularly in the model of the specter. Through culturally and historically framed textual analyses of literary texts by Edgar Allan Poe, Mark Twain, George Eliot, H.G. Wells, Heinrich Heine, Ricarda Huch, and others as well as a variety of contemporary life writing documents, the study explores the multifarious intersections of lifeworld and literature. Within the methodological and theoretical framework of the Medical Humanities and Gothic Studies, it thus reveals genuine strategies for making the unspeakable speakable. By the use of epi- and pandemic experience as an example of a state of emergency, the study shows how closely scientific, political, social, and cultural discourses are interwoven, how they influence each other, and what role art and literature play in these processes of exchange. The Spectre of the Pandemic thus raises awareness of the interdependence of most diverse knowledge formations and is a plea for inter- and transdisciplinary thinking and research, especially in times of crisis. The present excerpt is a translated, abridged and slightly adapted version of the introduction of the study Das Gespenst der Pandemie: Politik und Poetik der Cholera in der Literatur des 19. Jahrhunderts, originally published by frommann-holzboog publishing house.pandemicsmedicine and literaturecholera and 19th-century literatureMedical HumanitiesForward translationGothic studiestransnational American studieshistory of medicineapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2766x0charticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8tg7q78z2023-01-23T21:10:23Zqt8tg7q78zExcerpt from James Theodore Holly: Black Nationalist and Religious WritingsRobinson, Greg2022-01-01From James Theodore Holly: Black Nationalist and Religious Writings, edited by Greg Robinson. © 2020, Montreal by Le Centre International de Documentation et d'Information Haïtienne, Caribéenne et Afro-canadienne. Used with permission of the publisher. Publisher website: https://www.amazon.com/James-Theodore-Holly-Nationalist-Religious/dp/1643825348
Black NationalismJames Theodore Hollyrevolutionary writingsemigration versus revolutiontransational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8tg7q78zarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2136j99w2023-01-23T21:10:22Zqt2136j99wMediterranean Americans to Themselves, from Redirecting Ethnic SingularityAnagnostou, YiorgosPatrona, TheodoraKalogeras, Yiorgos D.Cocola, Jim2022-01-01Editors' introduction from Redirecting Ethnic Singularity: Italian Americans and Greek Americans in Conversation by Yiorgos Anagnostou, Yiorgos D. Kalogeras and Theodora Patrona, eds.Chapter by Jim Cocola from Redirecting Ethnic Singularity: Italian Americans and Greek Americans in Conversation by Yiorgos Anagnostou, Yiorgos D. Kalogeras and Theodora Patrona, eds.© 2022 by Fordham University Press. Used with permission of the Publisher. Publisher website: https://www.fordhampress.com/9780823299713/redirecting-ethnic-singularity/
crosscultural exchanges on Mediterranean American identityItalian American and Greek American exchangesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2136j99warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt80z590nb2023-01-23T21:10:20Zqt80z590nbIntroduction from Transatlantic Anglophone Literatures, 1776–1920Hughes, Linda K.Robbins, Sarah RuffingTaylor, AndrewHakim-Hood, HeidiNemmers, Adam2022-01-01From Transatlantic Anglophone Literatures, 1776-1920: An Anthology edited by Linda K. Hughes, Sarah Ruffing Robbins, and Andrew Taylor (with associate editors Heidi Hakimi-Hood and Adam Nemmers). © 2022 by Edinburgh University Press. Used by permission. Publisher website: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-transatlantic-anglophone-literatures-1776-1920.htmlTransatlantic Anglophone Literatures1776–1920application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/80z590nbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7kv0s06g2023-01-23T21:10:19Zqt7kv0s06gPreface, Becoming Home: Diaspora and the Anglophone TransnationalSavory, Elaine2022-01-01From Becoming Home: Diaspora and the Anglophone Transnational edited by Jude V. Nixon and Maria Concetta Constantini. © 2022 by Vernon Press. Used by permission of the publisher. Publisher website: https://vernonpress.com/book/1365
diaporic literaturesElaine SavoryAnglophone Transnational literaturetransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7kv0s06garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8pr0n9vh2023-01-23T21:10:18Zqt8pr0n9vhExcerpt from Ocean Passages: Navigating Pacific Islander and Asian American LiteraturesSuzuki, Erin2022-01-01From Ocean Passages: Navigating Pacific Islander and Asian American Literatures, by Erin Suzuki, pages 1-5. Used by permission of Temple University Press. © 2021 by Temple University. All Rights Reserved. Publisher website: https://tupress.temple.edu/books/ocean-passagesPacific Islander and Asian American literatureTranspacific Studiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8pr0n9vharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4b40c59x2023-01-23T21:10:17Zqt4b40c59xIntroduction from Transpacific Convergences: Race, Migration, and Japanese American Film Culture before World War IIKhor, Denise2022-01-01Introduction from Transpacific Convergences: Race, Migration, and Japanese American Film Culture before World War II (University of North Carolina Press)Japanese American film historytranspacific studiestransnational American studiesrace and migration and film cultureapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4b40c59xarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3hg2m4gx2023-01-23T21:10:16Zqt3hg2m4gxForward Editor's IntroductionReimer, Jennifer A.2022-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3hg2m4gxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9fc859212023-01-23T21:10:15Zqt9fc85921The Education of a Black Professor in Wuhan, ChinaPower-Greene, Ousmane K.2022-01-01This article explores my experiences as a Black American professor teaching American Studies at Wuhan University during the summer of 2019. It focuses on the various lessons I learned about China as both a teacher and scholar of Black social and political movements. In many ways, my experiences defied what my American colleagues told me it would be like being Black in China. Given the Chinese governments’ reputation for harsh treatment of intellectuals who criticize the government, this article also offers my impressions of the anxiety White professors I met in China felt about teaching particular topics. Ultimately, the article examines how my experiences teaching American Studies in Wuhan forced me to rethink my own motivations for coming to China, as well as the motivations of the Black radicals I teach about, who came to China because of US governmental repression.Black intellectuals in ChinaW.E.B. Du Bois in ChinaBlack Radical Tradition in ChinaAmericans teaching in Chinatransnational American studiesteaching and theorizing transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9fc85921articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7qg7b5rj2023-01-23T21:10:14Zqt7qg7b5rjGraphic Matters: Teaching Asian American Studies with Graphic Narratives in TaiwanFeng, Pin-Chia2022-01-01In this essay I first draw upon selected cases to briefly map out crucial issues relevant to teaching Asian American studies in East Asia. I then use my own teaching experience to illustrate how graphic narratives can help non-native students cultivate needed cultural and historical literacy in order for them to review and challenge the dominant ideologies that have informed their imagined vision of the United States. I argue that the graphic form can make visible the systematic operations of racial, class, and gender inequality inside and outside the United States, an understanding that is essential to the practice of transnational American studies.graphic narrativestransnational American studiesteaching American Studies in TaiwanAsian American studies in Taiwanteaching transnational Asian American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7qg7b5rjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2p70g2gk2023-01-23T21:10:13Zqt2p70g2gkTeaching and Theorizing American Studies in Singapore and Southeast Asia in the Post-American EraShu, Yuan2022-01-01In this paper, I share my experience in teaching and theorizing American studies in Singapore and Southeast Asia as a Fulbright scholar from 2017 to 2018. Through my own teaching at the National University of Singapore and lectures at universities in Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines, I examine what it means by American studies in the Asia Pacific in what critics call the post-American era. Drawing examples from literary studies themes such as post-9/11 literature, ethnic American literature, and environmental literature and genre specifics like graphic novel, video games, Hollywood cinema, visual and performance arts, I also call attention to special topics, which may vary from the Black Pacific to Vietnam War and the War on Terror. I argue that American studies have been taught differently in countries in Southeast Asia with Singapore showing its own interest and position in the region. There is a high demand on American studies in terms of theory, method, and diversity of genres and forms if we adapt our teaching to the local needs. In fact, we have arrived at a new critical moment in American studies, whether we call it “the transnational turn in American studies,” “transpacific American studies,” or “archipelagic American studies.”transpacific American studiesarchipelagic American studiestransnational American studiespedagogical studiesteaching Transnational American Studiestheorizing transational American studiespost-American eraAmerican studies in Singaporetheoryapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2p70g2gkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt75t7076w2023-01-23T21:10:12Zqt75t7076wUnited States Aerial Archives: Teaching and Theorizing Transnational American Studies in JapanTaketani, Etsuko2022-01-01Aeriality has emerged as one of the most defining perceptual and cognitive practices of the 20th century. This shift in perspective has changed the way one looks at the Earth, races, and species and their relationships to one another and to the environment. In this essay, I discuss the use of what I have heuristically termed “aerial archives” in teaching about American-occupied Japan (1945–1952). The operational definition of this term refers to texts, literary or otherwise, that operate as archiving systems, representing and relating a shift in the aerial imagination, and the corollary shifting ground it caused in the global imagination.aerial archivesaerial perspectivesUS-occupied Japanarchiving systemsaerialitytexts as archivesJapan and America photographstransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/75t7076warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5tn5n8nr2023-01-23T21:10:11Zqt5tn5n8nrTransnational American Studies, Ecocritical Narratives, and Global Indigeneity: A Year of Teaching in NorwaySpurgeon, Sara L.2022-01-01Texas and Norway may appear to be worlds apart—one flat, arid, and sprawling across the vast US West, the other green, mountainous, and defined by its waters. Yet they face surprisingly similar challenges resulting from economies built on the oil industry in a world now wracked by climate change. This essay assumes that indigenous sovereignty and social justice issues are inextricable from environmental concerns, and engages the experience of teaching and researching indigenous texts and petro-fictions, from Saami novels to writings about Standing Rock, during a Fulbright year in Norway.application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5tn5n8nrarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9mk3r7h12023-01-23T21:10:10Zqt9mk3r7h1Introduction: Theorizing and Teaching Transnational American Studies Around the GlobeShu, YuanLai-Henderson, Selina2022-01-01Critical approaches to teaching and theorizing transnational American studies after the post-American turn.
teaching and theorizing transnational American studiespost-American literaturetranspacific studiesarchipelagic studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9mk3r7h1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3xw233t22023-01-23T21:10:10Zqt3xw233t2The Need to TransnationalizeHornung, Alfred2022-01-01Issue Introduction by the journal's Editor in Chiefapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3xw233t2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8cp4n6dz2022-08-26T10:31:14Zqt8cp4n6dzAbout the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2022-01-01Bioscontributor biographies JTAS vol. 13no. 1 2022application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8cp4n6dzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5f07c8t92022-08-26T10:31:12Zqt5f07c8t9Recognition, Resilience, and Relief: The Meaning of GiftKirwan, Padraig2022-01-01Winner of the Fishkin Prize 2021.Fishkin Prize for International Scholarship in Transnational American StudiesChoctaw aidfamine potsChoctaw-Irish relationsPadraig Kirwanapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5f07c8t9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt04m7v5tc2022-08-26T10:31:11Zqt04m7v5tcPrefaceKirwan, Padraig2022-01-01Short commentary on the the volume Famine Pots: The Choctaw–Irish Gift Exchange, 1847–Present
, edited by LeAnne Howe and Padraig Kirwan (Michigan State University Press, 2020).JTAS PrefaceFamine Pots: The Choctaw–Irish Gift Exchange1847–PresentMichigan State University PressPadraig KirwanShelley Fisher Fishkin Prize 2021transnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/04m7v5tcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9pv8w3xm2022-08-26T10:31:10Zqt9pv8w3xmThe Materials of Art and the Legacies of Colonization: A Conversation with Beatrice Glow and Sandy RodriguezHsu, Hsuan L.Vázquez, David J.2022-01-01A conversation with the artists Beatrice Glow and Sandy Rodriguez, whose work reckons with the imperial and colonial histories that underlie conventional materials of art and aesthetic experience. Glow and Rodriguez share insights about their artistic processes, their experiments with pigment-making, scent production, field research, and collaboration, and how they have reflected on and enacted alternatives to the transnational sourcing of pigments, dyes, scents, and tastes.Beatrice GlowSandy Rodriguezdecolonial art practicepigment-makingsourcing of pigments and dyescolonial histories of artistic materialsscents and imperial historiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9pv8w3xmarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8xn505w42022-08-26T10:31:09Zqt8xn505w4Affective Chemistries of Care: Slow Activism and the Limits of the Molecular in Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We Are Briefly GorgeousLee, Rachel2022-01-01In this article, I explore care work outlined and performed as emotional and erotic support labor in Ocean Vuong’s novel, On Earth We Are Briefly Gorgeous (2019). The illnesses around which Vuong stages salient scenes of care work are not those easily addressed by surgery or a course of antibiotics. Instead, the novel focalizes those who are “[sick] in the brains” (122)— formally diagnosed with a mood disorder like bipolar, observed for behaviors of PTSD, addicted to narcotics, or grieving the loss of a body part. The unique contribution of Vuong’s novel to those interested in health and environmental humanities, disability studies, and reproductive labor, I argue, requires noticing that its portraits of care work come interleaved with its depictions of atmospheric dangers. Those atmospheric dangers include weather effects as well as sequelae from military weapons deployment and the un(der)regulated circulation of slowly violating chemicals. In relation to the theme of molecular intimacies, I introduce several heuristic terms: molecular entreaty, affective chemistries of care, hypo-interventions and intimate or slow activism, the latter two building on the work of science and technology scholars. Drawing out On Earth’s focalization of irruptions of care in atmospheres dense with chemistry, this essay both models a humanistic, decolonial and intersectional method that (re)values crip practical knowledge, and limns the novel’s provocation as to the political limits of queer interracial intimacy.care workcrip knowledgeOn Earth We are Briefly Gorgeousdisability studiesaffective chemistries of carehypo-interventionsintimate activismslow activismOcean Vuongscience and technology studiestransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8xn505w4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt29w0x0vp2022-08-26T10:31:08Zqt29w0x0vpVisions of Consent Nunavummiut Against the Exploitation of “Resource Frontiers”Hickey, Amber2022-01-01
Despite a long history of colonial, military, and extractive industry imposition on the land, waters, and people of Inuit Nunangat, resistance to such efforts is thriving. Through highlighting the work of The Place Names Program and Arnait Video Productions, I show how Nunavummiut (the people living in Nunavut) employ visual media to publicly wage their place-based knowledge as a mode of creative intervention against military and extractive forces, and the ways in which such forces have permeated Inuit bodies, lands, and waters. So successful are these visual acts of resistance that they compel southerners to reevaluate their approaches to northern development so drastically that projects are abandoned or no longer seen as viable. In putting these strategies into practice, Inuit engage with state-sanctioned systems of law and governance, but ultimately reshape these structures to better suit their own needs and the needs of the Arctic land and sea. The maps produced by the Place Names Program and films produced by Arnait Video Productions resist visions of the Arctic as a wasteland and of Inuit bodies as pollutable, instead putting forward visions of consent and reciprocity. Ultimately, I argue that seeing the Arctic in ways that challenge military and extractive representations and center Inuit epistemologies and voices, plays a significant role in halting the continued molecular and chemical colonization of Inuit lands and bodies. In other words, visual media is a tool for resisting unwanted extractive and military bodily intimacies, and insisting on consent before entry of these toxic presences.Inuit place-based knowledgePlace Names ProgramArnait Video ProductionsArctic mappingInuit mapsvisual mediaNunangatNunavuttransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/29w0x0vparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7188527q2022-08-26T10:31:07Zqt7188527qTGI Fridays In Kandahar: Fast Food, Military Contracting, and Intimacies of Force in the Iraq and Afghanistan WarsQuadri, Zaynab2022-01-01During the height of the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from 2004 to 2014, US military bases featured an amenity both familiar and unexpected: name-brand fast food (NBFF), such as TGI Friday’s, Burger King, Subway, and Pizza Hut. Drawing on firsthand accounts from soldiers, journalists, and bloggers, as well as academic literatures on critical food studies and cultures of imperialism, this article analyzes the circulation of NBFF in Iraq and Afghanistan as a mechanism by which to sustain US imperialism. It argues that NBFF generates the intimacy of “home” for US soldier-consumers and is deployed as enticing inducement for an all-volunteer military force to perform the necessary labor to maintain US empire across two war zones. NBFF simultaneously provided a profitable opportunity for the expansion of US corporations and capital, as contractors and subcontractors from across the global supply chain were mobilized to provide easy access to these comfort foods. Thus, the article traces the ways in which the chemosensory experience of consumption has served as a way of inducing some bodies to serve—to maim and kill other bodies—while requiring still other bodies to serve in mobilizing and facilitating the logistics of these encounters.fast food restaurants on military basesNBFF and US military contractingchemosensory consumptioncritical food studiestransnational American studiesUS wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and NBFFname brand fast food and US militaryapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7188527qarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3ct850gc2022-08-26T10:31:06Zqt3ct850gcViruses, Vaccines, and the Erotics of Risk in Latinx HIV Stories and Covid-19Bost, Suzanne2022-01-01In 2019, I published Shared Selves: Latinx Memoir and Ethical Alternatives to Humanism (University of Illinois Press), in which I discuss contagion as a metaphor for embracing our shared materiality with others. Six months later, during the Covid-19 pandemic, neighbors were crossing streets to avoid each other. Social distancing is, counterintuitively, asking us to view separation and seclusion as forms of solidarity. But how can we be solid if we are oriented against each other? Isolation itself has become contagious: sharing repulsion and rejection, measuring six feet of “social” distance from others. These spaces are made up of a variety of immaterial entities—ideology, fear, caring, and faith—and material ones like invisible microbes. This essay revisits my writings about radical kinship and shared materiality in the works of Tim Dean and John Rechy in light of this emerging ethics of distance. This focus is particularly important today as contagion, following history, is realigned with racism and xenophobia. Latinx communities are disproportionately affected by inadequate healthcare and disproportionately labor in “Covid clusters” such as meat-packing plants and automobile facilities. To rethink my earlier insights about Rechy, I turn to Rafael Campo (whose queer perspective as both poet and physician during the AIDS epidemic has something to teach us about the erotics, aesthetics, and microbiotics of risk) and Julia Álvarez (whose novel Saving the World shows how care and risk might intersect).Latinx HIV storiesCovid-19 and racialization of riskCovid-19 and Latinx HIV storiestransnational American studiesmicrobes and transnational circulationapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3ct850gcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6g08h8vs2022-08-26T10:31:05Zqt6g08h8vsFrom Radiation Effects to Consanguineous Marriages: American Geneticists and Colonial Science in the Atomic AgeTakeuchi-Demirci, Aiko2022-01-01In 1947, the US National Academy of Sciences established the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission (ABCC) and sent American scientists to Hiroshima and Nagasaki to investigate the delayed effects of the atomic bombs among survivors. James Neel, medical professor at the University of Michigan, headed the genetics team of ABCC whose mission was to measure the possible genetic mutations caused by radiation. After the conclusion of the ABCC studies, Neel and his scientific team continued to use the resources and subjects in southern Japan to conduct research on the genetics of consanguineous marriages in Japan. This article explores how both the ABCC genetic studies and consanguinity studies reflected American fears about rising mutations in an apocalyptic atomic age. Studies on inbreeding illuminated the nature and extent of mutations in a “pure” genetic population. Furthermore, the Japanese data were used for genetic counseling back in America, helping to address the American public’s concern about increasing interracial marriages between whites and Asians. Despite the attempts of Neel and other American geneticists to disassociate their work from previous, racist, eugenics studies, postwar genetic studies took on the same practices, institutions, and goals as their predecessors—to ensure the wellbeing of the white race. Neel’s ABCC and subsequent studies, all bankrolled by the US Atomic Energy Commission, exploited American military and financial power to take advantage of the “intimate” relationships with nonwhite, “deviant” subjects.US genetics research in JapanJames Neelconsanguineous marriage in JapanABCC studies in Japanpostwar genetic studiesrace and genetics researchtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6g08h8vsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0jg5d00j2022-08-26T10:31:04Zqt0jg5d00jBirdseye’s Frosted Possession: Processing, Storing, and Transmitting the Gift of Inuit Thermocultural Knowledge,Brousseau, Marcel2022-01-01
On August 12, 1930, Clarence Birdseye patented his “Method of Preparing Food Products,” a “quick” freezing machine that “for the first time produced ... a compacted, quick frozen block of comestibles ... which can be stored ... transported ... and ... after being thawed, reassumes its original condition.” Birdseye’s innovation in the frozen food industry is typically historicized as a progress narrative, wherein the lone inventor masters the molecular forces of water, salts, metal, cardboard, flesh, and plant matter. This teleology is further contextualized within an exploration account, wherein Birdseye’s curiosity is piqued during his years as a fur trader who observes the Labrador Inuit practice of quick-freezing fish. In this article, I use Goenpul scholar Aileen Moreton-Robinson’s concept of “white possessive logics” to interrogate how Birdseye’s racialized assumption of ownership dislocated Inuit epistemologies into industrial metanarratives. To trace the possession, but also the survivance, of Labrador Inuit thermoculture, I reconsider frozen food as a communication system, characterized by dynamics of processing, storage, and transmission. Within this system, food is thinkable as data—information and gift—and frozen food is understandable as an Inuit gift of knowledge and sustenance provided to, and unreciprocated by, Birdseye. Comparatively reading Birdseye’s papers and patents with ethnographical and autobiographical Labrador Inuit and Inuit-Metis narratives, I rethink the historic event of knowledge-sharing that gave Birdseye his thermocultural inspiration. Furthermore, I consider how Labrador Inuit communities reappropriate the mechanical freezer as a traditional technology, and I argue that the globalization of frozen food technology poses an ongoing challenge of reciprocity for Birdseye’s white possession.quick-freezingInuit knowledgeInuit thermocultureLabrador Inuit epistemologyClarence Birdseyepatent for quick-freezingtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0jg5d00jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3x8054pt2022-08-26T10:31:03Zqt3x8054ptConsider the Coconut: Scientific Agriculture and the Racialization of Risk in the American Colonial PhilippinesVentura, Theresa2022-01-01This article invokes the “molecular intimacies of empire” to illuminate the links between the superfood status of coconut oil and plantation labor in the American colonial Philippines. Prior to the American occupation in 1898, coconuts were a local crop that offered small growers a degree of protection from capitalist agriculture. A mere two decades later, coconut plantations occupied more than two million acres of land; copra – the dried kernels from which oil is pressed – was the archipelago’s third major export industry; and the industry employed at least four million people along a commodity chain that included prisoners, landed planters, and oil refiners. Transimperial tropical research stations, economic botany, and penal farms propelled this change. US-run prison plantations in the southern Philippines served as living laboratories for the racial management of labor and the bioengineering of trees bearing fruit all year. Though the copra trade comprised production of modern extractive capitalism, American dairy farmers and vegetable oil producers racialized copra imports as a tropical threat to the white body politic during the global Great Depression. Yet this conflation of coconut oil and the imagined tropical primitive positioned coconut oil for its rerendering as an unrefined natural health food. By connecting the colonial planation to the coconut’s superfood status, the article shows how discourses of risk are racialized and consumed. Indeed, is not the body of the laborer who risks exposure to fertilizers and pesticides nor the loss of biodiversity that North American consumers consider when asked if coconuts are a health food.Philippines and colonial agriculturecoconut plantationplantation labortransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3x8054ptarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7082m41v2022-08-26T10:31:02Zqt7082m41vThe Making of the American Calorie and the Metabolic Metrics of EmpireChoudhury, Athia N.2022-01-01In “The Making of the American Calorie and the Metabolic Metrics of Empire,” Athia Choudhury develops a far-reaching critical genealogy of caloric biocitizenship that reframes her personal experiences with calorie counting and fat-phobic discourses that stigmatize the bodies and pleasures of racialized, working-class people, especially female bodied and fem-identifying people. Tracing practices of energy management and bodily discipline from colonial military outposts, nineteenth-century domestic manuals, dietetic discourses in the Philippines, and Native American Boarding Schools to a range of reform projects that framed calories as a tool for inculcating responsible eating through the domestic practices of white, bourgeois women, Choudhury highlights continuities between colonial subjection and modern biocitizenship, as well as the ways in which the putatively objective metric of the calorie positioned the New American Woman as a powerful catalyst for policing race in the intimate domain of the home.caloric biocitizenshipcalorie counting and gendertransnational American studiesbodily disciplinefat studiesobesity and race and genderapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7082m41varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8v3487h22022-08-26T10:31:01Zqt8v3487h2Introduction: The Molecular Intimacies of EmpireHsu, Hsuan L.Vázquez, David J.2022-01-01Special Forum Editorsmolecular intimaciesracial capitalismtransnational American studiesscience and technology studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8v3487h2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0123f7v92022-08-26T10:31:00Zqt0123f7v9Editor in Chief's IntroductionHornung, Alfred2022-01-01Introduction: Transnational American Studies in the Time of Covid-19application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0123f7v9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 13, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2jx0z2xq2022-02-13T22:54:56Zqt2jx0z2xqGood Enough for Booker T to Kiss: Hampton, Tuskegee, and Caribbean Self-FashioningSmith, Faith2013-01-01This article examines the raced and gendered investments of early twentieth-century Caribbean subjects in Booker T. Washington, who was perhaps the most powerful African American in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and the two educational institutions with which he was associated, the Tuskegee and Hampton Institutes.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalBooker T. Washingtonapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2jx0z2xqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9cg5249p2022-02-13T22:54:55Zqt9cg5249p“Transcendental Cosmopolitanism”: Orlando Patterson and the Novel Jamaican 1960sFrancis, Donette2013-01-01This article repositions Orlando Patterson, the originator of “social death,” in his Caribbean milieu and suggests that part of why “social death” as a conceptual category has become fossilized is precisely because North American scholars have neglected other works in Patterson’s oeuvre, particularly the Caribbean scholarship that precedes Slavery and Social Death and the “richer stories” he attempts to tell in his largely unstudied Caribbean novels of the 1960s. This article attends to the emphasis on the hierarchies of difference and the idiom of sex within an understanding of “social death” in its close reading of Patterson’s 1972 neoslave narrative Die the Long Day.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalTranscendental CosmopolitanismSocial DeathOrlando Pattersonapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9cg5249particleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt94n2r4k62022-02-13T22:54:54Zqt94n2r4k6Democracy as a Human Right: Raymond Joseph, Despotic Haiti, and the Translation of a Rights Discourse, 1965–1969Polyné, Millery2013-01-01This article examines Raymond Joseph’s political vision of Haiti between 1965 and 1969, particularly through how he appropriates, links, and frames a human rights discourse that is dependent upon and constitutive of democratic principles of collectivity, popular control, and relative political and economic equality.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalDemocracyRaymond JosephHaitiHuman Rightsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/94n2r4k6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5z13v6612022-02-13T22:54:53Zqt5z13v661The Problem with Violence: Exceptionality and Sovereignty in the New WorldThomas, Deborah A.2013-01-01For many observers, the violent and often spectacular crime that takes place in particular Caribbean areas is evidence of a failure to create a growth-oriented economy and morally progressive ethos. It is a problem of culture, a mark of backwardness, an unsuccessful movement from savagery, or a failure to take advantage of post-World War II opportunities for development in political, economic, and socio-cultural fields. At the very least, it is something that marks the Caribbean—as well as some spaces within Latin America—as seeming to have taken a different path in relation to other New World trajectories. This article uses the case of Jamaica—itself often portrayed as exceptional within the region—to think through how, when, and why the US is, on one hand and from one perspective, written out of these narratives and, on the other and from alternative vantage points, central to them. In doing so, Thomas emphasizes the long-standing transnational dimension of violence in the postcolonial Americas, situating the New World as a single sphere of experience, in order to say something about the relationships among violence, the exploitation and settlement of the New World, sovereignty, and the various phases of modern capitalism.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalViolenceExceptionalitySovereigntyNew Worldapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5z13v661articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt52f2966r2022-02-13T22:54:52Zqt52f2966rArchipelagic American Studies and the CaribbeanRoberts, Brian RussellStephens, Michelle2013-01-01This article, as part of the “American Studies: Caribbean Edition” Special Forum, brings specific focus to the ways in which the Caribbean and the field of Caribbean Studies insists upon a version of American Studies that sheds its post-exceptionalist anti-insularity and, in the process, emerges as transregional and archipelagic.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalArchipelagicapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/52f2966rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7bb5c9j62022-02-13T22:54:51Zqt7bb5c9j6Aluminum across the Americas: Caribbean Mobilities and Transnational American StudiesSheller, Mimi2013-01-01The emerging field of critical mobilities research posits the need to replace sedentary approaches to nation-states as containers for national societies and repositories of national histories with a far more relational understanding of transnational and cross-regional dynamics. It proposes “mobile methodologies” for research that cross national boundaries, including following people, commodities, and cultures as they circulate between various interlinked sites of production and consumption. Yet few have noted the debt of mobilities research to Caribbean Studies and to the theoretical trajectories that have arisen out of research on the colonial and postcolonial Atlantic world. This article aims to situate the “new mobilities paradigm” in relation to Caribbean and transnational American Studies, and to mobilize Caribbean Studies as an approach that transcends regional or national paradigms. After tracing some of the theoretical intersections of mobilities theory and Caribbean Studies, the article sketches the arc of the author’s own work, leading into a current research project on the mobilities of bauxite/aluminum as a material object. Following the mobilities of aluminum allows us to break open both US American history and particular Caribbean national histories into a dynamic pan-American framework that challenges the geographical fixity of American Studies and illustrates the importance of placing (im)mobilities at the center of transnational American Studies.American StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalMobilitiesAluminumapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7bb5c9j6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1t1593q02022-02-13T22:54:51Zqt1t1593q0IntroductionEdmondson, BelindaFrancis, DonetteNeptune, Harvey2013-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum entitled "American Studies: Caribbean Edition," edited by Belinda Edmondson and Donette FrancisAmerican StudiesCaribbeanTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1t1593q0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3s3315vh2022-02-13T22:54:49Zqt3s3315vhAbout the ContributorsHong, Caroline2013-01-01Contributors for JTAS 5.1application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3s3315vharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5gq7r88m2022-02-13T22:54:48Zqt5gq7r88mEditor’s NoteHornung, Alfred2013-01-01Editor's Note for JTAS 5.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5gq7r88marticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7mn1g0zj2022-02-13T22:54:47Zqt7mn1g0zj“Fear of an Arab Planet”: The Sounds and Rhythms of Afro-Arab InternationalismLubin, Alex2013-01-01Lubin’s analysis focuses on the identities and actions of communities that translate their politics and poetics into other discursive forms, seeking liberation. “Seriously” reading global hip-hop as a transnational linkage of the voices of the dispossessed and oppressed, Lubin argues that reading and understanding the new geography of liberation that such discursive communities create is also a way of recognizing how such spaces and forms of community—the borderless and refugee—are always already breaking out of fixed rhythms and identities to produce new belongings and beats.Afro-ArabAmerican StudiesTransnationalHip-Hopapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7mn1g0zjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1282x6g52022-02-13T22:54:46Zqt1282x6g5The James Baldwin InterviewBobia, Rosa2013-01-01From Rosa Bobia’s The Critical Reception of James Baldwin in France (Peter Lang, 1998; and a special note of thanks to editor Stephen Mazur), Reprise reprints Bobia’s 1985 interview with Baldwin in Atlanta, shortly before his death in France in 1987. Here, as Bobia and Baldwin enter into a brief discussion of his perception of how he was received in France in the 1950s, Baldwin seems to embrace the fact that he was at that time in France largely unknown, an outsider: “I was a maverick.” In light of the fact that in his later years Baldwin came to speak French with great ease and to live comfortably in his home in France, it may seem surprising that his tone in these pages seems to suggest a hint of disinterest in how French critics perceived him—or perhaps it is simply indicative of his deeper affiliations, just as his final burial in the US seems to indicate.James BaldwinFranceapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1282x6g5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3s02q5xf2022-02-13T22:54:45Zqt3s02q5xf“Rowing for Palestine,” Performing the Other: Suheir Hammad, Mark Gerban and Multiple ConsciousnessBauridl, Birgit M.2013-01-01Originally published in Alfred Hornung and Martina Kohl’s Arab American Literature and Culture (Universitätsverlag Winter, 2012), Bauridl’s essay offers a full discussion of a number of theoretical constructions regarding identity. In closely reading the words of both Hammad and Gerban, Bauridl challenges the simpler dualisms of bifurcated, Du Boisian approaches to identity, interpreting the complex reality of the “trans” in transnational identity, which seems more appropriately mobile and fluid and permeable, as are the experiences of “multiple consciousness” of those who try not to side with any specific racialized or politicized aspect of identity but to creatively negotiate all of them.American StudiesTransnationalSuheir HammadMark Gerbanapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3s02q5xfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt47f1c8tc2022-02-13T22:54:43Zqt47f1c8tcWhy the Negro Won’t Buy Communism (1951)Hurston, Zora Neale2013-01-01Reprinted with permission of The American Legion Magazine, © June, 1951. www.legion.org.Zora Neale Hurstonapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/47f1c8tcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9s85d8sw2022-02-13T22:54:42Zqt9s85d8swI Saw Negro Votes Peddled (1950)Hurston, Zora Neale2013-01-01Reprinted with permission of The American Legion Magazine, © November, 1950. www.legion.org.Zora Neale Hurstonapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9s85d8swarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8t87n52h2022-02-13T22:54:41Zqt8t87n52hReprise Editor’s NoteMorgan, Nina2013-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 5.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8t87n52harticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt383560822022-02-13T22:54:41Zqt38356082Zora’s Politics: A Brief IntroductionMitchell II, Ernest Julius2013-01-01In his introduction to reading Zora Neale Hurston’s politics, Mitchell argues that contemporary scholarship has misread Hurston in significant ways, distorting Hurston’s work and reputation to serve contesting political agendas; thus, in recent years, she has been associated with “a bewildering array of affiliations: republican, libertarian, radical democrat, reactionary conservative, black cultural nationalist, anti-authoritarian feminist, and woman-hating protofascist.” Recuperating Hurston from this impossible political melee of labels, Mitchell argues, requires a careful reading of Hurston’s work dating from her earliest pieces in the late 1920s, as well as surveying her many yet to be published manuscripts and letters; it requires recognition of the transnational and comparative lens through which she reported on political maneuvers and military histories, as well as reading not only her strong criticisms but also her silences, ironic phrasings, and nuanced critiques in her writings on global colonial enterprises. Mitchell’s introduction to the two Hurston essays here reprinted, “I Saw Negro Votes Peddled” (1950) and “Why the Negro Won’t Buy Communism” (1951)—courtesy of the American Legion Magazine—is set in the larger frame of his assertion that Hurston’s work should be read with a deep appreciation of her staunch anticolonialism. Tracing her political philosophy through her views of how race and religion are used to valorize an international culture of violence that serves imperialistic and colonial ends, Mitchell takes his reader on a tour of Hurston’s transnational commentary—from the US occupation of Haiti, to the Spanish and British on the Florida peninsula; from Communist Russia and China, to election practices in the US—to set the stage for our encounters with these rarely read Hurston essays. Reading Mitchell’s “Zora’s Politics: A Brief Introduction” provides a firm foundation for a more complex understanding of the impressive range of Zora Neale Hurston’s political and literary oeuvre.American StudiesTransnationalZora Neale Hurstonapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/38356082articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5x49072r2022-02-13T22:54:40Zqt5x49072rExcerpt from Artistic Ambassadors: Literary and International Representation of the New Negro EraRoberts, Brian Russell2013-01-01Excerpted from Brian Russell Roberts, Artistic Ambassadors: Literary and International Representation of the New Negro Era (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2013).Reprinted with permission from University of Virginia Press.American StudiesTransnationalNew Negroapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5x49072rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4z54z97g2022-02-13T22:54:38Zqt4z54z97gExcerpt from Domestic Subjects: Gender, Citizenship, and Law in Native American LiteraturePiatote, Beth H.2013-01-01Excerpted from Beth H. Piatote, Domestic Subjects: Gender, Citizenship, and Law in Native American Literature (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013).Reprinted with permission from Yale University Press.American StudiesTransnationalGenderNative American Literatureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4z54z97garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1x1106p52022-02-13T22:54:37Zqt1x1106p5Excerpt from Modern Minority: Asian American Literature and Everyday LifeLee, Yoon Sun2013-01-01Reprinted from Modern Minority: Asian American Literature and Everyday Life by Yoon Sun Lee, with permission from Oxford University Press USA. © 2013 Oxford University PressAmerican StudiesTransnationalAsian American Literatureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1x1106p5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt72t3h0kw2022-02-13T22:54:36Zqt72t3h0kwExcerpt from East Is West and West Is East: Gender, Culture, and Interwar Encounters between Asia and AmericaKuo, Karen2013-01-01Excerpted from Karen Kuo, East Is West and West Is East: Gender, Culture, and Interwar Encounters between Asia and America (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2012).Reprinted with permission from Temple University Press.American StudiesTransnationalAsiaGenderapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/72t3h0kwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2mp3t3wb2022-02-13T22:54:35Zqt2mp3t3wbExcerpt from Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our TimeKatznelson, Ira2013-01-01Reprinted from Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time by Ira Katznelson. Copyright © 2013 by Ira Katznelson. With the permission of the publisher, Liveright Publishing Corporation.American StudiesTransnationalNew Dealapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2mp3t3wbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2p07m4pb2022-02-13T22:54:33Zqt2p07m4pbExcerpt from Global and Transnational History: The Past, Present, and FutureIriye, Akira2013-01-01Excerpted from Akira Iriye, Global and Transnational History: The Past, Present, and Future (Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).Reprinted with permission from Palgrave Macmillan.American StudiesTransnationalGlobalHistoryapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2p07m4pbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5gb0j3xw2022-02-13T22:54:32Zqt5gb0j3xwExcerpt from The Red Land to the South: American Indian Writers and Indigenous MexicoCox, James H.2013-01-01Excerpted from James H. Cox, The Red Land to the South: American Indian Writers and Indigenous Mexico (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2012).Reprinted with permission from University of Minnesota Press.American StudiesTransnationalAmerican IndianNative AmericanMexicoapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5gb0j3xwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1jx685zc2022-02-13T22:54:32Zqt1jx685zcExcerpt from Pacific Connections: The Making of the U.S.–Canadian BorderlandsChang, Kornel S.2013-01-01Excerpted from Kornel S. Chang, Pacific Connections: The Making of the U.S.–Canadian Borderlands (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012).American StudiesTransnationalPacificCanadaBorderlandsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1jx685zcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8mg349wx2022-02-13T22:54:31Zqt8mg349wxForward Editor’s NoteRobinson, Greg2013-01-01Forward Editor’s Note for JTAS 5.1application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8mg349wxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6c81k3t12022-02-13T22:54:30Zqt6c81k3t1Kookie Thoughts: Imagining the United States Pavilion at Expo 67 (or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bubble)Sheinin, Daniela2013-01-01In 1967, at the International and Universal Exposition (Expo 67 in Montreal), American government planners and their collaborators in the private sector revolutionized how the United States participated at world's fairs. They transformed the ways in which architecture, design, and exhibits could come together in a stunning visual endpoint. The choice of 1960s social visionary and design guru F. Buckminster Fuller’s geodesic dome (“Bucky’s Bubble”) for the US Pavilion structure proved a coup, as did the Marshall McLuhan-inspired Cambridge Seven design team that created the Pavilion interior of platforms joined by criss-crossing bridges and escalators. This article incorporates an analysis of four linked elements of the US Expo 67 design project. First, it conceives of the US Pavilion at the edge of US empire. Second, it suggests that, improbably, planners found success in the mix of earlier world’s fair grand designs with a new minimalist modernity. Third, Pavilion design and content reflected the influence of Andy Warhol and other artists whose work was transforming gay camp into mass camp in American popular culture. Finally, the project drew on a secret World War II US army collaboration between three key Expo 67 planners, whose wartime specialty had been in military deception, to complete the visual revolution at the US Pavilion.United States Foreign RelationsExpo 67World's FairsF. Buckminster FullerFashionUS ImperialismAndy WarholPop CultureCampHistoryAmerican StudiesCultural StudiesInternational RelationsTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c81k3t1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt30m769ph2022-02-13T22:54:29Zqt30m769phImperial Revisionism: US Historians of Latin America and the Spanish Colonial Empire (ca. 1915–1945)Salvatore, Ricardo D.2013-01-01During the period 1915–1945, United States historians contributed important revisions to the subfield of colonial Hispanic American History. Their histories argued for a reconsideration of inherited wisdom about the Spanish colonial empire, in issues of justice towards indigenous peoples, the interoceanic book trade, colonial universities, the Crown’s mercantilist policies, and the penetration of Enlightenment ideas in the Indies. This article reads these contributions in relation to the politics of US Pan-Americanism and the Good Neighbor policy, arguing that different versions of historical revisionism served to envision a new form of US engagement with Latin America.Colonial QuestionColonialitySpanish Colonial EmpireIrving LeonardLewis HankeClarence HaringArthur WhitakerJohn Tate LanningHistoryHistory of IdeasHistoriographyHemispheric StudiesAmerican StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/30m769pharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3z89t6hc2022-02-13T22:54:28Zqt3z89t6hcEnvironmental Justice, Transnationalism, and the Politics of the Local in Leslie Marmon Silko’s Almanac of the DeadRay, Sarah Jaquette2013-01-01This article analyzes Leslie Marmon Silko’s 1991 novel, Almanac of the Dead, drawing on insights from environmental justice ecocriticism and geographical theory. Ray argues that the novel offers an ethic of place that creates conditions for environmental justice. Her analysis focuses on a question that is fundamentally geographical: what kind of ethic of place is most likely to create the conditions for both environmental and social justice? Almanac offers a way of imagining place that moves beyond the tendency in environmental literary criticism to think in either global or local terms, and insists that the global and the local are dialectically related vis-à-vis colonialism. Thus Almanac offers what Rob Nixon calls a “transnational ethics of place,” what Ursula Heise calls “eco-cosmopolitanism,” or what geographer Doreen Massey calls a “global sense of place,” theories that account for global colonialism and planetary environmental justice while also promoting a strong sense of place rooted in responsibility to the land. Through its treatment of spatiality, the novel reveals the power and politics of unique places within broader global forces, while neither sentimentalizing nor rejecting the distinctiveness of place even as it recognizes the relationship between place and the networks and flows of colonialism and global capitalism. Ultimately, the novel eschews the “nation” as a basis by which to create sustainable human-nature relations, and recognizes that the histories and forces of diaspora, colonialism, and globalization—not overpopulation or resource scarcity, as conventional environmental thinking would have it—have produced the ecological problems we face today.TransnationalEnvironmental JusticeLeslie Marmon SilkoAlmanac of the DeadPlaceAmerican LiteratureNative American StudiesAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3z89t6hcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2vm8z5s22022-02-13T22:54:27Zqt2vm8z5s2Black and Korean: Racialized Development and the Korean American Subject in Korean/American FictionLim, Jeehyun2013-01-01This article examines the representation of the encounters and exchanges between Asian and black Americans in Sŏk-kyŏng Kang’s “Days and Dreams,” Heinz Insu Fenkl’s Memories of My Ghost Brother, and Chang-rae Lee’s A Gesture Life. While one popular mode of looking at Asian and black Americans relationally in the postwar era is to compare the success of Asian American assimilation to the failure of black Americans, Lim argues that such a mode of comparison cannot account for the ways in which Asian American racialization takes places within the global currents of militarism and migration. Against the popular view that attributes Asian American success to cultural difference, Lim relies on political scientist Claire Kim’s understanding of culture as something that is constructed in the process of racialization to explore how the above texts imagine the terms of comparative racialization between black and Asian Americans. The black-Korean encounters in these texts demand a heuristic of comparative racialization that goes beyond the discussion of the black-white binary as a national construct and seeks the reification and modification of this racial frame as it travels along the routes of US military and economic incursions in the Pacific. Lim suggests that the literary imagining of black-Korean encounters across the Pacific illustrates race and racialization as effects of a regime of economic development that is supported by military aggression.Comparative RacializationCamp Town LiteratureDevelopmentEnglishAmerican StudiesTransnationalKorean AmericanAsian American LiteratureSŏk-kyŏng KangHeinz Insu FenklChang-rae LeeAfro-AsianBlack-Koreanapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2vm8z5s2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7bf413rj2022-02-13T22:54:26Zqt7bf413rjNational Myths, Resistant Persons: Ethnographic Fictions of HaitiFarooq, Nihad M.2013-01-01In 1931, US writer Langston Hughes set sail for Haiti, the “land of blue sea and green hills,” in order – as he recalls in his 1956 memoir I Wonder as I Wander – “to get away from my troubles.” Seeking shelter from the US race problem in what he imagined would be the welcoming arms of the strong, proud, black republic, Hughes received instead a shocking, firsthand glimpse at Haiti’s constitutional contradiction: that the Haitian nation, “congealed around notions of liberty from slavery,” was launched in an opposite direction from the Haitian state, which had “inherited the social and economic institutions from colonial times,” and thus “required a regimented labor force.” The Haiti that welcomed Hughes in April 1931, fifteen years into the US Occupation, was indeed “a new world, a darker world,” but one in which “the white shadows” had encroached, transforming Haiti “into a sort of military dictatorship, backed by American guns.” It had become “a fruit tree for Wall street, a mango for the Occupation, coffee for foreign cups, and poverty for its own black workers and peasants.” All of the labor that kept Haiti alive and the foreign traders rich, lamented Hughes, was done by “the people without shoes.” This essay examines the rhetoric of national identification in twentieth-century Haiti – through the complex literary lens of US writers of the African diaspora, like Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, whose own labors to present how “the people without shoes” had worked to prop up Haiti’s economy for centuries, often fluctuated between biting political commentary aimed at the political elite, gentle depictions celebrating local peasant customs, and (strategic) apologies for the US Occupation – all revelatory of a desire to build a space of transatlantic, postnational sense of kinship; a narrative homeland for the exiled and the nationless people on either side of its borders, forging parallels between all New World architects-turned-outsiders in their own homelands.Zora Neale HurstonLangston HughesHaitiAfrican DiasporaimperialismAmerican LiteratureAmerican StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7bf413rjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9f2168s72022-02-13T22:54:25Zqt9f2168s7Green-Card American Fiction: Naturalizing Novels by Visiting AuthorsAbele, Elizabeth2013-01-01This essay examines four contemporary novels written by Commonwealth authors who lived in the United States: DBC Pierre’s Vernon God Little, Salman Rushdie’s Fury, Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, and Zadie Smith's On Beauty. These novels offer critiques of American culture, as well as asking how they define the borders of the American novel in a global literary society. When non-American Anglophone authors write novels set in the United States, it raises the question of what defines a novel written in English as “American” as opposed to “British” or “Commonwealth,” particularly when many Anglophone authors avail themselves of residential opportunities in the United States. The question becomes particularly interesting when these US-based novels are recognized by the Man Booker Committee for Commonwealth fiction, as was Vernon God Little.These four demonstrate the fuzzy distinction between an American novel and expatriate fiction, particularly when the novel only contains American characters, with little non-American perspective apparent within the narrative. So are these novelists writing from the community of their passports, their present country of residence, or as temporary/virtual “Americans”? Are these novels an external critique of American culture–or are these novels part of an American literary tradition of social examination?American StudiesTransnationalCommonwealthViolenceAmerican LiteratureLiterature in EnglishAnglophoneapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9f2168s7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 5, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6rn523z22022-01-05T09:32:50Zqt6rn523z2About the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2021-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6rn523z2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5z62g6202022-01-05T09:32:49Zqt5z62g620SkygypsiesDimacali, Timothy JamesBumanglag, John Raymond2021-01-01Illustrated by the award-winning creative artist John Raymond Bumanglag and told by the celebrated writer Timothy James Dimacali.Sky Gypsiesgraphic short storyPhilippines sci-fiIndigenous futurismIndigenous comicbookspace colonizationSkygypsies Skyharvestersapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5z62g620articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2nw3v56n2022-01-05T09:32:47Zqt2nw3v56nA Cycle of Poems by Toyo Suyemoto, from TrekSuyemoto, Toyo2021-01-01Cycle of poems includes "Gain," "In Topaz," "Transplanting," "Promise," and "Retrospect.""Gain I sought to seed the barren earth"In Topaz" Can this hard earth break wide"Transplanting" No anchorage in shallow dust"Promise" Here is the seed nurtured"Retrospect" No other shall have heardapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2nw3v56narticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8kp9c0wc2022-01-05T09:32:46Zqt8kp9c0wcExcerpt from Finding Meaning: Kaona and Contemporary Hawaiian LiteratureMcDougall, Brandy Nālani2021-01-01Chapter Two: Kaona Connectivity to the Kumulipo, from Finding Meaning: Kaona and Contemporary Hawaiian Literature, by Brandi Nālani McDougall, University of Arizona Press, 2016.© 2016 The Arizona Board of Regents. Reprinted by permission of the University of Arizona Press. John Dominis HoltImaikalani KalaheleSage Uʻilani TakehiroJamaica Heolimeleikalani Osoriokaona connectivityKumulipoHawaiian literaturegenealogy chantapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8kp9c0wcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7k76p16b2022-01-05T09:32:45Zqt7k76p16bThe New Cultural GeologyMcGurl, Mark2021-01-01"The New Cultural Geology," in Twentieth-Century Literature, Volume 57, no. 3-4, pp. 380-390. Copyright, 2011, Hofstra University. All rights reserved. Republished by permission of the copyrightholder, and the present publisher, Duke University Press. www.dukeupress.edu Mark McGurlnew cultural geologyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7k76p16barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9fm5s8472022-01-05T09:32:43Zqt9fm5s847Introduction: On Temporal Transnationalisms—The Exonational, the Decolonial Cosmogonic, the Unexceptional Human Fossil, and the Non-EarthboundRoberts, Brian Russell2021-01-01Reprise Editor's IntroductionBrian Russell RobertsReprise Editor's Introduction 2021temporal Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9fm5s847articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9pj5d9bp2022-01-05T09:32:42Zqt9pj5d9bp“Introduction: Archipelagic Thinking and the Borderwaters: A US-Eccentric Vision"Roberts, Brian Russell2021-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9pj5d9bparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9073k3z82022-01-05T09:32:40Zqt9073k3z8Excerpt from Migrant Crossings: Witnessing Human Trafficking in the USFukushima, Annie Isabel2021-01-01“Witnessing Legal Narratives, Court Performances, and Translations of Peruvian Domestic Work” from Migrant Crossings: Witnessing Human Trafficking in the U.S. by Annie Isabel Fukushima. Copyright © 2019 Stanford University Press.Migrant testimonyPeruvian domestic workerscourt performancesmigrant witnessinghuman trafficking in the USAapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9073k3z8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt76s0z5652022-01-05T09:32:39Zqt76s0z565“Catharine Maria Sedgwick’s Clarence, Sentimental Kinship, and the Transnational American Novel of Manners”Schultermandl, Silvia2021-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/76s0z565articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt76k8x3b82022-01-05T09:32:38Zqt76k8x3b8The Sonnet and Black Transnationalism in the 1930sMüller, Timo2021-01-01Exerpt from The African American Sonnet: A Literary History by Timo Müller. Copyright © 2018 by University Press of Mississippi.application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/76k8x3b8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8gs0d5mz2022-01-05T09:32:36Zqt8gs0d5mzForward Editor's IntroductionReimer, Jennifer A.2021-01-01Forward Editor's Introduction 2021Jennifer A. Reimerapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8gs0d5mzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1199r0pb2022-01-05T09:32:35Zqt1199r0pbAppendix B: Chinese Translations of Huckleberry FinnLai-Henderson, Selina2021-01-01Chinese translationsapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1199r0pbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3cj8515z2022-01-05T09:32:33Zqt3cj8515zAppendix A: Composite BibliographyGlobal Huck Special Forum, Authors and Editors2021-01-01Composite bibliographyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3cj8515zarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6k40j7q72022-01-05T09:32:31Zqt6k40j7q7Translation Processes and Cultural Critique in My Annotated Chinese Translation of Huckleberry FinnWang, An-chi2021-01-01My annotated Chinese translation of Huckleberry Finn 《赫克歷險記》, published in 2012 in Taiwan and based on UC Berkeley’s 2002 scholarly edition, is so far the most complete in Chinese, with one hundred and eighty-seven illustrations, three hundred and eighty-six annotated footnotes, plus a critical introduction of the novel’s reception history and research about it. I present my translation process and strategy, my experience of teaching American literature in Taiwan for more than thirty years, my modest contribution to Mark Twain studies, and an interpretation of my translation of the book as a cultural critique or Menippean satire. Since my intended readers are those in Taiwan, I translate the book using a “domestication” rather than a “foreignization” strategy to suit Taiwanese language habits and social culture. My translation includes the restored Raftsmen Passage, because it makes the whole book structurally and thematically consistent, and because most Chinese readers are used to reading the 1885 edition without it. Huckleberry Finn is a book of “double text”: On the surface it is a book about Huck’s adventurous journey down the Mississippi River, while in reality it exposes conflicting value systems and subverts dominant authority. Told through Huck’s eyes, the cultural systems are reevaluated and the taken-for-granted beliefs are challenged. Transnational American StudiesTaiwanese translationapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k40j7q7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1hn5w5zr2022-01-05T09:32:29Zqt1hn5w5zrHuck’s Adventures in India: Cultural Conversation in Select Hindi AdaptationsSharma, Seema2021-01-01Scholarly studies in India have acknowledged the role of Mark Twain’s writings in critiquing social justice in a transnational framework. However, in the popular sphere Twain is seen primarily as a writer of tales of boyhood adventure, and his relevance to current social issues has not been fully realized. In the context of Twain’s stature in India, this essay analyzes the degree to which select juvenile translations of Adventures of
Huckleberry Finn in Hindi (one of India’s official languages) have been able to harness the potential of this text to dismantle deep-seated prejudices among younger readers, socializing them into a culture of tolerance. Critiquing the range of translational efforts in two versions of juvenile readers (in both a descriptive and prospective way), the essay assesses the degree to which these translations have succeeded or failed in this endeavor. It also explores the structural and linguistic options for future translations in Hindi which could overcome the shortcomings of the existing texts, thereby tapping into the novel’s value as an instructional text for readers of an impressionable age.Hindi adaptations of Mark TwainHuckleberry Finn in Indiatranslations in Hindiapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1hn5w5zrarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9m77f7vb2022-01-05T09:32:28Zqt9m77f7vbThe Problem of the Explanatory: Linguistic Variation in Twenty-First-Century Spanish Retranslations of Huckleberry FinnSanz Jiménez, Miguel2021-01-01Starting with an overview of the complex notion of “retranslation,” this essay examines the six different translations of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn that have been published in Spain in the early twenty-first century. Specifically, this paper ponders how the newer Spanish versions of Twain’s novel tend to contradict the retranslation hypothesis, as they do not often portray the seven literary dialects announced by the Explanatory that opens Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The linguistic varieties included in the source text seem problematic for Spanish translators, whose strategies entail paratextual additions, depicting regional target dialects to recreate an interplay of voices, playing with nonstandard spelling, omitting the introductory note, and suppressing any trace of literary dialects in the target text. The analysis leads the author to observe how publishing norms—particularly publishers’ tendency to reprint previous translations, publishers’s commercial interests, and their predilection for unmarked texts in standard Spanish—have led to translations that ignore the diversity of voices portrayed by Twain’s novel.Linguistic VariationHuckleberry Finn Spanish translationsMark Twain's Explanatory as translation problemretranslation hypothesispublishing normstransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9m77f7vbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3zr487rp2022-01-05T09:32:27Zqt3zr487rpMark Twain: The Making of an Icon through Translations of Huckleberry Finn in BrazilRamos, Vera Lúcia2021-01-01This article aims at discussing seven translations into Brazilian Portuguese of Mark Twain’s Adventures of
Huckleberry Finn from 1934 (first translation) to 2019 (the latest translation published). To do so, paratexts of the translations are analyzed, such as notes, foreword, afterword, flaps and back panel, as well as other texts discussing the translation of the book in newspapers, reviews and interviews. The intention here is to show the pathway through which Huckleberry Finn was translated in Brazil and received by critics and the public and how the paratexts make the image of a Brazilian Mark Twain. The analysis will take into account the transnational approaches proposed by Shelley Fisher Fishkin, as well as the perspective Maria Sílvia Betti suggests for understanding how the Brazilian publishing market has shaped Mark Twain’s image created in Brazil.paratexts and transculturationBrazilian Portuguese translations of Mark TwainHuckleberry Finn in Brazilapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3zr487rparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7ft6w7152022-01-05T09:32:25Zqt7ft6w715Huck Finn’s Adventures in the Land of the Soviet PeopleMarinova, Margarita2021-01-01Mark Twain enjoyed immense popularity in Russia from the moment his writings became available in translation starting in 1872. The prerevolutionary fascination with his works only intensified after the emergence of the Soviet State, as Twain's critical stance towards the realities of American life, his antiracism, and his disdain for organized religion, made him extremely palatable to the new socialist government. Between 1918 and the end of 1958, more than 10.2 million copies of his books were published in the USSR. The Adventures of
Tom Sawyer dominated the market with eighteen editions during that same period, but Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was quite popular as well. This essay focuses on Daruzes’s popular 1955 translation of Huck
Finn in order to examine and challenge Sarukhanyan’s conclusions about the universal embrace and deep intercultural understanding of the novel in the Soviet Union. A comparison with the 1911 translation by Mikhail Engelgardt helps highlight the problems in the Russian representation of Twain’s heroes and topics, and the effects of specific translation choices on the overall message of the text.Russian translations of Mark TwainHuckleberry Finn in Russiaapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7ft6w715articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt35c2w0hd2022-01-05T09:32:24Zqt35c2w0hdHow German Translations of “Trash” in Chapter 15 of Huckleberry Finn Facilitate Misunderstanding the Whole NovelKelley, Winston2021-01-01After the fog lifts in Chapter 15 of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Huck plays a trick on Jim, and Jim’s reproval, implying that Huck’s behavior is unworthy of a friend but typical of “trash,” opens Huck’s heretofore closed mind on the subject of race. No German term carries the connotations of English “trash” that allow extension from twigs, leaves, and miscellaneous worthless things to poor Southerners whose belief in white superiority over colored races gives them self-respect. A few recent, complete and fairly accurate translations are improvements over the early versions that appeared between 1890 and World War II; nevertheless, annotation is required to define the specific repugnant quality of “trash” with which Jim evokes the good in Huck.Huckleberry Finn in Germanyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/35c2w0hdarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt37s8n5602022-01-05T09:32:23Zqt37s8n560Arabic Huck: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in Vernacular ArabicKassam, Hamada2021-01-01This article concentrates on the author’s efforts to produce the first translation of Mark Twain’s 1884 novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn into colloquial Arabic, and briefly reviews a few other major translations of Twain’s masterpiece into Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic. The article reflects on this ongoing translation project attempting to present Twain’s book in a vernacular Arabic dialect spoken in Damascus and the countryside surrounding the Syrian capital. It highlights and explains the rationale and inspiration behind this unique translation project as well as the reasons behind the selection and employment of this specific regional Damascene dialect. The article also discusses and exemplifies how all previous Arabic translations of Twain’s novel used Modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic and were affected by a motley assortment of cultural, political and religious factors that resulted in abridgement, adaptation, and censorship. These previous translations partially failed to capture the freshness of Huck Finn’s casual voice, childish tone, and cluttered storytelling, along with the perceptiveness and seriousness of Twain’s authorial intention, themes and comedy.Mark Twain translations in Arabicvernacular Arabic translationArabic translation of Huckleberry Finnapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/37s8n560articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6fs717pj2022-01-05T09:32:22Zqt6fs717pjTranslations of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in France (1886–2015)Jenn, RonaldChannaut, Véronique2021-01-01Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’s presence in France went through three phases. The pioneering period started in 1886 and ended right after World War II. The single translation it produced bore the hallmarks of mass schooling and the set of values championed by the fledgling Third Republic. The expansion period, spanning the second half of the twentieth century, was characterized by the geopolitical context of the Cold War, the advent of the figure of the teenager, and the rise of the leisure society. Currently, the field is in a consolidating period brought about by the “centennial fever” spurred by the anniversary of Mark Twain’s death. Taking stock of the novel’s canonized status in its home country, publishers endeavored to focus on the original’s esthetic challenges and hired translators with expertise in nineteenth-century American literature and Mark Twain’s writings. They were able to pay even greater attention to the novel’s literary finesse and complexity. The first part of this article is devoted to the pioneering and expansion periods, based on previous scholarship. The second part is devoted to the consolidating period based on the latest findings presented in Véronique Channaut’s 2019 study of three major retranslations of Huckleberry Finn.Mark Twain in Francehistory of Huckleberry Finn translationsapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6fs717pjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1t19f7w92022-01-05T09:32:21Zqt1t19f7w9Persian Huck: On the Reception of Huckleberry Finn in IranFomeshi, Behnam M.2021-01-01First translated into Persian in 1949, Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry
Finn is among the most popular works of American fiction in Iran. Although the anti-US policy of the post-1979 political system has tried to erase the manifestations of the previous period’s American influence, Iranian interest in Huckleberry Finn has been increasing. There are more than twenty Persian translations of the novel, most of which belong to the post-1979 period. After a short survey of Twain’s early reception in Iran, the present paper focuses on two major translations of Huckleberry Finn as well as a stage adaptation of the novel. It also elaborates on the role that Huckleberry Finn no Boken (1976), the Japanese anime based on the novel broadcast on the Iranian state TV, has played in the Iranian reception of the novel, as indicated by the Iranian play’s capitalizing on the Japanese anime’s widespread popularity. The paper concludes with a note on questions of censorship, Afro-Iranians, and the nation’s dire need of its own novel on the Iranian Jim.Afro-IraniansMark Twain in IrananimecensorshipPersian translatorsstage adaptationapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1t19f7w9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4z0349782022-01-05T09:32:20Zqt4z034978Special Forum Introduction: Global Huck: Mapping the Cultural Work of Translations of Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry FinnFishkin, Shelley FisherIshihara, TsuyoshiJenn, RonaldKersten, HolgerLai-Henderson, Selina2021-01-01
Editors' Introduction
Mark Twain translationsHuckleberry Finn in global contextsArabic Huck FinnPersian Mark TwainRussian translations of TwainHuck and Jimtranslating vernacularheteroglossiaparatext and transculturationSpanish translations of Twainapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4z034978articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4xp9v8q92022-01-05T09:32:19Zqt4xp9v8q9Introduction: The Progress of Transnational American Studies CollaborationHornung, Alfred2021-01-01Introduction by the journal's Editor in ChiefTransnational American Studiesintroduction by JTAS Editor in Chief Alfred Hornungapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4xp9v8q9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1z12b2m82021-10-03T13:14:30Zqt1z12b2m8About the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2021-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1z12b2m8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2vz1n12v2021-10-03T13:14:28Zqt2vz1n12vPluralism, Transition, and the Anglophone; and Just an American Darker than the Rest: On Queer Brown ExilePatterson, Christopher B.2021-01-01This excerpt from Transitive Cultures: Anglophone Literature of the Transpacific asks how South East Asian writing in English can be analyzed in conjunction with texts from its North American diasporas to reread forms of global multiculturalism within a longer genealogy of “pluralist governmentality:” an art of government that expects individuals to visibly express their difference via given group identities, and in doing so, to represent imperial state power as neutral, universal, or benevolent. Patterson asks how South East Asian migrant narratives deracinate the optics of pluralist governmentality by emphasizing forms of transitivity that Patterson dubs “transitive cultures,” the sets of camouflaged and shifting cultural practices tactically mobilized in contexts where identity is defined as fixed and authentic. To read across ethnicized genres and identities, Patterson reframes Asian migrant texts as transpacific Anglophone texts—a category that stresses encounter and exchange—and shines a spotlight on works that trouble a global multiculturalist reading because they are deemed “inauthentic” to both nationalist literatures, global literatures, and American ethnic literatures. Chapter 4, Just an American Darker than the Rest: On Queer Brown Exile, extends the inquiries of transitivity by reading texts of queer brown migrancy. It pairs Lawrence Chua’s 1998 novel, Gold by the Inch, with R. Zamora Linmark’s 2011 novel, Leche. Both novels consider queer of color travel as a rejection of American senses of brownness and homonormativity.Asian American StudiesQueer TheoryRace and Ethnic StudiesSouth East Asian literaturemigrant writingtranspacific literatureglobal multiculturalismpluralist governmentallyLawrence ChuaR. Zamora LinmarkGold by the InchLecheapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2vz1n12varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9jk269dd2021-10-03T13:14:27Zqt9jk269ddHasty Departures: The Evacuation of American Citizens from Europe at the Outbreak of World War IIWilk, Gavin2021-01-01When World War II began in September 1939, upwards of one hundred thousand American citizens were residing and traveling throughout Europe. Over the next three months, nearly seventy-five thousand of these individuals would be returned to the United States on crowded passenger ships and merchant vessels. This evacuation, organized and facilitated by the US government, shipping representatives, and labor organizers, proved to be difficult. Besides contending with logistical obstacles, officials leading the operations had to assist evacuees with bookings and other personal matters, contend with rowdy ship crews, and ensure that the vessels traveling across the Atlantic Ocean were safe from German U-boats. This article offers insight into the Americans who were assisted, the US government officials who orchestrated the repatriation efforts, and the ships that were involved in the transatlantic crossings. It also provides a unique glimpse into the activities of American consular staff in France, Britain, and Ireland during the early days of the international conflict. World War IIevacuationUnited States evacuees from UKEuropediplomatsDepartment of State policy on war evacuationapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9jk269ddarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt58b9360h2021-10-03T13:14:26Zqt58b9360hLessons from a Different Shore: Portrayals of Japanese American Incarceration and the Redress Movement by Western European Newspapersvan Harmelen, Jonathan2021-01-01The history of Japanese American incarceration is traditionally framed as one of the bleakest chapters in twentieth-century US history. Yet interest in the story of Japanese Americans and the lessons of the incarceration are not limited to the United States or the Japanese diaspora. This article examines media reactions to the story of the Japanese American incarceration and the redress movement of the 1980s in four Western European countries—the Netherlands, United Kingdom, West Germany, and France. In each country, media outlets discussed the redress movement and the Japanese American experience, larger issues of racism within the United States, and financial compensation for war victims. In doing so, these media accounts both dramatize the nature of public opinion on the subject of reparations and touch on larger debates on the collective memory of the Holocaust and colonialism that were emerging in Western Europe. Incarcerationcivil rightshuman rightsJapanese American historyredress movementnewspaper portrayals of internmentapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/58b9360harticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4k3816ts2021-10-03T13:14:25Zqt4k3816tsBlack Atlantic Currents: Mati Diop’s Atlantique and the Field of Transnational American StudiesEnzerink, Suzanne Christine2021-01-01This essay reads French-Senegalese director Mati Diop’s 2019 film Atlantique,
a Senegalese-French-Belgian coproduction, to argue that its oceanic focus gestures at the haunting histories that suture the US and Senegal. Atlantique, spoken in Wolof, explores global and local class inequalities through a romance narrative that foregrounds the lasting effects of colonialism and economic imperialism on Senegal. Despite this distinct national context, Atlantique was quickly absorbed into a global media stream, picked up by Netflix and distributed to more than one hundred and sixty-five million subscribers. While Atlantique appears to tackle the ravages of capitalism on a global scale by highlighting labor migration and the disruptive effects on the women left behind, a close reading of the film reveals a more complicated and transnational story. Atlantique forces us to also think about the United States. The American continent in the colonial era formed the tragic third corner in the triangular Atlantic economy based on the slave trade. Placing Atlantique within a Black Atlantic trajectory yields a richer, more politically invested reading of the film that simultaneously helps us to rethink the political work that film can do in a globalized world. In particular, I posit that Atlantique’s circulation to the US and Europe helps reverse the traditional patterns of flow, North to South, West to East, as such challenging limited understandings of the US's cultural and political ties to Senegal.After a discussion of production and circulation, I therefore turn to a close reading of the film and the paratext surrounding it to proffer a theory of how films like Atlantique can help us rethink the potentialities and investments of transnational American Studies as a field.Mati DiopSenegalese filmclass exploitationdjinnrefugeestransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4k3816tsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8wr2q8j52021-10-03T13:14:24Zqt8wr2q8j5Strange FruitGoenawan, Mohamad2021-01-01An analysis of the long history of anti-Black racism, which stretches from George Floyd's trampling death back to the lynching murders which Billie Holiday sang about in "Strange Fruit."George FloydBillie Holiday"Strange Fruit"history of lynchingapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8wr2q8j5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7z68z3h22021-10-03T13:14:24Zqt7z68z3h2'I can't breathe': Why George Floyd's Words Reverberate Around the WorldOkri, Ben2021-01-01Reflections by the Nigerian writer and critic Ben Okri on the worldwide impact of the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minnepolis police. Racial justicesocial protestGeorge FloydI can't breatheBen Okritransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7z68z3h2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8361f9wq2021-10-03T13:14:23Zqt8361f9wqReflections on Ben Okri, Goenawan Mohamad, and the 2020 Global UprisingsGaines, Kevin K.2021-01-01The global Black Lives Matter uprisings against police violence prompted by Floyd’s murder were connected to a longer history of transnational Black struggles. As Ben Okri and Goenawan Mohamad and others have suggested, the civil rights and Black Power movements from the 1950s to the 1970s were not confined to US terrain; they were part of a global conjuncture. Protests throughout the Western world highlighted the blood-soaked record of the global color line, coalescing around demands for the official repudiation of the continuing legacies of racial oppression, enslavement, segregation, and empire. In the United States, the Black Lives Matter movement transformed the public conversation in the US about police violence. Caught in the act, Derek Chauvin seemed untroubled at being recorded by a courageous 17-year-old Darnella Frazier. We do not know what he was thinking, but still one recalls those members of lynch mobs posing for photographs during the Jim Crow era. Convinced that he would not be held accountable by a system of state-sanctioned violence, Chauvin appears to have believed that his use of deadly force was justifiable, just as similar extrajudicial killings by police officers of Black people have been upheld by juries and the criminal–legal system. BLM linked the crisis of oppressive policing to longstanding racial inequities in health, housing, employment, and income while insisting on the sanctity of the lives of Black poor, queer, and transgender persons, and persons living with disabilities. Republican-authored laws seeking to wrest autocratic control of education by criminalizing the teaching of race in US history are a craven response to the ways that the global reckoning on racism in 2020 has altered the US political landscape.transnational Black historyTransnational American StudiesBlack Lives MatterGeorge FloydDarnella Frazierrace and ethnic studiescritical race theoryChimamanda Ngozi Adichieapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8361f9wqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5h2905ck2021-10-03T13:14:22Zqt5h2905ckIntroduction: Hello from the Other SideHornung, Alfred2021-01-01Transnational American StudiesJournal of Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5h2905ckarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 12, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt04x5m5hx2021-09-02T15:12:48Zqt04x5m5hxAbout the ContributorsJTAS, Managing Editor2020-01-01Journal of Transnational American StudiesJTAS 11.2 contributor biosapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/04x5m5hxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt13w0h5tr2021-09-02T15:12:47Zqt13w0h5trExcerpt from Black Land: Imperial Ethiopianism and African America (2019)Nurhussein, Nadia2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/13w0h5trarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt77h9m5hh2021-09-02T15:12:46Zqt77h9m5hhExcerpt from Colonial Phantoms: Belonging and Refusal in the Dominican Americas, from the 19th Century to the Present (2018)Ramírez D’Oleo, Dixa2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/77h9m5hharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt91p4z4xf2021-09-02T15:12:45Zqt91p4z4xfIntroduction from Anthologizing Poe: Editions, Translations, and (Trans)National Canons (2020)Esplin, EmronVale de Gato, Margarida2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/91p4z4xfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5hv1k2z92021-09-02T15:12:44Zqt5hv1k2z9"Raising Proper Citizens: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Sentimental Education of Bulgarian Children During the Soviet Era," excerpt (2018)Mihaylova, Stefka2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5hv1k2z9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8sn094602021-09-02T15:12:43Zqt8sn09460"The Bonds of Translation: A Cuban Encounter with Uncle Tom’s Cabin," excerpt (2018)Chaar-Pérez, Kahlila2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8sn09460articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6pn9d92v2021-09-02T15:12:42Zqt6pn9d92v“I Go to Liberia”: Following Uncle Tom’s Cabin to Africa, excerpt (2018)Dinius, Marcy J.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6pn9d92varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4sj7h85v2021-09-02T15:12:41Zqt4sj7h85vIntroduction from Uncle Tom's Cabins: The Transnational History of America's Most Mutable Book (2018)Davis, Tracy C.Mihaylova, Stefka2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4sj7h85varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8vw6g5gp2021-09-02T15:12:40Zqt8vw6g5gpForward Editor's IntroductionReimer, Jennifer A.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8vw6g5gparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8069d8h82021-09-02T15:12:39Zqt8069d8h8"Island Race," originally published in the International Journal of Okinawan Studies (2012)Okihiro, Gary Y.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8069d8h8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2bz2s32r2021-09-02T15:12:38Zqt2bz2s32r"Demonic Grounds: Sylvia Wynter," excerpt from Demonic Grounds (2006)McKittrick, Katherine2020-01-01Sylvia Wynter interviewapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2bz2s32rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3nk6364h2021-09-02T15:12:37Zqt3nk6364h"Defining Archipelagic Studies," excerpt from Archipelagic Studies: Charting New Waters (1998)Batongbacal, Jay L.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3nk6364harticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5798c8842021-09-02T15:12:36Zqt5798c884"Geographical Basis of History," excerpt from The Philosophy of History (1899)Hegel, G. W. F.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5798c884articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt35z4q1mz2021-09-02T15:12:35Zqt35z4q1mzReprise Editor's IntroductionRoberts, Brian Russell2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/35z4q1mzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt02b068fx2021-09-02T15:12:34Zqt02b068fxSelected Bibliography of Thomas Bender's WorksBender, Thomas2020-01-01Key publications by Bender.Thomas Bender bibliographytransnational American studiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/02b068fxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5bx1804p2021-09-02T15:12:33Zqt5bx1804pAdding America to World History: The K-12 ChallengeAronson, Marc2020-01-01This essay outlines a number of daunting obstructions to a transnational historical approach in the Kindergarten to Grade Twelve Social Studies curriculum including a hyperlocal focus during elementary school, an inflexible national approach in middle and high school, and political pressure on national testing organizations to emphasize “American exceptionalism.” Yet it argues that there are countervailing currents, including the rise of public schools that use the International Baccalaureate (IB) program, pressure on elite schools to prepare students for global futures, and the opportunities for high school teachers to experiment with crosscurricular themes.transnational children's literatureK-12 and teaching US Historyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5bx1804particleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt51c923m02021-09-02T15:12:32Zqt51c923m0Foreign-Language Scholarship and the Teaching of United States HistoryRobinson, Greg2020-01-01As a US-born and -educated Americanist teaching in a French-language institution outside the United States, I have learned that United States historians have much to learn from foreign colleagues, both because they explore less-studied aspects of America and because their distance from their subject of study affords them a broader field of vision.teaching US history outside the USapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/51c923m0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8kj3k6h12021-09-02T15:12:31Zqt8kj3k6h1Transnational History from the Survey to the DissertationNeumann, Tracy2020-01-01This essay, originally written to celebrate Thomas Bender’s retirement from New York University in 2015, explores topics related to integrating transnational approaches in the US history curriculum and in the education of graduate students. The author finds that transnationalizing the general education course on the US since 1945 engages students from diverse backgrounds and, rather than “leaving out” significant historical content, simply offers a different framing of the American past. Graduate student research on transnational topics, on the other hand, poses financial, linguistic, and archival challenges to all students, but especially to those not enrolled in elite doctoral programs.Thomas Bender SymposiumFraming American History essaysteaching transnational US historyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8kj3k6h1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3gj2t91k2021-09-02T15:12:30Zqt3gj2t91kThe Transnational Turn and the Dilemma of the "phenomenal mix"Tucher, Andie2020-01-01This essay explores the special challenges of “transnationalizing” a half-semester history survey course designed for nonhistorians in a graduate journalism school. The course has just seven weeks to address a huge array of material. Many of the students have not taken a single history course since high school. And while many of them, both US citizens and international students, have been pleasantly surprised to find that the course includes material they find relevant to their own experience, in the time we have it is not possible to validate everyone’s lives through inclusion. Navigating the dilemmas of identity in a diverse and fragmented public sphere is, of course, not a new challenge for people who do history for a living, but it may be instructive for journalists as well, whose everyday work also involves constituting meaningful narratives that satisfactorily explain why things happen.journalismapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3gj2t91karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt64s9z15k2021-09-02T15:12:28Zqt64s9z15k"Standing Up in a Canoe": Historians' Unsteady Place in a Public WorldBaick, John S.2020-01-01This essay reflects on Baick’s efforts to occupy what is often an unsteady position of a historian in the rough waters of the public sphere. From teaching teachers to talking to civic groups to media interviews, he has spent most of his academic career pursuing the role of a public intellectual. Providing nuance and complexity to the political and cultural issues of the day has become as important as traditional academic areas such as scholarship, teaching, and professional service.historians as public intellectualsacademics and TV appearanceshistory and public pedagogytransnational American studiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/64s9z15karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt29b2c1fw2021-09-02T15:12:28Zqt29b2c1fwFraming American History: IntroductionAbelson, Elaine S.Kotzin, Daniel P.2020-01-01Editors' IntroductionThomas Bendertransnational US historyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/29b2c1fwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt426286zh2021-09-02T15:12:26Zqt426286zhRadiation Songs and Transpacific Resonances of US Imperial TransitsSchwartz, Jessica A.2020-01-01
Abstract
This article listens to Marshallese radiation songs to hear how singers subject to US nuclear colonial practices—including US nuclear testing (1946–1958), extant displacement, and human radiation experimentation—continue to be ignored in official capacities, even after nuclear colonialism officially ended with the Republic of the Marshall Islands’s sovereignty through the Compact of Free Association (1986). US nuclear imperialism is persistent given the establishment of these official spaces where the Marshall Islands and United States governments are allowed to interact, politically, and the radiation communities, particularly women subject to disproportionate impacts from nuclear colonialism, are denied entrance or, (literally and metaphorically), voice. Radiation songs, which detail the ongoing and systemic violences of US nuclear imperialism, are ways that singers subversively make their petitions to US citizens and governmental representatives heard. Songs challenge the exclusionary modern systems (law, politics, mass media, biomedicine) that continue to claim specialized knowledge by advancing Marshallese epistemologies, sensibilities, and embodied, or lived experiences of nuclear violence. As a matter of the health humanities in transnational context, the uneven development of the global working class through constitutive colonial conditions and durative imperial networks are matters this essay points up.10 to 12 keywords for database searchesseparate with semi-colonsapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/426286zharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6zs4q1hv2021-09-02T15:12:25Zqt6zs4q1hvThe Politics of Invisibility: Visualizing Legacies of Nuclear ImperialismsAmundsen, FionaFrain, Sylvia C.2020-01-01Questions of visibility, witnessing, and agency are particularly pertinent to post-1945 US and French nuclear testing across Oceania. Images of enormous hovering atomic mushroom clouds have become familiar icons of this testing, while images of the effects of colonial–imperial occupation and ideology in the Pacific are rendered invisible within government-controlled imagery. Alternative forms of visualization are required to be able to (re)see the human experiences that remain central to contemporary Pacific militarization and the legacies of nuclear weapons testing. Images, be they from social media and online platforms, archives, or public exhibitions, have the political potential to make visible Indigenous experiences of nuclear testing and ongoing militarization. Here, our work expands the concept of transnational studies by centering Oceanic, archipelagic, and island thinking. This article explores how contemporary photographic imagery politicizes what has been rendered (in)visible through state-produced imagery, archiving practices, and US national park recognition. Focusing on American-born Chinese visual artist Jane Chang Mi’s series (See Reverse Side.) (2017) and Marshallese photojournalist and filmmaker Leonard Leon’s (@pacific_aesthetics) series of Instagram posts (2019), we argue that their methods of image-making can enable alternative forms of socioethical witnessing and visibility of not only state-produced archival images but also of the Indigenous Pacific communities who are deeply affected by nuclear testing and ongoing militarization. Through close readings of their works, we question how photographic practices communicate the humanity of nuclear military conduct while bringing their viewers closer to the human experience of living in a highly militarized and nuclear context.ImperialismMilitarismNuclear testingPacificLeonard LeonJane Chang Mi@pacific_aestheticsPhotographyVisual Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6zs4q1hvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0sn664592021-09-02T15:12:25Zqt0sn66459The Nevada Movement: A Model of Trans-Indigenous Antinuclear SolidarityRozsa, George Gregory2020-01-01Corbin Harney, Western Shoshone elder and spiritual leader, rises in prayer. He lights a ceremonial pipe and upon inhaling offers it to Olzhas Suleimenov, Kazakh national poet and leader of the Nevada-Semipalatinsk movement, who smokes it in turn. After completing the Western Shoshone Pipe Ceremony, the two reach down into the earth, each pulling up a stone, which they then proceed—in accordance with Kazakh custom—to throw at the face of evil—in this case, the face of nuclear fallout. This face is everywhere at the Nevada Test Site, and yet, nowhere to be seen. Guidelines for direct action campaigns at the test site caution would-be activists to be afraid of it—to be afraid of the dust. Contaminated from decades of nuclear weapons testing, this dust kills—just one more thing the Western Shoshone share with the Kazakhs, who, nearly a year-and-a-half earlier and halfway across the globe, gathered at Semipalatinsk, the Soviet counterpart to the Nevada Test Site, to hurl their own stones at the face of this very same evil. In 1989, inspired by Western Shoshone attempts to end nuclear weapons testing on their ancestral homeland, the Kazakhs rose up to demand an immediate cessation of Soviet testing at Semipalatinsk. They not only named their nascent movement Nevada, but they also took as their logo a Kazakh nomad sharing a pipe with a Western Shoshone. Over the next two years, Western Shoshone and Nevada activists engaged in cultural and political exchanges that sent delegates to protest in each other’s respective homeland. Soviet officials have repeatedly credited the Nevada-Semipalatinsk movement in their decision to halt their nuclear weapons testing program. By August 1991 Semipalatinsk closed. And without a credible Soviet threat the United States halted its own nuclear weapons testing program the following year. This essay documents the origins of this historic trans-Indigenous activism, as well as the joint strategies, tactics, and discourses employed by both movements in their bid to end nuclear weapons testing in their respective homelands.Nuclear ColonialismTrans-IndigenousInter/NationalismAntinuclear MovementNative American StudiesIndigenous Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0sn66459articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0hx7k00t2021-09-02T15:12:23Zqt0hx7k00tIndigenous Antinuclear Literary Resistance: Jim Northrup’s Satire and Anishinaabe Trans/nationalismMatsunaga, Kyoko2020-01-01“Indigenous Antinuclear Literary Resistance: Jim Northrup’s Satire and Anishinaabe Trans/nationalism” examines the way Jim Northrup (1943–2016), an Anishinaabe writer from the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa in northern Minnesota, engages Anishinaabe trans/nationalism as he combats nuclear colonialism in his satirical columns. The fundamental nature of Anishinaabe trans/nationalism, described by Joseph Bauerkemper and Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik Stark in “Trans/National Terrain of Anishinaabe Law and Diplomacy,” forms the basis of Northrup’s resistance to nuclear colonialism as he critiques the nuclear power plant and radioactive waste threatening the Mdewakanton Dakota residents of the Prairie Island Indian Community. He adds another layer to the politics of Indigenous trans/nationalism when he ridicules plans to send the radioactive waste from Prairie Island to be stored on the land of other Indigenous nations such as the Western Shoshone and Mescalero Apache. On another level, by emphasizing the bonds between Anishinaabe people in the United States and Canada, Northrup implies that Anishinaabe nationhood precedes the borders of nation states, defying the ideology of “transnational” in a conventional sense. With Indigenous trans/nationalism at the center of its argument, this essay considers Northrup’s use of satire and humor as an atomic age strategy to manifest Anishinaabe nationhood as well as to establish transnational Indigenous alliances to combat nuclear colonialism. Northrup situates his antinuclear opposition as part of an enduring multilateral Indigenous resistance to settler colonialism, and, in so doing, he emphasizes the importance of exercising treaty rights and insisting on the inherent sovereignty of the Anishinaabe people.Indigenous anti-nuclear activismtransindigenousPraire Island nuclear wasteJim Northrupcross-border transnational Indigenous and First Nations organizingapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0hx7k00tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5ps5x93q2021-09-02T15:12:22Zqt5ps5x93qThe Pacific Proving Grounds and the Proliferation of Settler EnvironmentalismBahng, Aimee2020-01-01Runit Dome is an eighteen-inch thick concrete dome covering the buried nuclear waste from twenty-three atomic tests conducted by the US military in the 1940s and ’50s in Pikinni Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Known to locals as “The Tomb,” it is leaking into the Pacific Ocean, in part because of the rising sea levels produced by global warming. Runit Dome brings climate change into direct relation with the legacies of nuclear imperialism in the Marshall Islands. This essay examines how Cold War securitization paradigms problematically inform the ecological management strategies developed by international policy-making entities such as the United Nations in the mid-twentieth century. While much literary and cultural scholarship on the rise of the nuclear age has focused on the concomitant rise of insecurities about body and environment under the duress of wartime, this essay crafts a different but intertwined history, showing how the transformation of the Pacific Ocean into a nuclear testing ground was parlayed into governmental projects for the remaking of life itself under the auspices of risk management. Military-backed and government-funded scientific experiments with nuclear and other weapons throughout the Pacific suggest a new phase in US imperial world-making, as the ecologies of waters, islands, sea creatures, and Pacific Islanders were turned into experimental materials for modeling shifts in social and ecological forms of governance. When environmental protections take for granted concepts such as enclosure, risk management, and Enlightenment formulations of property-owning and rights-bearing subjects, they manifest a settler environmentalism that too easily paves the way for capitalist regeneration under the aegis of eco-development projects rather than systemic change that understands human, nonhuman, and environment to be always already in relation. To break from perpetually extractive relations to land, sea, and life, Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner’s video poem “Anointed” models how environmental futures must reckon with the causes of past and ongoing harm, and this essay concludes with a brief reflection on this poet-activist’s work.settler environmentalismPacific Islandsnuclear testingBikini Atollecological managementcritical financial studiesKathy Jetñil-Kijiner"Anointed" video poemapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5ps5x93qarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6pj0n3x32021-09-02T15:12:21Zqt6pj0n3x3Academia in a Time of Pandemic: An Australian PerspectiveCraig, Douglas B.2020-01-01Although Australia has (so far) contained the spread of Covid-19 within its population relatively successfully, its universities and academic life have suffered greatly as a result of the pandemic. This has been the result of campus shutdowns, unsympathetic government policy, and the collapse of the previously lucrative supply of international students. The result has been financial stringency throughout the Australian university sector, significant job losses, and the cancellation and inhibition of the international collaboration and interaction that is vital to our common global academic and research endeavours.
Covid-19 cultural analysisapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6pj0n3x3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt57k5g5pc2021-09-02T15:12:21Zqt57k5g5pcIntroduction: Transnational Nuclear ImperialismsMaurer, AnaïsHogue, Rebecca H.2020-01-01Editors' Introduction to the Special Forum on Transnational Nuclear Imperialismsapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/57k5g5pcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9cz7p5kf2021-09-02T15:12:20Zqt9cz7p5kfImagining a Globally Distanced TransnationalismGoodman, David2020-01-01The article asks why we cannot now more actively work to imagine and construct a transnational American studies that allows people to work from where they are. This has been a desirable goal for some time but the Covid crisis is an occasion to ask this question anew.Transnational historyapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9cz7p5kfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3n6934zz2021-09-02T15:12:19Zqt3n6934zzInternationalism Beyond the “Yellow Peril”: On the Possibility of Transnational Asian American SolidarityLiu, Wen2020-01-01The pandemic has rearticulated racial discourses in unprecedented ways and at an accelerating pace. The resurgent protests of Black Lives Matter demand fundamental changes in the criminal (in)justice system and racial relations in the US beyond the Black–white dichotomy. In this paper, I argue that our current shared struggles require a new form of internationalism against the rapid right-wing turn of global hegemonies that does not draw lines between the simple binaries of “East vs. West,” “white vs. Black,” or “authoritarianism vs. democracy,” but in the interconnected fights against the militarized police state, neoliberal capitalist order, Han supremacy, and the continued impacts of Euro-American coloniality.Asian AmericanBlack Lives Mattertransnational solidarityimperialismapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3n6934zzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt91f767pv2021-09-02T15:12:18Zqt91f767pvVicious Aid for Vicious TimesGürel, Perin2020-01-01This essay combines a note on the difficulties of doing research in West Asia before and during the Covid-19 pandemic with observations on the shift in the tone of international aid efforts. The author identifies a public "viciousness" to the publicity surrounding the aid sent and received internationally during the pandemic.Historical researchinternational aidCovid-19application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/91f767pvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8722w6xj2021-09-02T15:12:18Zqt8722w6xjIntroductionTakeuchi-Demirci, Aiko2020-01-01Covid-19 cultural analysisapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8722w6xjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt25s120r42021-09-02T15:12:17Zqt25s120r4Issue Introduction: Turning a Transnational CornerMorgan, Nina2020-01-01Issue Introduction by the Editor-in-Chiefapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/25s120r4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt40g092pf2020-08-01T06:39:09Zqt40g092pfAbout the ContributorsManaging Editor, JTAS2020-01-01Journal of Transnational American Studies 11.1 Contributors biosapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/40g092pfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3520p9jc2020-08-01T06:39:07Zqt3520p9jcAfterword: Militant TerritorialityBrown, Vincent2020-01-01Afterword for the Special Forum on American Territorialitiespolitical geographychallenges to US political geographymartial territorialitymilitant territorialitytransnational American studiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3520p9jcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5ns1n0pw2020-08-01T06:39:06Zqt5ns1n0pwAfterword: What’s Law Got to Do With It?Salyer, Lucy E.Teeters, Lila M.2020-01-01Afterword for the Special Forum on American Territorialitieslaw and territorialitylaw and US empirechallenges to Westphalian sovereigntyTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5ns1n0pwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4cg540np2020-08-01T06:39:05Zqt4cg540npNorth American Counterterritoriality: Nineteenth-Century Black Activism and Alternative Legal SpatialitySawallisch, Nele2020-01-01This contribution uses the terms “territoriality” and “legal spatiality” to consider how they shape our understanding of the significance of the North American border between the US and Canada (British North America) in the nineteenth century. It looks, first, at the ways in which Black intellectual leaders constructed Upper Canada as a counterterritory to the United States in the context of debating Black emigration by combining politics and geography to challenge conflicting territorialities. Canada’s ambiguous position as a safe haven under the British lion’s paw that was formerly invested in slavery and the slave trade is reinforced, second, by the increasing numbers of black fugitives onto its territories. This perceived mass exodus provoked aggressive reactions from US slaveholders who relied on the fugitive slave laws to lay claims on their “property” in the form of fugitive slave extradition cases. The activism by Black communities along the border that emerged from the crises to save fugitives from being returned to bondage, this contribution shows, enacted a form of counterterritoriality that called on the British imperial center to challenge the legality of slavery, introducing alternative forms of “legal spatiality.”Upper Canada and fugitive slave lawsUS-Canada borderlandBlack fugitives in CanadaBlack activism around fugitive slave lawsTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4cg540nparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt24k7423t2020-08-01T06:39:04Zqt24k7423t‘Neither citizen nor alien’: Migration, Territoriality, and Malfunctioning Empire in the US Virgin IslandsFlood, Amelia2020-01-01In 1924, Leander Holder, an Afro-Danish housewife living in New York City, attempted to buy a steamship ticket home after a visit to the US Virgin Islands. The steamship company refused to sell her passage, arguing that she lacked the needed documents to prove her American citizenship. The snafu sent a flurry of letters, cables, and memos circulating through the islands–mainland circuit. As Virgin Islands activists, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), federal officials, and Holder’s family became embroiled in a debate over how she might return to the mainland, their conundrum became indicative of how migrating imperial subjects revealed the reach and limits of American power. This article considers Holder’s predicament through the lens of territoriality and migration to reveal the deficiencies of not only America’s territorial regime but also how the movements of ordinary women and men across, to, and from imperial spaces lay bare the way empire exerts power through incoherence. Opening with the facts of the case, the article then explores how rapid changes in conceptions of territoriality and citizenship influenced its events. It then considers migration as the key malfunction point in the increasingly racialized context of American empire in the early twentieth century. The article ends by examining the ways that Holder’s story speaks to the function of dysfunction in the history of American empire, a migrant’s ability to disrupt empire’s assumed efficiency, and the ways empire wields power even as its judicial congruency fails, its bureaucracies bicker, and its processes malfunction.US Virgin Islander citizenshipmigration and American imperial territorialityUSVI rights to travelTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/24k7423tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5zz204zz2020-08-01T06:39:03Zqt5zz204zzQuiet Empire and Slippery Geography: Puerto Rico as Nonsovereign TerritoryMadera, Judith2020-01-01This essay addresses sociospatial asymmetries configured into the status of nonsovereign island territories. It examines the roles of discourses as legal substructures for policies with clear economic and racial impacts. It also looks at the flexible ways location has been used by national courts, the executive branch, and US Congress to justify differential applications of rights toward island-based citizens. Slippery definitions of incorporation help ensure a nontransferability of national rights and a transferable system of cost-bearing and debt. The essay argues that neoimperialism was the realpolitik that gave logic to the territorial acquisition of Puerto Rico. It discusses diaspora, monocultural production, environmental vulnerability, and locational citizenship in the context of the US Insular Cases, beginning in 1901. By coding islands as suspended spaces from the metropole, quiet colonialism operates through obfuscation. It does not nest in any clear geographic form or authority, but instead works through laws, logistics and installations that are zoned at the crossroads of the foreign and domestic.US Insular CasesUS neoimperialismPuerto Rico and nonsovereign statusisland territorialitytransnational American studiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5zz204zzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt70z6w5022020-08-01T06:39:02Zqt70z6w502‘We’d rather eat rocks’: Contesting the Thirty Meter Telescope in a Struggle over Science and Sovereignty in Hawai‘iSaraf, Aanchal2020-01-01The selection of the sacred summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi as the site for a Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) inaugurated a surge in activism against desecration of the mountain, particularly following a TMT groundbreaking ceremony in October 2014. Drawing on fieldwork I conducted immediately preceding and following the groundbreaking, I argue that the protectors in these initial years of protection were theorizing an Indigenous future that can be seen unfolding in the immediate present. The accumulated tensions between the state’s parameters for recognition and the existence of Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) people and practice results in a dangerous dichotomy between Hawaiian knowledges and Western science that delegitimizes the former, so that Kānaka Maoli protecting Mauna Kea from the Thirty Meter Telescope are framed as antiscience, rather than anti-occupation. In response to the state’s disavowal of settler colonialism through the denial of Kanaka knowledges, Kanaka protection of Mauna Kea asserts itself as an anti-occupation reclamation of not just sovereign territory, but also of Kanaka ontologies. This combination demonstrates the mutually constituted nature of science, the sacred, and sovereignty under a Kanaka worldview. Kānaka Maoli position the struggle as a part of an ongoing sovereignty movement to assert continuities between their historical, contemporary, and emergent claims to land and knowledge.Mauna KeaHawaiian sovereigntytransnational Indigenous studiesTMTKanaka Maoli activismthirty meter telescopetransnational American studiesJournal of Transnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/70z6w502articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt361824dg2020-08-01T06:39:01Zqt361824dgThe Banality of American Empire: The Curious Case of Guam, USABevacqua, Michael LujanCruz, Manuel Lujan2020-01-01The title of a 2004 New York Times article sums up well the curious political existence of the island of Guam: “Looking for friendly base overseas, Pentagon finds it already has one.” Guam is known as the “tip of America’s spear” and has for more than a century played a crucial role in securing US strategic interests in the Asia-Pacific region. Guam is also one of seventeen remaining colonies in the world, as recognized by the United Nations, in need of decolonization. In media representations and critical discourse around US imperialism, Guam also occupies a curious space, where it is a US military colony that somehow does not represent colonialism or imperialism. This essay will use the concept of banality to interrogate how this simultaneous fullness of Guam as a site for American military power, and its emptiness as a site for American critique, enable the US to project force largely unchallenged over a significant part of the globe.
GuamUS imperialismUS military colonyunincorporated territorybanalityUS overseas basesTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/361824dgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1hw3p4kx2020-08-01T06:39:00Zqt1hw3p4kxCartographies of the Self: Indigenous Territoriality and Literary Sovereignty in Contemporary Native American Life WritingSarkowsky, Katja2020-01-01This contribution sets out to show how contemporary Indigenous autobiographers critically counter hegemonic territorial inscriptions of “America” and American citizenship and explore alternatives that often connect to but are not identical with tribal–nationalist notions of territoriality in their insistence on sovereignty. In the context of Indigenous life writing, this contribution suggests, “territoriality“ can be broadly understood as a land-based and transgenerational relationality; the Indigenous authors whose autobiographical work is discussed in detail—N. Scott Momaday, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Louise Erdrich—engage with territoriality as a category of selfhood by way of a self-reflexive storytelling that draws its authority from reference to earlier storytelling and to storytelling conventions, but also from its orientation towards an individual and collective Indigenous future.
N. Scott MomadayLeslie Marmon SilkoLouise ErdrichNative American autobiographyIndigenous storytellingland-based relationalityIndigenous sovereigntytransnational Indigenous studiesTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1hw3p4kxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7010021b2020-08-01T06:38:59Zqt7010021bBorderwaters: Archipelagic Geometries between Indonesia and the United StatesRoberts, Brian Russell2020-01-01Generally speaking, the border/borderlands complex has oriented itself around interactions between the border as a one-dimensional Euclidean line and the borderlands’ set of contestations growing out of cultural currents that exceed the state’s superimposed Euclidean geometry/geography. In complement and contradistinction, this essay advances a borderwaters framework as interlinked with governmentality’s engagement in and with modes of non-Euclidean spatial perception, in which the state’s imagination of borders has not been the evocation of, in Gloria Anzaldúa’s term, an “unnatural boundary” but has rather been a partial function of the geological and hydrological materialities and processes to which governmentality has tended to affix water-based and water-dependent borders. These water-dependent and natural-cultural borders (with their attendant notions of human sovereignty) are intertwined with an arena of borderwaters where nonhuman actants (currents, waves, shorelines, and nonhuman animals) play roles in establishing how human borders will attain perception. In outlining some of the dynamics of the borderwaters, this essay turns toward the oceanic and archipelagic work of the Greater Mexican visual artist Miguel Covarrubias, whose midcentury representations of Indonesia and the United States’s Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands help contextualize and theorize state, Indigenous, and nonhuman cultures as they have converged and diverged across non-Euclidean modes of imagining boundaries, nonboundaries, and spatial area on a terraqueous planet.borderwatersnonhuman agencynon-Euclidean geometryMiguel CovarrubiasTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7010021barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6g60x78r2020-08-01T06:38:59Zqt6g60x78r‘Pando/Pando’ Across the Americas: Transnational Settler Territorialities and Decolonial PluralitiesDietrich, René2020-01-01In Allison Hedge Coke’s 2015 poem “Pando/Pando,” Pando is, in one instance, the site of a 2008 massacre in Bolivia, in which thirteen Evo Morales supporters, many Indigenous, were killed by a militia backed by a US-supported right-wing opposition. While this support clearly illustrates the longstanding exertion of US influence over Latin American countries, it also moves across related sites of settler territorialities to reaffirm in Bolivia the structures of racialized hierarchization and Indigenous elimination as the very grounds of sociopolitical legitimacy and normativity through which the US controls its own “domestic” political space. This essay wants to show how Hedge Coke’s poem engages with this transnational production of settler territorialities while redefining the linkage between the two sites as a decolonial crossing. For, secondly, “Pando” refers to a giant clonal colony in present-day Utah: a forest-sized tree and the “largest living organism on earth.” The poem links this form of Indigenous growth at a site of colonial violence via “Pando” to Morales and the Indigenous political movement he signifies. As it connects these different forms of Indigenous (political) life through their rootedness within their specific lands, the poem works to disrupt the normativity of any territorial settler claim. Beyond the limited settler state conceptions of politics as a centralized project of hierarchization, “Pando/Pando” envisions instead a multiscalar structure of relationships as the normative principle of sociopolitical formation, in which transnational settler colonial connections are redrawn as decolonial pluralities of Indigenous territorialities and dimensions of political life.settler colonialismIndigenous territoriality in BoliviaAllison Hedge CokePando/Pando poemtransnational American studiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6g60x78rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3js9b5td2020-08-01T06:38:58Zqt3js9b5tdIntroduction: Mapping American TerritorialitiesTemmen, JensWaller, Nicole2020-01-01Editors’ introduction.territoritorialityUS imperialismIndigenous sovereigntyTransnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3js9b5tdarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3hv6891j2020-08-01T06:38:57Zqt3hv6891j“Internationalism and Its Limits,” from The World in a City: Multiethnic Radicalism in Early Twentieth-Century Los Angeles by David M. StruthersStruthers, David2020-01-01Transnational American StudiesShelley Fisher Fishkin Prize 2019JTASapplication/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3hv6891jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt36c0b2532020-08-01T06:38:56Zqt36c0b253About this IssueMorgan, Nina Y.2020-01-01application/pdfCC-BY-NC-NDeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/36c0b253articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 11, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7j83t49w2020-07-31T12:05:57Zqt7j83t49wAbout the ContributorsSabine Kim, Managing Editor2018-01-01Westenley AlcenatElsa del Campo RamirezNir EvronEric D. LarsonTeishan A. LatnerJosé Liste NoyaLori MerishChristen MucherBegona SimalClaudia Sadowski-SmithMandala WhiteJanet Zong Yorkapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7j83t49warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84w1578t2020-07-31T12:05:56Zqt84w1578tExcerpt from Young Americans in Literature: The Post-Romantic Turn -- "The Origins of Originality: Poe, Hawthorne, Noguchi"Tatsumi, Takayuki2018-01-01Preview of new work in Transnational American Studies.Post-Romantic American literatureyoung Americans in literaturetransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84w1578tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7467m78z2020-07-31T12:05:54Zqt7467m78zExcerpt from Contraceptive DiplomacyTakeuchi-Demirci, Aiko2018-01-01Excerptapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7467m78zarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9gj6d81t2020-07-31T12:05:53Zqt9gj6d81tExcerpt from India in the American Imaginary, 1780s–1880sKaur, RajenderArora, Anupama2018-01-01This book seeks to frame the “the idea of India” in the American imaginary within a transnational lens that is attentive to global flows of goods, people, and ideas within the circuits of imperial and maritime economies in nineteenth century America (roughly 1780s-1880s). This diverse and interdisciplinary volume – with essays by upcoming as well as established scholars – aims to add to an understanding of the fast changing terrain of economic, political, and cultural life in the US as it emerged from being a British colony to having imperial ambitions of its own on the global stage. The essays trace, variously, the evolution of the changing self-image of a nation embodying a surprisingly cosmopolitan sensibility, open to different cultural values and customs in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century to one that slowly adopted rigid and discriminatory racial and cultural attitudes spawned by the widespread missionary activities of the ABCFM and the fierce economic pulls and pushes of American mercantilism by the end of the nineteenth century. The different uses of India become a way of refining an American national identity."the idea of India"Herman Melvilletranscendentalismtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9gj6d81tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt40q314bq2020-07-31T12:05:52Zqt40q314bqEleanor Roosevelt in MontrealRobinson, Greg2018-01-01This article discusses First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt’s international travels during the Second World War. Mrs. Roosevelt achieved her greatest renown in the postwar period as a champion of international human rights, notably in her role as chair of the committee that drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1947–48, and later as leader in the struggle to ratify the Human Rights covenants that enforced the provisions of the Declaration. Yet ER’s later concentration on international affairs was prefigured in her experience as semiofficial diplomat in a series of wartime travels across the globe, undertaken at the request of her husband, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and in coordination with the chiefs of the host governments. It is useful to investigate how these travels provided her with an important apprenticeship in diplomacy. At the same time, her speeches and activities on these wartime trips helped shape her later support for peace and justice on an international scale.diplomacyEleanor RooseveltFirst Wifetransnational politicsMontrealCanadaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/40q314bqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6wr8p0162020-07-31T12:05:51Zqt6wr8p016Excerpt from The New Immigrant Whiteness: Race, Neoliberalism, and Post-Soviet Migration to the United StatesSadowski-Smith, Claudia2018-01-01Mapping representations of post-1980s immigration from the former Soviet Union to the United States in interviews, reality TV shows, fiction, and memoirs, Claudia Sadowski-Smith shows how this nationally and ethnically diverse group is associated with idealized accounts of the assimilation and upward mobility of early twentieth-century arrivals from Europe. As it traces the contributions of historical Eastern European migration to the emergence of a white racial identity that continues to provide privileges to many post-Soviet migrants, the book places the post-USSR diaspora into larger discussions about the racialization of contemporary US immigrants under neoliberal conditions. "The New Immigrant Whiteness" argues that legal status on arrival — as participants in refugee, marriage, labor, and adoptive migration — impacts post-Soviet immigrants’ encounters with growing socioeconomic inequalities and tightened immigration restrictions, as well as their attempts to construct transnational identities. The book examines how their perceived whiteness exposes post-Soviet family migrants to heightened expectations of assimilation, explores undocumented migration from the former Soviet Union, analyzes post-USSR immigrants’ attitudes toward anti-immigration laws that target Latina/os, and considers similarities between post-Soviet and Asian immigrants in their association with notions of upward immigrant mobility. A compelling and timely volume, "The New Immigrant Whiteness" offers a fresh perspective on race and immigration in the United States today.race and immigrationformer Soviet Union diasporawhite racial identityupward mobilitytransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6wr8p016articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5jv9n1wf2020-07-31T12:05:50Zqt5jv9n1wfExcerpt from Internment During the Second World WarPistol, Rachel2018-01-01Preview of new work in Transnational American Studies.application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5jv9n1wfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3jj8c3r82020-07-31T12:05:48Zqt3jj8c3r8Excerpt from Becoming Refugee American: The Politics of Rescue in Little SaigonNguyen, Phuong Tran2018-01-01Vietnamese refugees fleeing the fall of South Vietnam faced a paradox. The same guilt-ridden America that only reluctantly accepted them expected, and rewarded, expressions of gratitude for their rescue. Meanwhile, their status as refugees—as opposed to willing immigrants—profoundly influenced their cultural identity.Phuong Tran Nguyen examines the phenomenon of refugee nationalism among Vietnamese Americans in Southern California. Here, the residents of Little Saigon keep alive nostalgia for the old regime and, by extension, their claim to a lost statehood. Their refugee nationalism is less a refusal to assimilate than a mode of becoming, in essence, a distinct group of refugee Americans. Nguyen examines the factors that encouraged them to adopt this identity. His analysis also moves beyond the familiar rescue narrative to chart the intimate yet contentious relationship these Vietnamese Americans have with their adopted homeland. Nguyen sets their plight within the context of the Cold War, an era when Americans sought to atone for broken promises but also saw themselves as providing a sanctuary for people everywhere fleeing communism.
Publisher web page: https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/69qdw3cp9780252041358.htmlVietnam Wartransnational American studiesrefugee policiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3jj8c3r8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt73v1r8cx2020-07-31T12:05:47Zqt73v1r8cxExcerpt from Undocumented Lives: The Untold Story of Mexican MigrationMinian, Ana Raquel2018-01-01Excerptapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/73v1r8cxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt75j401pj2020-07-31T12:05:46Zqt75j401pjExcerpt from The Long Afterlife of Nikkei Wartime IncarcerationInouye, Karen M.2018-01-01The Long Afterlife of Nikkei Wartime Incarceration reexamines the history of imprisonment of U.S. and Canadian citizens of Japanese descent during World War II. Karen M. Inouye explores how historical events can linger in individual and collective memory and then crystallize in powerful moments of political engagement.Japanese American incarcerationtransnational American studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/75j401pjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7rv2b1g72020-07-31T12:05:45Zqt7rv2b1g7Forward Editor's NoteRobinson, Greg2018-01-01Framing commentary.application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7rv2b1g7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0g7944fg2020-07-31T12:05:43Zqt0g7944fgBeing True to the Trans-: The Transglobal Science Fiction of Samuel R. DelanyListe-Noya, José2018-01-01This essay begins with the recognition that science fiction, classic as well as contemporary, has always possessed a global, postnationalist imaginary, shying away from if also secretly conditioned by contemporary nationalist and imperialist scenarios. In recent critical work on SF, critics such as Fredric Jameson have persuasively argued that contemporary SF is a privileged literary mode of “cognitive mapping” of the inherently unrepresentable, technologically conditioned global economy. Samuel R. Delany’s 1984 novel, Stars in My Pockets Like Grains of Sand, dramatizes such an insight via a literally “transglobal” extrapolation of our current transnational dynamics. In the process, I suggest, the transglobal fictional world of Delany’s novel counters totalizing notions of the global and of the literal globe which is a planetary world by exposing the “plural singularity” of any and all worlds. Drawn from the work of Jean-Luc Nancy, the phrase points to the novel’s and the essay’s exploration of the juxtaposition between the notion of world and the global in order to pinpoint the paradoxical tendencies of globalization, its simultaneous opening up of the singular differences of world(s) and its homogenizing curtailment of such diversity within the enclosure of globality. Delany’s tale of desire, sexual and political, becomes a demonstration of science fiction’s straining at the boundaries of the global by tracing the postnational utopian impulse inherent to the very idea of the transnational. Samuel R. Delanyscience fictiontransglobalutopian literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0g7944fgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0443g1nq2020-07-31T12:05:42Zqt0443g1nqPostethnicity and Antiglobalization in Chicana/o Science Fiction: Ernest Hogan’s Smoking Mirror Blues, and Rosaura Sáncez and Beatrice Pita’s Lunar Braceros 2125-2148del Campo Ramírez, Elsa2018-01-01During the past decades, science fiction has evidenced an often-unacknowledged problematic brought to the forefront by advocates of alter-globalization: the future is (still) predominantly white, masculine, and globally built on indigenous exploitation. In the era of multinational capitalism, the trend towards an apparent postnationalism paradoxically risks leading towards what Lysa Rivera has described as a “Fourth World [which] promotes the ‘multiplication of frontiers and the smashing apart of nations’ and indigenous communities.”Simultaneously, the increase of ethnic transnational conflicts in a globalized world has prompted the pursuit of a utopian postethnic future that seeks social harmony but seems to be spiraling into the erosion of the American ethnic paradigm through the configuration of nonspecific and inconsistent ethnic categories, derived from the “lumping of all indigenous people into one category,” as Linda Alcoff claims.This paper aims at exploring the Chicana/o cultural and ethnic identity in the context of multinational capitalism through its articulation and dissolution in the realm of science fiction, where issues such as postethnicity and its intricate connection with corporate globalization are discussed. The study will focus on the analysis of two novels: Smoking Mirror Blues (2001), by Ernest Hogan, and one instance of what Catherine Ramírez has termed ‘Chicanafuturism,’ Lunar Braceros 2125-2148 (2009), by Rosaura Sánchez and Beatrice Pita.postethnicityglobalizationChicanafuturismexceptionalismBody Politicsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0443g1nqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0gn7h4sk2020-07-31T12:05:41Zqt0gn7h4skExotic Arabs and American Anxiety: Representations of Culinary Tourism in Diana Abu-Jaber's CrescentWhite, Mandala Camille2018-01-01In this essay, I examine the way in which Diana Abu-Jaber's novel, Crescent, presents an exoticised Arabic culture and the relationship of this to a post-9/11 American culture eclipsed by anxieties about terrorism. I am primarily concerned with the text’s representation of what I call “culinary tourism”—its characters’ attempts to access culture (and Arabic culture in particular)—through eating. Food becomes a vehicle through which the text critically explores the dialectics of a post-9/11 American exoticism: the fear of a vaguely defined Arabic or Islamic culture, on the one hand, and the potential for its strangeness to be seen as fascinating on the other. I argue that Crescent is a conflicted novel that presents an exoticised representation of culture through its depiction of food, and yet cannot seem to wholly abandon itself to its own systems of exoticism. On the one hand, as I discuss in the first half of this essay, the novel’s representations of food are a vehicle through which it critiques its characters’ engagement with stereotypes, a mode of cultural interaction which Homi Bhabha argues is always afflicted by anxiety. However, on the other hand, as I discuss in the second half of this essay, the florid language and imagery it uses in its representations of food reveal its reliance upon the same discourses of exoticism it critiques, and possession by the same kinds of anxieties about Arabic culture that afflict its characters.Culinary TourismTerrorismPost-9/11 NovelFoodArab-American FictionExoticapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0gn7h4skarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3jc9g2vb2020-07-31T12:05:40Zqt3jc9g2vbMapping the Transnational in Contemporary Native American Fiction: Silko and WelchMerish, Lori2018-01-01Revisiting the terrain of the 2012 JTAS Special Forum, “Charting Transnational Native American Studies,” this essay argues both that the transnational is a valuable, productive lens for understanding Native American literature, and that a consideration of Native American texts is indispensable to the “transnational turn” in Americanist literary scholarship. The essay argues that Native American literary texts engage the transnational in three ways: affirming “America” as transnational cultural space from its inception by staging ways Native cultures “dis-identif[y] with the nation”; affirming the transnational complexity of Native cultures; and registering Pan-Indian and indigenous transnationalisms vitally alive in the present. The essay advances these claims through readings of two recent historical novels by major Native American authors: Leslie Marmon Silko’s Gardens of the Dunes (2000), and James Welch’s The Heartsong of Charging Elk (2001). Both novels are set in the late nineteenth century, a critical period in Native American history, especially in the American West; and both novels map complex itineraries for Native American characters who travel abroad, scripting transnationalism in diasporic terms. The essay argues that Silko’s novel portrays transnational encounter as global transindigeneity, casting the transnational as a vehicle to awaken and activate feminist and especially ecofeminist transindigenous solidarities, while Welch employs the form of the transnational bildungsroman to make visible tribal processes of cultural adaptation and transnational dimensions of tribal cultures at “home.”Leslie Marmon SilkoJames WelchNative American literaturetransindigeneityecofeminismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3jc9g2vbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt597624c52020-07-31T12:05:38Zqt597624c5Anthologizing “Little Calibans”: Surplus in Junot Díaz’s Linked StoriesYork, Janet Zong2018-01-01Anthologizing stories from linked short story collections gives rise to a troubling tension. To select and curate a story in an anthology elevates it to paradigmatic status. Yet, linked collections are anti-paradigmatic: interweaving fragments, rejecting representative conventions and monolithic narratives, and producing a surplus of feeling and knowledge beyond individual stories. These qualities become obscure when reading a single story contextualized in an anthology. This tension is particularly evident with anthologization of authors like Junot Díaz, whose works are suspicious of neoliberal multiculturalism’s totalizing embrace, but whose inclusion as an ethnic, national, or world writer in different anthologies results in varied thematic framings specific to each. Juxtaposing the linked story in two settings, anthology and linked collection, expands scholarly conversations around emergent forms of transnational American literature. This article argues that linked collections preempt, primarily through formal means, the flattening and functionalizing of their stories into unified exemplars of multicultural diversity or universal experience. Examining stories from Díaz’s Drown and This is How You Lose Her alongside these same tales as framed in three Norton anthologies illustrates this possibility. Díaz develops a paradigm of surplus through stories connected by a sense of displacement. This surplus is a literary strategy that anticipates and addresses anthology curation’s effects and expectations. Rather than recuperating identity or loss to construct more unified notions of ethnicity, nation, or world, linked stories give shape to assembled fragments. They point toward a transnationalism invested in how narrative fragments of displacement and diaspora constitute an irreducible surplus. Junot DíazLittle Calibansgenre theoryapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/597624c5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8rc6c7th2020-07-31T12:05:37Zqt8rc6c7thTranslational Form in Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time BeingGullander-Drolet, Claire2018-01-01Through a close reading of the tropes of interlingual and historical translation in Ruth Ozeki’s 2013 novel, A Tale for the Time Being, this essay argues that an attention to forms of translational work has important implications for transnational American studies, particularly in reorienting the field beyond its continental US and anglocentric bounds. Taking as its primary object of inquiry the “voluminous influx” of national, racial, and linguistic ‘otherness’ that David Palumbo-Liu describes as “a distinct feature of late twentieth century and early twenty first century age of globalization,” A Tale for the Time Being highlights translation’s central (and often acknowledged) role in shaping the ways in which that otherness is negotiated across geographical and temporal meridians. My reading of the novel’s translational form is twofold. I begin by considering the import of this intervention to the field of Asian American literary studies, focusing on how Ozeki mobilizes the formal elements of interlingual translation to push back against naturalizing conceptions of Asian / American identity. I then apply this translational framework to the divergent accounts of history in the novel, and argue that—by calling attention to the fissures and gaps in these narratives—Ozeki offers a new model of empathic reading, one that draws herself and her readers together through a logic of “not knowing.”
translationtransnationalismAsian Americanhistoryempathyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8rc6c7tharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8rz911pr2020-07-31T12:05:35Zqt8rz911prSpecial Forum edited by Begoña Simal-González and José Liste NoyaSimal-González, Begoña2018-01-01Editor's Introduction by Begoña Simal-González Transnational turnapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8rz911prarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1mf6j8kf2020-07-31T12:05:35Zqt1mf6j8kfBenjamin Rush's Travels Towards PeaceBradley, David2018-01-01Commentary on Benjamin Rush.eighteenth-century abolitionBenjamin Rush biographyBenjamin Rush and slaveryapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1mf6j8kfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5zh1g7fx2020-07-31T12:05:33Zqt5zh1g7fxReprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2018-01-01Commentary on Reprise selection.Benjamin RushDavid Bradleyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5zh1g7fxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt51c2k7182020-07-31T12:05:32Zqt51c2k718Foreign Means to Local Ends: Bialik, Emerson, and the Uses of America in 1920s PalestineEvron, Nir2018-01-01In 1926, Haim Nachman Bialik, the premier poet and leading intellectual light of the Zionist movement, sailed for New York on a five-month-long fundraising mission on behalf of the yishuv, the pre-statehood Jewish settlement in Palestine. After his return, the poet gave a long speech in Tel Aviv, recounting his impressions of the United States before an audience of thousands. The America that Bialik presented to his listeners, this essay begins by arguing, should be read as tissue of widely circulating tropes and mythemes, which the poet had absorbed during his formative years in Europe as well as in the course of his 1926 tour. The essay then proceeds to discuss the uses to which the poet puts this (largely borrowed) narrative of American difference, focusing in particular on Bialik’s ambivalent response to the futural (largely Emersonian) ethos to which he returns time and again in his speech, and which he seems to simultaneously endorse and reject. The main part of the essay’s argument is devoted to making sense of this ambivalence, which I attribute to the diverging “temporal imaginaries” that underwrite Zionist and American exceptionalisms.H. N. BialikEmersonTransnational American StudiesTemporal ImaginaryZionismExceptionalismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/51c2k718articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8qn312mm2020-07-31T12:05:31Zqt8qn312mmAnticolonial Anti-Intervention: Puerto Rican Independentismo and the US ‘Anti-Intervention’ Left in Reagan-era BostonLarson, Eric D.2018-01-01Scholars of the post-1968 transnational left have increasingly criticized liberal frameworks that suggest that transnational politics fundamentally revolve around solidarity relationships between full citizens of distinct nation-states. The literature on the movements that opposed US military and political intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean in the 1970s and 1980s has also shifted to better illuminate the fundamental roles migrants, refugees, politically targeted activists, and minoritized groups have played in contesting US intervention, particularly in Central America. This article adds a layer to that discussion by examining how diasporic Puerto Rican activists helped galvanize anti-intervention movements in Boston in the 1980s. It shows how El Colectivo Puertorriqueño de Boston (the Puerto Rican Collective of Boston) developed what I call a politics of “anticolonial anti-intervention” that directly related empire “over there” to racialized colonialism in the urban US. They grappled with what it meant to live in a colonial diaspora as they helped build anti-intervention organizing in Boston. They centered the demand for Puerto Rican independence yet linked it to their resistance to US intervention elsewhere in Latin America and the Caribbean. They recalibrated independentista visions of self-rule, including through an updated version of community control, in the Reagan era. In doing so they challenged the implicitly white politics of rescue, aid, and deracialized Marxism that prevailed in much of Boston’s anti-intervention movement.anti-imperialismPuerto Riconational liberation1980sBostonraceCentral America solidarityTransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8qn312mmarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0j60s45v2020-07-31T12:05:31Zqt0j60s45v'Agrarians or anarchists?' The Venceremos Brigades to Cuba, State Surveillance, and the FBI as Biographer and ArchivistLatner, Teishan A.2018-01-01In the late 1960s, as thousands of Americans traveled to Cuba to evaluate the nation’s evolving revolutionary process, the FBI launched a surveillance campaign designed to prove that travel to the communist island by US citizens represented a threat to national security. Focusing on the FBI’s investigation of the Venceremos Brigade, a radical humanitarian organization that sent delegations of Americans to Cuba as volunteers for agricultural and construction projects, this article evaluates the FBI’s claims that Cuba was indoctrinating leftwing Americans with revolutionary theory and training them in guerrilla warfare. But while state surveillance was intended to criminalize the Venceremos Brigade in legal terms and demonize it within the popular imaginary, it failed to reveal any prosecutable evidence of criminality. Instead, the FBI’s efforts inadvertently transformed it into the group’s clandestine biographer, as agents produced a substantial archive of print material on the group. Amassing thousands of pages of surveillance, including rare pamphlets and ephemera, the FBI’s unofficial archive unexpectedly confirmed the liberatory and humanist aspirations of the Brigade. Although there is a dearth of scholarship on the Venceremos Brigade, the longest-lived Cuba solidarity organization in the world, the FBI’s files remain the most extensive archive on the group ever produced, surpassing any university’s holdings. Files on the Venceremos Brigade illustrate the manner in which counter-narratives can surface even within the body of the state’s archives on grassroots political movements, narratives that are potent enough to challenge the power of the state’s evidence deployed against them. ArchivesVenceremos BrigadesCounter Intelligence ProgramCommunismCubaFBIGlobal solidarityHavanaSurveillanceSocial Justice MovementsRaceRadicalismRevolution.application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0j60s45varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt82p0w1pn2020-07-31T12:05:30Zqt82p0w1pn'to transplant in alien soil': Race, Nation, Citizenship, and the Idea of Emigration in the Revolutionary AtlanticAlcenat, Westenley2018-01-01The emigration of African Americans to Haiti throughout the nineteenth century was influenced by the Haitian Revolution (1791–1804). Looking beyond this influence as mere legacy, this article proposes that scholars begin to interrogate the relationship that developed between African American Black Nationalists and Haitian allies. The article explores whether the emigration by African Americans to postrevolutionary Haiti during the nineteenth century was a political rejection of the US. Or was it an opportunity to explore the possibilities of democratic citizenship—the right to have rights—that only Haiti had to offer, in the hope of promoting genuine democracy in the United States, as well? Why, in spite of their insistence that they, too, were Americans, did some African Americans accept the invitation by Haitian revolutionaries to board a ship to the island republic? Black emigration, I argue, was not born of racial solidarity. Rather, it was the political consequence of racial exclusion.Haitian RevolutionAfrican American emigrationBlack emigrationblack citizenshipblack nationalismexileapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/82p0w1pnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt23h3n9w92020-07-31T12:05:29Zqt23h3n9w9Collecting Native America: John Lloyd Stephens and the Rhetorics of Archaeological ValueMucher, Christen2018-01-01 This article focuses on the representations of Maya statues made by archaeologist–explorer John Lloyd Stephens and his artistic collaborator Frederick Catherwood in the 1840s. While Stephens’s and Catherwood’s trips to Central America, Mexico, and the Yucatán were meant to provide material objects for a Pan-American museum of Native American “antiquities,” the statues themselves were never exhibited to the public. Nonetheless, the visual and literary representations of the Maya “idols” circulating across North and Central America as well as Europe incited international interest and dramatically increased similar statues’ monetary value. Stephens’s valuation of Indigenous objects as possessable historical relics rested on the transformation of Indigenous bodies into laborers and Indigenous homelands into saleable property; their representation as mystical “idols” merely concealed this transformation. What is more, the historical and monetary value of the relics collected by Stephens was eventually surpassed by their textual reproductions. These representations—rather than the artifacts or communities behind them—set a persistent pattern for the study and evaluation of Native American “culture” as demonstrated by the textual afterlives of Stephens’s work. John Lloyd StephensMaya antiquitiescollectingrelicsidolsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/23h3n9w9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt00q7x6k62020-07-31T12:05:28Zqt00q7x6k6Introduction: Transnational American Studies as Transdisciplinary CollaborationMorgan, NinaKim, Sabine2018-01-01Understanding that the transnational frame of twenty-first century scholarship in Transnational American Studies leaves behind the “national” origin of reference as an analytical tool and thus...Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/00q7x6k6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3vp338272020-07-31T12:05:27Zqt3vp33827A Word about the Journal StaffMorgan, Nina2018-01-01application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3vp33827articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 9, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8q42s58h2020-07-31T11:54:32Zqt8q42s58hAbout the ContributorsCaroline Hong, Managing Editor2017-01-01Rajender KaurColleen TrippChristopher PerreiraRobert G. LeeBryan YazellSunny YangCaroline M. RileyDaniel Lanza Riverstransnational American studiesJTASLa Floride françaiseapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8q42s58harticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7js418zn2020-07-31T11:54:31Zqt7js418znChapter Two from Global Families: A History of Asian International Adoption in America
Choy, Catherine Ceniza2017-01-01Catherine Ceniza Choy, "The Hong Kong Project: Chinese Adoption in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s," in Global Families: A History of Asian International Adoption in the United States (New York and London: New York University Press, 2013), 47-73, notes 190-95.Chinese adoption in USHong Kong Projectwar refugeesrefugee childrenadoptionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7js418znarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6nj7q64f2020-07-31T11:54:30Zqt6nj7q64fAn American in Tangier: Interview with Paul BowlesBejjit, Karim2017-01-01Karim Bejjit. "An American in Tangier: Interview with Paul Bowles." Originally published in the Moroccan Cultural Studies Journal (Spring 1999). Paul BowlesinterviewTangierAmericans in TangierKarim Bejjitapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6nj7q64farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3878w7zz2020-07-31T11:54:28Zqt3878w7zzOutside Looking In: Donna Summer's Sound of Munich and David Bowie's Berlin TrilogyAdelt, Ulrich2017-01-01Ulrich Adelt, "Outside Looking In: Donna Summer's Sound of Munich and David Bowie's Berlin Trilogy," in Krautrock: German Music in the Seventies (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2016), 129-60, 209-13.KrautrockDonna SummerDavid Bowietransnational musicGermanapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3878w7zzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4v3817x72020-07-31T11:54:27Zqt4v3817x7Reprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2017-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 8.1TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4v3817x7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0cf4j64r2020-07-31T11:54:26Zqt0cf4j64rExcerpt from Haunted by Hitler: Liberals, the Left, and the Fight against Fascism in the United StatesVials, Christopher2017-01-01Christopher Vials, Haunted by Hitler: Liberals, the Left, and the Fight against Fascism in the United States (Amherst and Boston: University of Massachusetts Press, 2017), 17-24, 239-40.historyFascism in the USanti-fascismliberalismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0cf4j64rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1zc1d1dh2020-07-31T11:54:25Zqt1zc1d1dhIntroduction to African American Travel Narratives from Abroad: Mobility and Cultural Work in the Age of Jim CrowTotten, Gary2017-01-01Gary Totten, Introduction to African American Travel Narratives from Abroad: Mobility and Cultural Work in the Age of Jim Crow (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2015), 1-15.TransnationalAmerican StudiesJim CrowAfrican American travel narrativesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1zc1d1dharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt07d4k2gz2020-07-31T11:54:23Zqt07d4k2gzExcerpt from Strange Fruit of the Black Pacific: Imperialism's Racial Justice and Its FugitivesSchleitwiler, Vince2017-01-01Vince Schleitwiler, "The Violence and the Music, April– December 1899," in Strange Fruit of the Black Pacific: Imperialism's Racial Justice and Its Fugitives (New York: New York University Press, 2017), 37-71, 264-67.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/07d4k2gzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6842g1bw2020-07-31T11:54:22Zqt6842g1bwIntroduction to Southwest Asia: The Transpacific Geographies of Chicana/o LiteratureSae-Saue, Jayson Gonzales2017-01-01Jayson Gonzales Sae-Saue, introduction to Southwest Asia: The Transpacific Geographies of Chicana/o Literature (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2016), 1–22.TransnationalAmerican StudiesTranspacificChicana/o Literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6842g1bwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7kk526zx2020-07-31T11:54:21Zqt7kk526zxExcerpt from Migrating the Black Body: The African Diaspora and Visual CultureRaiford, LeighRaphael-Hernandez, Heike2017-01-01Leigh Raiford, "The Here and Now of Eslanda Robeson's African Journey," in Migrating the Black Body: The African Diaspora and Visual Culture, edited by Leigh Raiford and Heike Raphael-Hernandez (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2017), 134-52.Eslanda RobesonAfrican JourneyBlack migrationdiasporaRaphael-Hernandezapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7kk526zxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1g83r6wf2020-07-31T11:54:21Zqt1g83r6wfExcerpt from Race and the Totalitarian Century: Geopolitics in the Black Literary ImaginationRasberry, Vaughn2017-01-01Excerpt from Vaughn Rasberry, Race and the Totalitarian Century: Geopolitics in the Black Literary Imagination (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016), 241-44.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1g83r6wfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0bb4r3ws2020-07-31T11:54:19Zqt0bb4r3wsExcerpt from Famine Irish and the American Racial StateO'Neill, Peter2017-01-01Peter O'Neill, "Black and Green Atlantic Crossings in the Famine Era," in Famine Irish and the American Racial State (New York: Routledge, 2017), 32-54.Irish faminegreen Atlanticracetransnationalismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0bb4r3wsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4k8891s92020-07-31T11:54:18Zqt4k8891s9A History That "Dares Not Speak Its Name"? Atlantic History, Global History and the Modern Atlantic SpaceMariano, Marco2017-01-01Marco Mariano, “A History That ‘Dares Not Speak Its Name’? Atlantic History, Global History and the Modern Atlantic Space,” originally published as “Lo spazio atlantico contemporaneo: una storia ‘che non osa pronunciare il suo nome’?” in the journal Passato e Presente 100 (2017).TransnationalAmerican StudiesHistoryAtlanticapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4k8891s9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6wd8d4bq2020-07-31T11:54:17Zqt6wd8d4bqIntroduction to The Limits of Westernization: A Cultural History of America in TurkeyGürel, Perin E.2017-01-01Perin E. Gürel, introduction to The Limits of Westernization: A Cultural History of America in Turkey (New York: Columbia University Press, 2017), 1–15.TransnationalAmerican StudiesWesternizationTurkeyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6wd8d4bqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2x74s4152020-07-31T11:54:16Zqt2x74s415"Introduction: The Transnational Turn, " in the Cambridge Companion to Transnational American Literature Goyal, Yogita2017-01-01Yogita Goyal, "Introduction: The Transnational Turn," in the Cambridge Companion to Transnational American Literature, ed. Yogita Goyal, 1–17 (New York and Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017).Cambridge Companion to Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2x74s415articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1936727c2020-07-31T11:54:16Zqt1936727cIntroduction to American Literature in the WorldDimock, Wai Chee2017-01-01Wai Chee Dimock, introduction to American Literature in the World: An Anthology from Anne Bradstreet to Octavia Butler, ed. Wai Chee Dimock et al. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2017), 1–18.TransnationalAmerican StudiesAmerican Literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1936727carticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8nz211zp2020-07-31T11:54:15Zqt8nz211zpBefore Nation, Beyond Nation: The Place of "Early" in Transnational American StudiesBross, KristinaStevens, Laura M.2017-01-01Kristina Bross and Laura M. Stevens, “Before Nation, Beyond Nation: The Place of ‘Early’ in Transnational American Studies,” in Obama and Transnational American Studies, ed. Alfred Hornung (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2016), 313–34.TransnationalAmerican StudiesNationEarly Americanapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8nz211zparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84d8v1352020-07-31T11:54:13Zqt84d8v135Excerpt from Environmental Justice in Contemporary US NarrativesAthanassakis, Yanoula2017-01-01Excerpt from Yanoula Athanassakis, Environmental Justice in Contemporary US Narratives (Abingdon, UK, and New York: Routledge, 2017), 1-30.TransnationalAmerican StudiesEnvironmental Justiceapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84d8v135articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8tp7v31b2020-07-31T11:54:12Zqt8tp7v31bForward Editor's NoteRobinson, Greg2017-01-01JTAS presents excerpts from forthcoming and recent monographs and journal articles in the field of Transnational American Studies.forthcoming work in transnational American StudiesAfrican American travelersantifacismecology and social justiceTurkish cultureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8tp7v31barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4282w7q42020-07-31T11:54:11Zqt4282w7q4Images of Florida in the Haitian Novel of ExileSatyre, Joubert2017-01-01This article examines how Florida is depicted in Passages (1991) by Émile Ollivier and in Cette grenade dans la main du jeune nègre est-elle une arme ou un fruit? (2002) by Dany Laferrière. The theoretical framework for this examination is “imagology,” which Jean-Marc Mourra describes as the study of the literary representation of Otherness. According to Mourra, this representation can be utopian or ideological. In the first category, Otherness is portrayed in a positive way, while in the second category, the portrayal is negative. The representation of Florida in the above novels swings between the two.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4282w7q4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7n0746bk2020-07-31T11:54:10Zqt7n0746bkQuébec French in Florida: North American Francophone Language Practices on the RoadBlondeau, Hélène2017-01-01This article explores the language practices of a group of speakers who experience a high degree of mobility and regular backand-forth contact between Francophone Canada and the US, namely Francophones speakers of Québécois origin who move in and out of South Florida. Using a case study approach, the analysis of interviews collected during fieldwork sheds light on the language practices from the point of view of both language use and language representations.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7n0746bkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5v3743mh2020-07-31T11:54:08Zqt5v3743mhA Tour de Force: Sarah Bernhardt and her 1906 Florida TourKerley, Lela F.2017-01-01This article examines the role that Sarah Bernhardt played in shaping Floridians’ vision of themselves during her 1905-1906 American tour. In spite of her suspect position as a foreigner, a Jew, and an actress, local news reports emphasized her industriousness, independence, and urbanity. This article highlights how Bernhardt’s visit coincided with a period of dramatic growth and reflected a desire of its inhabitants to break with their agrarian past in favor of a cosmopolitan identity.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5v3743mharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3fg573bx2020-07-31T11:54:07Zqt3fg573bxScience/Fiction/Politics: Jules Verne’s FloridasMathy, Jean-Philippe2017-01-01In From the
Earth to the Moon (1865), Jules Verne imagined a fictional Floridian site, a high desert plateau on which to build the gigantic space gun that would send astronauts to the moon. In North Against South (1886), the liquid, labyrinthine eco-system of the Everglades served as a backdrop to the Civil War. Both texts produced contradictory and complementary figurations of the Sunshine State, ancient and modern, arid and watery, traversed by history as well as myth.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3fg573bxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9dg698d82020-07-31T11:54:06Zqt9dg698d8Becoming Spanish in Florida: Georges Biassou and his “Family” in St. AugustineJohnson, Erica2017-01-01Historian Jane Landers has conducted extensive research on Georges Biassou and black society in Spanish Florida, and her various historical works provide most of what is known about Biassou's experiences there and the perceptions Spanish officials and Anglo American planters had of him. Alternatively, Erica Johnson approaches Biassou as a free man of color from a French colony adapting to life in a Spanish colony to further expand historical understanding of him and others like him.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9dg698d8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8v3242dj2020-07-31T11:54:05Zqt8v3242djFranco/Spanish Entanglements in Florida and the CircumatlanticLanders, Jane2017-01-01This essay analyzes the entangled histories of France and Spain in Florida and the circum-Atlantic and is based on little-utilized primary sources from Spain, Florida, the Dominican Republic and Mexico. The French and the Spaniards crossed paths, often violently, through war, piracy and revolutions, from the period when the French contested the Spanish territorial claims in the New World in the 16th century to the late 18th century when the French through Genêt, tried to revolutionize Florida. It also explores the impact of black royalists like Georges and French revolutionary leaders from Saint-Domingue in Florida. Biassou and his men fought for Spain in Florida, battling Georgia Patriots and risen Seminoles, while Luis Aury, established a short-lived Republic of the Floridas at Fernandina.TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8v3242djarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7dd8v5s52020-07-31T11:54:04Zqt7dd8v5s5“People of bad disposition”: The Failed French Colony at Fort Caroline as a Site of Local Conflict within a Transimperial SystemVitkus, Daniel2017-01-01Focusing on European colonial rivalry in Florida during the 1560s, including the massacre of French Huguenots there by Spanish forces, the article argues that our understanding of these events and of the texts that record the brief life of Fort Caroline should be situated within a broader network of imperial rivalry and religious conflict that connects Florida to Europe. It looks closely at two first-hand accounts—by René Goulaine de Laudonnière and by Nicolas Challeux.Fort CarolineFrench-Spanish conflictFrench HuguenotsTransnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7dd8v5s5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0nq6q8m62020-07-31T11:54:03Zqt0nq6q8m6Rereading the “Écriteau”: Protestant Myths, Native Alliances, and the Histories of French FloridaPollack, John H.2017-01-01The écriteaux or public signs that may have been hung around the necks of French colonists in Florida in 1565 by Menéndez de Avilés and his Spanish comrades indicate that the Spanish were motivated to destroy a “Lutheran” colony. Beginning with this Spanish “reading” of the French settlement, this essay explores the long history of understanding French Florida as an exclusively Protestant colony. This emphasis, I argue, obscures another interpretation that can be traced back to Jean Ribault and René de Laudonnière. Rather than focusing upon the colony as a Huguenot refuge, Ribault and Laudonnière, and others after them including Richard Hakluyt and Marc Lescarbot, argue instead for the colony as a “French” project built upon effective alliances with the Timucuan populations of the St. John’s River region. At the same time, Laudonnière’s account demonstrates how the French prove unable to maintain stable relations with Timucuan allies. The French failure to communicate with and comprehend their Native allies explains the colony’s demise and its destruction. Despite the power of religion and its rhetoric in the colony’s existence and aftermath, this essay argues that we cannot ignore Native power and Native rhetoric in understanding the beginnings and ends of la floride française.
TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0nq6q8m6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0989398t2020-07-31T11:54:02Zqt0989398tA Staged Encounter: French Meeting Timucua in Jacques Le Moyne de MorguesLestringant, Frank2017-01-01A quarter of a century after the destruction of the French settlements in Florida in 1565, there appeared in Frankfurt the second volume of Théodore de Bry’s Great Voyages, the Brevis Narratio of Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues that included a series of copperplates depicting the Timucua Native Americans engaged in a variety of everyday activities. Lestringant focuses on plate VIII which depicts the Timucua, in the presence of Laudonnière, prostrating themselves before the column that had been erected three years earlier by Jean Ribault and analyzes the space represented in it as a “theater,” in the sense the word often held in the sixteenth century—that is, a kind of visualization device—linking the world of the Amerindian idolaters and that of the Huguenots.application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0989398tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5kd1v51d2020-07-31T11:54:00Zqt5kd1v51dLa Floride française: Florida, France, and the Francophone WorldDupuigrenet-Desroussilles, FrançoisMcMahon, Darrin M.Munro, Martin2017-01-01Introduction to Special Forum: La Floride françaiseTransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5kd1v51darticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7pm4m6t32020-07-31T11:53:59Zqt7pm4m6t3Dangerous Playgrounds: Hemispheric Imaginaries and Domestic Insecurity in Contemporary US Tourism NarrativesRivers, Daniel Lanza2017-01-01This article explores a network of “dangerous playgrounds” narratives amid the backdrop of then President George W. Bush’s “War on Terror” and the revitalization of the “self-deportation movement” following the passage of SB1070. Tracing the journeys of young, white US American tourists traveling to Latin America to release their inhibitions, stories working in the dangerous playgrounds mode use figurations of insurrectionary violence to wed the narrative arc of the bildungsroman to the generic conventions of melodrama and horror, and so cast the Americas south of the US border as a source of danger to US American youth. By reading these narrative negotiations in relation to the legacies of US American hemispheric interventionism, post-9/11 immigration policy, and US American travel narratives, this article unpacks the ways Jessica Abel’s critically acclaimed comic La Perdida (2006) and the films Turistas (2006), Borderland (2007), The Ruins (2008), and Indigenous (2014) create slippages in meaning that project anxieties about terrorism and domestic security onto Latinx bodies and Latin American nations through figurations of imperiled white femininity. By using literary and cultural analysis to explore how popular sentiment, generic convention, and policy negotiations draw on, shape, and extend neo-Monroeist structures of feeling, this article ultimately finds that the emergence of domestic policies aimed at institutionalizing the surveillance of Latinx subjects arises in popular culture as a remarkably predictable narrative mode, which uses the conventions of adventure, melodrama, and horror to frame the nativist project of securing domestic borders and incarcerating and expelling undocumented Latinx subjects as one of the necessary compromises of a mature nation. Media StudiesImmigrationHemispheric American StudiesLa PerdidaContemporary Literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7pm4m6t3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3x68h6kb2020-07-31T11:53:58Zqt3x68h6kbInterzone’s a Riot: William S. Burroughs and Writing the Moroccan RevolutionSuver, Stacey Andrew2017-01-01Naked Lunch, Burroughs’ breakthrough work, was written in scraps and fragments and is a hallucinatory tour through a realm he calls Interzone, closely modeled on the international zone of Tangier and that corresponds with Tangier in many ways: geographically, culturally, and politically. Much of the book’s content is inspired by or a direct transcription of events he witnessed there. Burroughs developed a fascination with Morocco’s anticolonial revolution and the violence surrounding the movement for independence. Scenes in Naked Lunch involving Islam Inc. and lengthy descriptions of Interzone’s political factions serve as satirical representations of the revolutionary organizations operating inside Morocco during the writing of the novel, many of which had a tendency to fight each other as often as they fought the French. With the publication of Naked Lunch in 1958, William S. Burroughs expressed both his admiration for the transformative potential of revolutionary violence and his dismay that this potential went unrealized in Morocco.William BurroughsNaked LunchRed Night TrilogyTangierInternational ZoneColonialismRevolutionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3x68h6kbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1123r99s2020-07-31T11:53:57Zqt1123r99s"Strengthen the Bonds": The United States on Display in 1938 FranceRiley, Caroline M.2017-01-01In 1938, curators from the Museum of Modern Art installed their first international exhibition, Three Centuries of American Art, in Paris. This article examines the powerful role that museums played in constructing national art-historical narratives during the 1930s. It argues that the intertwining of art, political diplomacy, and canon formation uncovered by an analysis of the exhibition reveals American art’s unique role in supporting shared 1930s cultural ideologies. It questions how Three Centuries of American Art located and presented the heterogeneity of American culture in the 1930s to an international audience grappling with political instability. MoMA’s curators created the most comprehensive exhibition to date of the history of American art with works from 1590 through 1938, and with over five hundred architectural models, drawings, films, paintings, photographs, prints, sculptures, and vernacular artworks. It argues that each of these successive actions—borrowing, display, canonization, publication, and reception—vested this artwork with additional, and at times, contradictory meanings that problematize our understanding of not just this exhibition’s artworks but also other exhibitions that create histories of American art. With World War II on the horizon, these artworks took on new meaning as the embodiment of the United States.internationalizing American art1930s material cultureMuseum of Modern ArtThree Centuries of American Artapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1123r99sarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2135q8gx2020-07-31T11:53:56Zqt2135q8gxFictions and Frictions of the "Panama Roughneck": Literary Depictions of White, US Labor in the Canal ZoneYang, Sunny2017-01-01This essay expands the critical conversation on race, labor, and literature in the Panama Canal Zone by foregrounding the portrayal of white, U.S. workers in two popular texts, Harry A. Franck’s Zone Policeman (1913) and John Hall’s Panama Roughneck Ballads (1912). While existing scholarship has detailed the legal and economic policies that shaped the United States’ racialized form of labor management, the “gold and silver system,” in the Zone, it has largely ignored the literary discourse that emerged in response to the system’s incongruous values. This essay argues that literary depictions of white, American canal workers as hyper-masculine and hyper-productive “Panama roughnecks” rhetorically rationalized the gold and silver system’s privileging of white, US workers, while also producing narratives that destabilized its hierarchies of race, nationality, and skill set. These narratives also engendered new forms of identification that evaded or reimagined normative American understandings of race, genealogy, and national affiliation.panama canal zoneUS empireraceroughneckgold and silver systemapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2135q8gxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5tb6b3g02020-07-31T11:53:54Zqt5tb6b3g0Governable Travelers: International Comparison in American Tramp EthnographyYazell, Bryan2017-01-01Near the end of the nineteenth century, the “tramp” embodied the most extreme aspects of the boom-and-bust economy in the US. More than any other writer of his day, the ethnographer Josiah Flynt assisted both the public and government officials in visualizing the lives of tramps with the intent of rehabilitating this population. The key text in this effort, Flynt’s Tramping with Tramps (1899) hinges on a comparison between US and European vagrancy. For reform-minded authors like Flynt, tramping in Europe provides a point of comparison for evaluating key areas of concern in the US—namely, the problem of idleness among sectors of the American population. The depiction of tramping abroad in Flynt’s work—as well as in accounts by writers like Mark Twain—ultimately reflects the international nexus shaping both the discourse surrounding vagrancy as well as antitramp legislation. vagrancy laws19th-century antitramp legislationJosiah FlyntTramping with TrampsMark TwainA Tramp Abroadapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5tb6b3g0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4ws0q6312020-07-31T11:53:54Zqt4ws0q631Red Turbans in the Trinity Alps: Violence, Popular Religion, and Diasporic Memory in Nineteenth-Century Chinese AmericaLee, Robert G.2017-01-01This article shows how social violence among Chinese in the mining districts of California during the 1850s was an extension of the Red Turban Rebellion and subsequent ethnic civil war between “local” and “guest peoples” in the Pearl River Delta of South China. In that context, I read a popular religious text, a secret society manual, and temple carvings to argue that Chinese workingmen in the Gold Rush imagined a moral economy that enabled the construction of a heroic diasporic identity.Chinese AmericansworkingmenRed Turban RebellionCaliforniadiasporapopular religionsites of memoryapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4ws0q631articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3mp7p2dv2020-07-31T11:53:53Zqt3mp7p2dv“Suppose for a moment, that Keanu had reasoned thus”: Contagious Debts and Prisoner–Patient Consent in Nineteenth-Century Hawai‘iPerreira, Christopher2017-01-01This article considers the 1884 criminal case and medical archive of Keanu, a Native Hawaiian prisoner sentenced to death in the Hawaiian courts for murder. Keanu’s sentence was commuted to “life in prison” after he consented to experimental leprosy (Hansen’s disease) inoculations. The article examines the tensions between Keanu’s prisoner–patient value and US imperialism as a discourse of social debt in nineteenth-century Hawai‘i. It argues that the figure of the prisoner–patient raises broad questions about the historical function of racialization, criminalization, and disease across medical discourse at that time. More specifically, it interrogates how those discourses were constructed around the figure of Keanu and reveals a transformation in his status from devalued social death to that of valuable social debt.prisoner–patientsHawai'iNineteenth Century Transnational MedicineLeprosyEmpireapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3mp7p2dvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5k00f4gh2020-07-31T11:53:52Zqt5k00f4ghBeyond the Black Atlantic: Pacific Rebellions and the Gothic in Herman Melville’s “Benito Cereno”Tripp, Colleen2017-01-01While previous investigations of the black-white racial dichotomy in Herman Melville’s “Benito Cereno” have taught us an incalculable amount, paying attention to the complex modalities of Orientalism, rebellion, and transpacific migration in the novella makes even more relevant previous analyses of the story’s engagement with transatlantic slavery and the Haitian Revolution in a global arena. This study proposes that Melville’s narrative of a transatlantic slave mutiny—punctuated by phantom Orientalist references to East Asia and the South Pacific—suggests the indispensable role that the Atlantic revolutions played in framing European and American imaginings of East Asia and the South Pacific. Melville’s employment of the gothic as an expression of incipient racial and cosmopolitan anxieties, along with his unique adaptation of the travelogue’s “prolonged promise” and temporality, expresses East Asia and the South Pacific as a foreboding source of racial alterity and links his East Asian–Pacific and African populations through an Orientalist frame. Conversely, Melville’s comparative juxtapositions of West African slaves and villainous Malay characters—figures associated in the antebellum US with Muslim origins—craft an alternative, cross-Islamic community identification for imperial resistance in his “strange history” of the Pacific. While postcolonial critics positively read Melville’s pluralistic collectivity in Moby Dick, Melville’s rebellious Malay phantoms in “Benito Cereno” and Moby Dick betray moments of Islamic racialism and the problems of a republic built on slavery and the imperialism of the Asia Pacific, as seen in the Philippine–American War and other future imperial endeavors of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Race and Ethnic Studiesantebellum American literatureAmerican empireAsia Pacific Historiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5k00f4gharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt78w3x5532020-07-31T11:53:51Zqt78w3x553The Curious Case of Sick Keesar: Tracing the Roots of South Asian Presence in the Early RepublicKaur, Rajender2017-01-01This article is part of a larger monograph on India in the American imaginary that seeks to trace Indo-American interactions as mediated by the triangulated relationship between India, Britain, and the US. In this article I perform a symptomatic reading of a petition for redress by a Bengali lascar, Sick Keesar, to Benjamin Franklin in 1785. Whilst most scholarship on lascars and their integral role in the transoceanic trade in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries has focused on Britain and Europe, Keesar’s petition illumines South Asian histories of mobility and labor formations forged against global networks of colonial capital and a maritime economy in the little-known context of the United States in the Early Republic. Read in conjunction with the many advertisements for runaway “East Indian” slaves found in newspapers of the times, Keesar’s petition presents an alternative genealogy of South Asian presence in America dating back to the colonial era. The petition sheds light on the unacknowledged and little-known presence and contributions of early South Asian settlers, as indentured servants, slaves, and lascars, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Mapping this hitherto little-known history not only radically reshapes the history of South Asian presence in America, but also illumines a tumultuous period in the making of the American nation that, as yet, was just beginning to define itself and how it related to its racial others.South Asian AmericalascarsEarly RepublicPetitionSouth Asian AmericaIndiaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/78w3x553articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7xb153vv2020-07-31T11:53:50Zqt7xb153vvIntroduction: Transnational American Studies in the "Age of Trump"Kim, SabineRobinson, Greg2017-01-01Introduction by issue editors.This issue represents our journal’s first appearance after the onset of what multiple Americanists have referred to, and not in overly positive fashion, as the “Age of Trump.” A central theme of Trump administration discourse is its strident defense of physical borders manifested in harshly exclusionary policies, most notably the administration’s abandoning of the existing DACA program, as well as fostering increased visibility of white nationalist groups and openly racist discourse. At the same time, the White House, led by the president, has distinguished itself by its nationalist attacks on international trade and multilateral diplomacy. As scholars of American Studies based outside the United States, we both feel a special responsibility to make use of our position to investigate and discuss the larger forces at play here. One thing that larger transnational approaches can help reveal is the complex interface between national identity, domestic politics, and state policy, especially in regard to international relations.Age of Trumpbordersanti-immigration policiesborderlandsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7xb153vvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4770c5k82020-07-31T11:53:50Zqt4770c5k8Note from the Editor-in-ChiefMorgan, Nina2017-01-01Introduction by JTAS's new Editor-in-Chiefapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4770c5k8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 8, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7cb7x4df2020-07-30T21:38:03Zqt7cb7x4dfAbout the ContributorsSabine Kim, Managing Editor2019-01-01application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7cb7x4dfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt94p6n85s2020-07-30T21:38:02Zqt94p6n85s“Lost in Translation? Transnational American Rock Music of the Sixties and its Misreading in 1980s China”Teng Jimeng, .2019-01-01Excerpt from The Power of Culture: Encounters between China and the United States, edited by Priscilla Robertsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/94p6n85sarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt15n2v9c12020-07-30T21:38:01Zqt15n2v9c1“Blockbuster Dreams: Chimericanization in American Dreams in China and Finding Mr. Right”Ford, Stacilee2019-01-01Excerpt from The Power of Culture: Encounters between China and the United States, edited by Priscilla Robertsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/15n2v9c1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9tb881382020-07-30T21:38:00Zqt9tb88138“Locating Shirley Geok-lin Lim: An Interview by Nina Morgan”Morgan, Nina2019-01-01Excerpt from Asian American Writing: The Diasporic Imagination, Vol. 1 Interviews and Essays, edited by Somdatta Mandalapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9tb88138articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1vj9j1rz2020-07-30T21:38:00Zqt1vj9j1rz“Connecting a Different Reading Public: Compiling 美国文学大辞典"Yu Jianhua, .2019-01-01Excerpt from 美国文学大辞典 (A Companion to American Literature), edited by Yu Jianhuaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1vj9j1rzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4gb747w32020-07-30T21:37:59Zqt4gb747w3Reprise Editor's NoteLai-Henderson, Selina2019-01-01Introductionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4gb747w3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt48s1r7g92020-07-30T21:37:58Zqt48s1r7g9“Oceania as Peril and Promise: Towards a Worlded Vision of Transpacific Ecopoetics”Wilson, Rob2019-01-01Excerpt from Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistempologies, and Transpacific American Studies, edited by Yuan Shu, Otto Heim, and Kendall Johnsonapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/48s1r7g9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3xp8s2z02020-07-30T21:37:56Zqt3xp8s2z0“Introduction: Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistempologies, and Transpacific American Studies”Shu, Yuan2019-01-01Excerpt from Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistempologies, and Transpacific American Studies, edited by Yuan Shu, Otto Heim, and Kendall Johnsonapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3xp8s2z0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5sn6b8322020-07-30T21:37:55Zqt5sn6b832“The View from Home: Dreams of Chinese Railroad Workers across the Pacific”Zhang Guoxiong, .Hsu, Roland2019-01-01Excerpt from The Chinese and the Iron Road: Building the Transcontinental Railroad, edited by Gordon H. Chang and Shelley Fisher Fishkin, with Hilton Obenzinger and Roland Hsuapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5sn6b832articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3km2v5dc2020-07-30T21:37:54Zqt3km2v5dcIntroduction to The Chinese and the Iron RoadChang, Gordon H.Fishkin, Shelley FisherObernzinger, Hilton2019-01-01Excerpt from The Chinese and the Iron Road: Building the Transcontinental Railroad, edited by Gordon H. Chang and Shelley Fisher Fishkin, with Hilton Obenzinger and Roland Hsuapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3km2v5dcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9xz8z5372020-07-30T21:37:53Zqt9xz8z537Introduction to Performing America AbroadLippert, Leopold2019-01-01Excerpt from Performing America Abroad: Transnational Cultural Politics in the Age of Neoliberal Capitalism
application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9xz8z537articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5543q8fz2020-07-30T21:37:53Zqt5543q8fz“Colonial Problems, Transnational American Studies”Herlihy-Mera, Jeffrey2019-01-01Excerpt from After American Studies: Rethinking Legacies of Transnational Exceptionalism
application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5543q8fzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1t31h4xw2020-07-30T21:37:52Zqt1t31h4xw“A Kaleidoscope of Color or the Agony of Race? Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father”Banerjee, Mita2019-01-01Excerpt from Developing Transnational American Studies, edited by Nadja Gernalzick and Heike C. Spickermannapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1t31h4xwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5bb3k0f52020-07-30T21:37:51Zqt5bb3k0f5"Laws of Forgiveness: Obama, Mandela, Derrida"Morgan, Nina2019-01-01Excerpt from Routledge Companion to Transnational American Studies, edited by Nina Morgan, Alfred Hornung, and Takayuki Tatsumiapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5bb3k0f5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4zp047p72020-07-30T21:37:50Zqt4zp047p7Post-Apocalyptic Geographies and Structural AppropriationHsu, Hsuan L.Yazell, Bryan2019-01-01Excerpt from Routledge Companion to Transnational American Studies, edited by Nina Morgan, Alfred Hornung, and Takayuki Tatsumiapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4zp047p7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8bx9m29t2020-07-30T21:37:48Zqt8bx9m29tForward Editor's NoteReimer, Jennifer2019-01-01application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8bx9m29tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt47t0j33k2020-07-30T21:37:48Zqt47t0j33k“The Barbary Frontier and Transnational Allegories of Freedom”Bejjit, Karim2019-01-01Excerpt from Routledge Companion to Transnational American Studies, edited by Nina Morgan, Alfred Hornung, and Takayuki Tatsumiapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/47t0j33karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt41c223552020-07-30T21:37:46Zqt41c22355The Construction of Race and Space in Thomas Dooley’s Writings: “What kind of place was Laos?”Sisavath, Davorn2019-01-01This article examines narratives on Laos published between the Geneva Agreements of 1954 and 1962 because this period saw the most aid workers, missionaries, diplomats, journalists, and educators in Laos, and provided Americans the most detailed knowledge of the country. Attentive to imperialist ideology and close readings of Thomas Dooley’s nonfiction account of his humanitarian journey in The Edge of Tomorrow and The Night They Burned the Mountain, I analyze the languages and tropes that enabled Dooley to conceive of Laos and Laotians as stagnant, backward and without progress, characteristics that allegedly would make them more susceptible to communism. In particular, I read Dooley’s nonfiction novels as an imperial discourse that racializes Laos’ landscape as “empty land,” which I suggest contributed to America’s eventual treatment of Laos as a military wasteland during the US air war from 1964 to 1973. Situating my work in transnational American studies, ethnic studies and cultural studies, I offer a critical analysis of Dooley’s construction of race and space in Laos, which I argue can reveal another form of America’s racial knowledge of Asia(ns) that reinforced US intervention in the region.LaosThomas DooleyImperialismCold WarSoutheast AsiaRace and SpaceImperial discourseapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/41c22355articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5mx9n1992020-07-30T21:37:45Zqt5mx9n199Between Duty and Romance: The Attraction of Sounding “Black” in ParisWilson, Anndretta Lyle2019-01-01The histories of Black Americans who significantly influenced French life and culture in Paris are hardly marked or visible across the most frequented tourist destinations or within state-sponsored museums dedicated to national history. Instead, certain tourist-oriented live performances constitute audible monuments to Black soldiers and musicians. Audible monuments are sound objects constructed through live orature, collective participation, or sound-producing movements that recall history and memory for the purpose of witness engagement or tourist consumption. Toward a critical analysis grounded in performance studies theory this essay first replays and reinterprets the music and military histories shared between African-descended US soldiers and the nation of France as a gendered and misaligned romance, and then suggests how performance events like the tours of “Black Paris” can rehearse that romance and then rupture it by a contemporary African presence. TourismPerformance StudiesBlack PerformanceMilitary and TransnationalismOralityapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5mx9n199articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7hp561nv2020-07-30T21:37:44Zqt7hp561nvCurrents of Progress, Toy Store for Tourists: Nineteenth-Century Mexican Liberals View the Niagara FallsHaas, Astrid2019-01-01The essay addresses the depiction of the Niagara Falls as an ambivalent symbol of progress in nineteenth-century Mexican travel accounts of the United States. At that time, various Mexican intellectuals spent some time in the USA. In diaries and travelogues, some of them articulated their views of their host country but also reflected on their own society through the contrast with their northern neighbor. The Mexican visitors expressed a particular fascination with signs of modernity in the United States. Interestingly, such signifiers included not only political and social institutions and economic and industrial advancements, but also the Niagara Falls as a site of both natural and technological wonders. Examining the depiction of the Falls in major nineteenth-century Mexican travelogues of the United States, the essay illuminates some of the metaphorical “uses of nature” for articulating socio-political ideas as well as experiences of mobility.Niagaratravel writingMexican travelersUnited Statesnineteenth centuryapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7hp561nvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2dh2g8m92020-07-30T21:37:43Zqt2dh2g8m9Five New Poems (with Commentary by Nina Morgan)Lim, Shirley Geok-lin2019-01-01Published for the first time in the Journal of Transnational American Studies, these new poems by Shirley Geok-lin Lim are accompanied by a commentary by JTAS's Editor-in-Chief, Nina Morgan.New poems by Shirley Geok-Lin Limapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2dh2g8m9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0ft3g4242020-07-30T21:37:42Zqt0ft3g424Embracing the Angel: Reading Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s Hong Kong Poetry with Hannah Arendt’s The Human ConditionChang, Joan Chiung-huei2019-01-01In 1999, after having moved to America for nearly thirty years, Chinese Malaysian poet and scholar Shirley Geok-lin Lim began her sojourn in Hong Kong. In addition to being a research professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Lim has been accepting invitations to teach at the University of Hong Kong and the City University of Hong Kong as chair professor or writer-in-residence for almost twenty years, and has published several collections of poetry in and about Hong Kong. This paper analyzes Shirley Lim’s Embracing the Angel: Hong Kong Poems, a poetry collection inspired by the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, 2014. The major issues for discussion include: 1) how Hong Kong is under the shadow of Chinese culture and hegemony; 2) how Hong Kong has been striving for democracy and freedom after the Handover; and 3) how literature enacts to construct history and authorize hope. Similar to college students who have adopted the Umbrella Movement as their “space of appearance” (in Hannah Arendt’s term) for the ideal of democracy, Lim published Embracing the Angel as her “space of appearance” to offer support and indicate hope for Hong Kong.Shirley Geok-lin LimEmbracing the AngelHannah ArendtThe Human ConditionHong Kongpoetrystudents’ movementUmbrella Movementcivil disobedience campaignspace of appearanceapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0ft3g424articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1fp3n0772020-07-30T21:37:41Zqt1fp3n077Past Spaces and Revisits in Transnational Poetry: The Sojourning Returnee of Shirley Geok-Lin Lim’s Do You Live In?Wagner, Tamara S.2019-01-01This essay explores the shifting vantage-point of a temporary returnee and an observant sojourner in the poetry of Shirley Geok-Lin Lim. Situating Lim’s recent collection, Do You Live In? (2015) both in the context of her renewed migrations to different places in Asia and within a widening transnational project of reconceptualizing traditional dichotomies of the diasporic, a critical discussion of her latest poetry enables us to trace how reflections on memory and place in a world of growing global change and exchanges can contribute to an awareness of the everyday experiences of the transnational. The lyric form allows Lim to express the emotional experience of the moment, and the collection as a whole consequently produces a juxtaposition of divergent emotions: snapshots of returns and the reordering of memory. While the bounded self is located in what Lim terms a “place of nomadism,” the heteroglossia of individual lyrics expresses the multiplicity of influences and their re-appropriation. In her seemingly most localized poems, personal memories encounter – and rip apart – heritage nostalgia to engage self-consciously with transnational experience.LimShirley Geok-linSoutheast Asia in literaturePostcolonial poetryTransnationalism in literaturePeranakans in literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1fp3n077articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0hb428162020-07-30T21:37:41Zqt0hb42816The Familial Grotesque in the Poetry of Shirley Geok-lin LimNg, Andrew Hock Soon2019-01-01Framing the representation of the family in Shirley Lim’s poetry against the concept of the grotesque, this essay aims to demonstrate how the aesthetic category is arguably enlisted as a symbol referring to the trope – or more accurately, with particular members of the family– in order to mount a criticism against it, or less directly, the Confucian, male-biased symbolic order that underscores it. That the maternal-figure is most often transfigured as a grotesque embodiment in Lim’s poems is telling in its implication of the poet’s own ambivalent feelings towards her own mother whom she recognizes as a woman who illustrates empowering individualism but also reprehensibility. As such, while some of her poems express affirmation of the grotesque’s capacity for transgressing ideological borders and confusing distinctions, others are less celebratory of the concept, which they evoke explicitly to clarify the family’s monstrous dimensions. Shirley Geok-lin Limpoetrythe grotesquefamilysymbolembodimentempowermenttraditionambiguitymaternal figuretransgressionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0hb42816articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt26k1t5dz2020-07-30T21:37:39Zqt26k1t5dzPatriarchal Authority and the Southeast Asian Chinese Diaspora in Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s Passports and Other LivesLim, Walter S. H.2019-01-01In Anglophone diasporic Chinese literature, father figures represent forms of authority that both daughters and sons need to grapple with to find answers to questions of identity. In this literature, paternal figures may be marginalized to thematize mother-daughter relationships and identify mothers as an important source of cultural transmission and empowerment. Or they may be viewed as the ancestors of a new diasporic community in a new land. Fathers could also be authoritarian, embodying patriarchal and masculinist authority. Or they could represent the difficulties of assimilation under diasporic conditions.In her memoir Among the White Moon Faces (1996), Shirley Geok-lin Lim gives her reader an account of the significance of her father in her life, especially after her mother left the family when she was still very young. Left with the father as her sole parent, Lim has a problematic relationship with him, a man who is susceptible to severe rages and capable of physical violence. When she travelled to the United States for further studies, she did so without the accompanying presence of her father. Lim’s immigrant experience in America is realized through the abjection of paternal authority.The significance of the father to the writing of the immigrant and diasporic experience is elaborated on in the poems selected for publication in Passports and Other Lives (2011). Lim’s poems make clear that even though this father did not join his daughter in her journey to America, he continues to haunt her life in a foreign land through dreams, photographs, and the persistence of memory. Enabling the daughter’s remembrance of her birth country, the haunting presence of paternal authority facilitates literary meditation on the construction of diasporic identity predicated on the tension-filled negotiations between past and present, between remembering and forgetting. Shirley LimSoutheast AsiaMalaysiaChinaPeranakandiasporaexilememoryfamilyfatherapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/26k1t5dzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5cd058rv2020-07-30T21:37:38Zqt5cd058rvJuncos, Sparrows, and Crows in the Transnational Poetry of Shirley Geok-lin LimNewton, Pauline T.2019-01-01This essay explores Lim’s efforts to express and encourage inclusivity through the agency of her poetic imagination. As Lim renavigates the Pacific and other terrain and writes, she strives for a “utopian goal,” or to “voice authenticity as a signified.” Her poems advocate self-empowerment so that her nestlings can find their way in a world full of individuals of every race, creed, and gender. Lim shapes her poems to recognize the exhausting, long-term efforts a traveler or migrant must make as he or she wanders; a journey is not always finite, circular, or linear. To propel her inclusivity efforts, Lim often draws on imagery, not just of birds, but also of political movements in Hong Kong and elsewhere, natural disasters such as wildfires, or even a sunshine-filled Californian moment. She crafts her form to share her advocacy via haiku, alphabet, and prose poems. The intersections of her form, poetic imagination, and transnational crisscrossings reveal the painstaking ways in which a crosshatched identity develops and emerges over a lifetime. This article offers a bird’s eye view of some of Lim’s recent poems, mostly published after 2014, including her “Cassandra Days: Poems,” as well as works from Ars Poetica for the Day, Do You Live In?, and The Irreversible Sun, not to mention an unearthed and unpublished interview from 1985.Shirley Geok-lin LimtransnationalismPauline T. Newtonagencydiversity and inclusiontransnational poetrymulticultural poetryHong Kong extradition billHong Kong protestsCassandracross-hatched identityalphabet poemsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5cd058rvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt258003902020-07-30T21:37:38Zqt25800390'My Father’s Daughter': Filial Dislocation in Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s PoetryChin, Grace V. S.2019-01-01Drawing on the father figure and the father–daughter dynamic in Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s poetry, this article examines how the motif of filial dislocation underlines ambivalent and complicated emotions and meanings that can be traced back to the poet’s traumatic childhood experience of her father’s violence. This experience, described here as one of acute psychical and emotional rupture and dislocation, has been imprinted onto Lim’s body and consciousness in the form of embodied memories and emotions, and reenacted in writing and poetic articulation where the father figure is concerned. Through the recurring themes of memory, (dis)connection, distance, and dislocation, Lim’s deeply personal, even autobiographical, poems explore the wounded father–daughter relationship; in so doing, they trouble the ideological premise of filial piety as a cultural concept, which upholds the child’s obligation to the parent through the performance of filial care, respect, and obedience. At the same time, Lim’s poems reflect how embodied memories and emotions are relived and refelt in the process of writing as well as the depth of the poet’s emotional response and subjective interiority in the articulation and performance of filial and gender identity. Weaving through and traversing interior and exterior spaces and landscapes of memory and imagination, body and geography, the poems illuminate complex psychological, emotional, and embodied dimensions of Lim’s mediation of her filial and gender identity as a feminist poet, a daughter, and a gendered individual.Shirley Geok-lin LimMalaysian poetry in Englishdiasporafilial pietyChinese culture and genderemotion in poetrydislocationembodied memoryidentity performanceapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/25800390articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2gz0833f2020-07-30T21:37:37Zqt2gz0833f'cultivated, / Wild, exotic': Nationalism and Internationalism in the Poetry of Shirley Geok-lin LimHaskell, Dennis2019-01-01Born in multicultural Malacca during British rule, educated there and later in Kuala Lumpur and Boston, a long-time resident of the USA and a visiting professor to many countries, Shirley Geok-lin Lim seems a transnational writer par excellence. Yet much of her later work involves looking back to Malacca, “at a loss here, / Loosening my grip on yesterday,” afraid of losing “[s]hades of father and mother.” She is the author of poems, short stories, novels and a memoir, as well as literary and social criticism. The memoir, Among the White Moon Faces, is subtitled, “An Asian-American Memoir of Homelands,” and the plural noun is notable. Concentrating on her poetry, this paper charts her shifting sense of identity as Malaccan, Malaysian, American and as a woman of Chinese heritage whose language is English, through “[s]peech which is sufficient enterprise,” even though in these late poems she can feel “unmoored” and sense “the gravity / of the unmade I.”Shirley Geok-lin LimPoetry and IdentityPoetry and NationalismPoetry and InternationalismSouth East Asian LiteratureMalaysian LiteratureTransnational Literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2gz0833farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9gb6898k2020-07-30T21:37:36Zqt9gb6898k'The Art of Being Home': Home and Travel in Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s PoetryBoey, Kim Cheng2019-01-01"'The Art of Being Home': Home and Travel in Shirley Geok-lin Lim's Poetry" is an exploration of Shirley Geok-lin Lim’s poetics of travel and home anchored in a narrative tracking a day spent with the poet. It is a sequel to “Walking between Land and Water,” an essay published in Asiatic, in which I combine a personal encounter with the poet with an examination of the tropes of walking and liminality in her work. Here the focus is more on the motif and theme of home in the poet’s work, as the essay excavates the complexities and ambiguities of the meaning of home, from her first collection to recently published poems. This essay identifies the shifts in the poet’s idea of where and what home is, and examines how it forms a counterpoint to the poetics of travel and transnational mobility that informs her work. So far, critical attention has been more on her relationship with Malacca, her place of origin, than on her self-mappings in her adopted hometown of Santa Barbara. The essay gives a portrait of the poet at home, and highlights the increasing importance of Santa Barbara in her poetry. Shirley Geok-lin LimAsian-AmericandiasporapoetryhometravelMalaysian poetryapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9gb6898karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8hp845kz2020-07-30T21:37:35Zqt8hp845kzIssue Editors' Introduction: Shifting LandscapesMorgan, NinaFishkin, Shelley Fisher2019-01-01application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8hp845kzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3jz853hc2020-07-30T21:37:35Zqt3jz853hcTo Honor the Poet: A Festschrift for Shirley Geok-lin LimQuayum, Mohammad A.2019-01-01Editor's IntroductionShirley Geok-lin LimChinese Hokkien-Peranakanpoetryuprootednessliminalitynomadismnationalismtransnationalismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3jz853hcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9wz8w1nk2020-07-30T19:18:00Zqt9wz8w1nkAbout the ContributorsCaroline Hong, Managing Editor2016-01-01Contributors for JTAS 7.1application/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9wz8w1nkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt64v9w7r92020-07-30T19:17:57Zqt64v9w7r9From Baldwin’s Paris to Benjamin’s: The Architectonics of Race and Sexuality in Giovanni’s RoomZaborowska, Magdalena J.2016-01-01Originally published in Architectural Theory Review 10, no. 1 (2005): 44–63.TransnationalAmerican StudiesJames BaldwinWalter BenjaminParisArchitectureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/64v9w7r9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0s11w0xw2020-07-30T19:17:55Zqt0s11w0xwThe 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and FireLeikam, Susanne2016-01-01Originally published in Susanne Leikam, Framing Spaces in Motion: Tracing Visualizations of Earthquakes into Twentieth-Century San Francisco (Heidelberg, DE: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2015).TransnationalAmerican StudiesSan FranciscoEarthquakeDisasterapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0s11w0xwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt55z5v20k2020-07-30T19:17:53Zqt55z5v20kAdaptation Studies and American Studies: InterfacesBalestrini, Nassim W.2016-01-01Originally published in Adaptation and American Studies: Perspectives on Research and Teaching, ed. Nassim Winnie Balestrini (Heidelberg, DE: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2011).TransnationalAmerican StudiesAdaptationapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/55z5v20karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0p19r8qj2020-07-30T19:17:52Zqt0p19r8qjReprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2016-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 7.1TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0p19r8qjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8kj4w2x72020-07-30T19:17:50Zqt8kj4w2x7Old Masters’ Madonnas in “New World” Photographs: Instances and Impact of Interpictoriality in Lewis W. Hine’s PhotographySzlezák, Klara Stephanie2016-01-01This article proposes to investigate the degree and manner in which American photographer Lewis W. Hine in his works of the early twentieth century drew on previous artworks originating outside the United States. Many of Lewis Hine’s photographs, as the analysis of three selected case studies shows, make clear implicit and/or explicit interpictorial references. More specifically, the article focuses on the usage of the Madonna motif in selected Renaissance paintings, in photographs by nineteenth-century British photographer Julia Margaret Cameron, and in photographs by Hine. In these pictures, taken in such diverse contexts as Ellis Island, New York City tenements, and post–World War I Europe, Hine ventures beyond the representation of his actual photographic subjects, women and children, thereby expanding his photographic repertoire as well as the pictures’ meanings: by referring more or less overtly to other artworks and art forms, Hine adds not only to the appeal, the implications, and thus the effectiveness of his pictures (in the context of social documentary), he also redefines and repositions himself as a photographer between the two presumably opposite poles of social documentary and art photography.TransnationalAmerican StudiesPhotographyIconographyMadonna MotifInterpictorialityLewis W. HineJulia Margaret Cameronapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8kj4w2x7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2c13m4vk2020-07-30T19:17:48Zqt2c13m4vkThe Transnational Artists Yun-Fei Ji, Hung Liu, and Zhang Hongtu: Globalization, Hybridity, and Political CritiqueBrodsky, Joyce2016-01-01This essay examines the work of three artists, Yun-Fei Ji, Hung Liu, and Zhang Hongtu, all of whom emigrated from China to the US in the 1980s. Brodsky examines what effects the move to the US has had on their creative practices, as well as their connections to China—Ji has recently returned, Zhang has a studio there, and Liu’s painting content is rooted in Chinese subjects. Brodsky is primarily interested in the impacts of transnationalism, globalization, and the issues surrounding hybridity on the ways in which these artists construct their works. She is also attentive to the manner in which all three artists utilize artworks as forms of political critique that are related to local and global concerns. These practices have been partially enabled by their transnational lives in the US. Through examining the earlier artworks of these three artists, the changes observed in their more recent works will help to clarify the impact of immigration to the US on their lives and on their creative production.TransnationalAmerican StudiesGlobalizationHybridityPolitical CritiqueYun-Fei JiHung LiuZhang Hongtuapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2c13m4vkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1r45m1dq2020-07-30T19:17:46Zqt1r45m1dqFeminist Novels in a "Non-Feminist" Age: Pearl S. Buck on Asian and American WomenShaffer, Robert2016-01-01Nobel Prize–winning author Pearl S. Buck articulated a feminist sensibility in her best-selling novels and short stories from the 1930s to the 1960s about Asian and American women, showing both victimization and strength. This study demonstrates that Buck and her colleagues—female reviewers, readers, and other authors—in these non-feminist years not only helped keep a feminist perspective in the public eye but helped set the stage for the feminist revival of the 1960s. Moreover, Buck used her experiences growing up in China and her credibility in the US as an expert on Asia, not to bolster a sense of superiority among Americans with regard to others, but to show similarities in the social conditions of Asian and American women—an outlook that Shaffer calls “critical internationalism.” Moreover, as her career developed, Buck increasingly portrayed the strength of Asian women in their societies, even when relegated to the “private sphere.” This essay explores what appears to be a paradoxical approach in Buck’s fiction, that over time she maintained her critique of “separate spheres” in American society while she came to appreciate the potential for women of “separate spheres” in Asian societies.TransnationalAmerican StudiesPearl S. BuckChinese WomenAmerican WomenHistoryAmerican LiteratureCultural StudiesFeminismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1r45m1dqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2pj0n13b2020-07-30T19:17:45Zqt2pj0n13bTijuana Transa: Transa as Metaphor and Theory on the US–Mexico BorderReimer, Jennifer A.2016-01-01This essay explores the varied potential of “transa” as a new metaphor to describe the US–Mexico borderlands in the twenty-first century and the formal transactions used in the photo-textual essay Here Is Tijuana! (2006). Reimer identifies certain “transa techniques” in the book that connect reader-viewers to a practice of reading-viewing (both text and city) that contests North American and Mexican stereotypes depicting Tijuana (and the borderlands writ large) as a city of vice, illegality, poverty, or a cultural wasteland. What makes Here Is Tijuana! different from the many other texts produced about Tijuana (a large number of which are cited in the book itself) is the concept of transa. Reimer expands the authors’ usage of the term to offer a theoretical-aesthetic intervention into the existing discourse, not only on Tijuana itself, but also on the US–Mexico border and cultural studies in general. Transa offers an alternative approach to encountering experimental cultural productions. Through transa techniques that include textual-visual collage, pastiche, juxtaposition, and sampling, Here Is Tijuana! documents and visualizes a series of geopolitical and cultural phenomena encountered in Tijuana, such as free trade, uneven urban development, border crossings and migration, labor struggles, and urban and traditional art practices. The book forces readers into its transas to offer new ways of “reading” or “seeing” the US–Mexico border (through Tijuana) that testify to its contradictory power to transgress—and even to render obsolete—national boundaries, while also heightening the perceived power and presence of states and cohesive national identities.TransnationalAmerican StudiesUS–Mexico BorderBorderlandsTijuanaPhotographyAestheticsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2pj0n13barticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5390g91k2020-07-30T19:17:42Zqt5390g91k"This Land Is Holy!" Intersections of Politics and Spirituality in Luis Alberto Urrea’s The Hummingbird’s DaughterLopez, Christina Garcia2016-01-01This essay discusses the intersections of politics and spirituality during the Porfiriato era in Mexico, an oppressive period that initiated northward migration into the United States; specifically, Lopez examines Luis Alberto Urrea’s 2005 novel, The Hummingbird’s Daughter, which blends narrative, history, and biography. Merging a historical focus on the political impulses of northward migration with attention to spiritual and religious epistemologies, Urrea’s narrative of "Teresita," a regional folk saint of northern Mexico, highlights a critical time that would significantly determine the intertwined futures of both nations. As the author brings Teresita and her community to life for readers, he simultaneously describes the Porfiriato era’s relationship with US interests, the state’s violent push towards modernization, and power struggles over indigenous land rights, all of which would eventually culminate in the Mexican Revolution and mass migration into the United States. Ultimately, Lopez argues that, in its narrative representation of political conflicts over land rights during the Porfiriato, The Hummingbird’s Daughter functions as a form of witnessing to state violence and, further, highlights a complex, embodied spirituality through which indigenous and mestizo peoples responded to state violence with contestation and counterdiscourse. This essay highlights Urrea’s work as a substantial contribution to the further development of Border Studies, Chicano/a Studies, and Transnational American Studies.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSpiritualityFolk ReligionMigrationHistorical FictionState ViolenceFolk HealingPorfiriatoBorder StudiesChicano/a StudiesMexican American StudiesLuis Alberto UrreaTeresitaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5390g91karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt61j566s92020-07-30T19:17:41Zqt61j566s9Interplanetary Border Imaginaries in Upside Down: Divisions and Connections in the American ContinentGómez Muñoz, Pablo2016-01-01This paper provides a close analysis of Upside Down (dir. Juan Solanas, 2012), a science fiction film that presents two radically different portraits of two neighboring planets to metaphorically explore and negotiate the economic divide between the US and Latin America. The film focuses on the role of borders, legal provisions, and contact between humans in structuring interactions and movement between Latin America and the US. Gómez Muñoz employs Mark Shiel's geographic approach to film and pays special attention to characters' movements in the spaces that the film depicts. The first part of the paper focuses on boundaries and discrimination practices in the Americas. The second part considers exceptions to the limitations that borders try to impose in the film and examines the potential of transnational love in bridging differences and advancing understanding. Upside Down suggests that people infuse their images of borders and other nations with their own personal and local perceptions. Their transnational/trans-American relationships allow them to draw from different sources and bring disparate practices together for their own and their societies' benefit.TransnationalAmerican StudiesScience FictionFilmBordersThe AmericasUpside Downapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/61j566s9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9713d14n2020-07-30T19:17:39Zqt9713d14nPerforming Transnational Arab American Womanhood: Rosemary Hakim, US Orientalism, and Cold War DiplomacyKoegeler-Abdi, Martina2016-01-01The first Miss Lebanon-America, Rosemary Hakim, landed at Beirut Airport in July 1955 to start a public diplomacy tour. As an American beauty queen from Detroit visiting Lebanon, her parents' homeland, she was greeted enthusiastically by the local press and closely monitored by US government representatives. After her return to the States, she documented her experiences abroad in an unpublished memoir, entitled "Arabian Antipodes." However, this 1955 account does not just chronicle her travels. Hakim performs here her own approach to Arab American womanhood. In this essay Koegeler-Abdi contextualizes her narrative performance within the histories of American orientalism, the emerging Cold War, and ethnic beauty pageants to provide a better understanding of the specific intersection in these 1950s hegemonic discourses that framed and enabled her public agency. Her analysis then looks at how Hakim herself strategically cites these discourses in her self-fashioning to claim her own subject position as a white Arab and American woman during the 1950s. She argues that, while most Arab American authors at this time avoid a serious Arab ethnic affiliation, Rosemary Hakim already proudly uses a transnational sense of Arab Americanness to negotiate her own gender and ethnic identity. This is significant because we currently lack a broader historical understanding of Arab American women’s public agency, particularly during the mid-twentieth century. Hakim’s memoir requires us to rethink the history of Arab American women’s strategies of self-representation in ways that acknowledge but are not confined within the terms of conventional orientalist discourses.TransnationalAmerican StudiesArab AmericanLebanese AmericanOrientalismAuto-OrientalismImagined WomanhoodCultural DiplomacyEthnic Beauty PageantsBeirutDetroitMiss Lebanon-Americaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9713d14narticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4112x2v42020-07-30T19:17:37Zqt4112x2v4Transnational Post-Westerns in Irish CinemaGonzález, Jesús Ángel2016-01-01This article reviews the implications of two film categories developed in the last few decades (the transnational and post-Westerns) and applies them to two films produced in Ireland and usually not identified as such. After a review of the concepts of post-Westerns and transnationalism, two examples from Afghanistan (The Kite Runner) and Turkey (Once Upon a Time in Anatolia) are provided to illustrate the proposed category. A review of the cultural implications of the West in Ireland follows, with examples from James Joyce’s Dubliners and John Ford’s film The Quiet Man. Finally, two Irish films (Into the West and Mickybo and Me) are analyzed. These films, like other transnational post-Westerns, make explicit references to American Westerns, establish a dialogue with the original film genre, question its values and assumptions, and, at the same time, probe into the national identities and conflicts of both Ireland and the US.TransnationalAmerican StudiesPost-WesternsIrelandIrish Cinemaapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4112x2v4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5wf7k0622020-07-30T19:17:35Zqt5wf7k062Towards a Worldly Post-9/11 American Novel: Transnational Disjunctures in Joseph O’Neill’s NetherlandIrom, Bimbisar2016-01-01This paper traces possible responses to the mutations in US state power after 9/11 by analyzing the worldly and transnational gestures of the post-9/11 American novel. Irom maps how post-9/11 fiction speaks back to the state’s hegemonic imaginaries through an analysis of Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland. Irom proceeds from the premise that in light of the nation’s "geopolitically imperialist" ambitions, it becomes all the more crucial to delineate oppositional transnational practices that do not repeat the hegemonizing moves of the state that often operate under the semantic guise of the "transnational." While Netherland takes up the challenge of imagining worldliness through its various counternarratives—the transnational history of cricket, the geospatial imaginary of Google Earth, and the protagonists Hans and Chuck—the essay locates its reading between the osmotic spaces wherein the constituent elements of the transnational bear varying relations of resistance, conflict, and consonance with power structures. Irom argues that these disjunctures effect an unsettled and ambivalent series of counternarratives with unstable relations to power structures. In reading the disjunctures overdetermining Netherland’s transnational entities and in locating the novel’s aspirations towards a post-9/11 worldliness between the competing pulls of globe and nation, we come to a fuller comprehension of the ways in which nation-states still exercise a spectral fascination upon the imagination and how novels might more fruitfully gesture towards challenging such tenacious hegemonies.TransnationalAmerican StudiesGlobalizationPost-9/11American FictionAmerican ExceptionalismGoogle EarthGeospatial ImaginariesImmigrant Literatureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5wf7k062articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5hk3t36k2020-07-30T19:17:33Zqt5hk3t36kExcerpt from Reconfiguring Citizenship and National Identity in the North American Literary ImaginationTan, Kathy-Ann2016-01-01Excerpt from Reconfiguring Citizenship and National Identity in the North American Literary Imagination (Wayne State University Press, 2015)TransnationalAmerican StudiesCitizenshipapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5hk3t36karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4pb9906k2020-07-30T19:17:32Zqt4pb9906kExcerpt from Indonesian Notebook: A Sourcebook on Richard Wright and the Bandung ConferenceRoberts, Brian RussellFoulcher, Keith2016-01-01Excerpt from Indonesian Notebook: A Sourcebook on Richard Wright and the Bandung Conference, edited by Brian Russell Roberts and Keith Foulcher (Duke University Press, 2016)TransnationalAmerican StudiesRichard WrightBandung Conferenceapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4pb9906karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2jv0m3j72020-07-30T19:17:31Zqt2jv0m3j7Excerpt from Dean Worcester’s Fantasy Islands: Photography, Film, and the Colonial PhilippinesRice, Mark2016-01-01Excerpt from Dean Worcester’s Fantasy Islands: Photography, Film, and the Colonial Philippines (University of Michigan Press, 2014)TransnationalAmerican StudiesDean WorcesterPhotographyPhilippinesColonialismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2jv0m3j7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4d0300882020-07-30T19:17:30Zqt4d030088Excerpt from The Mexico Diary: Winold Reiss between Vogue Mexico and Harlem Renaissance (with hyperlinks to audio; see abstract for track listing)Mehring, Frank2016-01-01Excerpt from The Mexico Diary: Winold Reiss between Vogue Mexico and Harlem Renaissance (An Illustrated Trilingual Edition with Commentary and Musical Interpretation) (Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, co-published by Bilingual Press/Editorial Bilingüe, 2016). Reprinted with permission by Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier.ISBN 978-3-86821-594-6http://www.wvttrier.de/top/Beschreibungen/ID1526.html
*** See corresponding diary entry dates for hyperlinks to the following audio tracks from Meine Reise durch Mexico / Mexico Diary 1920: Track 21: Monday, October 11, 1920 – Truest MexicoTrack 22: Thursday, October 14, 1920 – Schwarzwald in Mexico?Track 30: Friday, December 10, 1920 – Back to the BluesTransnationalAmerican StudiesMexicoWinold ReissAmerican ArtModernismGerman American Immigrationapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4d030088articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5vv7b7tt2020-07-30T19:17:28Zqt5vv7b7ttExcerpt from The Ethnic Avant-Garde: Minority Cultures and World RevolutionLee, Steven S.2016-01-01Excerpt from The Ethnic Avant-Garde: Minority Cultures and World Revolution (Columbia University Press, 2015)TransnationalAmerican StudiesEthnic StudiesAvant-GardeRevolutionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5vv7b7ttarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0bf3r7cf2020-07-30T19:17:26Zqt0bf3r7cfExcerpt from Teaching Transatlanticism: Resources for Teaching Nineteenth-Century Anglo-American Print CultureHughes, Linda K.Robbins, Sarah R.2016-01-01Excerpt from Teaching Transatlanticism: Resources for Teaching Nineteenth-Century Anglo-American Print Culture, edited by Linda K. Hughes and Sarah R. Robbins (Edinburgh University Press, 2015)TransnationalAmerican StudiesTransatlanticPrint Cultureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0bf3r7cfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6jv2s1392020-07-30T19:17:25Zqt6jv2s139Excerpt from Writing America: Literary Landmarks from Walden Pond to Wounded Knee (A Reader's Companion)Fishkin, Shelley Fisher2016-01-01Excerpt from Writing America: Literary Landmarks from Walden Pond to Wounded Knee (A Reader's Companion) (Rutgers University Press, 2015)TransnationalAmerican StudiesAmerican LiteratureLandmarksapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6jv2s139articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt92w136662020-07-30T19:17:22Zqt92w13666Excerpt from Borges’s Poe: The Influence and Reinvention of Edgar Allan Poe in Spanish AmericaEsplin, Emron2016-01-01Excerpt from Borges’s Poe: The Influence and Reinvention of Edgar Allan Poe in Spanish America (University of Georgia Press, 2016)TransnationalAmerican StudiesEdgar Allan PoeJorge Luis Borgesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/92w13666articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt49j7z9c82020-07-30T19:17:20Zqt49j7z9c8The Shaping of We-Group Identities in the African American Community: A Perspective of Figurational Sociology on the Cultural ImaginaryBuschendorf, Christa2016-01-01"The Shaping of We-Group Identities in the African American Community: A Perspective of Figurational Sociology on the Cultural Imaginary" (from The Imaginary and Its Worlds: American Studies after the Transnational Turn, ed. Laura Bieger, Ramón Saldívar, and Johannes Voelz, Dartmouth College Press, 2013)TransnationalAmerican StudiesAfrican AmericanFigurational Sociologyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/49j7z9c8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt03d487202020-07-30T19:17:19Zqt03d48720Excerpt from Jazz Diasporas: Race, Music, and Migration in Post–World War II ParisBraggs, Rashida K.2016-01-01Excerpt from Jazz Diasporas: Race, Music, and Migration in Post–World War II Paris (University of California Press, 2016)TransnationalAmerican StudiesJazzParisapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/03d48720articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0mw3m8c92020-07-30T19:17:18Zqt0mw3m8c9Forward Editor's NoteRobinson, Greg2016-01-01Forward Editor's Note for JTAS 7.1TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0mw3m8c9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6308x2702020-07-30T19:17:16Zqt6308x270Uncovering a Cover: Marketing Swedish Crime Fiction in a Transnational ContextNilsson, Louise2016-01-01During the twenty-first century, Swedish crime fiction became an international phenomenon and turned into a million-dollar industry. Besides being translated all over the world, the crime novels are converted into movies and TV series in Sweden, while remakes of these films are produced abroad. This success story is closely interwoven with the international book market and publishing houses’ marketing strategies. This article investigates how domestic literature is marketed in a globalized book market.The article explores how these bestsellers are represented and designed to catch attention and attract a reader in a foreign setting. How is a visual story created by marketing strategies, through jacket designs and promotional images? How do these strategies create a global imaginary and put the book itself into play with other media? The article adapts a comparative perspective to illuminate similarities and differences between marketing strategies in a transnational context. The emphasis will be on the American book market, a choice motivated by USA’s hegemonic position in Western culture and its globalized entertainment business.The article will analyze source material from authors such as Arne Dahl, Mari Jungstedt, Lars Kepler, Jens Lapidus, Stieg Larsson, Åsa Larsson, Camilla Läckberg Henning Mankell, Liza Marklund, Leif G. W. Persson, and Maj Sjöwall & Per Wahlöö.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenCrime Fictionapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6308x270articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0dt8v3mq2020-07-30T19:17:15Zqt0dt8v3mqFrom “False” Neutrality to “True” Socialism: US “Sweden-bashing” during the Later Palme Years, 1973–1986Marklund, Carl2016-01-01Throughout the Cold War years, images of the USA, the American Way, and notions of Americanization played a significant role globally. Partly due to the dominance of this US-centered notion of Western democracy, admittedly marginal images of Sweden and the Swedish Model were held out as a palatable alternative to US capitalism. However, this alleged “exemplarity” of Sweden also made it the subject of a genre of “Sweden-bashing” in global public opinion.In this genre, US media actors played a key role for the shift from the Utopian image of Sweden in the 1960s to the more Dystopian visions of a welfare state in decline circulating from the 1980s and onwards. While US criticism of Swedish anti-war protests is well-known, the time period from 1973 to the assassination of Palme in 1986 has not been studied. This article therefore follows the active but largely unofficial American Sweden-criticism and the official Swedish tracking of this publicity, its reception in Sweden, and various Swedish attempts at affecting the image of Sweden in the USA.In particular, the article tracks a shift in US Sweden-bashing from targeting alleged “false” neutrality of Swedish foreign policy to attacking the “true” socialism supposedly detectable in Swedish domestic policies and development aid. Central themes of Swedish “People’s Home” criticism in the 1990s first emerged in US media and then spread in global public opinion, well before they entered Swedish debate, highlighting how transatlantic exchange may belatedly and indirectly impact upon national identity, collective memory, and historical consciousness.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenOlof Palmeapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0dt8v3mqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt09h5b6m12020-07-30T19:17:14Zqt09h5b6m1Reception, Circulation, Desire: Liv Ullmann and the Transnational Journeys of a Scandinavian ActressKoskinen, Maaret2016-01-01Transnational issues in cinema cover a wide spectrum, ranging from the regional to the global. Besides a host of multicultural concerns, e.g. so-called “accented” cinemas there are the ever more diversified production-, distribution- and consumption-cultures to consider. Current examples abound—for example, when David Fincher took the unusual decision to shoot, at an inordinate cost, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in Stockholm, and with international James Bond star Daniel Craig in the lead as Stieg Larsson’s literary hero Mikael Blomkvist.But transnationality in cinema is old news. For instance, ever since directors of Swedish silent cinema and actors like Greta Garbo and Ingrid Bergman, Nordic and/or Swedish stars have made cross-Atlantic journeys. One of the most prominent, yet least noticed in a transnational context, is Liv Ullmann (b 1939). Already well established on stage and film in Norway, it was her acting in films by Ingmar Bergman that launched her international career. She enjoyed a phenomenal popularity, particularly in the US where she won New York Film Critics’ Award for Best Actress twice, for Scenes from a Marriage in 1974 and Face to Face in 1976, while also starring on Broadway, in Anna Christie in 1977. In a transnational context, it is also of interest that her activities range well beyond film into other fields, as internationally bestselling author (e.g. Changing, 1977), UN-ambassador, and film and stage director with an international outreach.But what makes Ullmann a particularly intriguing case is that she can be regarded as an auteur-star, whose function in many ways parallels the function of stars in American mainstream film. For if the underlying commercial reasons for why current American film is more than ever filled with international actors is that Hollywood is adjusting itself to an increasingly globalized film industry, in which most of the revenues do not come from the US any more, Ullmann in her time very much served a similar function for the auteur-fueled European film culture of the day. There are simply good reasons to assume that art house auteurs such as Bergman were no less commercial than their commercial counterparts, e.g. in being supported by the international film trade. My aim, then, is to show how a “high-brow” star may serve as an index to the contemporary transnational media scape, and the degree to which she in this case also conflated notions abroad of the “Swedish” with the “Nordic”—what may called an early version of Nordic noir, albeit with an existential rather than crime novel twist.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenLiv Ullmannapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/09h5b6m1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6zz685172020-07-30T19:17:12Zqt6zz68517“Here Is the Beginning of Pennsylvania”: A Settler Commemoration and Entangled Histories of Foundational SitesHjorthén, Adam2016-01-01In the winter of 1937, Pennsylvania governor George H. Earle traveled to Sweden together with a state delegation, and made a stop in the small town of Bottnaryd—the birthplace of Johan Printz, a governor of the seventeenth century New Sweden colony located on the Delaware River. Reportedly affected by the moment, Earle gave a speech declaring: “Here is the beginning of Pennsylvania.” By using W. J. T. Mitchell’s discussion of “foundational sites” and theories on entangled history as points of departures, the article analyses the project of locating the birthplace of the Keystone State in relation to Sweden. The Pennsylvania tour was part of the state’s 300th Anniversary Celebration—elsewhere called the 1938 New Sweden Tercentenary— staged mutually by commissions from Sweden, Finland, and the US.I argue that this commemoration, of a magnitude on par with New England tercentenaries, should be understood as thoroughly entangled across regional, ethnic, and national borders. Pennsylvania’s placing of its foundational site in Sweden was the result of trans-Atlantic cooperation and regional competition with Delaware and New Jersey. It was a politicized project that rested on contemporary socio-economic interests connected to Sweden’s Social Democratic welfare state, and Pennsylvania’s “Little New Deal” backed by Governor Earle. The attempt to bypass William Penn by (dis)locating Pennsylvania’s foundational site outside state boundaries went against the grain of American settler mythologies, which generally have purportedly “homegrown” foundational sites on US territory. For Sweden, though, this aspect was less problematic. Eventually, the commemoration arguably had more impact on Sweden than on Pennsylvania.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenPennsylvaniaSettlerCommemorationFoundational Sitesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6zz68517articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2j51x0t32020-07-30T19:17:11Zqt2j51x0t3Intersecting Worlds: New Sweden’s Transatlantic EntanglementsFur, GunlögNaum, MagdalenaNordin, Jonas M.2016-01-01The New Sweden Colony (1638-1655) is often regarded as an anomaly in the context of 17th century Swedish politics and in the context of other European colonies in America. Equally, the colony's importance in the historical narrative of early modern Sweden and colonial America has been modest. However, more recent research on Scandinavian involvement in the Atlantic economy and early modern politics at home and abroad shows that Sweden was actively involved in producing and advancing a colonial agenda and that the relatively short-lived colonial venture in America had long-term effects and consequences.Taking the point of departure in a critical review of the scholarship on New Sweden, this article examines the common image of the colony and identifies several blind spots and points of convergence between New Sweden and Sweden’s other colonial projects. Informed by postcolonial approaches the article examines colonial rhetoric and logic underlying the interactions between the Swedes and the Native Americans and foregrounds practices of the Swedish community in America. It explores the connections between Sweden and the Swedish community in America throughout the 17th and 18th century and the impact of these connections (and this colonial venture) in Sweden and America. The article also draws attention to the close relations and parallels between the colonial practice in New Sweden and Sápmi. This analysis sheds new light on the colony and its role in Sweden and America in the 17th as well as in the 20th century. TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenTransatlanticapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2j51x0t3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3kq8c3g32020-07-30T19:17:10Zqt3kq8c3g3The Transnational Viking: The Role of the Viking in Sweden, the United States, and Swedish AmericaBlanck, Dag2016-01-01This article deals with how Vikings have been used as symbols and historical representations in Sweden, the United Sates, and Swedish America during the 19th and 20th centuries.Three usages of the Vikings are isolated. The first is a “Swedish Viking,” which emphasized the role of the Viking and Norse past in Swedish (and Scandinavian) histories as historical antecedents as a part of 19th century nation building. The second is an “American Viking,” with its beginnings in the mid-19th century and rooted in the increased racialization of American society, and concerned with the processes through which Sweden and Scandinavia managed to become “Anglo-Saxon” and thus a significant part of the early European history in North America. The third usage is a “Swedish-American Viking,” dealing with ways in which the Swedish-American ethnic communities appropriated the Vikings, and made them a part of the formation of Swedish-American identities in the US from the late 19th century.The article analyzes the ways in which the different usages have resonated with each other back and forth across the Atlantic. In the 19th century, “the Swedish Viking” clearly provided the building blocks for the establishment of the “American Viking.” Similarly, the “Swedish-American Viking,” drew on the contents and power of both the first types. During the 20th century, for example, the Swedish Viking has clearly become influenced by both the American and Swedish-American appropriations. This suggests both a circularity of interpretations and the importance of changing power relations.TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenSwedish AmericanVikingapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3kq8c3g3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt50f358h42020-07-30T19:17:08Zqt50f358h4“An NHL Touch”: Transnationalizing Ice Hockey in Sweden, 1994–2013Björk, Ulf Jonas2016-01-01During the 1994-95 ice hockey season in Sweden, one of the teams in the highest division, Luleå, treated fans to an innovation: instead of merely entering the ice as in years past, players flew out of a gigantic bear maw, to the accompaniment of a pounding rock beat. The idea was not original, however; as a newspaper columnist noted, it had been copied directly from the National Hockey league in North America. Luleå’s new entrance concept was part of a concerted effort by teams in Sweden’s highest ice hockey division, Elitserien, to emulate the NHL to make the sport more popular with young fans. This paper examines how and why that attempt was made and why it was ultimately unsuccessful.Using newspaper articles and ice hockey association materials and examining comments made by fans in online fora, the study recounts that the change involved creating an “event” atmosphere around games, making symbols more NHL-like, and adopting names in English. Reaction from both media commentators and fans was clearly negative, mainly because the changes were seen as gimmicks and because they had been imposed on team supporters without prior consultation. In the end, most teams quietly ended the use of both names and symbols.The last point is interesting, the study argues, as it has implications for discussions of Americanization. The case of Swedish hockey in the 1990s suggests that there are instances when American influences are rejected by recipients in other countries. TransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenHockeyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/50f358h4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4nf104732020-07-30T19:17:07Zqt4nf10473Transnationalizing Swedish–American Relations: An Introduction to the Special ForumBlanck, DagHjorthén, Adam2016-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum on "Sweden and America," edited by Dag Blanck and Adam HjorthénTransnationalAmerican StudiesSwedenSwedish Americanapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4nf10473articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5740x64n2020-07-30T19:17:06Zqt5740x64nA Community of Thought: Connecting with Transnational American StudiesMorgan, Nina2016-01-01Editor's Note for JTAS 7.1TransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5740x64narticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 7, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9175b7842020-07-22T13:02:39Zqt9175b784About the ContributorsSabine Kim, Managing Editor2019-01-01Bio statementsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9175b784articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9d38d17t2020-07-22T13:02:38Zqt9d38d17tVisualizing Protest: African (Diasporic) Art and Contemporary Mediterranean CrossingsFinley, CherylRaiford, LeighRaphael-Hernandez, Heike2019-01-01
For Bisi Silva (1962–2019)
Abstract
This essay surveys a number of contemporary artworks that address the recent migrations and perilous water crossings of African people to Europe, made by artists of the African diaspora. Paying specific attention to the deployment of photography, time-based media, and installation, we argue that artists like Isaac Julien, Alexis Peskine, Romuald Hazoumè, and others disrupt the photojournalistic portrayals of African migrant–refugees crossing the Mediterranean in overloaded small rafts and makeshift boats circulated by the international media. While the UN and its High Commissioner for Refugees have tried for years to call international attention to the situation of these migrant–refugees in Libya’s camps and those camps’ catastrophic violations of human rights, it has been only recently that public attention and discourse have begun to recognize these crossings as a “crisis,” primarily because a growing number of African migrant–refugees have succeeded in reaching Fortress Europe via Spain or Italy. The artists of the African diaspora considered in this essay have attempted to intervene in these public debates by offering counternarratives to often sensational and dehumanizing depictions of specifically Black migrant–refugee lives. In focusing on these counternarratives, we demonstrate how artists connect this contemporary mass migration from African countries to a longer history of forced migrations over water in the African diaspora. Artists have returned continually to the “chronotrope of the ship,” following Paul Gilroy, and have drawn on this long memory as a means to convey the contemporary crisis, thus addressing the sorts of “colonial amnesia” that conveniently ignore any prior entanglements.Black AtlanticBlack Mediterraneanvisual artSouth-North migrationsEuropean UnionHuman Rights violationsVenice BiennaleDak’ArtKassel Documentaart exhibitionsnot-yetmigrant-refugeesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9d38d17tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1nm6683g2020-07-22T13:02:36Zqt1nm6683gRadical Resistance: Constructions of a Transnational Self in Angela Davis's and Cynthia McKinney’s MemoirsLinke, Gabriele2019-01-01To achieve a better understanding of the dynamic transnationalism at work in African American politics since the 1960s, this study compares the life narratives by Angela Davis and Cynthia McKinney, two transnationally active radical Black intellectuals known for their fierce opposition to mainstream US politics. Davis’s An Autobiography was first published in 1974, McKinney’s memoir Ain’t Nothing Like Freedom in 2013, which means that the texts were conceived at different points in African American, US and world history. Despite the temporal distance between the two autobiographical texts, they show some fundamental similarities in the construction of the self as both authors on the one hand evoke the history of slavery and slave resistance as their political ‘pedigree’ while on the other hand they emphasize their transnational perspective. They foreground political struggle and intellectual analysis rather than elaborating the details of personal life. Major differences arise from their different positions with regard to the political establishment. While Davis presents her life story as representative of the fight for Black liberation and Civil Rights, former Congresswoman McKinney describes herself as an uncompromising outsider and lone voice of resistance to mainstream US politics. As she targets government lies, she supports the credibility of her own stories by the excessive use of documents from photographs through hate mails to Congressional records, making her own activism transparent. Her outlook with regard to peace, justice, and the role of the Unites States in the world is, however, less optimistic than Angela Davis’s after her release from prison in 1974.Angela DavisCynthia McKinneyblack radicalismautobiographyapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1nm6683garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6pb2j6f12020-07-22T13:02:35Zqt6pb2j6f1A Transatlantic Slavery Narrative: Work Sketches of a Nineteenth-Century Bristolian-Cuban Sugar Cane Plantation and President Barack Obama’s “Black Speech” in CubaOcasio, Rafael2019-01-01After the Haitian Revolution in 1804, Cuba became the world’s largest producer of sugar and the United States its principal buyer. There was a close commercial relationship between Cuba and Bristol, Rhode Island, which supported an illegal slave trade for Bristolian-owned ingenios, or sugarcane plantations in Cuba.This paper examines two outstanding testimonial accounts in the context of that shared transatlantic slave trade spearheaded by the United States. George Howe, a Bristolian manager of an ingenio, wrote in 1833 a work diary that recorded select operational details performed by enslaved workers. Howe’s travelogue provides the critical foundations for a literature of the plantation, a discursive narrative that served him well to reflect upon the impact of enslaved workers as the true underpinnings of Ingenio New Hope. American travelers to Cuba also documented racialized cultural practices. In President Barack Obama’s public address as part of his official three-day visit beginning on March 20, 2016, which impacted ongoing negotiations surrounding the US embargo to Cuba, Obama spoke about the racial heritage shared by both countries and stemming from slavery practices. Obama not only referred to the convoluted diplomatic relationship between both countries, but he also highlighted an Atlantic, Pan-American racial legacy.Through a racialized narrative allusive to the impact of plantations, Obama set himself as an African-American, a hybrid identity through which he examined the colonial histories of both countries. The intertextual conversation between Howe's diary and Obama’s speech ultimately illustrates the latter’s own struggle with the negative heritage of a hideous slave trade.Barack ObamaGeorge Howeliterature of the plantationtransatlantic slave tradeUS-Cuban diplomatic relationsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6pb2j6f1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt50x8g24g2020-07-22T13:02:34Zqt50x8g24gRestructuring Respectability, Gender, and Power: Aida Overton Walker Performs a Black Feminist ResistanceJackson, Veronica2019-01-01Aida Overton Walker, a premier vaudeville entertainer, engaged in a calculated, career-long process to restructure and re-present how African Americans, particularly black women in popular theater, were viewed and perceived in American society. Through a feminist lens this essay will demonstrate her awareness of her visual presence to perform black resistance by embodying the ideological practice of racial uplift—the response delivered by the African American, educated, middle-class elite to the anti-black racist environment prevalent in the early 1900s.The goal of this essay is to elucidate Overton Walker’s understanding of her image and her onstage performance career—choreography, dance, comedy, and drama—as powerful, subversive tools that countered the virulent racist portrayal of blacks rendered on the vaudeville stage through minstrelsy, and the damaging imagery persisting from slavery, white supremacy, and the prevailing Jim Crow regime. She enacted her brand of feminism to utilize her onstage and offstage likenesses to perform and proselytize for racial uplift, work traditionally designated almost exclusively for the black male elite.Overton Walker’s transnational forms of black resistance reside in her direct engagement in Britain and her indirect and imagined connections with the African continent. She is an understudied figure in the era of the New Negro. This essay will illuminate and consider her contributions to racial uplift in context to the US and abroad. Overton Walker’s transnational links between the African continent, Great Britain, and America were transformative performances in popular culture, and in context of an emerging American modernity. African American StudiesFeminist StudiesGender StudiesVisual StudiesPerformativityMinstrelsyVaudevilleModernityRacial UpliftResistanceRespectabilityTransnationalRaceClassapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/50x8g24garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8rm531sh2020-07-22T13:02:33Zqt8rm531shGerman Abolitionism: Kotzebue and the Transnational Debate on SlaveryOduro-Opuni, Obenewaa2019-01-01This essay challenges the notion of an absence of German abolitionist awareness in Europe during the Age of Enlightenment. Furthermore, it highlights the lack of a scholarly engagement with historical German debates on slavery and abolition in the media and the public sphere. In this regard, I investigate the transnational significance of German abolitionist discourse based on the work of August von Kotzebue (1761–1819). For this reason, I explore the formulation of Kotzebue’s antislavery trajectory by illustrating intertextual instances involving his play Die Negersklaven: ein historisch-dramatisches Gemählde in drey Akten 1796 (The Negro Slaves: A Historical-dramatic Painting, in Three Acts 1796). In so doing, I demonstrate that Kotzebue makes a substantial and significant contribution to transnational abolitionist discourse of the late eighteenth century in the form of an abolitionist text that discursively and polemically condemns slavery as an inhumane institution. My analysis makes the case for a revised understanding of German-language contributions to this transnational debate. In addition, I expose a marginalization and scarcity of scholarship on German-speaking abolitionism and abolitionist efforts within German Studies, which is of similar relevance to transatlantic American studies, that usually does not consider German-language contributions. Therefore, this study widens the discipline’s scope by an inclusion of additional voices with regard to the context of slavery and abolition that traditionally belong to the spectrum of American literature and history.Keywords: plantation slaveryantislaveryabolitionismtheatertransnational American studiesintertextualityGerman abolitionist discourseKotzebueBlack bodieseighteenth centurygenderapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8rm531sharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt54r8w4jz2020-07-22T13:02:32Zqt54r8w4jzTransnational Black Politics and Resistance: From Enslavement to Obama: Through the Prism of 1619Obenland, FrankSawallisch, NeleWest, Elizabeth J.2019-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum edited by:Frank ObenlandNele SawallischJohanna SeibertPia Wiegmink Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/54r8w4jzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0816d7mn2020-07-22T13:02:30Zqt0816d7mnSpecial Forum Visual Art AppendixLynn, Christopher2019-01-01Appendix of art works curated by Christopher Lynn and Fidalis Buehler for the JTAS Special Forum Archipelagoes/Oceans/ American Visuality, edited by Hester Blum, Mary Eyring, Iping Liang, and Brian Russell Roberts. Appendix design by Christopher Lynn.Maile AndradeFidalis BuehlerChris CharterisChristo and Jeanne-ClaudeJames CooperRosanna RaymondYuki KiharaGlenda LéonJuana ValdesHumberto DíazMary MattinglyJamilah SaburKalisolaite ‘UhilaRobert Smithsonapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0816d7mnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt52t5s3152020-07-22T13:02:29Zqt52t5s315Archipelagic EnvironmentsStephens, Michelle Ann2019-01-01In this micro-essay on the artists James Cooper (of Bermuda) and Jamilah Sabur (Miami-based, born in St. Andrew Parish, Jamaica), I explore both artists’ portrayals of the subaqueous landscapes of the Caribbean. Both strive to convey the complexities of tropical land- and seascapes sedimented with the detritus of human cultures and histories. In these landscape ecologies, residues provide tactile pathways back to the island past.Transnational American StudiesArchipelagic American Studiessubaqueousdetritusresiduehistoryarchipelagicenvironmentsapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/52t5s315articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5xf9p9xr2020-07-22T13:02:28Zqt5xf9p9xrWhat the Island Provides: Island Sustainability and Island-Human RelationalityMcDougall, Brandy Nālani2019-01-01
In this essay I examine three artworks featured in this issue: Chris Charteris’s Te ma; Maile Andrade’s Hana ka Lima; and Ibrahim Miranda’s Isla laboratorio o 7 maravillas or Island Laboratory of 7 Wonders. Following descriptions of the artworks and their materials, I assert that each piece emphasizes what I refer to as “island-human relationality,” which recognizes human interconnections and kinship with the island. Such kinship, I argue, entails the human adoption of an ethic of island sustainability, of humans receiving what the island provides, while also ensuring the island is not exploited or abused for its resources.
IndigenousenvironmentalismethicsTransnational American StudiesArchipelagic American StudiesChris CharterisIbrahim MirandaMaile Andradeapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5xf9p9xrarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4dn897pb2020-07-22T13:02:27Zqt4dn897pbArchipelagic Poetics in the Art of Kalisolaite ‘Uhila and Yuki KiharaGabbard, Caroline Sinavaiana2019-01-01Response to works of artTransnational American StudiesArchipelagic American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4dn897pbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6fj6r2rw2020-07-22T13:02:26Zqt6fj6r2rwwhen we dance the ocean, does it hear us?Hobart, Hiʻilei Julia2019-01-01Response to Yuki Kihara’s Siva in Motion (2012) and Kalisolaite ‘Uhila’s Ongo Mei Moana (2015) Transnational American StudiesArchipelagic American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6fj6r2rwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6ws6z3j02020-07-22T13:02:24Zqt6ws6z3j0Ocean SeeingMentz, Steve2019-01-01Response to Mary Mattingly's Triple Island and Humberto Díaz's Espejismooceanartblue humanitiesNew York CityCubavisual cultureapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6ws6z3j0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt13h8z1262020-07-22T13:02:23Zqt13h8z126A Pool of Water: Backyard Borders between Cuba and the United StatesLiang, Iping2019-01-01Response to Glenda León’s installation artwork Sueño de verano (“Summer Dream,” 2012) and Juana Valdes’s installation artwork, Te-Amo (“I-Love-You,” 2007) Transnational American StudiesCuban American transnationalismCuban American artGlenda LeónJuana Valdesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/13h8z126articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1k3092j02020-07-22T13:02:22Zqt1k3092j0Floating Island Reflections: Relationalities from Oceania and Manna-hataNa'puti, Tiara R.2019-01-01This response engages archipelagic thinking and etak/moving islands theories to rhetorically analyze Robert Smithson’s Floating Island (2005) in relation to other poetic and experiential artifacts. It considers how Indigenous cartographies and oceanic concepts maintain connections, movements, and relationalities that traverse waterways from peoples and places of Manna-hata and Oceania alike.Indigenous cartographiesTransnational American StudiesArchipelagic American Studiesoceanic conceptsRobert Smithsonetak/moving islandsrelationalitiesrhetoricapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1k3092j0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8dh178f22020-07-22T13:02:20Zqt8dh178f2Pretty in Pink Polypropylene: Christo’s and Jeanne-Claude’s Surrounded IslandsThomas, Tashima2019-01-01Response to Christo and Jeanne-Claude's Surrounded Islands (1983)Miamimarine conservationChristoJeanne-ClaudeSurrounded IslandsFloridapinkapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8dh178f2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9fj868sb2020-07-22T13:02:19Zqt9fj868sbFeeling Oceanic: Racial Identity and Postbellum DriftTavlin, ZacharyHitchman, Matthew2019-01-01Abstract: In this essay we draw a historiographical line from J. M. W. Turner’s Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying (1840)—a representation of the Zong massacre—to Charles Chesnutt’s novel The Marrow of Tradition (1901). Turner’s optical opacities render black bodies faceless and fragmentary while also pulling the ground out from under the nominal spectator, an effect that joins typical period representations of black slaves and sailors with a self-reflexive counterpressure that implicates viewers (and readers) in sense-making operations that dissolve as much as they congeal. We offer a transatlantic reading of the painting that foreshadows postbellum concerns about the raced subject as it contends with identitarian drift. In Chesnutt’s narrative we find an unexpected intrusion of the oceanic (through a shipwreck nightmare) into the life of a Reconstruction-era woman who must come to grips with the specter of the sea’s between-space as the fluctuating nonsite where racial identity and ideology is formed and potentially re-formed. Olivia Carteret’s dreamscape coincides at the novel’s climax with the 1898 Wilmington riot, a white supremacist takeover of the local government. Shipwrecked and floating on the open water with her son, she encounters her mixed-race half sister Janet on an approaching boat. As a major conceit of the dream’s narrative, Olivia’s understanding of the legal and social stability of her son’s whiteness and the legitimacy of his inheritance is thrown into crisis as she is forced to recognize Janet as kin. We examine this scene in more detail to show how postbellum writers and artists appealed to the oceanic as an affective medium or canvas upon which negotiations of raced and gendered identities play out, especially those of subjects explicitly caught between national and ethnic imaginaries. TurnerChesnuttraceslaveryoceansapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9fj868sbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt98h088032020-07-22T13:02:17Zqt98h08803Telescopic Relationality: Visualizing the Archipelagic Americas in Burn!DeGuzman, Kathleen2019-01-01This essay examines the narrative feature film Burn! (1969) to name a relation wherein the telescope serves as a tool for envisioning possibility rather than hierarchy. It argues that the film positions the telescope within its diegesis as a provocatively paradoxical tool of sight: characters use the optical instrument to magnify a vision of the archipelagic Americas without necessarily crystallizing the perceived image’s meaning. Approaching the practice of filmmaking as a symbolic telescope in its own right, the essay suggests that the broader implication of Burn!’s telescopic relationality is, once again, seemingly counterintuitive: it is a film that shows the Caribbean and imagines what it may look like after a revolution precisely in order to emphasize the phenomena of not seeing and not knowing. The film’s counterintuitive use of the telescope ultimately implicates viewers and compels them to understand islands in terms of alternative American connectivities rather than through discourses of insignificance. Archipelagic Americasrevolutionary CaribbeanBurn!Gillo Pontecorvoapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/98h08803articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt10p015sb2020-07-22T13:02:15Zqt10p015sb“Perfection with a hole in the middle”: Archipelagic Assemblage in Tiphanie Yanique’s Land of Love and DrowningSherrard-Johnson, Cherene2019-01-01This essay uses frameworks derived from Archipelagic American studies to examine Tiphanie Yanique’s novel Land of Love and Drowning and the United States Virgin Islands on the 100th anniversary of their transfer from Denmark. Yanique’s vision of a specifically USVI literature is necessarily archipelagic in that it participates in inter-island exchange based on circuits forged by colonial practice that have been dynamically revised through global black freedom struggles taking place in archipelagoes of the Virgin Islands in conjunction with the continents that comprise their diasporic communities. The archipelagic perspective exposes the circuits of connectivity between water, land, human, animals, and commodities that travel through the submarine routes of the Atlantic basin. Using a strategy of literary assemblage to build a diasporic mythology that is nevertheless grounded in the specific ecologies of the USVI allows Yanique to counter trenchant stereotypical portrayals that reify the VI’s historical invisibility in American culture. More urgently, she draws attention to the islands as a forgotten U.S. territory in times of crisis such as the wreckage of hurricanes Irma and Maria. One manifestation of Yanique’s literary assemblage are her fictive hybrids, her “ocean grown” folks; I read Land of Love in Drowning alongside Wangechi Mutu’s Nguva na Nyoka (Sirens and Serpents) and St. Croix-based artist La Vaughn Belle’s video installations/counternarratives of Danish slavery to further illuminate the archipelagic nature of Yanique’s narrative assemblage, which demands a interartistic perspective that considers multiple mediums and modes of exchange and encounter across national and natural boundaries. As Yanique’s generational tale coalesces around the commemoration and nostalgic unease of Transfer, her image-based thematics resonate with Belle’s and Mutu’s visual reckoning with the hybridity of splintered identity that results from an accumulation of colonial legacies and diasporic sensibilities.Tiphanie YaniqueLand of Love and DrowningWangechi MutuLa Vaughn BelleArchipelagicOceanicInterlappingDanish colonialism in the CaribbeanTransfer Day commemorationchaney objectsUS Virgin Islands postcolonialismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/10p015sbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0kg0m6kn2020-07-22T13:02:14Zqt0kg0m6knCaught (and Brought) in the Currents: Narratives of Convergence, Destruction, and Creation at Kamilo BeachCase, Emalani2019-01-01This paper visits, interacts with, and listens to place. Rather than ascribing narratives and frames to the spaces we study, it encourages scholars to take pause and to sift through the many layers of complex histories of and from place to uncover the stories not being told. As an example, this paper will focus on Kamilo, a beach located on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, that has become known (in recent years) as “Plastic Beach.” It will use the beach as a means of grappling with issues of accessibility and (in)visibility and the dangers of colonial framings, and will reposition the beach not just as a place of crossing, but one of destruction and creation. It will also propose that working with and on spaces requires a consideration of the responsibilities that researchers have to the places they work in. This paper will not only uncover stories but will tell them, circling between personal experience, research, and critical reflection.
Kamilo Beachplastic pollutionPacific Studiescolonial framingplastiglomerateindigenous invisibilityapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0kg0m6knarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt58k0532s2020-07-22T13:02:13Zqt58k0532s“Our ice-islands”: Images of Alaska in the Reconstruction EraCharlton, Ryan2019-01-01Abstract: Over the last two decades, scholars of Reconstruction have expanded their focus beyond the traditional regional and temporal boundaries of the campaign in order to situate the postbellum reconstruction of the South within a broader process of national consolidation unfolding across the continent. Though this perspective has reinvigorated Reconstruction scholarship, it has done so by excluding archipelagic spaces. In order to move beyond a continental model of Reconstruction, this essay explores the era’s representations of Alaska, focusing specifically on the popular image of the territory as a chain of icebergs or “ice-islands.” The first section of this essay traces the origin of this image in the political cartoons of Harper’s Weekly illustrator Thomas Nast and others. The second section analyzes the reverberations of this image in Constance Fenimore Woolson’s 1880 story of Reconstruction Florida, “The South Devil,” which juxtaposes a subtropical swamp with a shattering field of arctic ice to question the integrity of the continent and the national reunion narratives predicated on it. The controversy surrounding the 1867 Alaska Purchase reveals that Reconstruction was always debated in terms that exceeded the continent. Greater attention to the Alaska Purchase can decontinentalize our perceptions of Reconstruction while enhancing our understanding of the scope of US imperialism in the nineteenth century.Alaska PurchaseReconstructionArcticThomas NastConstance Fenimore WoolsonUS imperialismapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/58k0532sarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0t99r53z2020-07-22T13:02:13Zqt0t99r53zCartographic Sea-Changes in Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick: Ahab, Charles Wilkes, and the US Exploring ExpeditionSmith, L. Katherine2019-01-01Recent attention to the intersections between literature and geography has yielded productive new readings of old classics like Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick, though developments in scholarship on deep time, the Anthropocene, and archipelagic and oceanic studies bring new exigency to Melville’s frequent allusions to mapping in the novel. This article brings the novel’s engagement with cartographical practices at sea into clearer focus through a series of close readings framed by the extraordinary ideal of precision guiding the cartographic agenda carried out by the US Exploring Expedition (US Ex. Ex.) in the South Pacific and Antarctica from 1838 to 1842. As metaphors for land, the captured and pursued whales in the novel reflect the surveying processes undertaken by the US Ex. Ex., which sought to establish an imperial presence in the South Pacific by bringing cartographic order to the region. In addition to emphasizing the representational failures of cartography and shortcomings of nineteenth-century cartographic processes, the novel exposes the fatally-flawed ambition of the US Ex. Ex. on two fronts: first, by revealing a contradictory imperative for imperial powers to both represent and shape the cartographic subject, which often obscures (rather than clarifies) subjects surveyed in imperial relations; and second, by demonstrating how attempts to dominate the ocean and indigenous peoples through cartographic representation expose the surveyor to cartographic counterattacks. By capitalizing on the difficulty of organizing the sea into charted order, the novel issues an ominous warning for the nation, unsettling its geography and expanding borders by envisaging latent threats within representations conveying geopolitical visibility and order.history of cartographysurveying and mappingcartography and imperialismAmerican Literature 1800-1899United States Exploring ExpeditionWilkesCharlesUnited States imperialismexpansionismOceanic StudiesArchipelagic StudiesTransnational Aapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0t99r53zarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5w31v1p22020-07-22T13:02:12Zqt5w31v1p2Introduction: Archipelagoes/Oceans/American VisualityBlum, HesterEyring, MaryLiang, IpingRoberts, Brian Russell2019-01-01Introduction to the Special ForumTransnational American Studiesarchipelagic studiesAmerican visualityapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5w31v1p2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt11x3n8rv2020-07-22T13:02:11Zqt11x3n8rvNote from the JTAS EditorsMorgan, NinaDoss, Erika2019-01-01Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfCC-BYeScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/11x3n8rvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 10, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8c68v4q32015-03-06T18:24:06Zqt8c68v4q3About the ContributorsHong, Caroline2015-01-01Contributors for JTAS 6.1application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8c68v4q3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt32s8x4212015-03-06T18:24:03Zqt32s8x421Vietnam and the Pax Americana: A Genealogy of the “New World Order”Spanos, William V.2015-01-01William V. Spanos’s chapter “Vietnam and the Pax Americana: A Genealogy of the ‘New World Order’” was originally published in his book-length study entitled America’s Shadow: An Anatomy of Empire (1999) and is here reprinted, courtesy of the University of Minnesota Press. Spanos’s prescient, unrelenting, and wide-ranging analysis of the consequences of the Vietnam War argues that the contemporary moment—including the Gulf War, Operation Hope in Somalia, American interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo, for example—has its “provenance” in the Vietnam War, yet the Vietnam War has essentially been underanalyzed and forgotten under the anesthetic of the American amnesiac condition, which perpetuates, systematically, an interpretation and misrepresentation of American exceptionalism and imperialism. Spanos’s philosophically informed interpretation of Vietnam Era literature, as well as other mediated representations of war, suggests that the Derridean specter haunts the “triumphalist” American representation of the post–Cold War reality, the New World Order or “Pax Americana,” and that the various politically correct theories that predict the decline of the nation-state or that celebrate the rise of American multicultural democracy will have mostly been the blind leading the blind toward a misapprehension of the global phenomenon of American hegemony.American StudiesTransnationalVietnam Warapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/32s8x421articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt74n7c5902015-03-06T18:24:01Zqt74n7c590Whispers of the Unspeakable: New York and Montreal Newspaper Coverage of the Oscar Wilde Trials in 1895Robinson, Greg2015-01-01Greg Robinson’s article “Whispers of the Unspeakable: New York and Montreal Newspaper Coverage of the Oscar Wilde Trials in 1895,” originally published in 2010 in the French-language journal Rue des Beaux Arts, no. 24 (2010), is here republished and—with much gratitude—translated (for the original text, please see http://www.oscholars.com/RBA/twenty-four/24.7/Articles.htm). Robinson’s transnational study focuses on how reading the specific language of newspaper reports of the Oscar Wilde case, literally from a distance, from places less emotionally attached to and nationally distinct from the scandal’s epicenter in London, England, provides insight into “the state of everyday public knowledge and discussion of (homo)sexuality, at least west of the Atlantic”; thus Robinson’s fascinating research, which involves numerous newspapers—from the elite New York Times to the New York Herald, from the Montreal Daily Star to the French-language papers of Quebec—concludes that the popular press, read transnationally, offers key insights into the developing attitudes toward and levels of interest in the newly forming identity of the “homosexual” across societies.American StudiesTransnationalOscar WildeNewspapersapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/74n7c590articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt02x2r3zx2015-03-06T18:23:59Zqt02x2r3zx“American” Pictures and (Trans-)National Iconographies: Mapping Interpictorial Clusters in American StudiesHebel, Udo J.2015-01-01Udo J. Hebel examines the recent critical history of visual cultures in American Studies in his essay “‘American’ Pictures and (Trans-)National Iconographies: Mapping Interpictorial Clusters in American Studies,” focusing his analysis specifically on “political photography” and the concurrency of contexts that inform his reading of the history of US presidential images. This beautifully researched article, previously published in American Studies Today: New Research Agendas (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2014), takes up questions related to “tensions” between disciplinary concerns and transdisciplinary potentialities for interpreting the representation of the political inside the framework of transnational American Studies.American StudiesTransnationalPolitical PhotographyVisual Cultureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/02x2r3zxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2bf4k8zq2015-03-06T18:23:58Zqt2bf4k8zqA Transnational Tale of Teenage Terror: The Blackboard Jungle in Global PerspectiveGolub, Adam2015-01-01Adam Golub’s research in “A Transnational Tale of Teenage Terror: The Blackboard Jungle in Global Perspective” on the Cold War era depiction in popular film of the US educational system as plagued by juvenile violence—specifically in Blackboard Jungle (1955; based on the novel by Evan Hunter)—is timely and sets into motion a series of relevant questions about the global perception of on-campus violence, US youth, and US culture. Golub focuses on the film’s reception in post-occupation Japan and West Germany in order to highlight the role of geopolitics in assessing the social and cultural “honesty” of a critical self-representation in fictional narrative, as well as the US government’s willingness or unwillingness to allow such depictions their freedom. This essay expands the transnational interpretation of the value of this film by not only comparing how different countries responded to the film but by demonstrating that the intervention of the film into the political moment affords significant insight into the inner workings of cultural diplomacy. A highly teachable essay, this work could be usefully paired with more contemporary narratives problematizing juvenile violence and educational space in US culture and elsewhere; furthermore, it highlights the transnational interpretative framework as essential to an understanding of the mutuality of the political and forms of representation when read in historical context. JTAS is grateful to Red Feather: An International Journal of Children’s Visual Culture, which originally published Adam Golub’s essay in 2012.American StudiesTransnationalBlackboard Jungleapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2bf4k8zqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5nn3d94x2015-03-06T18:23:56Zqt5nn3d94xLatino Autobiography, the Aesthetic, and Political Criticism: The Case of Hunger of MemoryDurán, Isabel2015-01-01This 2003 essay, entitled “Latino Autobiography, the Aesthetic, and Political Criticism: The Case of Hunger of Memory,” was previously published in Nor Shall Diamond Die: American Studies in Honour of Javier Coy, edited by Carme Manuel and Paul Scott Derrick (Valencia: Biblioteca Javier Coy d’estudis nord-americans, Universitat de València). In a fierce defense of the aesthetic properties of the ethnic autobiography, Isabel Durán, “as an outsider” to the politics of “Chicano” critics working in the US (“I am Spanish, and live in Spain”), argues that certain politicized critical approaches to ethnic autobiography inside the US have insisted on an identity politics that reads ethnic or minority writing as “good” if and only if it is “obedient” to the critic’s political ideology, regardless of its aesthetic value as art. Proposing a “renewed theory of the aesthetic,” Durán offers a strong refutation of Ramón Saldívar’s critical assessment of Richard Rodriguez’s Hunger of Memory, while simultaneously demonstrating how a transnational American Studies produces very different intellectual concerns.American StudiesTransnationalLatinoEthnic AutobiographyAestheticHunger of Memoryapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5nn3d94xarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt09d2351z2015-03-06T18:23:55Zqt09d2351zCan National History Be De-Provincialized? U.S. History Textbook Controversies in the 1940s and 1990sBender, Thomas2015-01-01Thomas Bender’s 2009 essay “Can National History Be De-Provincialized? U.S. History Textbook Controversies in the 1940s and 1990s,” originally published in Contexts: The Journal of Educational Media, Memory, and Society, asks the important question of how a nation-specific curriculum in history—that is, how “American” history itself—can be taught with the least influence of political factions and the least interference of commercial factors, in light of the fact that both elements, the political and the commercial, have played a role in the construction of the US history textbook. Bender’s essay demonstrates the complexity of the problem as multiple stakeholders seek to control, limit, or promote particular elements of the narratives of US history. Professional historians, Bender argues, like history itself, have “no responsibility to supply comfort”—that is, no role in promoting nationalism or American exceptionalism—yet he also warns that, due to changes in the textbook industry, they also may have little role in determining what is finally published. Bender’s essay, which specifically discusses the impact of political conditions—World War II, for example—on the daily practice of teaching and writing about history, serves as an insightful reminder of the complexity and vulnerability of a nation’s memory.American StudiesTransnationalHistoryTextbooksapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/09d2351zarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt83d3n8c02015-03-06T18:23:53Zqt83d3n8c0Reprise Editor’s NoteMorgan, Nina2015-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 6.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/83d3n8c0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt102112tc2015-03-06T18:23:52Zqt102112tcGoing to Ground(s): The War Correspondent’s MemoirWilson, Christopher P.2015-01-01This essay considers two memoirs by leading American war correspondents: Stephen Crane’s memoir of the Spanish-American War, “War Memories” (1899), and Dexter Filkins’s account of the US occupation of Iraq, The Forever War (2003). But it also considers the archive of news dispatches behind both books: the news reports that come to “ground” and authorize the memoir in the first place. By “going to ground,” in addition, this essay examines both the interpretive and discursive networks that often migrate from news writing to retrospective chronicle, and the particular situation of returning to the home front that reframes those accounts. Thanks to the work of William Appleman Williams, Amy Kaplan, Elizabeth Samet, Robert Westbrook, and others, we’ve often tried to think about the reciprocity of the imperial and domestic fronts—to recognize, for instance, that reports of war often work in concert with home front ideas about national sovereignty, “foreign influence,” or citizens’ political obligation and socialization. This essay explores what it is about domestic fronts that contains and often silences the news the correspondent brings home. Moreover, it considers how war correspondents’ memoirs reconfigure these home fronts in transnational and intranational terms.War CorrespondenceJournalismSpanish-American WarIraq WarCraneStephenFilkinsDexterHistoryJournalismCultural StudiesLiteratureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/102112tcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1xb4t7xr2015-03-06T18:23:50Zqt1xb4t7xrMore than a “Subspecies of American Literature”: Obstacles toward a Transnational Mormon NovelHales, Scott2015-01-01Since the mid-twentieth century, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) has become an increasingly international organization with more than half of its members currently living outside US borders. Still, because of its US origins, strongly centralized Salt Lake City headquarters, and doctrinal traditions that privilege the United States as a Promised Land, Mormonism remains an American church in the eyes of much of the world. This essay explores Mormonism’s struggle to internationalize through the lens of Mormon novels about transnational Mormon experiences. Specifically, it shows how these novels have sometimes embraced and sometimes resisted the hegemonic narrative of US Mormonism in order to understand how these works consider and reconsider long-standing assumptions about the value of the boundaries and central gathering places that have traditionally defined Mormonism’s physical, cultural, and ideological landscapes. Focusing on Margaret Blair Young’s Salvador (1993), Toni Sorenson Brown’s Redemption Road (2005), and Ryan McIlvain’s Elders (2012), this essay also looks at ways Mormon novels imagine transnational utopian spaces that seek to conceptualize a future where Mormonism is less tied to bordered concepts like nation, state, and America, and more open to border crossings. While these utopian spaces are not altogether unproblematic or free of Americentric assumptions, this essay argues that a look at how these novels use these spaces reveals much about the genre’s potential to explore Mormonism’s possibilities as a transnational community and rethink its relationship to its US headquarters.MormonismMormon NovelTransnational LiteratureGlobal Religionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1xb4t7xrarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2md6f6fr2015-03-06T18:23:47Zqt2md6f6frBilingual Humor, Authentic Aunties, and the Transnational Vernacular at Gezi ParkGurel, Perin2015-01-01Mass-mediated American culture and the English language became raw materials for vernacular protest humor alongside images of headscarf-wearing middle-aged “aunties” during antigovernment protests in Turkey in the summer of 2013. Focusing on posts shared on Facebook and Twitter by Turkish protestors and their supporters in the first two months of the protests, this article studies the complex linguistic and visual humor that developed around Gezi Park and relates it to the identity politics mobilized during the resistance. Exploring how the protestors projected themselves as both cosmopolitan (through the use of American mass culture and the English language) and locally rooted (through the use of auntie humor), the essay delineates how “America” can function in local Middle Eastern politics even in the absence of actual US intervention on the ground. Humor at Gezi demonstrates how closely analyzing transculturated vernacular communication can help us modify Western-derived academic theories about culture and power, making the case for incorporating the study of folklore into transnational American Studies.political humorfolkloretransculturationEnglish languageU.S. in the Middle Eastapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2md6f6frarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7pw6k0382015-03-06T18:23:45Zqt7pw6k038The Aesthetics of Remembering 9/11: Towards a Transnational Typology of MemorialsGessner, Ingrid2015-01-01A decade after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, all three sites of violent impact have seen the dedication of national memorials to the victims. Hundreds of memorials have appeared in less likely places in the United States and around the world. This article offers an analysis of international 9/11 memorials along the lines of Michael Rothberg, as “a complementary centrifugal mapping that charts the outward movement of American power.” It traces well-established memorial aesthetics, such as walls and statues, in a selection of 9/11 memorials located in the United States, Ireland, Spain, Germany, Italy, and Israel. Richard Gray’s hypothesis, that no fundamental change occurred in American prose writing, the works rather “assimilate the unfamiliar into familiar structures,” lends itself to examine 9/11 memorial aesthetics. In fact, despite the proclaimed sense of historical rupture, we do not witness great innovations of memorial design but a continuation of known patterns: modernist minimalism augmented by figural representations.9/11Daniel LibeskindGround ZeroWorld Trade CentermemorialaestheticsCultural StudiesMemorial Culture StudiesVisual Culture StudiesLiterary Studiesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7pw6k038articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1n25z4902015-03-06T18:23:43Zqt1n25z490“Ancestors We Didn’t Even Know We Had”: Alice Walker, Asian Religion, and Ethnic AuthenticityGarton-Gundling, Kyle2015-01-01Recent debates about the ethics of identity in a global age have dealt with how to prioritize conflicting local and global allegiances. Guided by these concerns, the fiction of Alice Walker develops a distinctive view of how local cultures and global movements can fruitfully interact. This vision depends on concepts from Asian religions, a major influence that critics of Walker have largely overlooked. Walker promotes Hindu and Buddhist meditation in a context of widespread African American skepticism toward Asian religions. According to widespread notions of cultural authenticity, Asian religions cannot nourish an African American connection to ethnic roots. In response to this challenge, Alice Walker’s fiction portrays Hindu and Buddhist mystics as African Americans’ ancestors, thus positioning these faiths as authentically black.By creatively enfolding Asian religions into her sense of African American heritage, Walker builds a spiritual cosmopolitanism that relies on claims of ancestral affiliation even when these claims are not literal. This strategy is Walker’s effort to create a new paradigm of cultural authenticity, one that allows individuals and groups to choose their ancestors. Walker’s approach seeks to incorporate disparate global influences while still valorizing the figure of the ancestor. This innovative approach places Walker at the forefront of a growing number of African American artists and intellectuals who promote Asian religions to American minorities. Walker’s work vividly dramatizes larger concerns in transnational American Studies: Eastern philosophy’s relevance to identity politics, the tensions between universal ideals and cultural specifics, and the ethics of cross-cultural appropriation.ethnic authenticityAfrican American identityancestryBuddhismHinduismtransnationalcosmopolitanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1n25z490articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8dm6d1fz2015-03-06T18:23:41Zqt8dm6d1fzCampobello’s Cartuchos and Cisneros’s Molotovs: Transborder Revolutionary Feminist NarrativesGano, Geneva M.2015-01-01Though “revolutionary” acts and attitudes were frequently claimed in various civil rights–era movements in the US, this article considers the specific meaning of the term in a Mexican-Chicano context through a simultaneous examination of Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street (1984) and Nellie Campobello’s Cartucho: relatos de la lucha en el norte de México (1931). By way of a formal allusion to Campobello’s revolutionary text, Cisneros forces her readers to reconsider Mango Street from a hemispheric perspective, prompting new readings of her work. Most broadly, it resituates the text within a broader Latino tradition of the modern testimonio, which demands recognition of its sociopolitical significance. More specifically, the formal connection Cisneros forges insists on a similarity between the violent spaces of the post-WWII barrio and revolutionary Durango. Thus Cisneros collapses national and temporal distinctions that would assure US readers (Cisneros’s main audience) that poverty, violence, and revolution cannot happen here. To Gano, this radical use of form threatens not just literary conventions (this is not simply an assertion of “revolutionary style”) but also contains the suggestive threat that the barrio is a potential site of revolution, inseparable from violent acts. That this is a woman-centered story is significant: Cisneros’s kindling world is comprised largely of women and children who are inundated with daily episodes of violence. Often dismissed as political actors, these individuals are transformed in Cisneros’s work into potential revolutionaries.Sandra CisnerosNellie CampobelloTestimonioFeminismMexican RevolutionChicana/oapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8dm6d1fzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8n70b1b62015-03-06T18:23:39Zqt8n70b1b6Techno-Orientalism with Chinese Characteristics: Maureen F. McHugh’s China Mountain ZhangFan, Christopher T.2015-01-01Christopher T. Fan argues that McHugh’s award-winning 1992 science fiction novel perceives the twilight of the American Century by offering a “critical realism,” to use Georg Lukács’s phrase, of postsocialist US–China interdependency. In other words, it offers a form in which we perceive ourselves as subjects and objects of the twenty-first century world-system’s most important bilateral relationship. Moreover, as a novel about US–China interdependency, it implicitly critiques the binary Orientalism that structures the rapidly growing body of work on “techno-Orientalist” formations. Fan's analysis thus extends arguments about American Orientalism’s non-Manichean formations (Christina Klein, Melani McAlister, Colleen Lye) into the postsocialist era.The novel’s near-future, China-centric world analogizes McHugh’s personal crises of professional desire as a precarious laborer in New York City, with the massive reorientation of desires from Maoist politics to market-directed individuality that she witnessed among her students when she taught in China from 1987–1988. Chinese racial form plays a crucial mediating role in the novel because it reflects the revival of Confucian humanist discourse in reform-era China as a way to focus a national project of rapidly generating capitalist desire. Finally, by describing US–China interdependency, this article also generates a theory of US–China neoliberalism that corrects for universalist, Euro-American accounts of neoliberal subject formation (Lauren Berlant), as well as insufficiently subject-sensitive accounts (Aihwa Ong).OrientalismMaureen McHughChina Mountain ZhangRacial FormRacial FormationNeoliberalismCritical RealismGeorg Lukacsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8n70b1b6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2xh8j1nb2015-03-06T18:23:38Zqt2xh8j1nbExcerpt from The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model MinorityWu, Ellen D.2015-01-01Excerpted from Ellen D. Wu, The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model Minority (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2013).American StudiesTransnationalAsian AmericanModel Minorityapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xh8j1nbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4178d3zb2015-03-06T18:23:37Zqt4178d3zbExcerpt from Racial Asymmetries: Asian American Fictional WorldsSohn, Stephen Hong2015-01-01Excerpted from Stephen Hong Sohn, Racial Asymmetries: Asian American Fictional Worlds (New York: New York University Press, 2014).American StudiesTransnationalAsian Americanapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4178d3zbarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5d8273zc2015-03-06T18:23:35Zqt5d8273zcExcerpt from Legal Orientalism: China, the United States, and Modern LawRuskola, Teemu2015-01-01Excerpted from Teemu Ruskola, Legal Orientalism: China, the United States, and Modern Law (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013).American StudiesTransnationalOrientalismChinaLawapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5d8273zcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2j34p63k2015-03-06T18:23:34Zqt2j34p63kExcerpt from Black Cosmopolitanism: Racial Consciousness and Transnational Identity in the Nineteenth-Century AmericasNwankwo, Ifeoma Kiddoe2015-01-01Excerpted from Ifeoma Kiddoe Nwankwo, Black Cosmopolitanism: Racial Consciousness and Transnational Identity in the Nineteenth-Century Americas (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014).American StudiesTransnationalCosmopolitanismRaceapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2j34p63karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt61t647rs2015-03-06T18:23:32Zqt61t647rsExcerpt from Arabs in American Cinema (1894–1930): Flappers Meet Sheiks in New Movie GenreHajji, Abdelmajid2015-01-01Excerpted from Abdelmajid Hajji, Arabs in American Cinema (1894–1930): Flappers Meet Sheiks in New Movie Genre (Abdelmajid Hajji, 2013).American StudiesTransnationalArabsAmerican Cinemaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/61t647rsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9gz1g63h2015-03-06T18:23:31Zqt9gz1g63hExcerpt from Islam Is a Foreign Country: American Muslims and the Global Crisis of AuthorityGrewal, Zareena2015-01-01Excerpted from Zareena Grewal, Islam Is a Foreign Country: American Muslims and the Global Crisis of Authority (New York: New York University Press, 2013).American StudiesTransnationalAmerican Muslimsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9gz1g63harticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt00m5p9052015-03-06T18:23:30Zqt00m5p905Excerpt from Looking Like the Enemy: Japanese Mexicans, the Mexican State, and US Hegemony, 1897–1945García, Jerry2015-01-01Excerpted from Jerry García, Looking Like the Enemy: Japanese Mexicans, the Mexican State, and US Hegemony, 1897–1945 (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2014).American StudiesTransnationalJapanese MexicansMexicoapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/00m5p905articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1c13k85x2015-03-06T18:23:28Zqt1c13k85xExcerpt from Translated PoeEsplin, EmronVale de Gato, Margarida2015-01-01Excerpted from Emron Esplin and Margarida Vale de Gato, eds., Translated Poe (Bethlehem, PA: Lehigh University Press, 2014).Edgar Allan PoeTranslationAmerican StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1c13k85xarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6fr8j4ph2015-03-06T18:23:27Zqt6fr8j4phForward Editor's NoteRobinson, Greg2015-01-01Forward Editor's Note for JTAS 6.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6fr8j4pharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1pd1074m2015-03-06T18:23:26Zqt1pd1074mEnvisioning Transnational American StudiesFishkin, Shelley Fisher2015-01-01Editor's Note for JTAS 6.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1pd1074marticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 6, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3mz851082012-12-29T22:03:24Zqt3mz85108About the ContributorsHong, Caroline2012-01-01application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3mz85108articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3kj5h0qx2012-12-29T22:03:23Zqt3kj5h0qxMaking a Home away from Home: Traveling Diasporas in María Escandón’s Esperanza’s Box of SaintsPriewe, Marc2012-01-01This essay was originally published in Amerikastudien/American Studies 51, no. 4 (2006): 581–93.Marc Priewe’s essay argues convincingly for a way of applying the term “diaspora” to Chicana/o cultural formations and consciousness by focusing on the transnational relations within the US that pervade Chicana/o life and are manifest in allegiances and nostalgias that transform ideas of ethnicity and place. Priewe’s analysis of Escandón’s text depicts how life in the “transnation” might be imagined. Echoing the language of Du Bois, Priewe examines the “zone of doubleness” and the “transnational gestalt” that characterize the experience of a living in or making a “home away from home.”American StudiesChicana/o StudiesTransnationalDiasporaMaría Escandónapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3kj5h0qxarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4fc268d02012-12-29T22:03:22Zqt4fc268d0Radical Cosmopolitanism: W. E. B. Du Bois, Germany, and African American Pragmatist Visions for Twenty-First Century EuropeLenz, Günter H.2012-01-01This essay originally appeared in Representation and Decoration in a Postmodern Age, edited by Alfred Hornung and Rüdiger Kunow (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2009), 65–96.Günter H. Lenz’s important essay focuses on W. E. B. Du Bois’s education and experiences in Germany. Tracing Du Bois’s time in Germany, from his university years there (1892–1894) to his visits in the 1920s and 1930s, and finally to his last stay in 1958 when he received an honorary doctorate in Berlin, Lenz’s analysis of Du Bois’s work indicates how political factors and social change in Germany influenced and transformed Du Bois’s interpretation of the US but also shifted the ground of Du Bois’s critique to the larger forces of global imperialism and colonialism. Moving from a study of The Souls of Black Folk (1903) through an analysis of the less popular Dark Princess (1928) and on to essays and books such as Color and Democracy: Colonies and Peace (1945), Lenz develops an argument for reading Du Bois’s “radical cosmopolitanism” as “an open, trans (and post-)national, diasporic discourse that acknowledges and negotiates intercultural multiplicity, heterogeneous interests and positions, and hybrid publics.”American StudiesAfrican American StudiesTransnationalW. E. B. Du BoisGermanyCosmopolitanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4fc268d0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3v17520r2012-12-29T22:03:22Zqt3v17520rMoroccan American Studies: Assets and ChallengesMoumine, Mohamed El Amine2012-01-01Mohamed El Amine Moumine’s essay, published originally in Moroccan American Studies, edited by Mohamed Benzidan (2010), as an account of the development of American Studies in Morocco, is here republished on the heels of a significant international conference held in Marrakesh, Morocco, in December 2012 on the timely topic of the Arab Spring’s impact on the teaching of American Studies in Arab universities. The conference, organized by Professor Moumine and the Moroccan American Studies faculty at Université Hassan II Mohammedia–Casablanca was a continuation of the inaugural Cairo conference in 2004, which Moumine describes as the event that opened discussions among Americanists from the US and Arab countries on the topic of American Studies. Observing that “Morocco was the first nation to recognize the newly sovereign United States in 1777,” Moumine speaks from the perspective of a long-held diplomatic bond between these two nations. Detailing the role of “comparative cultural pedagogy” in Université Hassan II Mohammedia–Casablanca’s Moroccan American Studies programs at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, Moumine’s essay offers an exciting example of transnational American Studies at work.American StudiesTransnationalMoroccan American StudiesMoroccoArab SpringComparative Cultural Pedagogyapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3v17520rarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8rb0n1bg2012-12-29T22:03:21Zqt8rb0n1bgReprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2012-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 4.2American StudiesTransnationalRepriseapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8rb0n1bgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5vn092kk2012-12-29T22:03:20Zqt5vn092kkLinguistic Marginalities: Becoming American without Learning EnglishWilkerson, Miranda E.Salmons, Joseph2012-01-01People living in the United States but unable to speak English are often portrayed as "marginal" and "isolated"—socially, economically, and geographically. Such narratives present the learning of English as central to "becoming American" and widely claim that earlier immigrants quickly acquired English. This paper counters such stereotypes. Wilkerson and Salmons present a case study of the extent to which one group of monolingual immigrants lived literally and figuratively on the margins. They draw qualitative and quantitative data from southeastern Wisconsin, especially one township, Hustisford. In 1910, 24 percent of Hustisford residents reported being German monolingual, 35 percent of those American-born. Contrary to assumptions of economic marginality, in this region such monolinguals were not only housewives and farmhands but also craftsmen, tradesmen, teachers, and members of the clergy. Another stereotype is that monolinguals were geographically marginal, but they find them living interspersed with bilinguals and English monolinguals. Nor were they socially marginal, as church records point to a broadly German-dominant but overwhelmingly bilingual community, where numerous Anglo-Americans became highly proficient in German. Even schools were hardly the powerful tools of English learning they are often portrayed as being. Despite all this, Hustisford and similar communities presented themselves as hyperpatriotic Americans. These monolingual immigrants, in short, were not marginal in the usual senses.Community EngagementFirst and Second Language AcquisitionOther GeographyQuantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical MethodologiesimmigrationlanguageidentitygeographyhistoryWisconsinapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5vn092kkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5mf394g12012-12-29T22:03:20Zqt5mf394g1Eros, Thanatos: Amsterdam in Contemporary Anglophone FictionParker, Joshua2012-01-01This article compares a recent American fiction set in Amsterdam (David Liss’s The Coffee Trader, 2003) with several other Anglophone fictions set in the same city to show how several centuries of literary heterostereotypes of Amsterdam have influenced American ideas on the city in literature. Foreign spaces in fiction almost inevitably draw American projections of the American self that cannot be recognized at home, yet Amsterdam’s particular nexus of projection is perhaps one of the most striking and underexamined, with roots reaching back to the founding mythos of America as Pilgrims’ last stop in Europe and extending to today’s often negative projections of libertinism contrasted with traditional American-style Puritanism. How do the spaces of Amsterdam in a highly detailed work like Liss’s allow a range of issues pertinent to contemporary American society to play themselves out on an “othered” stage? Contemporary questioning of capitalism, sexual and ethical mores, and Americans’ relationship with death are highlighted in this space safely outside the American self, and which thus provides a more comfortable locus for their analysis and narrative development.American StudiesAmerican LiteratureAmsterdamComparative ImagologyEnglish Literatureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5mf394g1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt550779g52012-12-29T22:03:19Zqt550779g5Gesturing beyond the Frame: Transnational Trauma and US War FictionLahti, Ruth A. H.2012-01-01The convergent boundary between the fields of trauma theory and US war fiction has resulted in a narrow focus on the subjectivity of the American soldier in war fiction, which partly conditions American war fiction's privileging of the soldier-author. However, this focus on American soldiers does not adequately account for the essentially interactive nature of war trauma, and it elides the experiences of nurses and noncombatants on all sides of the battle while also obscuring women's distinctive war experiences, even when the fiction itself sometimes includes these dimensions. In this essay, Lahti argues that a transnational method can counter these imbalances in trauma theory and in studies of US war fiction. She engages Tim O'Brien's highly influential The Things They Carried from a transnational perspective by interrogating the text's figuring of the survivor author and focusing on critically neglected scenes of interaction between the American soldiers and Vietnamese civilians. In order to discern the way these scenes reveal the text's own struggle with its national US frame, she elaborates a methodology of close reading characters' bodily gestures to foreground the way that fiction offers a glimpse into war as a relational event, always involving two or more participants. In the case of The Things They Carried, this approach brings into view a heretofore unnoticed pattern of mimicry between the American characters and Vietnamese characters that reshapes our scholarly understanding of the text's representation of war trauma.transnationalUS war fictiontrauma theoryTim O'BrienVietnam Wargestureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/550779g5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8hd6s1jq2012-12-29T22:03:18Zqt8hd6s1jqImagining Cultures: The Transnational Imaginary in Postrace AmericaSaldívar, Ramón2012-01-01Forthcoming in The Imaginary and Its Worlds: American Studies after the Transnational Turn, ed. Laura Bieger, Ramón Saldívar, and Johannes Voelz (Dartmouth College Press/University Press of New England, 2013).Ramón Saldívar‘s contribution is a wide-ranging and spirited piece of critical analysis that deals with the “color line” and its relation to the “cultural imaginary” of Americans. Making virtuosic use of examples drawn from texts by a panoply of different Black, Latino, and Asian American authors, Saldívar interrogates the nature (and existence) of “postethnic fiction.”American Studiestransnationalimaginarypostracepostethnic fictionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8hd6s1jqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt07c2k96f2012-12-29T22:03:18Zqt07c2k96fAmericans Abroad: A Global Diaspora?Croucher, Sheila2012-01-01This article uses the lens of diaspora to explore the understudied case of US emigration and the transnationalism of Americans residing abroad. Although rarely recognized as such, native-born US citizens are also migrants who cross international borders, maintain close cultural and political ties to their homeland, and form social networks with their compatriots scattered across the globe. Despite these "diasporic" tendencies, various peculiarities of the case (individual and national privilege high among them) render Americans unlikely subjects for the application of a concept commonly associated with coercion, trauma, and marginalization. Nevertheless, this article maintains that (1) the inclusion of a counterintuitive but compatible case can sharpen the conceptualization of an already inflated term; and (2) the application of a counterintuitive framework can illuminate aspects of American mobility and belonging with significant implications for the host countries, the homeland, and the migrants themselves.Social and Cultural AnthropologydiasporatransnationalismAmerican expatriatesUS emigrantsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/07c2k96farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt78k1r8vc2012-12-29T22:03:17Zqt78k1r8vcExcerpt from Zoot Suit: The Enigmatic Career of an Extreme StylePeiss, Kathy2012-01-01Kathy Peiss knocks the established literature akilter in her study of the zoot suit. This flashy, over-the-top garb of the 1940s has long been studied as a uniform of hipsters and pachucos in the United States, who were targeted for violent repression by white police and servicemen in the 1943 “Zoot Suit Riots” in Los Angeles. Peiss audaciously opens up her study to discuss the signifier of the zoot suit internationally. In a tour de force, she outlines the sense of cultural identity fostered among zoot suiters and allied long-coat wearers, as well as the political meanings assigned to them, in such diverse places as Mexico, Trinidad, South Africa, and the USSR during the 1940s.zoot suittransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/78k1r8vcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7zm7p7f62012-12-29T22:03:16Zqt7zm7p7f6Excerpt from The Transatlantic Century: Europe and America, 1890–2010Nolan, Mary2012-01-01Mary Nolan’s contribution, which comes from her new book, The Transatlantic Century, accomplishes the impressive feat of turning the historical literature on its head. Instead of adding to the familiar story of European influences on the United States and American culture, she instead reveals the pervasive influence of the United States on European culture, even before the United States became a hegemonic world power.transatlanticEuropeUnited Statesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7zm7p7f6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt24m9n1n32012-12-29T22:03:16Zqt24m9n1n3Toward a Politics of American Transcultural Studies – Discourses of Diaspora and CosmopolitanismLenz, Günter H.2012-01-01Excerpt from Re-Framing the Transnational Turn in American Studies (2011), edited by Winfried Fluck, Donald E. Pease, and John Carlos Rowe, published by Dartmouth College Press in Re-Mapping the Transnational: A Dartmouth Series in American Studies. Used with permission. http://www.upne.com.This piece, which is drawn from Günter Lenz's contribution to a new anthology volume on transnational American Studies, attempts to make sense of the “transnational turn” by contrasting it with what he refers to as “transcultural studies” and looking at how both are informed by cosmopolitanism.American Studiestransnationaltransculturaldiasporacosmopolitanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/24m9n1n3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2xg468hg2012-12-29T22:03:15Zqt2xg468hgExcerpts from In Search of First Contact: The Vikings of Vinland, the Peoples of the Dawnland, and the Anglo-American Anxiety of DiscoveryKolodny, Annette2012-01-01Annette Kolodny executes a breathtaking leap into creation stories and folklore of native peoples. Kolodny examines both European (notably Viking) and Native American stories about the first contacts between the New World and the Old World, and brings the Native people’s words into the center of historical inquiry.Native AmericanVikingfirst contactapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xg468hgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt58n4t1b52012-12-29T22:03:14Zqt58n4t1b5Excerpt from Negro Comrades of the Crown: African Americans and the British Empire Fight the U.S. before EmancipationHorne, Gerald2012-01-01Negro Comrades of the Crown unveils the amazing history of the alliances that African Americans in search of individual and group freedom forged throughout the antebellum decades with the British Empire. Black soldiers were recruited by the British, who had their own imperial and diplomatic interests, in opposing the United States. Whether in the War of 1812, in raids from Spanish Florida, in the Caribbean, or in opposing the secession of Texas from Mexico, they eagerly joined in battles against the slave republic and its citizens.African AmericansBritish Empireapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/58n4t1b5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8k43s13c2012-12-29T22:03:13Zqt8k43s13cExcerpt from Stubborn Roots: Race, Culture, and Inequality in U.S. and South African SchoolsCarter, Prudence L.2012-01-01Prudence L. Carter takes on the formidable task of assessing the impact of race on the culture of public schools, among both students and faculty, in two nations marked by histories of extreme racial inequality: the United States and South Africa. Through school visits, interviews, and patient compilation of statistics, she examines the salience, and in some cases the slippery role, of race in interpersonal and professional relations. In the process, she bravely attempts to bring out the voices and subjectivities of the people on all sides of the color line(s) with whom she interacts.racepublic educationUnited StatesSouth Africaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8k43s13carticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2n4175f62012-12-29T22:03:13Zqt2n4175f6Excerpt from Florida’s Snowbirds: Spectacle, Mobility, and Community since 1945Desrosiers-Lauzon, Godefroy2012-01-01Godefroy Desrosiers-Lauzon investigates the phenomenon of the “snowbirds.” Every year, tens of thousands of individuals from eastern Canada and the US Northeast, mainly older people, migrate to Florida for the winter months. Going beyond the usual sociological (and satiric) treatments, Desrosiers-Lauzon studies the development of the migratory flows in the post-1945 period and analyzes them in relation to structural issues in leisure studies, such as the roles of state-promoted tourism, economic development, and environmentalism. Rather than seeing the migrants as contributors to community, either through their presence or their economic input, Floridians have tended to build community by engaging in tourist-bashing—the outsiders being scapegoats for larger concerns over growth and environmental damage. One of the author’s important contributions is in addressing the question of how we should understand this group of border-crossing migrants as constituting “Americans,” and his implicit response to the set of works, of which Lizabeth Cohen’s Making a New Deal is perhaps the most prominent, that foreground the role of cultures of consumption in identity formation.snowbirdsmigrationFloridaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2n4175f6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2hg1g57m2012-12-29T22:03:12Zqt2hg1g57mForward Editor’s NoteRobinson, Greg2012-01-01Forward Editor’s Note for JTAS 4.2American StudiesTransnationalForwardapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2hg1g57marticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2k72p3w72012-12-29T22:03:11Zqt2k72p3w7Journeys to Others and Lessons of Self: Carlos Castaneda in CamposcapeSluis, Ageeth2012-01-01Drawing on Michel Foucault’s concept of heterotopia, this article examines the importance of place and gender within constructions of race politics in Carlos Castaneda’s series on shamanism. Championing a “separate reality” predicated on an indigenous worldview, Castaneda’s lessons invited transnational middle-class youth to "journey" alongside him to camposcape—an anachronistic and idealized countryside—as a means to escape the bourgeois values of their homelands and find spiritual fulfillment in a timeless and "authentic" Mexico. Castaneda’s work proposed new viable spaces of difference in Mexico, yet inscribed these spaces with a masculinist discourse that served to neutralize the gender trouble within the counterculture movement in both Mexico and the US.heterotopiaCarlos CastanedaCamposcapeMexicoapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2k72p3w7articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5sb9d3922012-12-29T22:03:10Zqt5sb9d392Owning the Revolution: Race, Revolution, and Politics from Havana to Miami, 1959–1963Benson, Devyn Spence2012-01-01“Owning the Revolution” explores the role that conversations about race and racism played in defining the 1959 Cuban Revolution both on the island and in South Florida, where over half of the exiles fled. It highlights how revolutionary leaders challenged internal and external opposition movements by publicly labeling dissenters “counterrevolutionaries” and “racists.” Using the label “racist” to attack an opponent was not altogether new in the 1960s, but by linking the term to counterrevolution, national discussions occurring in newspapers, magazines, and on television defined public racism as existing outside of the norms of a new Cuba. Exiles disagreed with this identification and accused the revolution of betraying the nineteenth-century colorblind goals of Jose Martí. Exile leaders in Miami argued that Castro invented racial tensions and claimed that their fight was not with blacks or mulatos but with “red” or communist Cubans. The politics expressed by white exile newspapers, however, did not always fit with the concerns of Afro-Cubans in the United States. Miami Cubans failed to acknowledge the persistence of racism in new exile communities in the same way that the revolutionary government dismissed racism on the island. These parallel silences exemplify the dangers of polarized narratives that imagine the revolution as antiracist and the exile community as racist.raceracistrevolutionCubaMiamiexileapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5sb9d392articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9hx356m42012-12-29T22:03:09Zqt9hx356m4“Si Nicaragua Venció”: Lesbian and Gay Solidarity with the RevolutionHobson, Emily K.2012-01-01This article analyzes the radical imagination of lesbian and gay activism in solidarity with the Nicaraguan Revolution. It examines the reasons US lesbian and gay radicals supported that revolution and investigates the ways that homoerotic, especially lesbian, desire shaped their solidarity. Drawing on Herbert Marcuse and Michel Foucault, the article argues that lesbian and gay radicals viewed the Nicaraguan Revolution in erotic and heterotopic terms. Posters, fliers, and interviews reveal that US activists, people of color and white, represented the Revolution and solidarity through tropes of female masculinity and women’s affection. Many Nicaraguan lesbians and gay men shared these nonnormative images of socialist change. Yet while Nicaraguans claimed Sandinismo as their own, for US activists revolution remained a distant object of desire and solidarity a “seduction,” “crush,” or embrace. United States activists who embraced developmentalist views of Latin American sexualities remained unable to witness lesbian and gay life inside Nicaragua, while lesbian and gay Sandinistas kept silent about FSLN homophobia so as not to undermine solidarity against the Contra war. Desire served as a powerful tool for mobilizing transnational solidarity. By failing to examine desire critically, however, US activists limited their communications with Nicaraguan lesbians and gay men and weakened the relationship they sought with revolution itself.lesbian and gay activismNicaraguan RevolutionSandinistasdesiretransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9hx356m4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0wp587sj2012-12-29T22:03:09Zqt0wp587sjTricontinental Routes of Solidarity: Stokely Carmichael in CubaSeidman, Sarah2012-01-01Stokely Carmichael’s visit to Cuba for three weeks in the summer of 1967 illustrates a convergence in the transnational routes of the African American freedom struggle and the Cuban Revolution. African American activists saw Cuba as a model for resisting US power, eradicating racism, and enacting societal change, while the Cuban government considered African Americans allies against US imperialism and advocates of Cuba’s antiracist stance. Amidst racial violence in the United States and Cuba’s efforts to inspire revolution, Carmichael’s presence at the Organization of Latin American Solidarity conference in Havana—and in particular his interactions with Fidel Castro—caused ripples worldwide. A shared “tricontinental” vision that promoted unity in the Global South against imperialism, capitalism, and racism facilitated Carmichael’s solidarity with Castro. Yet divergent views on the role of race in fighting oppression limited their solidarity. Carmichael and Castro’s spectacular alliance demonstrated their personal affinity and ideological commonalities but did not result in an institutional alliance between the black liberation movement and the Cuban state. Instead Carmichael’s connection with the Cuban Revolution left an underexplored legacy. Examining Carmichael’s visit to Cuba illustrates the possibilities and pitfalls of transnational solidarity and furthers our understanding of postwar struggles for change.Stokely CarmichaelCubaAfrican Americanblack liberationCuban RevolutionFidel Castrotricontinentaltransnationalsolidarityapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0wp587sjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1tz2v7122012-12-29T22:03:08Zqt1tz2v712Transnational Zapata: From the Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional to Immigrant MarchesSlaughter, Stephany2012-01-01Drawing on the examples of the neo-Zapatista movement and the pro-immigrant marches of 2006, this article analyzes images of Emiliano Zapata, a Mexican national hero intricately tied to postrevolution nation rebuilding, as used within transnational movements that “de/territorialize” his image. At the same time that people in these movements have felt the negative effects of globalization, they have also benefited from certain recent technological developments associated with globalization, especially “technoscapes” and “mediascapes” that have launched the “local” discourse of Revolutionary nationalism across borders and onto the world stage through a variety of national and international (cyber)spaces, creating transnational heterotopias or “other spaces” for cultural and political expression that transgress national boundaries. Analyzing examples of Zapata imagery from the post-revolutionary era (1920s–1930s) against the neo-Zapatista movement of the 1990s and 2000s and the 2006 migrant protests in the United States, the paper explores the ways in which the formation of transnational “imagined communities” can destabilize traditional concepts of the nation-state.Emiliano ZapataglobalizationtechnoscapemediascapetransnationalheterotopiaEjército Zapatista de Liberación Nacionalmigrant protestsimagined communitiesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1tz2v712articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4bp4x1sg2012-12-29T22:03:07Zqt4bp4x1sgGlobal Mexico’s Coproduction: Babel, Pan’s Labyrinth, and Children of MenCarroll, Amy Sara2012-01-01This essay compares and contrasts Babel, Pan’s Labyrinth, and Children of Men’s treatments of global Mexico. It focuses on each film’s representations of white femininity and children (variously absent, potentially revolutionary, and messianic). In addition, it offers preliminary notes on a theory of “coproduction” as both an aesthetic response to, and an effect of, neoliberal and alter-globalizations.Cultural StudiesMexicoglobalBabelPan's LabyrinthChildren of Mencoproductionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4bp4x1sgarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt79w3r5ck2012-12-29T22:03:06Zqt79w3r5ckKeeping Time, Performing Place: Jazz Heterotopia in Candace Allen’s ValaidaDvinge, Anne2012-01-01Candace Allen’s 2004 novel Valaida illustrates the migratory patterns of early twentieth-century jazz music and musicians, positing the art form and its performers as “heterotopians”: simultaneously in and outside of the power relations of hegemonic time-space compression, traveling in an alternate and progressive space, signified by the music. Through a reading of heterotopic spaces in Valaida, this article seeks to complicate the notion of heterotopias as purely progressive spaces for reversal and liberation. It does so by emphasizing the double nature of heterotopias as both progressive and reactionary and suggests that the way time is employed in a heterotopic space determines its progressive potential. Spaces of cumulative, static, or frozen time refuse to yield any utopian promise, whereas fluid, dynamic, and ephemeral time offers moments of agency. In the case of Valaida, music and performance offer an alternate space, where the radical potential lies in the moment of communication and community, constituting a diasporic practice and heterUtopian spaces of sound and time.Cultural StudiesCandace Allenjazzheterotopiaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/79w3r5ckarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3ts0f9xh2012-12-29T22:03:06Zqt3ts0f9xhThe Spatial Politics of Radical Change, an IntroductionSeigel, MicolFrazier, Lessie JoSartorius, David2012-01-01Introduction to the JTAS Special Forum entitled "Revolutions and Heterotopias," edited by Micol Seigel, Lessie Jo Frazier, and David Sartoriustransnationalrevolutionheterotopiaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3ts0f9xharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt08d1j3sq2012-12-29T22:03:05Zqt08d1j3sqHistorical Consciousness and Transnational American StudiesSuh, ChrisRobinson, Greg2012-01-01Editors' Note for JTAS 4.2American StudiesTransnationalHistoryapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/08d1j3sqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6sz1q4m62012-06-22T16:10:23Zqt6sz1q4m6About the ContributorsHong, Caroline2012-01-01application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6sz1q4m6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8x3533pf2012-06-22T16:10:21Zqt8x3533pfSex in the City: Prostitution in the Age of Global MigrationsRobinson, Lillian S.2012-01-01The article traces the history and current role of gendered migration and sexual labor through an exploration of the contradictions inherent in gendered migration in which rural youth are migrating to the cities of the developing world while sex-customers migrate to “hot” tourism destinations. The author focuses on the economic nature of this migration within the context of the two main concepts used to understand women’s migration: refugees and trafficking. Case studies, particularly from Asia, reveal that a blanket application of the trafficking label misinterprets the agency, daily life, and even the oppression of sex workers. By examining the factors that influence women’s migration for work and the conditions that perpetuate their entrance into the sex industry, the author concludes that there is need to take into account the limited choices in today’s global economy that compel women to engage in sex work. She questions therefore the utility, in developed countries, of criminalizing these activities, suggesting instead that they be protected by extending their rights.MigrationSex WorkRefugeesTraffickingapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8x3533pfarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1mx8w1k92012-06-22T16:10:20Zqt1mx8w1k9Intercultural Communication in the Global ClassroomHerrington, TyAnna K.Tretyakov, Yuri P.2012-01-01The Global Classroom Project, a joint experiment in long-distance, cross-cultural, transnational learning (“not,” the authors point out, “the one-sided ‘missionary’ instruction typical of distance learning courses”), is outlined in “Intercultural Communication in the Global Classroom” by TyAnna K. Herrington and Yuri P. Tretyakov, originally published in 2004 in Russian-American Links: 300 Years of Cooperation (Russian Academy of Sciences). Here, the authors review the history of their experiment in communication studies, which revealed a number of challenges in intercultural communication styles among Russian, Swedish, and American students. This valuable study lends insight into early attempts to bring “collaborative” practice to transnational and cross-cultural constituencies meeting each other for the first time. The “chaos” that the authors report is read as a space for unstructured and unimagined discoveries for students and professors alike, testifying perhaps to broad, non-ideologically informed but technologically enhanced creative and transnational networks yet to come.Global Classroom ProjectTransnationalCommunicationEducationapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1mx8w1k9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3h55m3rj2012-06-22T16:10:17Zqt3h55m3rjWriting on Multiple JourneysRobbins, SarahPullen, Ann Ellis2012-01-01In their beautifully researched study and critical edition, Nellie Arnott’s Writings on Angola, 1905–1913: Missionary Narratives Linking Africa and America (Parlor Press), authors Sarah Robbins and Ann Ellis Pullen examine in fine detail the historical record of the transnational network of literary work produced by Arnott. Tracing her legacy in the study’s third chapter, “Writing on Multiple Journeys,” the authors argue on behalf of Arnott’s capacity to create authority and celebrity as well as a sense of community among her distant readers, underscoring the powerful and influential role that missionary women’s writing (mimicking to some extent the popular genre of travel writing) played in shaping attitudes at home, not only with regard to race, but also in relation to women’s roles, place, and purpose. Robbins and Pullen display a conscientious resolve not to obscure the inherent contradictions in Arnott’s changing perspectives as they offer a historical narrative based on Arnott’s public and private texts, which also reveal the “consistent inconsistency” in her attitudes and beliefs. Details of and insights into educational practices in missionary schools, including the observation that mothers in the US appreciated the fact that their middle-class Christian children were sharing curriculum with Umbundu children in Angola, invite interesting conclusions about the transnational, transgenerational, and gendered effects of women’s work in the missionary world.Nellie ArnottAngolaMissionary NarrativesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3h55m3rjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3dp6q6n22012-06-22T16:10:15Zqt3dp6q6n2Essence and the Mulatto Traveler: Europe as Embodiment in Nella Larsen’s QuicksandGray, Jeffrey2012-01-01This 1994 article by Jeffrey Gray originally appeared in the journal NOVEL: A Forum on Fiction (Duke University Press). An early foray into transnational American Studies, Gray’s analysis of the role “Europe” plays both in the narrative and in the life of the author herself begins with a discussion of the object of art—the self as exoticized, distanced other—imagined and displayed against the carceral black body in the American imaginary, an imaginary that holds the protagonist, Helga, hostage to an indeterminacy represented by her mulatto status. Gray argues that the “quicksand” of the search for essence, whether located in the body or in the eyes of others, eventually dissolves the protagonist’s sense that a change of place can change the truth that essence does not exist. Gray references the shared observation among African American international celebs (Richard Wright, James Baldwin, and Josephine Baker—whose 1973 interview with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., is cited) that “being different is different” in Europe, yet that otherness is finally also not an experience of self, which the narrative (and perhaps the author’s life as well) proves to be endlessly deferred.TransnationalEuropeNella LarsenMulattoapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3dp6q6n2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9g70g1882012-06-22T16:10:14Zqt9g70g188Reprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2012-01-01Reprise Editor’s Note for JTAS 4.1American StudiesTransnationalRepriseapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9g70g188articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84h9n66t2012-06-22T16:10:12Zqt84h9n66tRaising The Wild Flag: E. B. White, World Government, and Local Cosmopolitanism in the Postwar MomentZipp, Samuel2012-01-01This essay argues that the writer E. B. White, best known for his literary essays and children’s books, also had a significant but neglected career as a political writer. It considers his writings, during and just after World War II, on the subject of world government, and argues that he made the case for world federation by way of a novel model of cosmopolitanism that results from love of place and country rather than from dispensing with them. It considers the reception of his 1946 book The Wild Flag and the productive tension between White’s skepticism about political advocacy and his attempt to imagine a public for world government as constituted through his vision of cosmopolitanism.E. B. WhiteWorld GovernmentCosmopolitanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84h9n66tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2mj2p06d2012-06-22T16:10:10Zqt2mj2p06dSaving Civilization from the "'Green-Eyed' Monster": Emma Goldman and the Sex Reform Campaign against Jealousy, 1900–1930Hustak, Carla C.2012-01-01This article explores the Anglo-transatlantic dimensions of the early twentieth-century sex reform movement through the lens of an emotional economy, which, Hustak argues, marked a specific historical moment in defining political alliances at the level of embodied felt relations of power. The article examines the importance of the collaboration between British and American sex reformers by focusing on how their radical feminist and socialist politics were underpinned by their attacks on jealousy. Hustak suggests here that new transatlantic relationships were forged by British and American sex reformers through their consideration of the emotional constitution of white middle-class citizens who were similarly shaped by capitalist and patriarchal institutions that crossed national divides, while also articulating a special kinship among white middle-class citizens in cosmopolitan bohemian communities on both sides of the Atlantic. Hustak’s use of the term "emotional economy" highlights how white middle-class British and American sex reformers shared similar concerns over a declining white middle-class birthrate, the nervous exhaustion of white middle-class bodies, and the eugenic future of white middle-class civilization. She suggests that sex reformers' campaigns against jealousy highlighted communal ties that defied national boundaries by identifying shared emotional constitutions along the lines of whiteness, eugenic reproduction, and professional work regimes. Hustak uses the specific case study of sex reformer and anarchist Emma Goldman's activities in Greenwich Village as an example of an influential early twentieth-century transnational reformer whose attacks on jealousy as the "'green-eyed' monster" occurred in the wider context of an Anglo-transatlantic politics of emotion.emotional economyAnglo-transatlantickinshipapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2mj2p06darticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2j9627xk2012-06-22T16:10:08Zqt2j9627xkExcerpt from Queer Compulsions: Race, Nation, and Sexuality in the Affairs of Yone NoguchiSueyoshi, Amy2012-01-01Amy Sueyoshi’s Queer Compulsions: Race, Nation, and Sexuality in the Affairs of Yone Noguchi is a fascinating study of the writings and character of the transnational Japanese-born poet Yone Noguchi during his years in the United States, as seen through the prism of his interlocking sexual/romantic affairs with western writer Charles Warren Stoddard, historian Ethel Armes, and editor Léonie Gilmour (a liaison that produced the famed sculptor Isamu Noguchi). Sueyoshi’s detective work, matched with her sensitive analysis, allows readers to grasp the complicated ways that race, class, and “exoticism” inform intimate relations.Yone NoguchiQueerTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2j9627xkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7dr777vs2012-06-22T16:10:07Zqt7dr777vsExcerpt from Trans-Americanity: Subaltern Modernities, Global Coloniality, and the Cultures of Greater MexicoSaldívar, José David2012-01-01José David Saldívar’s work, excerpted from Trans-Americanity: Subaltern Modernities, Global Coloniality, and the Cultures of Greater Mexico, focuses on Américo Paredes, whom he refers to as a “proto-Chicano.” Here he discusses Paredes’s columns written from Asia for the United States Army magazine Stars and Stripes and how his experience in Asia between 1945 and 1950 crossed with and informed his evolving viewpoint on US–Mexican borderlands and his “outernationalist” envisioning of a “Greater Mexico.”Américo ParedesProto-ChicanoMexicoBorderlandsTransnationalOuternationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7dr777vsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2mz5t4zh2012-06-22T16:10:05Zqt2mz5t4zhExcerpt from After Camp: Portraits in Midcentury Japanese American Life and PoliticsRobinson, Greg2012-01-01In his book By Order of the President: FDR and the Internment of Japanese Americans (2001), Greg Robinson discussed FDR’s decision to remove Japanese Americans from their homes and concentrate them in internment camps. Now in this chapter from his recently published book, After Camp: Portraits in Midcentury Japanese American Life and Politics, he unearths Roosevelt’s grandiose and frightening idea of their return to civil society by scattering them—two or three families at a time—in small towns, all away from the west coast. He also thought such a scatter plan would suit refugee European Jews who he hoped would settle in Latin America. Indeed he thought ethnic minorities crowded into American cities might also benefit if resettled in small towns. While this is a racial story, FDR’s vision here was also driven by the rural sentiments of FDR, the gentleman farmer. That produced some highly regarded programs, most notably the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and the “Greenbelt towns.” But the massive population transfers that Robinson shows to have been on the president’s mind would have made a mockery of the US rights tradition. Of equal importance, Robinson’s examination of the role of major social scientists recruited to the project provides an object lesson in the dangers of intellect seduced by power.Japanese AmericanFranklin D. RooseveltResettlementapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2mz5t4zharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5bx354k12012-06-22T16:10:03Zqt5bx354k1Excerpts from Bridging Cultures: International Women Faculty Transforming the US AcademyRobbins, Sarah R.Smith, Sabine H.Santini, Federica2012-01-01This is a pair of excerpts from the anthology Bridging Cultures: International Women Faculty Transforming the US Academy. The book is composed of a series of memoirs by foreign-born women scholars working in various disciplines, in which they reflect on their personal experiences as foreigners in US academia. The introduction by Federica Santini, Sabine H. Smith, and Sarah R. Robbins underlines the crucially feminist nature of “standpoint epistemology”—that is, the identifying and critiquing of one’s own particular viewpoint and “positioning.” Sabine Smith’s contribution proceeds to recount her own experience as a foreign-born woman scholar, and how she both contributes to the education of her students through her understanding of her native German language and culture and is herself shaped by her position as an outsider in the United States—Smith glories in the sense of liberation her status offers her.MemoirWomen FacultyAcademiaStandpoint EpistemologyTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5bx354k1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8b2686z92012-06-22T16:10:02Zqt8b2686z9Excerpt from Queequeg’s Coffin: Indigenous Literacies and Early American LiteratureBrander Rasmussen, Birgit2012-01-01Birgit Brander Rasmussen’s Queequeg’s Coffin: Indigenous Literacies and Early American Literature is a fascinating discussion of various non-alphabetic writing by indigenous peoples. According to its blurb, it “recovers previously overlooked moments of textual reciprocity in the colonial sphere, from a 1645 French-Haudenosaunee Peace Council to Herman Melville’s youthful encounters with Polynesian hieroglyphics.” The text reproduced here takes on Melville’s iconic novel Moby Dick and explores Ishmael’s description of the tattoos on the body of the Polynesian harpooner Queequeg and on his coffin. Rasmussen posits these as a fictionalized embodiment of actual Polynesian writing.IndigenousTransnationalHerman MelvilleMoby Dickapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8b2686z9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt53c3t83t2012-06-22T16:10:00Zqt53c3t83tExcerpt from Transnational Russian-American Travel WritingMarinova, Margarita D.2012-01-01Margarita Marinova’s text is excerpted from her new work Transnational Russian-American Travel Writing. The work’s purpose is to examine “the diverse practices of crossing boundaries, tactics of translation, and experiences of double and multiple political and national attachments” found in a group of writings about encounters between Russians and Americans between 1865 and the Russian Revolution of 1905. (These encounters provide a prelude to the more famous American travelogue of 1930s Soviet satirical writers Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov, Odnoetazhnaia Amerika [Single-Storied America].) Contrasting viewpoints on race and ethnicity form an important element of Marinova’s corpus, and one fine example is the extract shown here, which treats the encounter of Russian-Jewish revolutionary Vladimir Bogoraz (Tan) with a Black American student working as a Pullman porter, and the Russian’s unwittingly humorous incapacity to view him outside of stereotypes (in a fashion that anticipates the character of the mother in Shirley Jackson’s mordant short story “After You, My Dear Alphonse”).Russian-AmericanTravel WritingTransnationalVladimir Bogorazapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/53c3t83tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt04m251xc2012-06-22T16:09:58Zqt04m251xcExcerpt from Judah L. Magnes: An American Jewish NonconformistKotzin, Daniel P.2012-01-01Daniel Kotzin’s Judah L. Magnes: An American Jewish Nonconformist offers a new view of Magnes, a prominent American rabbi and Zionist leader who emigrated to Palestine after World War I and became the first president of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Paradoxically, as Kotzin demonstrates, it was through his work in Jerusalem that Magnes most clearly sought to realize his American values. In the face of pressure from leaders of the Yishuv for a Jewish state, Magnes championed democracy, humanistic values, and Jewish–Arab binationalism.Judah L. MagnesJewishAmericanTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/04m251xcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2sw311w42012-06-22T16:09:57Zqt2sw311w4Excerpt from Sites Unseen: Architecture, Race, and American LiteratureGleason, William A.2012-01-01This excerpt from William A. Gleason’s Sites Unseen: Architecture, Race, and American Literature juxtaposes the work of Richard Harding Davis and Olga Beatriz Torres, two international travelers during the generation preceding US involvement in World War I. Davis, a popular author and magazine editor, barnstormed through Central and South America, which he made the subject of a popular travelogue and “imperialist novel.” Torres, a teenaged girl, traveled north from Mexico into the United States and reported on conditions there in a series of letters published after her death. Yet despite their obvious disparities in point of view, the two works not only address similar themes of US power (albeit from different directions) but they both focus on architecture and how it reflects race and class structures. The excerpt forms a fascinating counterpoint to Rhys Isaac’s pioneering study of architecture and social hierarchy in colonial Virginia, The Transformation of Virginia, 1740–1790 (1983).Richard Harding DavisOlga Beatriz TorresArchitectureRaceAmerican LiteratureTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2sw311w4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0207q69j2012-06-22T16:09:55Zqt0207q69jExcerpt from East–West Interchanges in American Art: A Long and Tumultuous RelationshipChang, Gordon H.2012-01-01Gordon Chang’s essay, excerpted from East–West Interchanges in American Art: A Long and Tumultuous Relationship, focuses on Zhang Shuqi, a Chinese-born artist who worked in the United States during the period of World War II and acted as a cultural diplomat for China. Zhang strongly influenced American mass culture by bringing methods of Chinese brush painting to a general audience. However, despite the popular “orientalist” association of Zhang’s art with traditional brush painting (and, beyond that, timeless Chinese culture), his work was in fact strikingly modern.Cultural StudiesArt HistoryZhang ShuqiBrush Paintingapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0207q69jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt14g1g4pr2012-06-22T16:09:53Zqt14g1g4prSpecial Editor’s NoteBender, Thomas2012-01-01Special Editor’s Note for JTAS 4.1’s ForwardAmerican StudiesTransnationalForwardapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/14g1g4prarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1rm3h17t2012-06-22T16:09:51Zqt1rm3h17tForward Editor’s NoteRobinson, Greg2012-01-01Forward Editor’s Note for JTAS 4.1American StudiesTransnationalForwardapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1rm3h17tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5fp5b4kw2012-06-22T16:09:50Zqt5fp5b4kwTransnationalizing Asian American Studies: Two PerspectivesCapozzola, Christopher2012-01-01Book reviews of Christian Collet and Pei-Te Lien, eds., The Transnational Politics of Asian Americans (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2009); and Setsu Shigematsu and Keith L. Camacho, eds., Militarized Currents: Toward a Decolonized Future in Asia and the Pacific (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010).Asian AmericanTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5fp5b4kwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt84x5v5qj2012-06-22T16:09:48Zqt84x5v5qjBecoming-Animal in Asian Americas: Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s God of Luck and a Watanabean Triptych (Three Poems by José Watanabe)Kim, Michelle Har2012-01-01Considering the implicit North American and Anglophone core of Asian American literature traditionally conceived, this essay discusses two examples of literatures of the Asian Americas. A narrative of a Chinese coolie’s heroic escape from a Peruvian guano mine, Ruthanne Lum McCunn’s novel God of Luck (2008) introduces a lesser-known point of view to the field: the nineteenth-century Chinese coolie in Peru. Rather than embrace the emblematic hero who accedes to voice, this essay attempts to read outside of an anticipated rubric of individual politico-economic repletion. In the poetry of Peruvian writer José Watanabe (1946–2007), motifs of animal encounter abound—yet dogs, fish, and other kinds of life are never deployed as a discrete metaphor through which we can see and know ourselves. As readers we are shifted to the edge of the world, in a “becoming-animal” that explores not the Asian American, but its restless morphing, illegibly human or otherwise.Asian American LiteratureRuthanne Lum McCunnChinese CoolieJosé WatanabeBecoming-Animalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/84x5v5qjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt16v4g0b12012-06-22T16:09:46Zqt16v4g0b1“Speaking German Like Nobody’s Business”: Anna May Wong, Walter Benjamin, and the Possibilities of Asian American CosmopolitanismLim, Shirley Jennifer2012-01-01In the summer of 1928 in Berlin, the noted German Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin (1892–1940) and Chinese American actress Anna May Wong (1905–1961) shared an unlikely encounter that set in relief European and American conceptions of modernity as well as white European intellectual and American racial minority cosmopolitanisms. On July 6, 1928, Benjamin published the results as “Gespräch mit Anne May Wong” [“Speaking with Anna May Wong: A Chinoiserie from the Old West”] on the front page of the leading German literary review, Die Literarische Welt. Read against a cache of Wong’s writings, the encounter and the writings are significant for how they intervene in constructions of cosmopolitanism and racial and gendered difference. This encounter raises questions concerning the relationship between Asian America, modernity, race, gender, and cosmopolitanism, linking notions of cosmopolitanism to a discourse of race in the transnational American context. Benjamin’s struggles in fully characterizing Wong also point to the antagonism between racialized American modern femininity and Eurocentric cosmopolitanism.Anna May WongWalter BenjaminAsian AmericanCosmopolitanismModernityTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/16v4g0b1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0pn2w8cs2012-06-22T16:09:45Zqt0pn2w8csLooking In, Looking Out: The Chinese-Caribbean Diaspora through Literature—Meiling Jin, Patricia Powell, Jan Lowe ShinebourneMisrahi-Barak, Judith2012-01-01Few scholars have focused on the Chinese diaspora in the Caribbean, and it is only fairly recently that the literature written by Caribbean writers of Chinese origin has aroused interest. This essay interrogates the lack of visibility of Chinese-Caribbean writers, like Meiling Jin and Jan Shinebourne, whose ancestors arrived in Guyana in the nineteenth century as indentured workers, and are now considered to be Caribbean writers of Guyanese origin living in the UK, with the Chinese element being (almost) erased (but not quite). This essay also considers Patricia Powell since she focuses on the Chinese diaspora in the Caribbean, even though she is not of Chinese origin but a Jamaican American writer.Carribean StudiesChinese-CaribbeanDiasporaMeiling JinPatricia PowellJan Lowe Shinebourneapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0pn2w8csarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt19c9k0br2012-06-22T16:09:43Zqt19c9k0brDismantling Bellicose Identities: Strategic Language Games in Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s DICTEEJoo, Hee-Jung SerenityLux, Christina2012-01-01This essay argues that Cha’s DICTEE trains the reader in strategic language games in order to resist bellicose identities. It engages contemporary studies of multilingual literature in the United States, challenging overly optimistic visions of an inclusive cosmopolitanism that elides problems of gender, race, class, and nation. Sau-ling Wong’s “Denationalization Reconsidered” is used to examine these issues in relation to defense funding, language policies, and historical tensions between ethnic studies and area studies in the US. As this essay posits, Cha addressed many of Wong’s concerns avant la lettre.Asian AmericanTheresa Hak Kyung ChaDicteeLanguage Gamesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/19c9k0brarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2vg2x0ds2012-06-22T16:09:42Zqt2vg2x0dsWhen You Can’t Tell Your Friends from “the Japs”: Reading the Body in the Korematsu CaseKim, Heidi Kathleen2012-01-01Fred Korematsu, plaintiff of the landmark 1944 case Korematsu v. United States, had facial cosmetic surgery to try to escape the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II. This article examines the popular and legal discussion of his surgery at that time, which conveys that fears of Japanese spies and the supposed inability to distinguish Japanese, captured in the famous Life magazine article “How To Tell Your Friends from the Japs,” directly influenced the courts’ rulings on the legality of the incarceration. The deliberate decision of the Supreme Court to excise this issue from the Korematsu opinion, which disclaimed racism as a root cause of the incarceration, is exposed through archival documents and drafts that betray a deep interest in his surgery, as do the government and lower court documents. As a heroic figurehead of civil rights, Korematsu complicates the discussion of surgical patients as complicit, drawing attention instead to the legalized discrimination that drives such choices.Japanese AmericanInternmentIncarcerationFred Korematsuapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2vg2x0dsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt35g046ww2012-06-22T16:09:40Zqt35g046ww“Continental Drift”: Translation and Kimiko Hahn’s Transcultural PoetryMai, Xiwen2012-01-01In the context of the expanding discourse of transnational Asian American Studies, this essay studies Kimiko Hahn, particularly her engagement with East Asian traditions in her poetry, and shows how her work exemplifies a transcultural Asian American literature that requires reading beyond the domestic boundaries of the United States. Drawing on Walter Benjamin's and Gayatri Spivak’s translation studies, it examines how Hahn critiques the assimilationist representation of Asian women in translations of Asian texts such as Arthur Waley’s version of Lady Murasaki’s The Tale of Genji. It then reads how, based on her thoughts about literary translation, Hahn experiments with creative practices of “translation,” including a retranslation of Ezra Pound’s Chinese images and untranslation of zuihitsu. Rewriting Ezra Pound’s Chinese images, Hahn reconstructs women’s voice in ancient Chinese writings. Undoing the simplistic interpretation of the classical Japanese form zuihitsu, her restorative untranslation of the form makes connections between the discursive agency of ancient Asian women writers and contemporary women poets. Thus, Hahn’s translational writing reveals a poetics of “continental drift,” a poetics that calls attention to the necessity of reading Asian American literature in transnational and transcultural contexts.Kimiko HahnAsian AmericanPoetryTranslationTransnationalTransculturalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/35g046wwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2b9067vd2012-06-22T16:09:38Zqt2b9067vdLet Us Remember Fengliu instead of Miseries: Dayou Poems and Chinese DiasporaZheng, Da2012-01-01In 1953, Chiang Yee, a Chinese American travel writer and artist, began to write and exchange Chinese-language dayou poems with Yang Lien-sheng, a Harvard professor. These poems, seemingly casual, unrestrained, humorous, and sometimes emotional, reflected the sentiments of diaspora poets, their feelings about displacement, profession, language, and home. This article is a study of the cultural and literary significance of these dayou poems. Written during the Cold War era by Chinese scholars, they stand in sharp contrast with mainstream publications in both China and America. They are not merely an instance of Chinese poetic form being practiced overseas; when examined against their sociocultural context, these verses raise significant issues concerning displacement and homeland, career and cultural identity, and “mother tongue” and public expression. They reveal an ethos that diaspora poets have never publicly manifested in their English-language writings. Thus, a study of these dayou poems may deepen our understanding about Asian American literature, lead to a better appreciation of writing in languages other than English, and open up a new, exciting topic within Asian American Studies.Asian AmericanChinese AmericanChiang YeeDayouChinese PoetryDiasporaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2b9067vdarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5kr4j4z12012-06-22T16:09:37Zqt5kr4j4z1A Subject of Sea and Salty Sediment: Diasporic Labor and Queer (Be)longing in Monique Truong’s The Book of SaltPeek, Michelle2012-01-01Caught having an affair while employed at the home of the governor-general of Saigon, Vietnamese cook, migrant worker, and narrator of Monique Truong’s The Book of Salt, Binh, is cast out of his natal home, and sets off for the open sea, winding up as a live-in cook in the household of lesbian couple Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas. As an abstract source of labor and culinary pleasure to those he encounters in Paris, Binh concludes, despondently, that he is, “nothing but a series of destinations with no meaningful expanses in between.” Yet the “expanses in between,” most notably in reference to waterways, allude to a central trope of Vietnamese culture. Incorporating Vietnamese symbolism with formative migratory experiences, this essay argues that Truong constructs a subject who can be read through both affective forms of national belonging as well as a broader queer diasporic community. It also explores Binh’s percipient tongue as one that is ever critical of the dynamics of power and privilege, and ever sensitive to the variances in salt (of sea, sweat, tears). The Book of Salt thus mediates the possibility of a gustatory epistemology and community constituted in the sensate, attuned to divergent experiences of mobility, labor, and love.Asian AmericanVietnameseMonique TruongLaborQueerDiasporaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5kr4j4z1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6v8636jz2012-06-22T16:09:35Zqt6v8636jzThe Limits of Hospitality in Gish Jen’s The Love WifeSokolowski, Jeanne2012-01-01Gish Jen’s 2004 novel The Love Wife highlights the foreign presence within American national boundaries but plays with the reader’s expectations of a novel of immigration to deconstruct the categories of citizen and immigrant, foreigner and native, protagonist and antagonist, host and guest. This blurring between antagonist and protagonist in the novel captures the dynamics of hospitality: through a delicate series of adjustments, concessions, and compromise, guest and host can exchange places with one another. Tapping into fears particularly emergent in the post-9/11 era of immigrants as poised to infiltrate America, Jen’s novel engages with the anxiety evoked by the foreigner’s presence but complicates this notion through her careful examination of the ethnic- and gender-inflected dimensions of that response, as well as through the resolution of the plot. Considering the trope of hospitality within contemporary Asian American works also helps illuminate fiction’s role in evolving definitions of “Asian American” and “America” in the “post-national” era.Asian AmericanHospitalityGish Jenapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6v8636jzarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt86v6f64g2012-06-22T16:09:33Zqt86v6f64g“Call Me an Innocent Criminal”: Dual Discourse, Gender, and “Chinese” America in Nie Hualing’s Sangqing yu Taohong/Mulberry and PeachFusco, Serena2012-01-01This essay discusses Nie Hualing’s novel Sangqing yu Taohong (Mulberry and Peach: Two Women of China) as a literary text that intensely engages Chinese identity and Chineseness as a global, transnational cultural phenomenon, while at the same time narrating a story of migration to the US that spurs the emergence (within the text) of some of the most localized, politically charged concerns of Asian American cultural discourse. While the publication of Nie’s novel coincides with the initial articulations of Asian American identity in the context of political activism, Sangqing yu Taohong/Mulberry and Peach also anticipates the growing interest for contextualizing the Asian American experience as a transnational phenomenon. In its representation of Chinese migration to America and female sexuality as issues that stretch ethical and political boundaries and blur the distinction between private and public discourses, this novel constructs identity as both politicized and uncontainable, anticipating, again, some key components of Asian American cultural discourse since the 1990s. This excess of signification reproduces the tension between “model minorities” and “bad subjects” that makes Asian American discourse inescapably political. This political nature, in turn, intertwines public and private frameworks of reference, as well as ethnic, national, and transnational dimensions of signification.Nie HualingChineseAsian AmericanTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/86v6f64garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5720m2d32012-06-22T16:09:32Zqt5720m2d3Mifune and Me: Asian/American Corporeal Citations and the Politics of MobilityMetzger, Sean2012-01-01This essay examines the relationships of performing bodies to elaborate “Asian/American corporeal citations” and argues that such citations create the grounds for a politics of mobility. Revisiting and extending Sau-ling Wong’s theoretical engagement with “myths of mobility,” it specifically uses the nexus of mourning, performance, and racialization to rearticulate modes of cultural passing by constructing a lineage through several men: screen star Toshiro Mifune, actor Lane Nishikawa (who invokes Mifune through Nishikawa’s elegiac solo piece Mifune and Me), and the author (disciplined through acting classes with Nishikawa). The stakes of re-membering are further articulated through the interweaving of the bodily acts associated with the death of the author’s grandfather, Bo Jung. Joining the principal argument with this more personal reflection is an attempt to think through the implications of Nishikawa’s theatrical memorial and to grapple with loss and the complex, nonlinear structures of memory that attend it. Ultimately, all the cultural transmissions discussed place the body at the center of transnational, racial, and ethnic discourses. In so doing, the essay revises kinship as the foundation for what might otherwise be too easily read as diasporic cultural productions.Asian AmericanCorporeal CitationsMobilityPerformanceToshiro MifuneLance NishikawaTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5720m2d3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt25h3m6c02012-06-22T16:09:30Zqt25h3m6c0Across a Different Table: Strange and Familiar Encounters in Asian American CinemaKim, Ju Yon2012-01-01The 2008 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival presented three narrative films, Never Forever, Pretty to Think So, and West 32nd, with suggestively similar interests. Namely, all three films focus on “horizontal” (rather than intergenerational) conflicts between characters distinguished by class, legal status, and migration history but connected by ethnic or racial identifications. This article argues that the films, individually and collectively, participate in ongoing deliberations about the borders of Asian America by juxtaposing and organizing distinct models of conceiving Asian American identity. In particular, the films suggest the limitations of privileging certain formations of Asian America over others by both dramatizing and embodying their uneasy coexistence. Tensions between minority, immigrant, and diasporic positions become evident not only through their plots, characterizations, and stylistic elements but also in their complex production and distribution histories. The films together highlight the necessity of attending to the difficult questions of ethnic and racial identification and material inequity that are manifest when the various narratives of affiliation and difference espoused by each model encounter one another.Film StudiesAsian American CinemaNever ForeverPretty to Think SoWest 32ndAsian AmericanFilmapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/25h3m6c0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt88g6k6pk2012-06-22T16:09:28Zqt88g6k6pkMigration, Displacement, and Movements in the Global Space: Ming-Yuen S. Ma’s Multi-Media Project Xin Lu: A Travelogue in Four PartsZhou, Xiaojing2012-01-01In her recent work, Sau-ling Cynthia Wong draws critical attention to the implications of the formation of an Asian American “diaporic community” in cyberspace, where race still operates as an organizing principle of power relations. Although cyberspace is not confined by national borders, Wong examines how subversion of and intervention in race- and sex-based hierarchies in cyberspace can articulate Asian American identities in relation to diasporas and the nation-state. This essay explores the politics of artistic invention in diasporas as embedded in the disruption, dislocation, and fragmentation in Ming-Yuen S. Ma’s multi-media project, Xin Lu: A Travelogue in Four Parts—a series of four experimental videos about Chinese diasporas. It argues that by moving outside the nation-space into the experiential and virtual “global space” of diasporas, Ma’s work addresses Wong’s concerns and enacts a viable “virtual mediation” that situates Chinese diasporas in the historical contexts of British colonialism and American racial exploitation and exclusion. This movement also entails confronting other forms of oppression, including sexism and heterosexism in both the East and West. While giving voice and visibility to the struggles of racial and sexual minorities across national borders, Ma demonstrates the possibilities of a historicized critical approach to diasporas, one which underlies Wong’s insistence in critiquing gendered and racialized power structures both within and outside the nation-state.Asian AmericanDiasporaCyberspaceMing-Yuen S. MaTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/88g6k6pkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7zm9r2dq2012-06-22T16:09:27Zqt7zm9r2dqPosthuman Difference: Traveling to Utopia with Young-Hae Chang Heavy IndustriesLiu, Warren2012-01-01This essay puts into conversation two rarely conjunctive discourses: posthumanism, which focuses on how technological mediation forces a reconsideration of the very categories of “subject,” “object,” and “literature”; and Asian American literary criticism, which seeks to continually interrogate how Asian American subjects are produced, reproduced, and represented. Putting these two discourses into conversation yields several important results: for one, posthumanist theory allows for a more complex understanding of the shift, within Asian American criticism, from nation-bound models to transnational frameworks. Moreover, posthumanism’s emphasis on technological mediation provides an important new theoretical framework for Asian American literary criticism, particularly in terms of the way that subjects are produced and reproduced in conjunction with technological objects. At the same time, Asian American literary criticism’s focus on the material effects of cultural productions pinpoints and illuminates a critical aporia in posthuman theory: its uncertain and equivocal treatment of race and ethnicity. The essay concludes with a reading of Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries’ Traveling to Utopia: With a Brief History of the Technology. Considered together, the form and content of the piece enact an aesthetics of “posthuman difference,” which both highlights the limits, and requires the strengths, of posthumanist and Asian Americanist discourse.PosthumanAsian American Literary CriticismTransnationalTechnologyYoung-Hae Chang Heavy Industriesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7zm9r2dqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0647844d2012-06-22T16:09:24Zqt0647844dThe ABCs of Chinese Pop: Wang Leehom and the Marketing of a Global Chinese CelebrityWang, Grace2012-01-01How did singer Wang Leehom, a Chinese American raised in the suburbs of New York, end up becoming one of the industry heavyweights of Mandopop (Mandarin-language pop music)? This essay uses Wang as a case study to investigate how discourses of race, market, and belonging are reworked in global contexts. Drawing on Sau-ling Wong’s theoretical insights on transnational processes of race, citizenship, and belonging, it argues that Wang capitalizes on a fluid dynamic of sameness and difference to appeal to a heterogeneous Chinese-speaking audience that stretches across China to Taiwan, Hong Kong, Southeast Asia, and the greater Chinese diaspora. Through an examination of the racial and national contexts that frame Wang’s participation in Mandopop, this essay analyzes the particular calibrations of Chineseness that emerge from the singer’s music and public image and the imperfect translation of identities such as Chinese American, Chinese diasporic, and Chinese across diverse linguistic and national communities.Wang LeehomMandopopPopular MusicChineseChinese AmericanTransnationalDiasporaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0647844darticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt53c6c1kp2012-06-22T16:09:23Zqt53c6c1kpRedefining the American in Asian American Studies: Transnationalism, Diaspora, and RepresentationTunc, Tanfer EminMarino, ElisabettaKim, Daniel Y.2012-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum in honor of Sau-ling Wong, entitled "Redefining the American in Asian American Studies: Transnationalism, Diaspora, and Representation," edited by Tanfer Emin Tunc, Elisabetta Marino, and Daniel Y. KimAsian American StudiesSau-ling WongTransnationalDiasporaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/53c6c1kparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7m97691w2012-06-22T16:09:21Zqt7m97691wThe Trans/National Terrain of Anishinaabe Law and DiplomacyBauerkemper, JosephStark, Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik2012-01-01The extensive and enduring commitments to nationhood within Native American Studies have unsurprisingly engendered in the field extensive and enduring resistance to transnational theoretical and methodological frameworks. This is largely because scholarly transnationalism fundamentally seeks to unmoor intellectual work from national(ist) affiliations. This, of course, directly contradicts the commitments to nationhood within Native Studies. Yet even while conventional transnational modes of critical inquiry present trajectories and objectives that threaten to undermine the core commitments of Native American Studies, the judicious use of particular aspects of conventional transnationalism and the development of innovative conceptions of transnationalism can serve the field.While conventional transnationalism seeks to decenter the nation in any form—and therein maintains a strict opposition between nationalism and transnationalism—the mode of indigenous transnationalism that Bauerkemper and Stark propose decenters the settler-state while recentering Native nationhood. Maintaining Native American Studies’ commitments to nationhood, this mode of inquiry intentionally and self-consciously underscores the boundaries that distinguish Native nations as discrete polities. Through an analysis of Anishinaabe law and diplomacy, this mode of inquiry serves to lay the groundwork for recognizing the transnational flows of intellectual, cultural, economic, social, and political traditions between and across the boundaries of distinct yet often—though not always—allied and mutually amenable Native nations.TransnationalismAnishinaabeNative AmericanDiplomacyLawapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7m97691warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2mj3c2p32012-06-22T16:09:19Zqt2mj3c2p3"¡Todos Somos Indios!" Revolutionary Imagination, Alternative Modernity, and Transnational Organizing in the Work of Silko, Tamez, and AnzaldúaAdamson, Joni2012-01-01This essay builds on Shari Huhndorf’s analysis of the “significant implications” of Leslie Marmon Silko’s Almanac of the Dead for Indigenous Studies by setting the novel into the context of María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo’s analysis of how Zapatista organizing activities in Chiapas, Mexico, reshaped the “revolutionary imagination in the Americas” and helped to construct an “alternative modernity” that disrupts the empty signifier of “authentic” indigenous identity. The essay juxtaposes Silko’s novel with the work of emerging Lipan-Jumano Apache poet, scholar, and activist Margo Tamez, who is currently leading an effort to retribalize the Lipan Apache in the militarized US–Mexico borderlands of the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Adamson explores how Tamez and her mother are part of a growing indigenous movement to build capacity among transnational indigenous groups, groups who self-identify as “native” even though they may not be formally recognized by a nation-state, and nonnative groups whose interests in social justice and environmental protection overlap. Adamson explores how this movement is shifting the focus in Native American and American Studies away from debates about “authenticity” and cultural nationalism toward a renewed attention to hemispheric and global struggles for civil, human, and environmental rights. She also argues that, when Silko and Tamez are read together, their work suggests new avenues of interpretation for Borderlands/La Frontera and calls on scholars to reread/rethink Gloria Anzaldúa’s concept of mestizaje, not as mere adherence to mythological tropes, but as suggestive of the experiences of persons of indigenous descent living in communities that fall outside the category of “nation.” The experiences of Tamez and Anzaldúa with illness and toxins, and their writing about it, also challenge readers to imagine a coalition politics that is not exactly “post-identity” but no longer invested in the boundaries of identity. “Another world is possible,” but achieving this goal—Silko, Tamez, and Anzaldúa suggest—will require alliance-making and capacity-building to strengthen local, regional, and global abilities to meet the challenge.Transnational Indigenous OrganizingAmerican StudiesNative American StudiesMargo TamezLeslie Marmon SilkoGloria Anzaldúaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2mj3c2p3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt54p2f9pq2012-06-22T16:09:17Zqt54p2f9pqAlone on the Snow, Alone on the Beach: “A Global Sense of Place” in Atanarjuat and FountainHorton, Jessica L.2012-01-01Recently, scholars and artists have queried the relationship between indigenous places—defined by their unique histories and meanings—and abstract spatial metaphors attending a current period of globalization. In this essay, Horton revisits two well-known works of digital video by Native North American artists to consider how they resolve an apparent tension between the indigenous lands they depict and the global networks in which they circulate: the internationally popular feature-length film Atanarjuat, the Fast Runner (2001), directed by Inuit artist Zacharias Kunuk, and the short video work Fountain (2005), created by Anishinaabe artist Rebecca Belmore for the Canadian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Both works feature human bodies interacting with tactile substances like ice and water, spiritual forces at work in the environment, and landscapes that fade in and out of abstraction. Their creative approaches to sound, montage, and projection techniques set in motion dialectics of displacement and emplacement. Atanarjuat and Fountain contribute to an expansive notion of indigenous places, one that values the historical and cultural specificity of locales as the starting point for unraveling the complexities of their relationships to distant people and places.Zacharias KunukRebecca BelmoreNative American Studiescontemporary artfilmtransnationalismglobalizationspaceplaceapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/54p2f9pqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt82m5j3f52012-06-22T16:09:16Zqt82m5j3f5A Transnational Native American Studies? Why Not Studies That Are Trans-Indigenous?Allen, Chadwick2012-01-01This essay questions both the Special Forum’s invitation to chart a “Transnational Native American Studies” and its assertion, in the call for papers, that issues “surrounding place and mobility, aesthetics and politics, identity and community, and the tribal and global indigenous” have “emerged” from within “the larger frameworks of transnational American Studies.” Through a series of critical and interpretive engagements with examples of contemporary Indigenous arts and literature from the US, Canada, and Aotearoa/New Zealand, the author offers an alternative rubric of the “trans-Indigenous” for future work in global Indigenous Studies.special forum on TNASCultural StudiesCritical TheoryNative American StudiesIndigenousTransnationalTrans-Indigenousapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/82m5j3f5articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3w4347p62012-06-22T16:09:14Zqt3w4347p6Charting Transnational Native American StudiesHuang, HsinyaDeloria, Philip J.Furlan, Laura M.Gamber, John2012-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum entitled "Charting Transnational Native American Studies: Aesthetics, Politics, Identity," edited by Hsinya Huang, Philip J. Deloria, Laura M. Furlan, and John GamberCultural StudiesCritical TheoryNative American StudiesIndigenousTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3w4347p6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt99z8g81w2012-06-22T16:09:13Zqt99z8g81wConcurrency in Transnational American StudiesMorgan, Nina2012-01-01Editor's Note for JTAS 4.1American StudiesTransnationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/99z8g81warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 4, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4pv352292012-06-01T16:39:53Zqt4pv35229About the ContributorsEditors, The2011-01-01application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4pv35229articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1ks1v1vj2012-06-01T16:39:51Zqt1ks1v1vjThe Politics of Transnational Memory in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck ClubSchultermandl, Silvia2011-01-01“The Politics of Transnational Memory in Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club” sees Tan’s representation of memory as either a function of loss (and limited recovery) or of distance (whether temporal or physical). For Schultermandl, the text suggests that familial or national relationships built on generational and immigrant memory cannot really create conditions of solidarity or identification and are thus doomed to failure—either that, or what is “memory” must be transformed by “experience” and then be understood, what Schultermandl calls “belated memory.” Schultermandl offers an account of the failure of the narrative to provide for a bond between the generations of women—immigrant mothers and American-born daughters. This conceptual problem is represented by the novel’s end, where the overriding implication of the narrative is that in order to reconcile and occupy the identity of a Chinese American one must somehow be both Chinese and American, an experience of being that Schultermandl questions. Additionally, in not representing modern China or modern Chinese women, Schultermandl argues, the novel gives up an opportunity to create a “transnational solidarity” among women in favor of a national identity that supersedes the individual, who in Tan’s text becomes a mere stand-in for traditionally held ideological and national stereotypes.Amy TanTransnationalMemoryChinese Americanapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1ks1v1vjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6sr1z60n2012-06-01T16:39:49Zqt6sr1z60n“A garden in the middle of the sea”: Henry James’s The Aspern Papers and Transnational American StudiesWaller, Nicole2011-01-01Nicole Waller’s study of Henry James’s The Aspern Papers examines how conventional literary studies’ approaches (those that depend on biography and character analysis) may tether James’s work to a set of values that reinscribe the hierarchies that his narrative specifically sets adrift. Reviewing various newer paradigms in American Studies—the border, immigrant studies, the Black Atlantic, Native American encounters—Waller relies on a subset of transnational studies, Atlantic studies, to utilize the metaphors of circulation and exchange, of fluidity and drift, of space and dislocation, to argue for a reading of James’s The Aspern Papers as a dislocated response to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s work The House of the Seven Gables. Reading The Aspern Papers closely against Hawthorne’s work, and comparing the European perspectives in both James’s and Hawthorne’s works, Waller suggests that in The Aspern Papers James affords a reading of the transnational experience as a generative gesture, where a Venetian “garden in the middle of the sea” may serve as an abode more fruitful (despite losses) and more productive than the fires to which Hawthorne condemns Italian villages in The Marble Faun. Waller’s interest in the fluid spaces between the works of James and Hawthorne is echoed by both transnational American Studies and the essay itself in the unnamed narrator’s instructions to the gondolier: “Go anywhere. . . .”Henry JamesTransnational American StudiesNathaniel Hawthorneapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6sr1z60narticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5rb855rp2012-06-01T16:39:48Zqt5rb855rpPerformance and Politics in the Public SphereWiegmink, Pia2011-01-01Pia Wiegmink’s timely examination of the transforming transnational spaces of protest in a globalizing and technologically mediated public sphere in “Performance and Politics in the Public Sphere” offers a well-researched review of contemporary theory surrounding ideas of the political (Chantal Mouffe), the public sphere (Jürgen Habermas), the transnational public sphere (Nancy Fraser), and the reterritorialized transnational public sphere (Markus Schroer) as the basis for her analysis of how the performance of political action in public—virtual or physical—is transformed by the capacity of the local to be played on a global stage, thus turning the citizen-actor into a cosmopolitan, transnational force. Tracing examples from the Seattle protests against the World Trade Organization meetings in 1999 by the Global Justice Movement to the work of the Electronic Disturbance Theater, from the civil rights movement to the subject matter of her larger study, “The Church of Life After Shopping,” “Billionaires for Bush,” and “The Yes Men,” Wiegmink provides an important analysis of the “alternative aesthetics” of the counterpublics’ formation, dissent, and action in and against hegemony. This selection is taken from her monograph, Protest EnACTed: Activist Performance in the Contemporary United States, a strong, cultural studies–focused contribution to transnational American Studies.PerformancePoliticsPublic SphereProtestapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5rb855rparticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9ch965432012-06-01T16:39:46Zqt9ch96543Locas al Rescate: The Transnational Hauntings of Queer CubanidadLima, Lázaro2011-01-01“Locas al Rescate: The Transnational Hauntings of Queer Cubanidad” (originally published in Cuba Transnational) offers a significant contribution both to transnational American Studies and to gender studies. In telling the insider story of the alternative identity formation, practices, and forms of “rescue” initiated by the affective activism of the Cuban American society in drag in 1990s Miami/South Beach, Lima resuscitates the liberatory gestures of a subculture defined by its pursuit of its own acceptance, value, and freedom. With their aesthetic and political life on a raft, the gay micro-communities inside Cuban America asserted their own islandic space, Lima observes, performing “takeovers” in and of parks and bars and beaches—creating a post-Habermasian sphere of public activism focused on private parts, saving themselves from AIDS, from the disaffection and disaffiliation of the right-wing Cuban immigrant community, and from the failure of their own yearning to belong, to be wanted, to be embodied as the figure of their compelling Cubanidad. Against the hegemony of the invented collective politics of the sacrificing immigrants whose recognition of the queer side of being (of a being constituted by identity loss) is yet to come, Lima suggests a spectral return—a personal and transnational reckoning of those whose lives the dream of freedom drowned.Cuban AmericanCubanidadMiamiSouth BeachDragQueerTransnationalHauntingapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9ch96543articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6956t3482012-06-01T16:39:44Zqt6956t348Reprise Editor's NoteMorgan, Nina2011-01-01Reprise Editor's Note for JTAS 3.2Transnational American Studiesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6956t348articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt90r5479j2012-06-01T16:39:43Zqt90r5479jThe Propositional Logic of Mapping Transnational American Studies—A Response to “‘Deep Maps’: A Brief for Digital Palimpsest Mapping Projects”Bishop, Karen Elizabeth2011-01-01This response to Shelley Fisher Fishkin's “‘Deep Maps’: A Brief for Digital Palimpsest Mapping Projects” explicates the layers of complex interconnected practices that Fishkin’s paradigm of Deep Maps instates. Bishop notes that Fishkin’s trope of palimpsests “depends on a scholarly methodology that privileges the transnational as a structure, a means, and a dynamic site of excavation for intellectual inquiry” and “provides for new forms of collaborative writing and new reading practices” in which scholars, students, and even members of the general public can build geo-archives together. Fishkin’s Deep Maps project, Bishop concludes, foregrounds a construction of place in a “self-reflective placial exercise” that accepts “other national literatures and histories [with] . . . their own ways of understanding and engaging with the transnational.”Transnational American StudiesDeep MapsPalimpsestapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/90r5479jarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt92v100t02012-06-01T16:39:41Zqt92v100t0“Deep Maps”: A Brief for Digital Palimpsest Mapping Projects (DPMPs, or “Deep Maps”)Fishkin, Shelley Fisher2011-01-01This article proposes a potentially fruitful “next step” for transnational American Studies, inviting colleagues around the world to collaborate on Digital Palimpsest Mapping Projects—DPMPs, or “Deep Maps.” “Deep Maps,” curated collaboratively by scholars in multiple locations, would put multilingual digital archives around the globe in conversation with one another, using maps as the gateway. “Deep Maps” could be read as palimpsests, allowing multiple version of events, texts, and phenomena to be written over each other—with each version visible under the layers. “Deep Maps” would bring multilingual perspectives from multiple archival locations together to complicate our understanding of topics that engaged people across the globe. Links to secondary sources and interpretive frameworks introducing the topic of any given “Deep Map” would help tell transnational stories in fresh ways. “Deep Maps” would not replace traditional scholarship; rather, they would present it in new contexts, amplifying its impact. Some examples of “Deep Maps” currently under construction are explored. By requiring collaboration—across borders, languages, nations, continents, and disciplines—Digital Palimpsest Mapping Projects would bring our interdependence—as scholars, as citizens, as human beings—to the foreground and could help us take the field of transnational American Studies in some exciting new directions.Transnational American StudiesDeep MapsPalimpsestapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/92v100t0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3j13s0pm2012-06-01T16:39:40Zqt3j13s0pmNeoliberalism, Global “Whiteness,” and the Desire for Adoptive Invisibility in US Parental Memoirs of Eastern European AdoptionSadowski-Smith, Claudia2011-01-01This essay explores the recent surge in US parental memoirs of adoption from Russia and Ukraine. This analysis of the most influential works speculatively highlights underexamined connections between the US media focus on adoption failures and the centrality of race in adoptions from Eastern Europe. In the memoirs under examination, parents eschew the traditional humanitarian narrative of adoption and portray themselves as consumers who have the right to select “white” children from an international adoption market in order to form families whose members look as though they could be biologically related. The authors’ belief that they share a preexisting racial identity with children from Eastern Europe expands to the global plane the US notion that “whiteness” accords racial and economic privilege to all those of European descent in the United States. While the myth of a shared racial identity confers immense and immediate privilege onto Eastern European adoptees even before their arrival in the United States, it also enables parents to ignore their children’s national differences, as well as the neoliberal transformations in the former USSR that have shaped the conditions for their children’s relinquishment and displacement from their birth countries, languages, and cultures through transnational adoption. Coupled with the emergence of a neoliberal adoption market, the search for adoptive invisibility may help explain the significant numbers of abuse and death cases of Eastern European adoptees at the hands of US parents as compared to other adoptee populations.Transnational AdoptionEthnic StudiesWhiteness StudiesEastern European Immigrationapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3j13s0pmarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7j88q1622012-06-01T16:39:38Zqt7j88q162“All for the sake of Freedom”: Hannah Arendt’s Democratic Dissent, Trauma, and American CitizenshipMehring, Frank2011-01-01As an intellectual Jewish immigrant, Hannah Arendt’s work is informed by two key factors: the failures of German intellectuals regarding the rise of fascism and the promise of American democracy. Arendt was haunted by the past and the memories of how the democratic structures of the Weimar Republic had been undermined, manipulated, and finally transformed into a totalitarian terror regime. The issues of freedom, equality, and the shortcomings of democratic societies form a transcultural nexus in her oeuvre. This reading of Arendt will reveal how her efforts to deal with a transatlantic traumatic past shaped the felt need to voice democratic dissent in the United States. While much has been said about her theoretical groundwork on the mechanisms of totalitarian systems, Arendt’s living conditions as a naturalized foreigner, her enthusiasm for American democracy, and her refusal to return to Germany have been largely neglected. Arendt is usually rooted firmly in a European philosophical context. She has been canonized as one of the foremost philosophical thinkers from Germany on the emergence of totalitarian systems and the Holocaust. This transatlantic force field looms large over the second half of the twentieth century in the realm of culture and politics. Among her fellow intellectual émigrés and exiles such as Adorno, Horkheimer, Marcuse, or Fraenkel, Arendt stands out. She decided not to return to the new democratic Germany with its Grundgesetz fashioned along the lines of the American Constitution. Instead, she insisted on becoming naturalized and used her transnational background as a basis to address democratic gaps from the vantage point of an American citizen. First, Mehring shows in which ways Arendt identified herself as an American and wished to become recognized as an American citizen. Second, he reconnects Arendt’s democratic dissent with her efforts to become recognized as an American citizen.Political TheoryCultural StudiesHannah ArendtDemocratic TheoryTransatlantic TraumasCitizenshipPatriotic DissentRecognitionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7j88q162articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6p3066272012-06-01T16:39:36Zqt6p306627Threatening “the Good Order”: West Meets East in Cecil B. DeMille’s The Cheat and John Updike’s TerroristFreeman, Bradley M.2011-01-01Despite almost a hundred years of separation, both Cecil B. DeMille’s film The Cheat (1915) and John Updike’s novel Terrorist (2006) deploy a clear-cut territorial divide between Western and Eastern spaces in order to envision a unified American space. These narratives superimpose a “natural” division on these historically opposed spaces and thereby suggest that any contact between these spaces will have dangerous consequences. These consequences include the potential dissolution and eventual destruction of American productivity, surveillance, and territorial integrity. DeMille’s film and Updike’s novel represent America as a nation-state that must be protected from the East. In 1915, The Cheat warned against an interracial America and the upsurge in immigration that characterized the turn of the century. Nearly a century later, Terrorist presupposes an interracial America but still constructs an East that threatens the security of America. While registering the particular concerns of two distinct historical moments, these narratives represent a larger attempt in American aesthetics to imagine an East that jeopardizes the utopian possibilities of an overly idealized American space.SpaceEastCecil B. DeMilleJohn Updikeapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6p306627articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt6x5280hq2012-06-01T16:39:35Zqt6x5280hqCultural Nationalism, Orientalism, Imperial Ambivalence: The Colored American Magazine and Pauline Elizabeth HopkinsCho, Yu-Fang2011-01-01This essay examines African American novelist Pauline Hopkins’s deployment of the trope of respectable domesticity to contest black disenfranchisement in the context of African Americans’ ambivalent relationship to late-nineteenth-century US imperial expansion in the Asia Pacific. This essay analyzes Contending Forces (1900) in relation to two crucial yet underexplored contexts: first, Hopkins’s commentaries on international race relations; second, African American intellectuals’ commentaries on US imperial ventures in the Asia Pacific and on Chinese immigration in the Colored American Magazine, where Hopkins’s fictional works were serialized. Situated within these contexts of comparative racialization, Hopkins’s works offer critical responses to the masculine nationalist representations of black–Asian relations, illuminating the divisive effects of nationalist identification on differentially racialized subjects, the uneven effects of marriage on the black community, and this institution’s structural ties to imperialism and to the color-based class hierarchy within the imagined black community—all of which call for radical reimagining of race relations beyond the nation form.Pauline Elizabeth HopkinsUS ImperialismAsia PacificInterracial RelationsMarriageBlack Orientalismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/6x5280hqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8f1567z42012-06-01T16:39:33Zqt8f1567z4The Several Lives of Joan the SpinnerShanahan, Brendan2011-01-01This essay is a study of Honoré Beaugrand’s Jeanne la filieuse. Beaugrand’s work, a fictional narrative of French Canadian migration to New England originally published in serial form in 1878, is at once a political tract on emigration and French Canadian society, a pioneering diasporic novel, and a muckraking study of New England industrialism. Shanahan shows how the appearance of multiple editions of the work, spaced across time and national borders, highlights the shift in meanings and the conflicting messages intended to be drawn from it by its publishers.The essay was originally published in the journal Je Me Souviens.Honoré BeaugrandFrench CanadianFranco-AmericanMigrationNew EnglandIndustrialismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8f1567z4articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt965742f82012-06-01T16:39:32Zqt965742f8Excerpt from Subverting Exclusion: Transpacific Encounters with Race, Caste, and Borders, 1885–1928Geiger, Andrea2011-01-01The Japanese immigrants who arrived in the North American West in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries included people with historical ties to Japan’s outcaste communities. In the only English-language book on the subject, Andrea Geiger examines the history of these and other Japanese immigrants in the United States and Canada and their encounters with two separate cultures of exclusion, one based in caste and the other in race.Geiger reveals that the experiences of Japanese immigrants in North America were shaped in part by attitudes rooted in Japan’s formal status system, mibunsei, decades after it was formally abolished. In the North American West, however, the immigrants’ understanding of social status as caste-based collided with American and Canadian perceptions of status as primarily race-based. Geiger shows how the lingering influence of Japan’s strict status system affected immigrants’ perceptions and understandings of race in North America and informed their strategic responses to two increasingly complex systems of race-based exclusionary law and policy.JapaneseImmigrationCasteRaceOutcasteUnited StatesCanadaExclusionMibunseiapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/965742f8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7qb6j1742012-06-01T16:39:30Zqt7qb6j174Excerpt from Triangulations: Narrative Strategies for Navigating Latino IdentityVázquez, David J.2011-01-01Just as mariners use triangulation, mapping an imaginary triangle between two known positions and an unknown location, so, David J. Vázquez contends, Latino authors in late twentieth-century America employ the coordinates of familiar ideas of self to find their way to new, complex identities. Through this metaphor, Vázquez reveals how Latino autobiographical texts, written after the rise of cultural nationalism in the 1960s, challenge mainstream notions of individual identity and national belonging in the United States.In a traditional autobiographical work, the protagonist frequently opts out of his or her community. In the works that Vázquez analyzes in Triangulations, protagonists instead opt in to collective groups—often for the express political purpose of redefining that collective. Reading texts by authors such as Ernesto Galarza, Jesús Colón, Piri Thomas, Oscar “Zeta” Acosta, Judith Ortiz Cofer, John Rechy, Julia Alvarez, and Sandra Cisneros, Vázquez engages debates about the relationship between literature and social movements, the role of cultural nationalism in projects for social justice, the gender and sexual problematics of 1960s cultural nationalist groups, the possibilities for interethnic coalitions, and the interpretation of autobiography. In the process, Triangulations considers the potential for cultural nationalism as a productive force for aggrieved communities of color in their struggles for equality.LatinoTriangulationAutobiographyErnesto GalarzaJesús ColónPiri ThomasOscar “Zeta” AcostaJudith Ortiz CoferJohn RechyJulia AlvarezSandra CisnerosLiteratureCultural NationalismSocial Justiceapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7qb6j174articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0xw0g4z92012-06-01T16:39:28Zqt0xw0g4z9Excerpt from Pluralist Universalism: An Asian Americanist Critique of U.S. and Chinese MulticulturalismsJin, Wen2011-01-01Pluralist Universalism: An Asian Americanist Critique of U.S. and Chinese Multiculturalisms is an extended comparison of US and Chinese multiculturalisms during the post–Cold War era. Her book situates itself at the intersection of Asian American literary critique and the growing field of comparative multiculturalism. Through readings of fictional narratives that address the issue of racial and ethnic difference in both national contexts simultaneously, the author models a “double critique” framework for US–Chinese comparative literary studies.The book approaches U.S. liberal multiculturalism and China’s ethnic policy as two competing multiculturalisms, one grounded primarily in a history of racial desegregation and the other in the legacies of a socialist revolution. Since the end of the Cold War, the two multiculturalisms have increasingly been brought into contact through translation and other forms of mediation. Pluralist Universalism demonstrates that a number of fictional narratives, including those commonly classified as Chinese, American, and Chinese American, have illuminated incongruities and connections between the ethno-racial politics of the two nations.The “double critique” framework builds upon critical perspectives developed in Asian American studies and adjacent fields. The book brings to life an innovative vision of Asian American literary critique, even as it offers a unique intervention in ideas of ethnicity and race prevailing in both China and the United States in the post–Cold War era.MulticulturalismComparative MulticulturalismAsian AmericanChinesePost–Cold WarLiteratureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0xw0g4z9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5jw4h66v2012-06-01T16:39:26Zqt5jw4h66vExcerpt from Militarized Currents: Toward a Decolonized Future in Asia and the PacificShigematsu, SetsuCamacho, Keith L.2011-01-01Foregrounding indigenous and feminist scholarship, this collection analyzes militarization as an extension of colonialism from the late twentieth to the twenty-first century in Asia and the Pacific. The contributors theorize the effects of militarization across former and current territories of Japan and the United States, demonstrating that the relationship between militarization and colonial subordination shapes bodies of memory, knowledge, and resistance.MilitarizationColonialismAsiaPacificapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5jw4h66varticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt64j8t6p02012-06-01T16:39:24Zqt64j8t6p0Excerpt from Dead Stars: American and Philippine Literary Perspectives on the American Colonization of the PhilippinesMcMahon, Jennifer M.2011-01-01Dead Stars: American and Philippine Literary Perspectives on the American Colonization of the Philippines examines the American colonization of the Philippines from three distinct but related literary perspectives. The first is the reaction of anti-imperialist American writers Mark Twain, W. E. B. Du Bois, and William James to America’s first foray into the role of colonizer and how their varied essays, letters, and speeches provide an incisive delineation of fundamental conflicts in American identity at the turn of the twentieth century. The book then analyzes how these same conflicts surface in the colonial regime’s use of American literature as a tool to inculcate American values in the colonial educational system. Finally, Dead Stars considers the way three early and important Filipino writers—Paz Marquez Benitez, Maximo Kalaw, and Juan C. Laya—interpret and represent these same tensions in their fiction.PhilippinesColonizationMark TwainW. E. B. Du BoisWilliam JamesAmerican LiteratureColonial EducationPaz Marquez BenitezMaximo KalawJuan C. Layaapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/64j8t6p0articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt34q1s2p92012-06-01T16:39:23Zqt34q1s2p9Forward Editor’s NoteRobinson, Greg2011-01-01Forward Editor’s Note for JTAS 3.2American StudiesTransnationalInternationalapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/34q1s2p9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4nb9249f2012-06-01T16:39:21Zqt4nb9249fConfirmed: Sonia Sotomayor and Latino Political IncorporationNegrón-Muntaner, Frances2011-01-01This essay explores how the 2009 confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor once again transformed the process to become a Supreme Court Justice as new political fault lines reached the nation’s highest court. Although the majority of political supporters emphasized Sotomayor’s individual and professional qualifications as the crucial factors that made her confirmable, what ultimately became confirmed through her appointment was the increasing, if uncomfortable, weight of Latino identity as a relevant category of social difference in contemporary American politics. This essay engages with the confirmation process’s discarded and expanded plotlines to produce an acceptable story, in order to understand Sotomayor’s appointment not simply as the culmination of Latino achievement or collective empowerment but as a way to assess the current price of the ticket for Latino political incorporation.Sonia SotomayorSupreme CourtJusticeLatinoPoliticsLatino Political Incorporationapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4nb9249farticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5rc7b51t2012-06-01T16:39:20Zqt5rc7b51tBeing Blue in Hawai‘i: Politics, Affect, and the Last Queen of Hawai‘iHarvey, Bruce2011-01-01For Hawaiian self-rule activists, who retain ties to the land and forms of sociality emerging out of the land, the US is regarded as an occupier force, and nonnative ownership, whether white or Japanese, a blighting catastrophe justifying resentment and rage. The demise of the Kingdom of Hawai‘i, when an oligarchy of US white settler businessmen overthrew Queen Liliʻuokalani (1838–1917) in 1893, reduced aloha ‘āina (or land-cherishing) to a ghostly affect; to be blue in Hawai‘i, today, is to be in a state of ongoing and implacable mourning. This essay explores several affective historical scenes of Hawaiian injury: from the early nineteenth century, when Protestant missionaries began their effort to transform Hawaiian sensibilities; onto the Queen’s forced abdication via the McKinley 1898 annexation; and finally to the contemporary era of Hawaiian nationalist protest. The Queen’s story, contextualized by brief case studies of native bereavement earlier in the century (David Malo and Henry Obookiah), leads in the final sections to a query of the relation of affect—whether melancholic or rageful—to political effect. The essay concludes with a critical coda on President Obama’s declaration (in a speech given in Hawai‘i, before elected) that the “Aloha spirit” is “what America is looking for right now.” The problem with liberalism, as it is with certain versions of local/global studies, is that wounded, grievous affect cannot readily be translated (there is no efficacious transference) into specific political praxis.Hawai‘iPoliticsAffectQueen LiliʻuokalaniDavid MaloHenry ObookiahPresident ObamaLiberalismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5rc7b51tarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5nf1c2jn2012-06-01T16:39:18Zqt5nf1c2jnPost-1898 Imaginative Geographies: Puerto Rico Migration in 1950s FilmTolentino, Cynthia2011-01-01This essay studies cultural representations of Puerto Rico’s economic boom and 1952 shift in legal status to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. It suggests that apprehending these events requires the reframing of Puerto Rican migration as global phenomena. Drawing on the historical and cultural scholarship on Puerto Rican migration, Operation Bootstrap, and US empire, Tolentino analyzes the famous musical film West Side Story (1961), but also the Hollywood film Sabrina (1954) and Island productions El Otro Camino (The Other Road, 1955) and Maruja (1958). In contrast to prevailing views, she interprets these films as narratives about migration and modernization that engage the discourse of sentimental modernization, the figure of the jíbaro, and the idea of small town Puerto Rico. In so doing, they reveal the global vision at the center of the Operation Bootstrap development plan and Commonwealth formation. The concluding section suggests how the films take up issues in Puerto Rico’s historiography. Rather than merely illuminating a forgotten historical period of 1950s Puerto Rico, the 1950s films negotiate Puerto Rico’s geographical, political, and cultural locations by rethinking institutionalized meanings of 1898 in discourses of Puerto Rico historiography and US empire. Proposing new ways of interpreting the introduction of the Commonwealth in 1952 makes possible the revision of dominant conceptions of 1898 rooted in nation, government, and constitutional law.Puerto RicoMigrationFilmOperation BootstrapUS EmpireWest Side StorySabrinaEl Otro CaminoMarujaJíbaroapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5nf1c2jnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3bb1x47k2012-06-01T16:39:17Zqt3bb1x47k“The future holds more than the past has yielded”: T. S. Eliot’s Invention of Tradition and the St. Louis Exposition of 1904Stasi, Paul2011-01-01This essay offers a new interpretation of T. S. Eliot’s central concept of tradition by reading “Tradition and the Individual Talent” in light of the representation of America’s conquest of the Philippines at the 1904 World’s Fair held in Eliot’s hometown of St. Louis. Against the stated ideology of the modern—which dismisses tradition as the inevitable cost of an ever-progressive modernity—Eliot recuperates the notion of tradition by showing how it is always engaged in a dialectical relation to the present. In this way, Eliot resists both the primitivism that reifies tradition as an unchanging realm of ancient values and the notion of historical progress intimately tied to the development of imperial capital. Furthermore, Eliot’s notion of tradition is fundamentally transnational—albeit limited in scope to Europe—which highlights the constitutive relationship between nationalism and the concept of development embedded within the discourse of progress. Modernist tradition becomes, in this account, a way to resist the historical ideology of the developing American empire.T. S. EliotTraditionPhilippinesModernModernismTransnationalEmpireapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3bb1x47karticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8fz4t1882012-06-01T16:39:15Zqt8fz4t188Colonial Photography Across Empires and IslandsRice, Mark2011-01-01When the US acquired its colonies of Puerto Rico and the Philippines in the aftermath of the 1898 war with Spain, those colonies had to be made known to American citizens. Lanny Thompson has described what he calls the “principle narratives” of the different colonies, and the ways that those narratives helped shape political debates about those colonies. Thompson notes that photography played an instrumental role in developing and representing those narratives. “Colonial Photography Across Empires and Islands” discusses the specific uses of photography in the US colonial regimes in the Philippines and Puerto Rico, the two colonies most frequently deemed “unfit” for self-rule. It traces the contours of those themes and ideas that were shared across the different colonies, as well as the particular subject matter that photographers were attracted to in each colony. It also finds points of connection and continuity between US colonial photography, and photography in the Philippines in the Spanish colonial era. The triangulation of these three colonial contexts helps clarify both the generalized nature of colonial photography and the specific uses of photography in particular colonial contexts.Puerto RicoPhilippinesPhotographyColonial PhotographyColonialismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8fz4t188articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0hv360912012-06-01T16:39:14Zqt0hv36091A New Factor in American Destiny: Visions of Porfirio Díaz and the Politics of “Logical Paternalism”Ruiz, Jason2011-01-01This essay interprets American representations of dictator Porfirio Díaz in relation to the “economic conquest” of Mexico that took place during his long rule (1876–1911, a period known as the “Porfiriato,” in which Americans invested more than $1 billion). No single person inspired as much attention from travelers, reporters, and photographers during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as Díaz, and their visions of the President helped to shape perceptions of Mexico as a desirable field in which to expand US capitalism and influence. Travelers clamored to meet him and his sophisticated young wife, and their travelogues were rich with descriptions of such encounters. Reporters, dazzled by the rapid transformation of Mexico during his 35-year rule, described Díaz in such terms as “the Mexican Wizard” and “the maker of modern Mexico” until the very end of his regime. Photographers, working in a relatively new medium, amassed a huge body of works devoted to the dictator; even at an advanced age late in his rule, the President’s image adorned postcards and commemorative cartes-de-visite that posited him in heroic and hypermasculine terms (not unlike those of his US counterpart, Theodore Roosevelt). Ultimately, this essay argues that representations like these reflected American desires for a Mexican body politic that was amenable to economic and social transformation under the inextricable banners of “progress” and US capitalism. Prevailing images of Díaz and his family suggested that Mexico was as friendly to foreign investors as it was to foreign visitors.Porfirio DíazMexicoUS CapitalismTravelReportersPhotographyLogical Paternalismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0hv36091articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2fg167n22012-06-01T16:39:12Zqt2fg167n2Obtaining “Sympathetic Understanding”: Gender, Empire, and Representation in the Travel Writings of American Officials’ Wives, 1901–1914Samonte, Cecilia2011-01-01How do women’s travel writings affirm official reports about imperial conquest, and how may they offer narratives reflecting other modes of control and subjugation? Of what value are empathy and sorrow in attaining political aims? This essay addresses these issues by focusing on travel writings by wives of American officials during the first decade of American rule in the Philippines. Officials’ wives offer an intimate and sentimentalist account of the ceremonies they participate in, threats of violence, and their pursuit of “sympathetic understanding” between Filipinos and the American official community. Through letters written to families and friends, they provide an “unofficial” story behind the narrative of colonialism and articulate thoughts resulting from their direct personal connection to American empire and its subjects. Their writings reflect their ambivalent position as agents of empire: considering themselves racially superior, these women are subordinate to the prevailing patriarchal order. While participating in the agenda of colonial expansion, they redefine traditional gender roles. The inclusion of women’s travel writing in the present literature broadens, reconfigures, and challenges conventional accounts, revealing reveal incongruities and complicating generally accepted truths about colonial administration, assimilation, and resistance. The texts examined—Helen Taft’s Recollection of Full Years, Edith Moses’s Unofficial Letters of an Officials’ Wife, and entries from the unpublished diary of Nanon Fay Worcester—were produced by spouses of officials in the Second Philippine Commission (the Taft Commission), charged with establishing civil governance in the Philippines from 1900–1902.GenderEmpireTravel WritingPhilippinesColonialismHelen TaftEdith MosesNanon Fay WorcesterTaft Commissionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2fg167n2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt75z157cv2012-06-01T16:39:10Zqt75z157cvRacial Geographies, Imperial Transitions: Property Ownership and Race Relations in Cienfuegos, Cuba, 1894–1899Lucero, Bonnie2011-01-01This article explores race relations in the provincial city of Cienfuegos, Cuba, during a time of immense political change from 1894 to 1899. In those five years, Cuba was transformed from a Spanish colony struggling for independence to an occupied territory of the United States. This political transformation brought into direct confrontation two models of race relations: one Spanish, characterized by racial integration, and the other American, renowned for Jim Crow segregation. This essay examines the lived significance of this political transformation through interracial property transactions recorded in the notarial protocols of Cienfuegos. The findings suggest that the final war of independence provided opportunities for Afro-descendants to purchase prime properties within the official city bounds. Yet, with US intervention in 1898, a subtle but increasing marginalization of men and women of color from the market in urban property is evident. Lucero contends that this marginalization reflects a shift in race relations due to the American imperial presence.CienfuegosCubaRace RelationsPropertyAfro-descendantsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/75z157cvarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7f4431z62012-06-01T16:39:09Zqt7f4431z6Empire’s Mastheads: Rewriting the “Correspondents’ War” from the Edge of EmpireBerkey, James2011-01-01This essay recovers a forgotten moment in the print culture history of US empire by examining a handful of newspapers and periodicals—American Soldier, Manila Outpost, Soldier’s Letter, Co. F Enterprise, and Volunteer—that were founded and written by and for US soldiers in the Philippines and Cuba. Unlike their more famous stateside counterparts who produced the “correspondents’ war” and trafficked in national culture’s romantic sensationalism, soldier-correspondents mapped the everyday culture of their imperial community, reporting on ordinary, everyday events of daily life in the imperial outpost like baseball games, debate clubs, popular barbers, robberies, sanitation violations, mail deliveries, and local advertisements. Such publications revise and remediate the dominant romantic ideology of empire at the turn of the century, creating an imagined community of empire far different from that produced by the “correspondents’ war.” Revising the romantic paradigm into an alternative narrative of everyday habit, ordinary routine, and mundane desire, soldier-newspapers produce a flat account of empire that endows the project of empire-building with a sense of the mundane and the nonheroic. This quotidianizing of empire not only conceals the violent realities of imperial encounter behind the dull shimmer of newsprint, but also remodels the romantic spaces of the public’s imperial imagination into the familiar spaces of everyday life, a process that normalizes empire as a way of life for soldiers.American SoldierManila OutpostSoldier's LetterCo. F EnterpriseVolunteerNewspapersPeriodicalsCorrespondents' WarPhilippinesCubaEmpireSoldier-Newspapersapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7f4431z6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3tf1p4062012-06-01T16:39:07Zqt3tf1p406“from achiote”; “from tidelands”; “from The Micronesian Kingfishers”Perez, Craig Santos2011-01-01Selected poems by Craig Santos PerezPoetryCraig Santos PerezPoetryChamorroapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3tf1p406articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt02f4v8m32012-06-01T16:39:06Zqt02f4v8m3Discontiguous States of America: The Paradox of Unincorporation in Craig Santos Perez’s Poetics of Chamorro GuamLai, Paul2011-01-01Eclipsed by other islands incorporated into the United States after the Spanish-American War of 1898, Guam has nevertheless played a crucial role in the development of the American Pacific as a strategic military site. Like other territories of the United States, Guam’s ambiguous legal status and the presence of native peoples, cultures, and histories signal the paradox of unincorporated territories that troubles the issues of belonging and identification as “American.” This essay takes up poet-scholar Craig Santos Perez’s work to assert the primacy of Indigenous Chamorro histories, languages, and cultures in understanding the island’s place in and out of the American Empire. Perez’s experimental, decolonial poetics fracture narratives of America as a benevolent force in the Pacific; of English as the only relevant language of the Mariana Islands and America; of Spanish and Catholic domination as a relic of the past; of environmental transformations wrought by the intimacies of empire; and of simplistic accounts of assimilation or resistance to militarization and colonialism. Furthermore, by foregrounding “Discontiguous States of America” as an organizing trope for comparative understanding of unincorporated territories in the Caribbean and Pacific, American Indian reservation spaces on the continent, and the outlying states of Alaska and Hawai‘i, this essay argues that transnational American Studies must look within its territorial possessions to Indigenous sovereignty claims as well as outside to global flows in order to offer a truly critical, transnational American Studies.Craig Santos PerezGuamIndigenousChamorroEmpireImperialismTransnationalAmerican Studiesapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/02f4v8m3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0040j0kc2012-06-01T16:39:03Zqt0040j0kcStaging Unincorporated Power: Richard Harding Davis and the Critique of Imperial NewsTrivedi, Nirmal2011-01-01This essay contextualizes the work of war correspondent Richard Harding Davis within an evolving “imperial news apparatus” that would culminate in his reporting of the Spanish-American War. Critics have conventionally framed Davis squarely within the imperial cause, associating him with his admirer Roosevelt and naval admiral Alfred T. Mahan. Contrary to readings of Davis as an apologist for US imperialism, Trivedi contends that Davis understood how US imperial power relied on an information apparatus to communicate to an increasingly media-conscious American public through culture, that is, via familiar narratives, symbols, and objects—what Trivedi calls “imperial news.” The essay follows Davis’s development from his fictional representation of the new war correspondent in “The Reporter Who Made Himself King” to his own war correspondence before and after the Spanish-American War as collected in the memoirs A Year from a Reporter’s Notebook (1897), Cuba in War Time (1897), and Notes of a War Correspondent (1912). Davis’s war correspondence and fictional work effectively stage US imperialism as “unincorporated power”: that is, as power reliant on a developing news-making apparatus that deploys particular discursive strategies to validate its political claims. This staging critiques strategies of US imperial sovereignty—specifically its “privatization of knowledge” and its promotion of the war correspondent as nothing more than a spectator and purveyor of massacres.Richard Harding DavisSpanish-American WarUS ImperialismImperial Newsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0040j0kcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7t4558362012-06-01T16:39:02Zqt7t455836Circa 1898: Overseas Empire and Transnational American StudiesHsu, Hsuan L.2011-01-01Introduction to the Special Forum entitled "Circa 1898: Overseas Empire and Transnational American Studies," edited by Hsuan L. HsuAmerican StudiesTransnational1898EmpireImperialismColonialismSpecial Forumapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7t455836articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2tc8p10q2012-06-01T16:39:00Zqt2tc8p10qThe Shape of Transnational American Studies: Good and Excellent NewsLim, Shirley Geok-lin2011-01-01Editor's Note for JTAS 3.2American StudiesTransnationalJournal of Transnational American StudiesJTASapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2tc8p10qarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 2oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8n55g7q62011-07-04T03:12:40Zqt8n55g7q6Symposium: Redefinitions of Citizenship and Revisions of Cosmopolitanism—Transnational PerspectivesLenz, Günter H.Kroes, RobKunow, RüdigerHornung, AlfredBoelhower, William2011-03-15The following set of essays consists of revised versions of contributions read at, or prepared for, a roundtable discussion at the 2009 convention of the American Studies Association in Washington, DC. The short contributions by the individual authors reflect on the boundaries, the perspectives, and the transdisciplinary dynamics of the field imaginary of transnational American Studies and the specific political role of new notions of citizenship and the parameters of a new cosmopolitanism beyond the limits of the Western tradition.citizenshipcosmopolitanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8n55g7q6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 3, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2qt9w2hh2011-07-03T22:08:16Zqt2qt9w2hhFrom the End of History to Nostalgia: The Manchurian Candidate, Then and NowHwang, Junghyun2010-03-30This article puts the cold war in a broader historical perspective by juxtaposing the original Hollywood film The Manchurian Candidate (1962) with the 2004 remake as an occasion to ponder the (dis)continuities of history from the Korean War to the Gulf War. It reads both versions as nostalgia films in that they relegate the historical events of the Korean War and the Gulf War into floating background images as the sexualized/feminized Asian other or as the vilified Arab “enemy.” As a result, specific histories from Korea to Iraq become silenced while simultaneously represented through popular clichés of Red Queens, Yellow Perils, and “fanatic” suicide bombers, replacing history with nostalgia for home—the mythic Virgin Land of the American national imaginary. The American millenarian dream of utopia is haunted by the anxiety about doom as the desire for home stumbles upon repressed unhomely presences, upon the paradoxical impulse to remember by forgetting.The Manchurian CandidateCold WarKorean WarUS-Iraq Warnostalgia filmapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2qt9w2hharticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2pm9g4q22011-07-03T22:08:14Zqt2pm9g4q2The Afro-AmericanDu Bois, W. E. B.2010-03-30This hitherto unpublished essay by W. E. B. Du Bois, the text titled “The Afro-American,” which likely dates to the late autumn of 1894 or the winter of 1895, is an early attempt by the young scholar to define for himself the contours of the situation of the Negro, or “Afro-American,” in the United States in the mid-1890s. It is perhaps the earliest full text expressing his nascent formulations of both the global “problem of the color-line” and the sense of “double-consciousness” among African Americans in North America.Other American StudiesOther Race, Ethnicity and post-Colonial StudiesAfro-AmericanAfrican Americaneducationracepolitical ideologyapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2pm9g4q2articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8q64g6kw2011-07-03T22:08:10Zqt8q64g6kwOf Horizon: An Introduction to “The Afro-American” by W. E. B. Du Bois—circa 1894Chandler, Nahum D.2010-03-30This article offers an introduction to the hitherto unpublished early essay by W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Afro-American.” More precisely it outlines the problematic of the essay and places the essay amidst Du Bois’s writings of the 1890s and the production of the text that became The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches of 1903. In so doing it proposes a path for the initial reading of this essay by rendering thematic the worldwide horizon that framed Du Bois’s projection from this early moment and by bringing into relief the interwoven motifs of the global “problem of the color-line” and the sense of “double-consciousness” for the “Afro-American” in the United States.Other American StudiesOther Race, Ethnicity and post-Colonial StudiesW. E. B. Du BoisAfrican Americansapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8q64g6kwarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4567j2n12011-07-03T22:08:06Zqt4567j2n1The Junkyard in the Jungle: Transnational, Transnatural Nature in Karen Tei Yamashita’s Through the Arc of the Rain ForestSimal, Begoña2010-03-30In this new millennium the relatively young field of ecocriticism has had to face important transdisciplinary, transnational, and transnatural challenges. This article attempts to demonstrate how two of the major changes that environmental criticism is currently undergoing, the transnational turn and the transnatural challenge, have both been encoded in Through the Arc of the Rain Forest (1990), the first novel published by Karen Tei Yamashita. I particularly focus on a significant episode in Through the Arc of the Rain Forest, when a peculiar anthropogenic ecosystem is discovered, and interpret it according to Leo Marx’s classic paradigm of “the machine in the garden.” I intend to prove that Yamashita’s novel not only revisits the old master theory but also revamps it by destabilizing the classic human-nature divide inherent in first-wave ecocriticism and by adding the transnational ingredient. Thus, the machine-in-the-garden paradigm is updated in order to incorporate the broadening of current environmental criticism, both literally (globalization) and conceptually (transnatural nature). While at times Marx’s paradigm may metamorphose in intriguing ways, the old trope also corroborates its continuing validity. Though filtered by the sieve of globalization and shaken by the emergence of cyborg ecosystems, “the machine in the garden” has survived as a compelling ecocritical framework, even if it occasionally mutates into a junkyard in the jungle.ecocriticismtransnationaltransnaturalKaren Tei YamashitaLeo Marxapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4567j2n1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt01j2b4ms2011-07-03T22:08:01Zqt01j2b4msMaking the Case for Middlebrow CultureEdmondson, Belinda2010-03-30It is commonly assumed that Caribbean culture is split into elite highbrow culture—which is considered derivative of Europe and not rooted in the Caribbean—and authentic working-class culture, which is often identified with such iconic island activities as salsa, carnival, calypso, and reggae. In Caribbean Middlebrow, Belinda Edmondson recovers a middle ground, a genuine popular culture in the English-speaking Caribbean that stretches back into the nineteenth century. Edmondson shows that popular novels, beauty pageants, and music festivals are examples of Caribbean culture that are mostly created, maintained, and consumed by the Anglophone middle class. Much of middle-class culture, she finds, is further gendered as "female": women are more apt to be considered recreational readers of fiction, for example, and women's behavior outside the home is often taken as a measure of their community's respectability. Edmondson also highlights the influence of American popular culture, especially African American popular culture, as early as the nineteenth century. This is counter to the notion that the islands were exclusively under the sway of British tastes and trends. She finds the origins of today's "dub" or spoken-word Jamaican poetry in earlier traditions of genteel dialect poetry-as exemplified by the work of the Jamaican folklorist, actress, and poet Louise "Miss Lou" Bennett Coverley-and considers the impact of early Caribbean novels including Emmanuel Appadocca (1853) and Jane's Career (1913).Caribbean cultural studiesOther Race, Ethnicity and post-Colonial StudiesAspirational cultureCaribbean middle classjazzAfrican-American influencepopular fictionapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/01j2b4msarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt46j322bc2011-07-03T22:07:58Zqt46j322bcTransnational American Studies in the Digital AgeAthanassakis, YanoulaMartinsen, Eric L.2010-03-30American StudiesTransnational American Studiesimpact of information technologyapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/46j322bcarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 2, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt8zn5v1ws2011-07-03T18:37:10Zqt8zn5v1wsThe Realm of an Empire and the Reach of Empathy: Reconsideration of Humanism in Mark Twain's 'the War-Prayer'Arimitsu, Michio2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" imperialismhumanismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/8zn5v1wsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2q3829pn2011-07-03T18:07:53Zqt2q3829pnForward Editor’s NoteRobinson, Greg2009-02-16application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2q3829pnarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt68t2k01g2011-07-03T18:05:02Zqt68t2k01gLife, Writing, and Peace: Reading Maxine Hong Kingston's The Fifth Book of PeaceShan, Te-Hsing2009-02-16Unlike her former award-winning and critically acclaimed works, Maxine Hong Kingston's The Fifth Book of Peace has received little attention. This is an unthinkable phenomenon for a writer who has been hailed as one of the most widely taught authors living in the United States. One of the main reasons is that critics and reviewers do not know how to cope with this complicated, heterogeneous, and "weird" text that defies easy categorization. Nor do they know how to respond to the ways the author urges her readers to squarely face collective American traumas and symptoms through writing (especially the Vietnam War). This paper attempts to approach this intriguing text from the perspective of life writing. Part I points out the undue neglect of this book, refutes some serious misunderstandings, and offers "life writing" as a critical approach. Part II places this book in the context of Kingston's career and life trajectory in order to show that "peace" has always been her major concern. Part III argues that, whereas the 1991 Berkeley-Oakland fire destroyed the manuscript of her "Fourth Book of Peace" along with her house, this "baptism of fire" and its accompanying sense of devastation generated a special empathy, enabling her to better understand those who suffer, especially Vietnam War veterans. Part IV deals with both the subjects of writing trauma and trauma narrative and indicates how Kingston combines her writing expertise with the Buddhist mindfulness expounded by the Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh to lead the Veterans Writing Workshop. Finally, Part V stresses how Kingston and her writing community, by combining life, writing, and peace, tell their own stories and create new lives both personally and collectively.Maxine Hong Kingston (1940- )The Fifth Book of Peacepeacetraumalife writingapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/68t2k01garticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt20x6f98d2011-07-03T17:14:58Zqt20x6f98d'the War-Prayer': Samuel Clemens and 9/11Kiskis, Michael J.2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" "Corn-Pone Opinions" "As Regards Patriotism" patriotismSeptember 11 Terrorist Attacks (2001)application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/20x6f98darticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt0ch1t7c12011-07-03T17:14:53Zqt0ch1t7c1Mark Twain's Messengers for a Fallen World: Supernatural Strangers in 'the War-Prayer' and the Mysterious Stranger ManuscriptsVon Rosk, Nancy2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" The Mysterious Stranger (1916)the supernaturalstrangerapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/0ch1t7c1articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt666369jq2011-07-03T17:14:51Zqt666369jqThe Trans-Pacific Lesson of Mark Twain's 'War-Prayer'Hsu, Hua2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" imperialismtravelapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/666369jqarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt3943t6p32011-07-03T17:14:46Zqt3943t6p3Twain's Rhetoric of Irony in 'the War-Prayer'Lock, Helen2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" rhetoricironyPhilippine-American Warapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/3943t6p3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt7vp0q9072011-07-03T17:14:42Zqt7vp0q907God's Imperialism: Mark Twain and the Religious War between Imperialists and Anti-ImperialistsBlum, Edward J.2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" religious authorityPhilippine-American Warapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/7vp0q907articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5tz715b62011-07-03T15:02:32Zqt5tz715b6Thomas Dixon's War PrayersCapozzola, Christopher2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" imperialismracismreligionrelationship to sermonsapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5tz715b6articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2xp7f2wt2011-07-03T12:40:13Zqt2xp7f2wtWhat Hath Happened to 'the War-Prayer'Powers, Ron2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" imperialismtravelapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2xp7f2wtarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt4rk327rk2011-07-03T12:40:09Zqt4rk327rkAnti-War Statements in 'the War-Prayer' and 'the Private History of a Campaign That Failed'Oran, Maggie2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" "The Private History of a Campaign That Failed" Philippine-American WarAmerican Civil Warpatriotismapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/4rk327rkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt36g3h4p92011-07-03T12:40:04Zqt36g3h4p9Let U.S. Prey: Mark Twain and Hubert Harrison on Religion and EmpireGaskins, Adrian2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" religionimperialismrelationship to Hubert H. Harrison (1883-1927)application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/36g3h4p9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt2215m9ts2011-07-03T12:40:00Zqt2215m9tsThe Real Prayer and the Imagined: The War against Romanticism in Twain, Howells, and BierceEdwards, Tim2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" "The Private History of a Campaign That Failed" warRomanticismAmbrose Bierce (1842-1914?)"Chickamauga" William Dean Howells (1837-1920)"Editha"application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/2215m9tsarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5dg6j3x92011-07-03T12:39:56Zqt5dg6j3x9Caloocan: The War-Prayer AnsweredBrock, Darryl2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" Philippine-American Warapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5dg6j3x9articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1qh1w0g32011-07-03T12:39:53Zqt1qh1w0g3Mark Twain's 'the War-Prayer'—Reflections on Vietnam and IraqLan, Mông-2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" Vietnam Warapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1qh1w0g3articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9tt8s4vk2011-07-03T12:39:49Zqt9tt8s4vkFailed Campaigns and Successful RetreatsClaybaugh, Amanda2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" "The Private History of a Campaign That Failed" warkillingapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9tt8s4vkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt5zs4253w2011-07-03T12:21:35Zqt5zs4253wMark Twain and Gensai Murai: A Japanese Inspiration for 'the War-Prayer'Mac Donnell, Kevin2009-02-16Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)"The War-Prayer" antiwar literatureMurai Gensai (1863-1922)Japanese literatureapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/5zs4253warticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt01j7g4jk2011-07-03T03:31:38Zqt01j7g4jkAbout the Contributors2009-02-16application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/01j7g4jkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt1xt305pj2011-07-03T03:27:33Zqt1xt305pjManuscript of "The War-Prayer"2009-02-16application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/1xt305pjarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt01m6g7h82011-07-03T03:27:28Zqt01m6g7h8Typescript of "The War-Prayer"2009-02-16application/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/01m6g7h8articleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai:escholarship.org:ark:/13030/qt9vr1k8hk2011-07-03T00:40:07Zqt9vr1k8hkToward a Philosophy of TransnationalismDoyle, Laura2009-02-16This essay suggests, first of all, that the power of transnational studies lies in its fundamentally dialectical approach, and, secondly, that this approach opens the way to a fresh consideration of the human subject of history. In the kind of transnational studies highlighted here, the focus is less strictly on the movements of people and capital across national borders and more on the implicitly other-oriented interactions between and among nations, making them mutually contingent phenomena, a situation which in turn entails intersubjective and intertextual events and calls for a fresh philosophy of the subject. Doyle draws on the thinking of Frantz Fanon, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Louis Althusser to explore one such possible "transnational philosophy." The second half of the essay pursues the idea that literature offers a micro-world of the dialectics of both transnational history and existential intersubjectivity. Doyle interprets Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe and Olaudah Equiano's Interesting Narrative in relation to each other as well as in relation to transnational Atlantic history. Such readings model a method for transnational literary studies, one grounded in philosophy as well as history.transnationalAtlanticraceexistentialdialecticalOlaudah Equiano (1745/6-ca. 1802)Daniel Defoe (1660-1731)Robinson Crusoe (1719)Black Atlanticslaveryapplication/pdfpubliceScholarship, University of Californiahttps://escholarship.org/uc/item/9vr1k8hkarticleJournal of Transnational American Studies, vol 1, iss 1oai_dc:acgcc_jtas:500:563:eyJmaXJzdCI6NTAwLCJpbmNsdWRlIjpbIlBVQkxJU0hFRCIsIkVNQkFSR09FRCJdLCJvcmRlciI6IlVQREFURURfREVTQyIsImxhc3RJRCI6InF0OXZyMWs4aGsiLCJsYXN0RGF0ZSI6IjIwMTEtMDctMDJUMTc6NDA6MDctMDc6MDAifQ