Assignment #6

After a tough battle with blackboard, I am the victor!

Anywho…

You would think that there would be more similarities between families that migrate throughout the country and those that immigrate into the wonderful US of A. However, these two novels have told me otherwise…

It appeared that minority families who migrated into the ‘burbs (like those in Linden Hills) felt less like they had to fight to preserve their culture. This is probably because no matter where you go throughout the country, everybody knows at least something about Southern black culture. Slavery is such a large part of this country’s history; if you deny slavery, you’re omitting a significant chunk of our rich, complex history. So many aspects of black culture today began in the days of slavery. Many forms of music and dance that are still popular today root back to the days of cotton picking. Soul food is cooked all around the country! Because black culture has such a strong hold on American history, it’s not going anywhere. Subsequently, many people don’t feel like they need to flash their culture around. The residents of the predominantly black community of Linden Hills are too preoccupied with their materialism and suburban culture to really fight to preserve that of their ancestors.

As for the Gangulis, or our immigrant family, I feel like they really felt like they had to fight to keep their heritage. Ashima just couldn’t adjust to the American lifestyle. She and Ashoke try so hard to preserve their heritage that they give Gogol a distaste for his background for a long time. He dates a bunch of “exotic” Caucasian women. It seems that in the attempt to preserve their heritage, a lot of immigrant families become even more immersed in their original culture after they move to the states.

Blackboard = the death of me

Blackboard has decided that now is the perfect time to battle my computer and absolutely refuse to load when I try to sign in. I need to see the prompt for the blog that's due tomorrow! Ah!! Alright, I'm going to breathe, give it some time, and try again in an hour...

Assignment #5

Alright, first things first…

I glanced at the assignment prompt a few days ago and came to the moronic assumption that Pernice’s piece was another article, not a book. As I glanced through the assignments and links on blackboard, I realized that I was W-R-O-N-G. I am going to have to run to the bookstore tomorrow morning before classes and work so I have the book read for class on Wednesday. Therefore, this blog will have to overlook Pernice for now…I will come back and add more post-Pernice reading…

Anyway…

It appears that very little is expected of girls in the suburbs. Sad much? It’s like we’re just existing until we’re old enough to become trophy wives who pretend to clean their big houses in fishnets and little French maid outfits while our bored, overpaid husbands tell us to bend over a little more as we dust the banister with a hot pink feather duster. Most of the time, suburban adolescent females are often portrayed as shallow party girls who wear too much makeup and too little clothing. We’re all just flitting about, fighting for the attention of our male peers. Yeah, trophy wife training!

Look at Stephanie; she’s just portrayed as an object in, “Better Luck Tomorrow.” Time after time, she just lets Steve do as he pleases with her. At one point, Steve literally says, “I have Stephanie.” Wtf?!? She lets him borrow her out for the formal and treat her poorly when he has clearly had too much to drink. It takes the entire movie for her to finally muster up the courage to think and act for herself. She never even gets to rip Steve a new one because by the time she has finally grown some metaphorical balls, he is already buried in Jesus’ backyard. Grrrr.

"You know how you make decisions that lead to other decisions but you don't remember why you made those decisions in the first place." <-- Hopefully this little line of Stephanie’s, followed by following her heart and kissing Ben, is the beginning of a more aggressive, outspoken Stephanie.

Clearly, we do more than this. Boo on stereotypes and poor representation.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I got a feeling that the male characters in, “Better Luck Tomorrow,” just had way too much pressure and did not know how to deal. It’s a stereotype (we all know how much I LOVE these…haha) that Asians are harder workers, therefore more successful – especially in school. The pressure is just unbearable; it’s not easy trying to stay at the top of your class. Who wants to sit and study 24/7? Everybody wants a social life; and unfortunately it’s extremely hard to balance being uber studious and a party animal. So, these guys found a way to do both and took full advantage of it. Clearly, they had many much more intelligent, less self-destructive options. By no means am I making excuses for them, but this is how I can begin to pick apart why they would choose such a injurious path.

Funny enough, I can most def relate in a convoluted sense…I am clearly not an Asian male, but I have my own pressures to succeed. My father passed away when I was a few days less than five months old, leaving my 27-year-old mother to raise me on my own. She sacrificed so much to make sure I had everything working in my favor my entire childhood. I worked super hard in high school, which (obviously) got me into SC. I’m the first person in my family to go to college! My mom is still sacrificing A LOT to put me through school here. I constantly feel pressure to succeed and make my hard working mom proud. I could see where people would go to insane lengths to just stay above water.

Oy, I’m drained. I should be able to add some commentary on Pernice tomorrow evening after my 800 sorority meetings…

#4

Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky-tacky,
Little boxes, little boxes,
Little boxes, all the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they're all made out of ticky-tacky
And they all look just the same.
And the people in the houses
All go to the university,
And they all get put in boxes,
Little boxes, all the same.
And there's doctors and there's lawyers
And business executives,
And they're all made out of ticky-tacky
And they all look just the same.
And they all play on the golf-course,
And drink their Martini dry,
And they all have pretty children,
And the children go to school.
And the children go to summer camp
And then to the university,
And they all get put in boxes
And they all come out the same.
And the boys go into business,
And marry, and raise a family,
And they all get put in boxes,
Little boxes, all the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they're all made out of ticky-tacky
And they all look just the same.



Most clever theme song ever...

...Even though I still totally disagree with its message.
It's kind of funny that the theme song is so similar to many
shows that depict the 'burbs.
These shows all bascailly imply that suburban folks are bland
and bored.
Weeds was amazing because it completely broke that stereotype.
Granted, there were others...
(The black folks were ghetto as all can be!)
Oh well, you can't win them all.
Weeds was amazing; I think I'm going to download the first season on iTunes...

Assignment #2

Way to crush my spirit, Eric Avila.

Discovering that Disneyland was designed to represent, "order, familiarity, and harmony," was uber depressing. Just be blunt, Avila...Disneyland promoted conformity. I mean I guess it doesn't surprise me in the end -- all I ever hear about that Walt Disney character is that he was a major racist, so it kind of makes sense that his theme park would have a convoluted parallel to that. However, this still does not soften the blow.

Just sticking to the basics, Jerry's suburb doesn't seem much different from Disneyland. Divergence from the guidelines is strongly prohibited and frowned upon; conformity still ultimately rules. Clearly if he is concerned that his, “different,” house (because of the slightly varying roof shingles that create an, “X,” for a safer, more accurate landing of his plane) will upset the neighbors, there is an issue. Ugh.

I guess this just really irks me because I have always been raised to be myself, which requires being an individual. March to the beat of your own drum! So, all this stuff about traditional values and submission to the bland standards these suburban societies have placed upon their residents seems like a load of crap. I’m still trying to figure out the rationale behind this goal to remain super vanilla; I just don’t see the fun in being just another faceless person is a crowd.

Oh well; I am now officially repressing all of this information from my head so I can return to ignorantly enjoying the happiest place on earth...

It's sweet to be young and innocent...

Assignment #1

Wow, am I sheltered.

The mere week that I have been in this class has really started to open my eyes. Heck, the two articles that we had to read, as well as Aloft, smacked me in the face so hard that I feel like I have welts on my face! I always thought that I was really lucky growing up in my little ‘burb, but I have lately come to the realization that I have been walking around with my eyes pretty much closed for the past 21 years. Pathetic, I know.

White Diaspora basically describes suburban life as bland. Jurca reiterates how suburbs seem to promote, “mass production, standardization, dullness, and conformity.” Unfortunately, this appears to even include race. I could always kind of see how blah a lot of the architecture in most ‘burbs is…House after house looks exactly the same. However, I never really experienced this first hand until right before I moved out here to LA. See I grew up in Oak Park (aka the OP), the suburb that is the proud home to Frank Llyod Wright’s home and studio. So, needless to say, we most def didn’t have the boring, old cookie cutter houses. However, when I started high school, a lot of huge, overpriced condos started appearing in the most random parts of the OP. That irritated me a little, but after some of the discussions we had in class and reading this article, I am starting to see how the OP fits more and more into the nasty rep suburbs have acquired throughout the decades.

I do disagree that suburbs can suffocate one’s creativity. What does a canvas look before an artist creates a masterpiece? That’s right…It’s blank. Creativity, although can be enhanced by outside forces, comes from inside.

Now some of the facts in, “Policing the Third Border,” made me absolutely sick. I cannot believe that some communities reduced park hours and charged families with over four members admission to parks just to keep the “riff raff” out. That’s totally ridic! Everybody has the right to go to the park and shop wherever they please. If a poor person wants to spend his every last penny on Rodeo Drive and bring his family of 5 to do it, that’s his prerogative. Grrrrr!

Closing off streets is kind of nuts too. Oak Park actually kind of does this. It’s the first suburb west of Chicago. So, you can literally cross Austin Blvd. and you’re in the West side of Chi-town. Most of the Oak Park streets that intersect with Austin are cul-de-sacs so people driving around in Chicago can’t get into the OP quite as easily. Davis and Moctezuma speak of a similar situation in SoCal: South Pas shouldn’t close off streets to, “prevent drive by shootings,” and the residents on the other side shouldn’t assume that everybody who has a luxury car zooms through everywhere, running over local children. It’s so sad that everybody is constantly stereotyping each other with little-to-no evidence to even back up their generic claims.

Kind of random question…Are cul-de-sacs uber suburban?

Now all of this stuff seems to tie into race. The suburbanites who appear to want conformity are the middle-class white citizens. Those who want a little taste of suburban life are the minorities who are not as well off. These opposing forces seem to constantly be at war. You can see this in the articles with all the border issues, admission to parks, etc. It’s also clear in first part of Aloft. Jerry, like many people today, is very hung up on racial issues. He was shocked at first to discover that Hal was black because Shari looked like, “your typical Long Island white lady.” Why is she all of a sudden abnormal because she is married to a black man? It’s sad to hear how hard it was for the black families in the novel to sell their belongings. It amazes me that families did not want to pay a lot of money for a house that was previously owned by a black family. That’s so dumb. All of this is just so hard for me to swallow because I have just learned to tune out race. Being biracial (half white half black, baby!) I have never really experienced racism, so it’s something that I still just don’t get. I never really understood why some people were so stuck up on skin color, but I guess when you have constantly run into issues that are directly linked to race, it becomes difficult to just let it slide. I need to stop seeing the world through rose-colored glasses.

Hm, looks like I have been ranting for quite a while now. This is my first blog that doesn’t just consist of me whining about my lack of a love life, so I’m sorry if my thoughts are absolutely all over the place. If you got bored and skipped thorough some of my paragraphs, just take note that the basic gist of this entry was that I [sadly] have a lot to learn. I have grown up around a lot of very open-minded, non-judgmental suburbanites. After reading these three works, that sounds like an oxymoron…I promise it’s true! Lol.

I’m really excited to continue reading the novel and everything else for this class. I feel like I have already learned more in this class than an entire semester in ENGL 261 (stupid English Lit before the 1800’s). Sorry if anybody liked that stuff – those works were the bain of my existence last semester. On that note, I’m going to hush before I wrote myself into a hole. Adios, all. See you in class mañana.