A million years ago when I was a child, I was always fascinated by what could be. I think this was primarily because I was surrounded by what was. As a Native person, I was constantly made aware of our heritage, our culture, everything from the past that made us unique and special. Also I was conscious of the fact that – technologically speaking – we were at a bit of a disadvantage to those who showed up one day for dinner and never left. I remember the first time I saw television, played with a computer, watched Star Trek, and got an electric toothbrush. Darn clever those White people. Native people constantly wonder at the clever innovations and devices the dominant culture feels the need to create – everything from vibrators to nuclear bombs. Read more »
If you missed the previous blog, then click here. Last week, we left off with Ira Wagler talking about the difficulty of writing Growing Up Amish. In the following video, he continues in the same vein with the tricky topics of guilt, reception of his book, and the challenge of finding the right title, just to name a few. Without further ado, the American Studies Blog now brings you Part II.
Still have questions? Then why not get a copy of Ira Wagler’s book, explore the leading website on Amish studies, or join the Amish scholars, professionals, and educators at the international conference, “Continuity and Change: 50 Years of Amish Society” hosted by the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania from June 9–11, 2016?
Questions. Questions. There are always questions, especially when dealing with the Old Order Amish. And questions there were – plenty of questions – following The New York Times best-selling author Ira Wagler’s talk at the Plain People Conference at Leuphana University. In fact, the Q&A ran slightly longer than his introductory remarks to Growing Up Amish. Of course, this really shouldn’t be surprising since Wagler has a unique way of connecting with his audience, an audience on this particular sweltering evening made up of scholars, students, upper-secondary English teachers, and residents of Lüneburg. Reflecting the diversity of that delightful audience, the questions dealt with everything from trauma to the Pennsylvania Dutch. So, if you are Ira Wagler’s fan, an avid American Studies Blog reader, or a student trying to pep up your presentation on the Amish, you can be sure to find ample food for thought.
lê thi diem thúy at Leuphana University in May 2015
When lê thi diem thúy (pronounced “twee”) visited Leuphana University this past May, not only did our students have the opportunity to attend her reading and talk, the three of us also had the pleasure of interviewing her. lê thi diem thúy is the author of the highly acclaimed novel, The Gangster We Are All Looking For, but primarily sees herself as a poet. If you’re looking for some creative inspiration to start off the new year, take a peek at the interview.
ASB: When did you first decide to become a writer?
thúy: It was never decided that I would become a writer. What I wanted, ever since I was a child and first learned to read, was to be with words. Reading was both a challenge and a consolation, stories were worlds I could enter, and from a young age I understood that words somehow summoned worlds. At first I only wanted to be transported as a reader. Perhaps I became a writer when I realized that I, too, carried worlds within myself, and words were the key to unlock those worlds and release people, places, moments, questions, desires. Read more »
I wrote this piece for a seminar called “Reversing the Gaze.” The idea was to write about difference and the challenging of stereotypes, so I tried to incorporate as many gazes as possible.
The characters were chosen for their ambiguity. After our discussions in class, Injun Joe seemed to be the perfect anti-hero instead of a common villain with a racial slur. Esperanza – with her identity struggle concerning ethnic issues, gender identity, social status, and her hints at the deconstruction of stereotypical gender roles – was a character that I felt I could identify with.
Ted Cassidy as Injun Joe in The New Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1969) | Photo credit: NBC television (Public domain), via Wikimedia Commons
The notion of being neither here nor there, being in-between culturally, is something that I can relate to while recognizing what a privileged position this can be when one is not subjected to discrimination. The numerous borders the characters have had to face are reminiscent of fences around reservations or the brutality of the Mexican-American border. More specifically, it is about what happens years, maybe decades, later when the ancestors have long crossed the border, but the individual is still confronted with dividing lines and is forced to make decisions as well as create his/her own identity, which is always cultural and political.
Americana
By Sassetta Harford
I guess it’s kind of funny, what with political correctness and all. They just can’t seem to get it right when it comes to people like me. Half-breed, that’s what they used to call us, like a dirty mongrel pissing on their white picket fence. Precisely that makes me an American, more American even than George Bush or Washington himself, and certainly more American than their precious Jesus.
The American jazz queen, Melody Gardot, is still eager to explore the world around her, but her focus has changed and been narrowed down to her own country. Her fourth album, Currency of Man, features social commentary on American society – a commentary wrapped in a bluesy analog sound with warm soul and gospel influences and lots of horns, a commentary that has never seemed to have more currency than now.
