Your Thoughts on Son of Sinbad

It was a great pleasure, as it always is for me, to watch The Son of Sinbad on Tuesday. Please read the 2 assigned articles (they are on OASIS, and you can find the list of readings on OASIS, too, if you didn't get the handout in class) and answer the following questions by 5 pm on Monday, 1 October:

1. In Ellen Strain's "Defining the Tourist Gaze," Strain makes the argument that anthropology, film, and tourism are all linked.
a) Describe how the links between the three fields work.
b) Where do you see an anthropologist's perspective or a tourist's perspective in The Son of Sinbad?
c) Where do you see a Son of Sinbad-type perspective (a cinematic influence) in scientific or historical or journalistic accounts of the East (Near, Middle, or Far)?
d) Where do you see a Son of Sinbad-type perspective (a cinematic influence) in Westerners' touristic journeys to the East (Near, Middle, or Far)?

2. Ella Shohat's "Gender in Hollywood's Orient" states that Orientalist films "superimposed the visual traces of civilizations as diverse as Arab, Persian, Chinese and Indian into a single portrayal of the exotic Orient, treating cultural plurality as if it were a monolith." I made an argument on Tuesday that Son of Sinbad is in part a response to the Korean War, a fantasy that fulfills some sublimated, repressed wishes aroused by that conflict. What traces of Korea (South or North) or China, or any other Eastern nations or peoples, did you notice in Son of Sinbad? (These "traces" aren't necessarily literal, they can be metaphorical.)

3. Shohat also discusses the "Western rescue fantasy" in Orientalist films.
a) What does she mean by "Western rescue fantasy"?
b) Do you interpret Son of Sinbad to be a Western rescue fantasy in any way?
c) Do you see the Western rescue fantasy still at work in any recent films or TV shows that you can think of? In what media texts have you seen this fantasy included?

Your Thoughts on Godzilla, Part II

Do you like this "Godzilla Saves America" comic book cover? I'm not sure what's going on in that illustration, but if anyone can shed light on this particular comic book series, I'd be psyched to read/hear about it.

Here are the questions that you must reply to by 5 pm on Monday, 24 Sept 07:

1. Only a few of you shared your impressions of, thoughts about, reactions to Gojira in class. So post here about what you thought about this 1954 film. And those of you that did respond to this question in class, think of this as an opportunity elaborate on your answers!

2. Anisfield talks about the ecological damage symbolized by Godzilla. How do you think Godzilla represents our guilt/fear/anxieties over the environment?

3. Now that you've heard two lectures on Godzilla, read 3 articles about him, and watched the original film, what do *you* think Godzilla represents, and why?

Your Thoughts: Gojira (Godzilla) (1954) Readings

I'm sorry that we weren't able to watch the original Gojira (Godzilla) in class on Tuesday. The reason I brought in a Japanese DVD is that for more than fifty years, the only way you could watch the uncut original Gojira was by buying a copy from a Japanese media company. There was no version of the film for sale in the U.S. You could buy that bizarre adulterated Raymond Burr version, but not the original. Well, now the original is for sale in the U.S. (actually, there's a Collector's Edition with both the uncut version and the Raymond Burr edit). So I'm going to get a hold of that, and as I said in class yesterday, either I'll figure out a way to upload it for you this weekend, or we'll all watch it together in class next Tuesday.

Since you won't have access to the film till at least the weekend, this week's blog questions pertain only to the assigned readings: Noriega's "When 'Them!' Is U.S." article, Napier's "Panic Sites" article, and the photo of MacArthur with Emperor Hirohito.

So after you do the readings, please read the following questions and post your answers by 5 pm on Monday, 17 Sept 07:

1) According to Noriega, the creature Godzilla has served many different functions and taken on multiple meanings for Japanese filmmakers and audiences. Godzilla, always produced and/or awakened by nuclear weapons, has represented Japan's WWII military monstrosity and atrocities, Japan's suffering as the only nation ever to ever be subjected to nuclear attacks, and Japan's "middle ground" status as a nation that has consistently refused to build or possess nuclear arms, yet is surrounded and deeply affected by nuclear discourses (the U.S. tested its H-bombs near Japan in the 1950s; geographically, Japan was situated between the two mightiest nuclear powers of the Cold War; and today Japan regards nearby N. Korea as a nuclear threat). Yet, Godzilla movies are almost synonymous with light entertainment; they are almost universally regarded as mindless "monster movies," the predecessors of today's comic-book-based summer blockbusters. Do you think that the low-culture status of the Godzilla films has enabled (or allowed) Godzilla to take on so many cultural and historical meanings, or do you think the fact that the films have never attained critical value have hindered the films' audiences from discerning the deeper meanings of the monster? Explain your opinion and give reasons for it.

2) Did reading the Noriega and Napier articles change your point-of-view on the social relevance and importance of popular cinema, particularly sci-fi cinema, in any way? If so, in what ways? If not, why not?

3) Nuclear weapons still exist and are still a major threat to human and environmental health and safety. What examples of (what Napier describes as) "the imagination of disaster" and fantasies of "secure horror" do you see in present-day media (fictional or not) that address or allude to the possibility of nuclear warfare and weaponry? What role do notions of Asia, "the Orient," and Orientalist discourses play in contemporary nuclear narratives?

Gojira (Godzilla) Readings

The required readings on Gojira (Godzilla) for the Techno-Orientalism class on 18 Sept 07 are:

1. (OASIS) Chon Noriega, “Godzilla and the Japanese Nightmare: When “Them!” is U.S.” From Cinema Journal, Vol. 27, No. 1 (Autumn, 1987), pp. 63-77.

2. (OASIS) Susan J. Napier, “Panic Sites: The Japanese Imagination of Disaster from Godzilla to Akira.” From Journal of Japanese Studies, Vol. 19, No. 2 (Summer, 1993), pp. 327-351.

3. (WWW) “American Experience: MacArthur: People & Events: Emperor Hirohito.” http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/macarthur/peopleevents/pandeAMEX97.html. (Or, go to http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/macarthur/index.html, click on “People & Events” in the left column, and on the next page, click on “Emperor Hirohito” at the top of the page.)

OASIS = Readings can be downloaded from the course OASIS site.
WWW = Can be found on the World Wide Web.

Your Thoughts: The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932)

I enjoyed watching The Mask of Fu Manchu with you all yesterday, despite the technical difficulties (sorry about that; our permanent projector and DVD player should be installed by next class session). No matter how many times I've seen this film, I find that I always notice and appreciate new, wonderful, amazing aspects of it. This time, I noticed the way that Boris Karloff and Myrna Loy use their hands, with those super-long fingernails; I noticed that Sheila, like Fu Manchu's daughter, also is an extension of her father's work (both women are "tools" to carry out their fathers' missions); I noticed that Fu Manchu "thinks" technologically in every respect, whether he is deploying low technology (the bell-ringing torture, the sword of Genghis Khan) or high technology (that crazy serum, the hydraulic spiked-door torture, the lightning machine). What a bizarre and fantastic film.

This week, please post on the following questions:

(1) If, as Ling suggests in her "Monster Within" article, Fu Manchu's popularity stems from the fact that "the hunter" (the U.S./U.K.) needs and desires "prey," what made Fu Manchu such attractive prey from the 1910s to the present day (the latest Fu Manchu novel is set to be published this year)? What, do you think, has made Fu Manchu such an appealing supervillain for British and American readers and moviegoers for generations?

(2) What did you learn from the Wong article that you didn't know before (about film history, American and Asian American history, or Fu Manchu)?

(3) Wong argues that the Hollywood film industry has long been not only ignorant, but willfully ignorant. What do you think the film industry had to gain by purposefully perpetuating stereotypes of non-white races for many years? Do you think Hollywood has demonstrated a greater knowledge of minority races and ethnicities in recent years? Why or why not?

(4) Do you detect any "yellow peril" thinking in present-day U.S. political discourse? If so, where (and with respect to what nations) do you see the yellow peril theme? If you think that yellow peril fear is totally outdated, when do you think this type of fear stopped being a common part of American life?

Fu Manchu Readings

The readings for Techno-Orientalism for 9.11.07 are the following:

Required Reading:

1. (OASIS) L.H.M. Ling, “The Monster Within: What Fu Manchu and Hannibal Lecter Can Tell Us about Terror and Desire in a Post 9/11-World” (2004).

2. (OASIS) Eugene Franklin Wong, “The Early Years: Asians in the American Films Prior to World War II” (1978).

3. (WWW) “Yellow Myths on the Silver Screen” at
http://web.mit.edu/21h.153j/www/aacinema/intro.html.


Additional Resources:

4. Vernellia R. Randall (editor), “Asian Pacific Americans: Laws and Policies” at http://academic.udayton.edu/race/03justice/aspilaws.htm
(part of “Race, Racism, and the Law” website).

5. Population Resource Center, “Executive Summary: U.S. Immigration: A Legislative History” at
http://www.prcdc.org/summaries/usimmighistory/usimmighistory.html.

6. Lawrence J. Knapp, “The Page of Fu Manchu” at
http://www.njedge.net/~knapp/FuFrames.htm.


OASIS = Article can be downloaded from the course site on OASIS.
WWW = Article can be found on the World Wide Web.