The Women of Color Collective Invite you to our End of the Year Social: Wednesday, June 9, 5-7pm, District Lounge in Hotel Deca. We hope you will take a few moments to stop by and enjoy good company!
Thursday, June 3, 2010
WOCC Social: June 9, 5-7, District Lounge in Hotel Deca
Posted by Priya
The Women of Color Collective Invite you to our End of the Year Social: Wednesday, June 9, 5-7pm, District Lounge in Hotel Deca. We hope you will take a few moments to stop by and enjoy good company!
The Women of Color Collective Invite you to our End of the Year Social: Wednesday, June 9, 5-7pm, District Lounge in Hotel Deca. We hope you will take a few moments to stop by and enjoy good company!
Memory & Memorial Day
Posted by Mona
Memory & Memorial Day: A Native America perspective by Mona Halcomb
As we prepare to put away the final decorations of Memorial Day celebrations until next year’s festivities it is an opportune time to stop and consider the complexities this holiday holds for Native American and Alaskan Native (NA/AN) communities. While the contradictions may be many, they cannot overshadow the pride NA/AN have in serving their country. Attending any cultural event such as a pow wow will be evidence of this pride, where an Eagle Staff is first carried in then, the American flags, Indian Nation flags, and any other flags that are being displayed (e.g. the POW-MIA flag, a state flag, or the Pow Wow’s own flag etc…) The flags are raised while a flag song is preformed, which is followed by a veterans’ honoring song.
The patriotic commitment of NA/AN is not a new phenomenon. Even before NA/AN were citizens they served this country. Indian Scouts were used from 1812 until 1947. American Indians in the Military were finally granted U.S. citizenship in 1919. Five years later the Snyder Indian Citizen Act would grant all American Indians this.
While many think of military service with being a “warrior” and "men" there are many instances of women serving this country. During the American Revolution a Native woman by the name of Tyonajanegen was said to have fought along side her husband. In Alaska, the Alaska National Guard had over 60 women serve as of 1980. Four Indian nuns went to Cuba as nurses. And many have heard of the contribution made by Sacajawea. There are many more examples of contributions made by women however, for the sake of time I will leave this up to you to find them.
While the Navajo Code Talkers in World War II are credited with using their language to aid in the war efforts, this was also done in World War I with the Choctaw nation. During WWI it is estimated that as many as 12,000 Native Americans served their country. In light of the current immigration policies debate-taking place in Arizona, it is ironic that part of the Navajo Reservation is located in within it's borders. A Hopi woman by the named Piestewa from Arizona died in the Gulf War. In addition, Arizona is listed as one of the top five (5) states that NA/AN veterans are originally from. The battle over immigration, which targets “brown people” is brewing in Arizona where so many heroic minorities are from.
During WWII nearly 24% of Native American’s were involved in the war. With a population of less than 350,000, there were 44,000 NA/AN serving in WWII. In fact 99% of healthy Indian males registered for the draft during WWII; another 40,000 NA/AN left the reservation to work in industries that supported the war. NA/AN also made significant financial contributions to war bonds and organizations like the Red Cross and the Army & Navy Relief societies.
In the Vietnam War it is estimated that 42,000 NA/AN served. The report Senator Matsunage Project found higher levels of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) among Native Americans. Of course there are many considerations that may contribute to this yet one in particular is usually agreed upon. The “stereotype” that all Indians are better trackers and scouts often put them in the front line and in dangerous situations more than their peers.
On a personal note, my dad served in both the Navy and the Army. This is something I did not even know this until at his funeral when both branches showed up to honor him. He had once told me a story, which is a perfect example of the dichotomy of this article. He had just returned from war, a number of his buddies and he got together to celebrate their safe return. A bartender refused to serve my dad a drink even though he was in his uniform and with his other returning comrades. Saying, "We don't serve Injuns here." A fight broke out because his friends were so outraged at the injustice of him not being able to be served a drink after fighting for this country.
According to the congressional testimony of Gordon Mansfield, a deputy secretary for veterans’ affairs, in 2004, Native American veterans are four times less likely to receive healthcare than other veterans. NA/AN’s are less likely to have health insurance than veterans of all races. And many NA/AN get caught up in bureaucracy, such as the case of former Army Sergeant Andres “Buzzy” Torres who has been fighting the VA for 21 years. He had barely enough to survive on and continues to get denied benefits even though he is unable to work due to being injured in the military and the care he received from that injury. The only reason he was able to manage was because of his wife’s income to supplement him; unfortunately he lost his wife to cancer. Now this man who sacrificed so much is about to lose everything because he is still fighting the VA. NA/AN veterans in general are more likely to have family incomes in the ranges below 30,000 dollars and less likely in the range of 50,000 dollars or more than all races.
For a community that believes it is an honor to serve, show strength, pride and devotion to a country who does not always reciprocate these stories and facts are extremely painful to hear. Native Americans have the highest per capita rate of enlistment of all races. Despite the long term affects of historical trauma Indian people have endured they remain very patriotic. Examples of this historical trauma which continues today include, ethnic cleansing which didn’t end with military defeat and occupation of their land. It has persisted for generations, losses that include language, religious practices, subsistence, traditional ways, taking children from homes, dress, and traditional healing practices. The toll on NA/AN is evident in their current economic status, educational attainment, health and life expectancy rates, and the number of NA/AN caught up in the cycle of addictions or the legal system.
And yet we see, more than 180,000 Native Americans and Alaska Native veterans living today. This number is projected to increase given the number of NA/AN serving in the military. Let us hope that our Veteran Affairs, Government and Society show the respect and support that these and all veterans deserve.
Resources/further reading:
Badkhen, Anna. September 17, 2007. “Native American Veterans seen at risk Region lags in efforts to help stress-afflicted” Boston Globe
Holiday, L.F. and Gabriel Bell, Robert E. Klein, and Michael R. Wells. September 2006. “American Indian and Alaska Native Veterans: Lasting Contributions” Office of Policy, Assistant Secretary for Policy, Planning, and Preparedness, Department of Veterans Affairs.
http://www.defense.gov/specials/nativeamerican01/women.html
http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq61-1.htm
http://www.race-talk.org/?p=3677
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
The Children are Dying
Posted by Mandy
With the usual warnings, cautionary tales, and kindly meant advice, I would like to offer a brief public service announcement regarding indoor and outdoor swimming venues, and highlight the dangers the season presents for young children of color.
Drowning has been a method of killing intertwined with the violent oppression of people of color for centuries. The cruel stories of watery murders sit fixed within our weaving herstories. From the 132 enslaved Africans of the Zong sacrificed to the sea in 1781 to the recent purposeful sacrifice of New Orleans’ 98% Black Lower Ninth Ward during Hurricane Katrina. In the mostly unseen sub-sections of our nation’s newspapers, there sit thousands of stories of “illegal immigrants” seeking lives free from the oppression of NAFTA found drowned in the waters surrounding the United States. Many victims of the various U.S. “military interventions” throughout the 20th and 21st centuries have fled their war-torn country in makeshift vessels, often fated to drown in unfamiliar waters. Yet the primary manner in which this drowning manifests today seems even further invisibalized.
According to a 2009 study at the University of Memphis, “drowning is a leading cause of death for children ages 5-14 in the United States, and the inability to swim is one of the most often cited reasons why children drown.” Yet, as alarming as this statistic is on its own, the stress of this issue is further complicated by the reality that Black children are 3 times more likely to be killed from drowning than their White counterparts. In Washington, while 7% of children identify as Asian American, they account for 18% of deaths by drowning, the highest of any racial group in the state (Bock). According to the Center for Disease Control, the fatal drowning rate for Native children is 2.2 times higher that of White children. A 2006 study in the American Journal of Public Health surveyed the deaths of youth between the ages of 5 and 24 by drowning; 47% were Black, 33% were White, and 12% were Latin@.
Paula Bock of the Seattle Times offers a series of reasons as to why this racial disparity exists, including the following rationale: “Families, in general, hand down recreation through the generations.” In consideration of the reality that people of color have been and continue to be (see video below- note use of word "complexion") denied access to public swimming facilities, and the poor quality of waters in the lifeguard-less segregated swimming pools that eventually did emerge for the use of people of color, to what extent can swimming be viewed as an intergenerational pastime within communities of color? The reasoning is simple: how can I learn to swim from my people, those from whom I can achieve new skills most comfortably and inexpensively, if they were not given access to swimming places in which they might have learned the skill in their own childhoods?
According to the aforementioned University of Memphis study, “70% of white and Hispanic children of non-swimmers do not swim themselves; for black children the correlation is 91.”
The question thus becomes, who will teach our kids to swim?
If a child is lucky, she has access to a program like Make a Splash, a “national child-focused water safety initiative” with a mission to teach “minority youth” how to swim. If she’s really lucky, her guardian/s can afford to pay for lessons at her local YWCA. If she’s really really really lucky, she is able to attend a well-funded school where swimming classes are included in the P.E. curriculum.
In her essay “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” the fantastic Audre Lorde discusses how the loss of our children is the most violent oppression that women of color face today. Historically, we have been robbed of our children through forced sterilization and abortion. Indigenous children have been kidnapped be raised in state-run “boarding schools.” This theft and spiritual murder takes a more sinister, surreptitious turn in our present situation, it is ever-present but far less visible; Lorde explains: “violence weaves through the daily tissues of our living — in the supermarket, in the classroom, in the elevator, in the clinic and the schoolyard, from the plumber, the baker, the saleswoman, the bus driver, the bank teller, the waitress who does not serve us” (119).
In Latin@ culture, there exists a myth surrounding a woman referred to as La Llorona, the crier, the weeper. The most popularized story in U.S. society tells of a woman scorned by her lover, the father of her children. This woman, in a Medea-like rage, drowns her children, before taking her own life, and is left to search for her children as a spirit until the end of days.
Mural of "La Llorona" by Juana Alicia, San Francisco, CA
This story was revisited and reconsidered by a wonderfully talented Chicana professor with whom I had the pleasure of studying at Seattle University. She asked us to read the story in consideration of themes such as those addressed in Toni Morrison’s seminal novel Beloved, in which the titular child is slaughtered by her mother when she and her family are about to be discovered as runaway slaves. Why would a sane woman really kill her children?
It seems that only situations murder our children. In the case of La Llorona, we may more realistically imagine that her children were spared through death rather than be allowed to fight as child soldiers in one of the many U.S.-funded Latin American civil wars. The only option remaining when a child is to be taken, the parent deported, and culture forcibly removed through a cruel foster system.
The ghost of La Llorona is more present than ever in our problematic present, wailing for the children she has been lost in an inherently racist and cruelly apathetic environment. The children are dying, oftentimes within the womb of the mother hyperactively stressed from the terror of living while continuous oppressed (Allers). A beautiful post on the Womanist Musings blog asks “Who Will Love the Black Child?” “Whiteness would love to see us cast aside our babies,” this La Llorona weeps, “They are our future and the best of us flows within their tiny beating hearts.”
Allers, Kimberly. “What’s in Your Womb?” MomLogic. 13 May 2010. 1 June 2010. http://www.momlogic.com/2010/05/whats_in_your_womb.php
Bock, Paula. “The Power of the Pool: Issues of class, culture and political priorities swirl.” Seattle Times 15 June 2008, online ed. 29 May 2010. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/pacificnw/2004468944_pacificpswim15.html
Brown, Sierra.“Everybody in the Water: Black People Too.” Brooklyn Ink 3 May 2010, online ed. 29 May 2010. http://thebrooklynink.com/2010/05/03/11581-everybody-in-the-water-black-people-too/
Guenther, Curt. “Civil Rights Leader Hooks’ Nov. 4 Memphis Talk Will Reprise Earlier Washington, D.C., Speech.” 26 Oct. 2009. U of Memphis. Press release. 29 May 2010. http://benhooks.memphis.edu/Newsroom.html
“How Do I Talk To You, My White Sister?” Center for Gender in Organizations: GPO Commentaries 2 (2004). Newsletter.
Lorde, Audre. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” Sister Outsider. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 1984. 114-123.
Miller, Larry. “Black, Hispanic Children Turned Away From Philadelphia Swimming Pool.” New Journal & Guide. 1 June 2010. http://www.njournalg.com/index.php?view=article&id=112:black-hispanic-children-turned-away-from-philadelphia-swimming-pool&option=com_content&catid=41:national-news&Itemid=74
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Knopf, 1987.
Saluja, Gitanjali, et al. “Swimming Pool Drownings Among US Residents Aged 5–24 Years: Understanding Racial/Ethnic Disparities.” American Journal of Public Health 96.4 (2006): 728-733. 1 June 2010. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16507730
Thomas, Wendi C. “Pooling efforts at summer of safety.” Commercial Appeal 20 May 2010, online ed. 29 May 2010. http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/may/20/pooling-efforts-at-summer-of-02/
“Unintentional Drowning: Fact Sheet.” Center for Disease Control and Prevention. 17 May 2010. 29 May 2010
USA Swimming Foundation. 2004. United States Swimming. 29 May 2010. http://198.246.98.21/HomeandRecreationalSafety/Water-Safety/waterinjuries-factsheet.html
“Who Will Love The Black Child?” Womanist Musings. Web log. 2 Nov. 2009. Blogger. May 29 2010. http://www.womanist-musings.com/2009/11/who-will-love-black-child.html
“White women fear their children will grow up to join the patriarchy and testify against them, women of color fear their children will be dragged from a car and shot down in the street, and White women will turn their backs on the reasons the children are dying.”- Audre LordeWhile the approaching warm weather brings to some dreams of rest, fond nostalgia for childhood adventures, and the season of a slower pace, the first songs of the summer bird can be a death knell to the mother of a child of color. For with the heat comes the promise of repose from the heat, found through the participation in water-based sports and other activities.
With the usual warnings, cautionary tales, and kindly meant advice, I would like to offer a brief public service announcement regarding indoor and outdoor swimming venues, and highlight the dangers the season presents for young children of color.
Drowning has been a method of killing intertwined with the violent oppression of people of color for centuries. The cruel stories of watery murders sit fixed within our weaving herstories. From the 132 enslaved Africans of the Zong sacrificed to the sea in 1781 to the recent purposeful sacrifice of New Orleans’ 98% Black Lower Ninth Ward during Hurricane Katrina. In the mostly unseen sub-sections of our nation’s newspapers, there sit thousands of stories of “illegal immigrants” seeking lives free from the oppression of NAFTA found drowned in the waters surrounding the United States. Many victims of the various U.S. “military interventions” throughout the 20th and 21st centuries have fled their war-torn country in makeshift vessels, often fated to drown in unfamiliar waters. Yet the primary manner in which this drowning manifests today seems even further invisibalized.
According to a 2009 study at the University of Memphis, “drowning is a leading cause of death for children ages 5-14 in the United States, and the inability to swim is one of the most often cited reasons why children drown.” Yet, as alarming as this statistic is on its own, the stress of this issue is further complicated by the reality that Black children are 3 times more likely to be killed from drowning than their White counterparts. In Washington, while 7% of children identify as Asian American, they account for 18% of deaths by drowning, the highest of any racial group in the state (Bock). According to the Center for Disease Control, the fatal drowning rate for Native children is 2.2 times higher that of White children. A 2006 study in the American Journal of Public Health surveyed the deaths of youth between the ages of 5 and 24 by drowning; 47% were Black, 33% were White, and 12% were Latin@.
Paula Bock of the Seattle Times offers a series of reasons as to why this racial disparity exists, including the following rationale: “Families, in general, hand down recreation through the generations.” In consideration of the reality that people of color have been and continue to be (see video below- note use of word "complexion") denied access to public swimming facilities, and the poor quality of waters in the lifeguard-less segregated swimming pools that eventually did emerge for the use of people of color, to what extent can swimming be viewed as an intergenerational pastime within communities of color? The reasoning is simple: how can I learn to swim from my people, those from whom I can achieve new skills most comfortably and inexpensively, if they were not given access to swimming places in which they might have learned the skill in their own childhoods?
According to the aforementioned University of Memphis study, “70% of white and Hispanic children of non-swimmers do not swim themselves; for black children the correlation is 91.”
The question thus becomes, who will teach our kids to swim?
If a child is lucky, she has access to a program like Make a Splash, a “national child-focused water safety initiative” with a mission to teach “minority youth” how to swim. If she’s really lucky, her guardian/s can afford to pay for lessons at her local YWCA. If she’s really really really lucky, she is able to attend a well-funded school where swimming classes are included in the P.E. curriculum.
In her essay “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” the fantastic Audre Lorde discusses how the loss of our children is the most violent oppression that women of color face today. Historically, we have been robbed of our children through forced sterilization and abortion. Indigenous children have been kidnapped be raised in state-run “boarding schools.” This theft and spiritual murder takes a more sinister, surreptitious turn in our present situation, it is ever-present but far less visible; Lorde explains: “violence weaves through the daily tissues of our living — in the supermarket, in the classroom, in the elevator, in the clinic and the schoolyard, from the plumber, the baker, the saleswoman, the bus driver, the bank teller, the waitress who does not serve us” (119).
In Latin@ culture, there exists a myth surrounding a woman referred to as La Llorona, the crier, the weeper. The most popularized story in U.S. society tells of a woman scorned by her lover, the father of her children. This woman, in a Medea-like rage, drowns her children, before taking her own life, and is left to search for her children as a spirit until the end of days.
Mural of "La Llorona" by Juana Alicia, San Francisco, CAThis story was revisited and reconsidered by a wonderfully talented Chicana professor with whom I had the pleasure of studying at Seattle University. She asked us to read the story in consideration of themes such as those addressed in Toni Morrison’s seminal novel Beloved, in which the titular child is slaughtered by her mother when she and her family are about to be discovered as runaway slaves. Why would a sane woman really kill her children?
It seems that only situations murder our children. In the case of La Llorona, we may more realistically imagine that her children were spared through death rather than be allowed to fight as child soldiers in one of the many U.S.-funded Latin American civil wars. The only option remaining when a child is to be taken, the parent deported, and culture forcibly removed through a cruel foster system.
The ghost of La Llorona is more present than ever in our problematic present, wailing for the children she has been lost in an inherently racist and cruelly apathetic environment. The children are dying, oftentimes within the womb of the mother hyperactively stressed from the terror of living while continuous oppressed (Allers). A beautiful post on the Womanist Musings blog asks “Who Will Love the Black Child?” “Whiteness would love to see us cast aside our babies,” this La Llorona weeps, “They are our future and the best of us flows within their tiny beating hearts.”
Works Cited
Allers, Kimberly. “What’s in Your Womb?” MomLogic. 13 May 2010. 1 June 2010
Bock, Paula. “The Power of the Pool: Issues of class, culture and political priorities swirl.” Seattle Times 15 June 2008, online ed. 29 May 2010
Brown, Sierra.“Everybody in the Water: Black People Too.” Brooklyn Ink 3 May 2010, online ed. 29 May 2010
Guenther, Curt. “Civil Rights Leader Hooks’ Nov. 4 Memphis Talk Will Reprise Earlier Washington, D.C., Speech.” 26 Oct. 2009. U of Memphis. Press release. 29 May 2010
“How Do I Talk To You, My White Sister?” Center for Gender in Organizations: GPO Commentaries 2 (2004). Newsletter.
Lorde, Audre. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” Sister Outsider. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 1984. 114-123.
Miller, Larry. “Black, Hispanic Children Turned Away From Philadelphia Swimming Pool.” New Journal & Guide. 1 June 2010. http://www.njournalg.com/index.php?view=article&id=112:black-hispanic-children-turned-away-from-philadelphia-swimming-pool&option=com_content&catid=41:national-news&Itemid=74
Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Knopf, 1987.
Saluja, Gitanjali, et al. “Swimming Pool Drownings Among US Residents Aged 5–24 Years: Understanding Racial/Ethnic Disparities.” American Journal of Public Health 96.4 (2006): 728-733. 1 June 2010. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16507730
Thomas, Wendi C. “Pooling efforts at summer of safety.” Commercial Appeal 20 May 2010, online ed. 29 May 2010
“Unintentional Drowning: Fact Sheet.” Center for Disease Control and Prevention. 17 May 2010. 29 May 2010
USA Swimming Foundation. 2004. United States Swimming. 29 May 2010. http://198.246.98.21/HomeandRecreationalSafety/Water-Safety/waterinjuries-factsheet.html
“Who Will Love The Black Child?” Womanist Musings. Web log. 2 Nov. 2009. Blogger. May 29 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Latinos & Immigration in America- Event
Posted by Mona
Latinos & Immigration in America
A Discussion about Arizona’s Anti-Immigrant Law
& Upcoming Legal Challenges
Guest Speaker
Thomas A. Saenz
MALDEF President and General Counsel
Panelists:
Jorge Barón, Director of Northwest Immigrant Rights Project
Luis Fraga, Professor University of Washington
Pramila Jayapal, Director of OneAmerica
Shankar Narayan, ACLU
Rebecca Smith, National Employment Law Project
Moderator:
Dan Ford, Latina/o Bar Association of Washington
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
7:00p.m-9:00p.m.
Town Hall
1119 8th Avenue
Seattle, WA 98101
Kindly RSVP to Fé Lopez at fe.f.lopez@lbaw.org
The need for national immigration reform has never been greater. On April 23, 2010, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB1070 which requires law enforcement to question people about their immigration status during everyday police encounters and criminalizes immigrants for failing to carry their "papers."
MALDEF President Thomas Saenz will speak on MALDEF's legal challenge to the Arizona law and on the pressing need for immigration reform. Following Saenz’s speech, a panel of speakers, moderated by Dan Ford of the Latina/o Bar Association of Washington, will join Saenz to discuss these issues as well as the recent incident involving the beating of a Latino man and the use of racial slurs by a Seattle police officer.
Thomas A. Saenz
MALDEF President and General Counsel
Thomas A. Saenz is President and General Counsel of MALDEF. Previously, as Counsel to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Saenz honed his leadership skills by serving on the four-person executive team to the mayor, where he provided legal and policy advice on major initiatives. Saenz had previously practiced civil rights litigation at MALDEF for 12 years. During that time, he was a leader in the successful challenge to California's unconstitutional Proposition 187, and he led numerous civil rights cases in the areas of immigrants' rights, education, employment, and voting rights. He gruaduated summa cum laude from Yale University, and he received his law degree from Yale Law School.
Sponsored by:
Schroeter Goldmark & Bender
Latina/o Bar Association of Washington
Co-Hosted by:
CASA Latina
Columbia Legal Services
El Centro De La Raza
Northwest Immigrant Rights Project
OneAmerica
Seattle University School of Law
University of Washington School of Law
Latinos & Immigration in America
A Discussion about Arizona’s Anti-Immigrant Law
& Upcoming Legal Challenges
Guest Speaker
Thomas A. Saenz
MALDEF President and General Counsel
Panelists:
Jorge Barón, Director of Northwest Immigrant Rights Project
Luis Fraga, Professor University of Washington
Pramila Jayapal, Director of OneAmerica
Shankar Narayan, ACLU
Rebecca Smith, National Employment Law Project
Moderator:
Dan Ford, Latina/o Bar Association of Washington
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
7:00p.m-9:00p.m.
Town Hall
1119 8th Avenue
Seattle, WA 98101
Kindly RSVP to Fé Lopez at fe.f.lopez@lbaw.org
The need for national immigration reform has never been greater. On April 23, 2010, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB1070 which requires law enforcement to question people about their immigration status during everyday police encounters and criminalizes immigrants for failing to carry their "papers."
MALDEF President Thomas Saenz will speak on MALDEF's legal challenge to the Arizona law and on the pressing need for immigration reform. Following Saenz’s speech, a panel of speakers, moderated by Dan Ford of the Latina/o Bar Association of Washington, will join Saenz to discuss these issues as well as the recent incident involving the beating of a Latino man and the use of racial slurs by a Seattle police officer.
Thomas A. Saenz
MALDEF President and General Counsel
Thomas A. Saenz is President and General Counsel of MALDEF. Previously, as Counsel to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Saenz honed his leadership skills by serving on the four-person executive team to the mayor, where he provided legal and policy advice on major initiatives. Saenz had previously practiced civil rights litigation at MALDEF for 12 years. During that time, he was a leader in the successful challenge to California's unconstitutional Proposition 187, and he led numerous civil rights cases in the areas of immigrants' rights, education, employment, and voting rights. He gruaduated summa cum laude from Yale University, and he received his law degree from Yale Law School.
Sponsored by:
Schroeter Goldmark & Bender
Latina/o Bar Association of Washington
Co-Hosted by:
CASA Latina
Columbia Legal Services
El Centro De La Raza
Northwest Immigrant Rights Project
OneAmerica
Seattle University School of Law
University of Washington School of Law
The Traditional Asian Women
Posted by Phoebe
This blog contains a brief history of Asian American women:
"Asian women shouldered much of the cost of subsidizing Asian men's labor. U.S. employers didn't have to pay Asian men as much as other laborers who had families to support, since Asian women in Asian bore the costs of rearing children and taking care of the older generation."
This situation has not been a lot changed with time. The spirit still remains in Asian women's mind, that is, to support and take care of their husbands' family without asking for rewards.
My grandmother had her first child when she was 20 years old. She not only had to take care of my grandfather and my uncle, but also need to bring up my grandfather's younger sisters. She is illiteracy. In her generation, women did not have the right to receive education. The ultimate life goal of a woman in my grandmother's generation is to support and help her husband. There are three disciplines imposed on women in Chinese society: Women should obey her father before marriage, obey her husband when married, and obey her sons in widowhood. Women also need to possess four virtues, those are, morality, proper speech, modest manner and diligent work.
Since the western thought emphasizing women's right spread to the East, the situation has been changed. In my mother's generation, women can go to school and receive higher education. Women can also have their own careers. My mother is a working woman. She also earned college diploma. However, women in this generation still need to look after their husbands' families. My mother told me, "Your children and your husband are the most important things in your life. You have to spare no effort to support them." My mother also said that it is useless for a woman to get a high position at work or high education. If a woman pays too much attention to her work, she will not able to take care of her family.
Nowadays, in my generation, most girls pursue higher position at work or want to get higher education. They think taking care of family cannot only count upon the wife. Both of the husband and the wife should undertake the responsibility. Therefore, there is a huge gap between this generation and the last generation in my country.
Susan's response to our request
Hello Theryn
I am certainly very interested. It seems like an extremely important space.
I have a couple of questions I'd like to pose to the group.
From: Theryn KigvamasudVashti [mailto:therynkmv@yahoo.com]
Sent: Sat 5/29/2010 3:48 PM
To: Susan Harewood
Subject: UWB Women of Color
| Hello Susan, Amanda, Phoebe, Priya, and myself have formed "The Graduate Women Of Color Collective" and we need a faculty advisor and of course we thought of you. We understand that you may be exhausted and we promise not to bother you too much but we need your ok sometime before Thursday. This collaboration is born out of two different necessities. First, graduate women of color need a space to build community across disciplines that is safe and supportive that facilitates critical discourses that are not happening in the class room. Our goal is to create a place other women of color can come into and build on as they see fit during their tenure in their respective programs. We would love to give you more about it in person (hence, Amanda attempts to reach you) but in the meantime please check our our blog, our most public venue, at uwbwomenofcolor.blogspot.com Deeply appreciate your consideration! Theryn, et al |
Note: Mona was not included in this email as an error on the part of the ladies present at the (very long) meeting-- sorry Mona!!!
The Silencing Nature of the "Downer" Vibe
Posted by Theryn
A couple of weeks ago my graduate cohort viewed a debate between Michael Eric Dyson and Tom Horne, Arizona superintendent of public instruction. Their debate aired on Anderson Cooper 360 on May 13, 2010. The Dyson/Horne debate was about why Arizona public schools should no longer continue an ethnic studies curriculum. Coming on the heels of Arizona’s Senate Bill 1070 anti-immigrant measure that requires law enforcement to stop and interrogate anyone they suspect of being and undocumented immigrant, House Bill 2281 prohibits schools from offering courses at any grade level that advocate ethnic solidarity, promote the overthrow of the US government, or cater to specific ethnic groups (Mother Jones, Retrieved on May 31, 2010). According to Motherjones.com, the House Bill 2281 was passed largely because Horne's personal distaste for the Tucson Unified School District's Chicano studies program, which out of 55,000 only 3 percent of the district's students actually participate. During the debate, when Horne was asked about his public responses to the elimination of ethnic studies programs, he kept repeating that ethnic studies preaches “a race obsessed philosophy, a downer philosophy” that in turn transforms otherwise peaceful students into angry militants whose rage threatens public safety and is essentially un-American. Now, for most of the students in my cohort, Horne sounded ridiculous. My colleagues were laughing, outwardly guffawing, shouting at the screen while cheering on Dyson’s rigorous interrogation of Horne’s statements. It all became quite a spectacle, albeit fun, but somewhat spectacle none the less because…
Since that time, there have been two instances were women of color have come under direct fire for sharing their truth. In the first case, I was told that the method of my truth sharing was “like getting kicked in the gut” by my professor. Then in another class a Native American woman argued with a fellow white cohort who is known for her ignorance of the complexities of racial discourse but constantly tries to debate racial issues often making highly problematic comments that go unchallenged. In each case, there were shocking silences on the part of the rest of the class. Now, while it is true that cohorts spoke to one another outside of class and show solidity for the women of color in different venues like Facebook or by phone and in the latter case, the professor did try and slow the torrent of errors from the white woman toward the Native woman, the majority of white people did not respond to the women in class the way they did to Micheal Erik Dyson’s critique of Horne on screen. Why is that?
Many of my cohorts and I have expressed feeling exhausted by the year’s worth of work and are greatly anticipating the close of the quarter, but is everyone too tired to support the subjectivities of women of color in class while supporting the distant subjectivities of the Brown people we engage with textually? My guess is that the “kicked in the gut” remark made by my professor lends a clue to what may be going on. Simply, the “downer philosophy” Horne name as the reason for his disdain for ethnic studies programs has found its way into the classroom astride the truths of women of color and becomes too much to handle and too threatening to the sense of social order. As long as the critique of colonialism, white supremacy and heteropatriarchy is made by the far away Brown male expert vs. the in-house woman of color, the “downer” consequence of marginalized people’s rage can be laughed off instead of engaged, ignored instead of interrogated as a result of in-house white supremacy.
References
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2010/05/13/must-see-ac360-az-ethnic-studies-discussion/
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/05/ethnic-studies-banned-arizona
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgvOdD5bVsg
A couple of weeks ago my graduate cohort viewed a debate between Michael Eric Dyson and Tom Horne, Arizona superintendent of public instruction. Their debate aired on Anderson Cooper 360 on May 13, 2010. The Dyson/Horne debate was about why Arizona public schools should no longer continue an ethnic studies curriculum. Coming on the heels of Arizona’s Senate Bill 1070 anti-immigrant measure that requires law enforcement to stop and interrogate anyone they suspect of being and undocumented immigrant, House Bill 2281 prohibits schools from offering courses at any grade level that advocate ethnic solidarity, promote the overthrow of the US government, or cater to specific ethnic groups (Mother Jones, Retrieved on May 31, 2010). According to Motherjones.com, the House Bill 2281 was passed largely because Horne's personal distaste for the Tucson Unified School District's Chicano studies program, which out of 55,000 only 3 percent of the district's students actually participate. During the debate, when Horne was asked about his public responses to the elimination of ethnic studies programs, he kept repeating that ethnic studies preaches “a race obsessed philosophy, a downer philosophy” that in turn transforms otherwise peaceful students into angry militants whose rage threatens public safety and is essentially un-American. Now, for most of the students in my cohort, Horne sounded ridiculous. My colleagues were laughing, outwardly guffawing, shouting at the screen while cheering on Dyson’s rigorous interrogation of Horne’s statements. It all became quite a spectacle, albeit fun, but somewhat spectacle none the less because…
Since that time, there have been two instances were women of color have come under direct fire for sharing their truth. In the first case, I was told that the method of my truth sharing was “like getting kicked in the gut” by my professor. Then in another class a Native American woman argued with a fellow white cohort who is known for her ignorance of the complexities of racial discourse but constantly tries to debate racial issues often making highly problematic comments that go unchallenged. In each case, there were shocking silences on the part of the rest of the class. Now, while it is true that cohorts spoke to one another outside of class and show solidity for the women of color in different venues like Facebook or by phone and in the latter case, the professor did try and slow the torrent of errors from the white woman toward the Native woman, the majority of white people did not respond to the women in class the way they did to Micheal Erik Dyson’s critique of Horne on screen. Why is that?
Many of my cohorts and I have expressed feeling exhausted by the year’s worth of work and are greatly anticipating the close of the quarter, but is everyone too tired to support the subjectivities of women of color in class while supporting the distant subjectivities of the Brown people we engage with textually? My guess is that the “kicked in the gut” remark made by my professor lends a clue to what may be going on. Simply, the “downer philosophy” Horne name as the reason for his disdain for ethnic studies programs has found its way into the classroom astride the truths of women of color and becomes too much to handle and too threatening to the sense of social order. As long as the critique of colonialism, white supremacy and heteropatriarchy is made by the far away Brown male expert vs. the in-house woman of color, the “downer” consequence of marginalized people’s rage can be laughed off instead of engaged, ignored instead of interrogated as a result of in-house white supremacy.
References
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2010/05/13/must-see-ac360-az-ethnic-studies-discussion/
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/05/ethnic-studies-banned-arizona
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgvOdD5bVsg
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