Monthly Archives: December 2015

shut it

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Over the weekend, a mistake was made. A woman was mistakenly crowned Miss Universe. Profuse apologies followed. Eventually, Miss Philippines won the Miss Universe title. Social media continues to buzz. End story.

Dear People of the World: Feel free to talk about these series of events all you like. Before you do, I kindly as you to do the following things:

1) Note the correct spelling of the current title holder’s country: Philippines.

2) Note the correct way to address people from said country: Filipino or Pilipino (not Philippino, Philippians or any other variation of that).

3) Confused or bothered about the title holder’s last name and/or mixed race identity? Please read up on the colonial history of the Philippines. It may take a while, but at least you’ll be informed.

4) Keep your racist comments to yourself. No one likes reading uninformed bullshit.

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Fremont, CA

the last dragon

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This weekend, everyone is going crazy watching this:

Personally, I’m waiting for the hype to die down (and for the time to re-visit the original series). Though I will not be watching The Force, I will be watching something that has to do with The Glow:

Don’t judge. I’m well aware that The Last Dragon is one of those awesomely bad 80s movies. You either love it or you don’t. Well guess what side of the street I’m standing on. The Manpanion managed to grab some tickets to a 30th anniversary screening and Q&A event featuring W. Kamau Bell and Taimak. We can’t wait! (Yes, I’ll post a full report later.)

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

South San Francisco, CA

inspired

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Confession: In high school and college, I was an artist. (As I write these words, the admission is still tough to wrap my head around.) Photography was my first love and I eventually majored in Art Studio. My areas of concentration were printmaking and performance. I gave up photography because at the time (in the 35mm days), supplies were expensive and the primary photo professor was a jerk. He was known to HATE commercial work, and there were notorious stories about him tearing up student projects, claiming they were shit.

Art classes critiques are hard enough. No one needs Professor Douchebag to add to the misery.

Still, I  often fantasize about what life would be like if I actually pursued photography. Would I have walked away from it the same way I did printmaking and performance? Who knows?

I will always be a lover and believer in the transformative ways of art. There are a lot of smart and creative people who illustrate this. Check out this interview with 2015 MacArthur Fellow LaToya Ruby Frazier.

I set out to retell the collapse of the steel mill industry, global economy, loss of social services, environmental racism and healthcare inequity through the bodies of three generations of Black women: Grandma Ruby, who lived from1925 and 2009 Mom, who was born in 1959 and myself, born in 1982). Our lives are markers on a historic timeline as Braddock shifted from a prosperous melting pot when my grandmother grew up to a segregated redlined community losing jobs and suffering from white flight when my mother grew up to dismantled steel mills, the War On Drugs and disinvestment at the local, state and federal levels by the time I grew up.

Her work shows us how art can be as effective and informative as the academic articles and books we write, and that our own families and experiences are central to understanding the major issues of the time. Perhaps it’s time that we all dust off that old trusty camera.

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Goleta, CA

Itliong-Vera Cruz Middle School

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itliongvera

Confession: Growing up, I was really lucky in that I was raised in pre-dominantly non-white, immigrant communities. In fact, I mostly grew up in areas where there were large concentrations of Filipino families, just like mine. Dededo, my home village is notorious for being Filipino-heavy. When I moved to Union City, California, the story continued.

This Friday, Alvarado Middle School (one of two middle schools in Union City) will be re-named to Itliong-Vera Cruz Middle School. It’s been a while since I have lived in Union City and I loosely followed the conversations surrounding the name change. (This is largely because my students at Berkeley would fill me in on this.) While I did not attend Alvarado Middle School, all of my cousins did. The name change makes sense, given the community makeup and history of Union City’s immigrant community. The middle school I attended was called New Haven Middle School. However, its name was eventually changed to Cesar Chavez Middle School. The newly named Itliong-Vera Cruz Middle School is a nice tribute to Filipinos in UFW’s legacy. I do hope to join the festivities on Friday. If that happens, I’ll post an update:)

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Mesa, AZ

racial uniform

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sikhs

When you’re reading the news and you’re reminded of Ronald Takaki and his lectures/discussions on the racial uniform….

Sikh Broncos fans are denied entry to game ‘because of their turbans’ – and then stopped by the bomb squad on the way out!

K-pop group denied entry at LAX on suspicion of being sex workers, band says

A Hundred Years Later, “The Birth of a Nation” Hasn’t Gone Away

Who We Be

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I’m just going to come out and say it: I have a new academic/scholar idol. His name is Jeff Chang. Should the day come that I finally grow up, I really wanna be this guy. Check out his work and you’ll see why.

Recently, I had the honor of meeting Jeff when he did a few events at ASU. For the record, he’s the nicest person you’ll ever meet. That, plus he’s a writing genius makes him my new idol. Sorry Jeff, it’s all your fault!

You need to read this:

WhoWeBe

and this:

CantStop

Just so you know I’m not lying about meeting him, here you go:)

IMG_7751

My dear friend Dr. Rudy Guevarra (far right) and I had the honor of facilitating a Q&A session with Jeff Chang (center).

For more on Jeff Chang, check out these articles:

Jeff Chang: The ‘Who We Be’ Interview with Kam Williams

Q&A: Jeff Chang, Author of ‘Who We Be’

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Mesa, AZ

The Red Road

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redroad

I’ll spoil it for you off the bat. Sundance TV decided to cancel The Red Road after its second season. Still, it’s an awesome show that you can watch online or on Netflix. (Please ignore the negative review that’s linked to the photo above.) It has a diverse cast and rich story lines that make an ES scholar like me melt. Yes, Jason Momoa is easy on the eyes. However, the show illustrates that he has some acting chops too. I’ll miss The Red Road (and I shall curse Sundance TV for letting you go).

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Chandler, AZ

The Big 4-0

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This is me at 40. Yes, that smirk is pretty standard.

I turn 40 years old today. That means that I’m slightly younger than the fall of Saigon and older than Blake Shelton. According to Hollywood, 40 is also the age that I should just give up on life and die. The older we get, the less we matter. Apparently, women only matter as long as they are date-able and marriage-able and controllable. At some point, a consortium of stupid men (I’m sure of it) decided that 40 would be the age of our deaths.

Well FUCK those assholes! (I won’t apologize for the foul language. It’s one of the perks of being 40.)

As someone who honors age, this culture’s obsession with youth boggles me. I remember my 20s and 30s. While I learned a lot, I was nowhere near the peak of my life then. At 40, things are just beginning to get good because I am not controllable. The road to 40 was so much better than the road to 30. I look forward to the road to 50, because with age, I become wiser, stronger, and more confident than I have ever been. With age, I get closer to person I am meant to be. With that, turning 40 is a blessing… as is 50, 60, 70, and beyond.

To honor my 40th birthday, I decided to launch this blog, Skin Memoirs. If you want to know what she’s about, go here. Her origin story can be found here. We live in a culture that expects a woman in her 40s to shut up and be invisible. That is not how I want to live. As a scholar who focuses on race, gender, colonialism, and inequality, this is not the time nor the age to be silent. As I had explained in the Origins page:

Often times, there is a silent buzzing in my head that is spouting out a million ideas about something I ran in to – an article, an image, an experience. I created Skin Memoirs to make sense of that buzzing, to humanize and make peace with the research process, and to again, develop my voice. On my terms. As an academic, not everything we write or think has to or will be published in the latest and greatest journal. Our work can and should focus on critically engaging in the everyday world around us….

I often tell my students to not be afraid of their voices, that there is power to the words they write and the emotions that run through their veins. Yet, for so many years, I kept mine in the dark. Skin Memoirs is a tribute and a thank you to my students, colleagues, friends, family, and other amazing people in my life who have encouraged me to take ownership of my own voice and words.

Skin Memoirs follows a simple Ethnic Studies concept: we have the right to tell our stories.

Maraming Salamat (Many Thanks),

Joanne L. Rondilla, Ph.D.

Chandler, AZ