Recent literary works have gained wide popularity, featuring the Californian culture of multiculturalism we live in. The phrase sounds ironic, but irony is the only way to describe the state that we live in, Among the literary works, the ones that have gained notable attention are Ang Lee’s 2004 film, Crash; novel, American Son by Brian Roly Ascalon; and performance troupe Bordertown’s play, Culture Clash in America. These literary works present to us the negative consequences that come with living in such a diverse community. Though all three works are portrayed through different mediums, they have the same goal- to help us open our eyes and recognize the world that we have created for ourselves. It is that our stereotypes of one another that pulls us even farther in trying to understanding another person’s culture and living peaceably side-by-side with one another; it divides us even further, eventually causing us to disassociate with the fact that these other people are human beings as well, going through the exact same problems as we try to juggle life as well.
The movie, Crash has interweaving stories of seven characters, all of different backgrounds. The beginning scene shows us a car accident between two female drivers. One is an Asian woman, and the other is Ria, a latina LAPD detective and partner of African-American detective, Graham Waters. The Asian woman accuses Ria of “blak[ing] too fast” saying that “Mexicans no know how to drive” threatening to call immigration on Ria. Ria responds, “I’m sorry you no see my ‘blake’ lights” and suggested that “maybe if [the asian woman could] see over steering wheel, [she] ‘blake’ too!” condescendingly mimicking the Asian woman with purposely incorrect grammar. Out of frustration and the heat of the moment, both women resort to accusing each other based on known stereotypes of each other that have nothing to do with the accident itself, creating more frustration, tension, and going as far as imprinting further negative impressions on each other’s culture. It is only through the use of film that allows us to fully immerse ourselves in the moment of action; seeing every minute facial movement and hearing vocal intonations of professional actors, and extensive Hollywood sets and filming techniques make us feel like a real car accident had occurred and these women are really angry at each other. In the middle of the movie, we find out that Detective Ria and her partner, Detective Waters have more than just partners, they are part-time lovers as well. In one scene, Detective Waters tells his mother on a phone call, that he was with a white woman. After he gets off the phone, Detective Ria points out that her father is Puerto Rican and her mother, El Salvadorean. It shows us how we can still stereotype and be ignorant of the people around us. Stereotypes are too often used in place of our trying to get to know one another which only negatively impacts us even further because we start to believe that we know each other well enough already. At the end of the movie, the story weaves back to the Asian woman from the beginning of the movie. We find out that her reason for driving so badly and being so rude and racist to Detective Ria was because her husband was in the hospital. It makes us wonder why we resort to racist thoughts when we are angry in presence of other cultures. Detective Ria is not a character that is racist, but if she had known that the other woman was on her way to the emergency room to see her husband then she might have acted differently.
In Culture Clash in America, the theatre troupe plays on the same theme of language in their unique way, showing us how . The beginning of act one begins with a dark stage, and a male’s voice yells out “Halt! Halt!” and there are “panicked voices [heard] in Spanish”. The man yells, “Alto! Alto! Hold still.” and two men are saying “Señor, no somos Mexicanos, está equivocado. Por favor. .” (9) but the man ignores their pleas, and command them to get down and place their hands behind their back while he calls in reinforcements. The beginning of the next act, also begins in total darkness. A man’s voice is heard yelling, “Alto! Alto!”, and all across the stage there are “panicked voices in English. . [as Americans yell,] ‘Run! Run!’” (39) The scene continues in the same manner except that the roles are now reversed. The beauty of a play is its ability to combine comedy and irony, that like film, gives us the benefit of visuals, yet it also allows for moments inside a character’s mind as a novel does during introspective monologues. Looking at the irony of the acts being reversed, we laugh, not only because we assumed that the same situation was occurring in the first few moments of the second act as was the first, but mostly because there is no real-life application of the second act as much as there is truth behind the first. And that is the beauty of the play, if we laughed the first time, and again the second time, our second round of laughter was pointed back at ourselves. Who are we to chuckle in the darkness of the first act, but more importantly, at a situation that involved families traveling for hundreds of miles in horrible conditions, in hopes of making it past armed militia towards a chance at a better life?
In Roley’s novel, American Son, the story is told in a first-person narrative by Gabe, a half-filipino, half-white teenage boy living with his foreign-born single mother, and an older brother that trains and sells trained attack dogs as another source of income for the family. Unlike the other two mediums, Roley’s novel allows us to walk inside Gabe’s shoes and mind as he tries to understand his place in the world. In the beginning of each chapter, Benito, Gabe’s uncle, sends his sister, Iks, a letter from the Philippines. In the letters, he is constantly asking his sister to move back because she is having such a difficult time working two jobs to support her two boys. However, she refuses to move back because she believes that America will hold much better opportunity for her boys through being educated in America. Ika is so persistent in staying in the U.S. even though she doesn’t feel like she doesn’t belong there because she doesn’t speak English very well. When Ika goes to pick up Gabe from school, she accidentally hits another womans car and as the woman yells at Ika, she can only hang her head “like a bedraggled little sparrow” and say sorry (177) The woman continues to abuse her when she finds out that Ika does not have insurance saying, “ The idiots they let send their kids to school here. . People who can’t afford insurance should ride the bus.” (178) It is hard enough for a teenager to cope with living in a new world where he feels like he doesn’t belong. His mother, who is supposed to set an example, is not able to do so because she is not confident in this new place either. The woman, like many other people are very insensitive to the difficulties of other people’s lives. While she was complaining about how having her car being ruined would make her life more difficult because she had to go to the dealership, she ignored the fact that someone else was having troubles too.
If we all took the time to get to know our neighbors better, we could live in peace. Our neighbors, though different in their ways and speech are not much different than us. They have their problems in life. They have to juggle work, their families, friends, along with lifes everyday problems. If we could be more compassionate towards one another we wouldn’t live in a society that resorts to prejudices and racism. Our diverse community could prosper and achieve so much if we became more tolerant of one another.Reflection
This was one of my favorite sections other than the section of identifying and argumentation of fallacies. I learned from many different perspectives of what it was really like to live in multicultural California. I realized what it was like for people to move their entire lives to try to have a better life even though they knew that there would be a long tough road for them to get there.
As a writer, I learned how to identify similarities between more than two works of literature. This was my first experience in having to have more than three literary works to work from. I felt like this essay was not very strong. I had an idea of where I wanted to go but it was very difficult to articulate and organize all these sources into a big paper. Though it was long and difficult, I am still glad to have had the first-time experience anyways.
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