Tag: Sharon Luk

Adoptee Formations of Kinship: Queer Diasporic Traditions in Chinese America

Presenter: Alayna Neher – Ethnic Studies, Psychology

Faculty Mentor(s): Sharon Luk

Session: (In-Person) Poster Presentation

Chinese American adoptees are part of a tradition of non-normative kinship and exist in relationships that transcend racial, gendered, and physical borders. It is hypothesized, given the history of transnational adoption, that Chinese American adoptees seek to navigate identity in predominantly white families and communities, negotiate kinship, and participate in the queering of relationships in biological, adoptive, and/or chosen families. In-depth interviews were conducted with 19 adult adoptees (18 women, 1 man; ages 18-26), all of whom were born in China and adopted to the United States. Results show generally strong connections between adoptees and their immediate family members and other adoptees, although adoptees experience varying quality and strength of relationships with all people in their lives. Relationships with other adoptees and non-adopted Asian Americans are less frequent when adoptees are raised in predominantly white communities. Relationships between adoptees are particularly important for humanizing adoptee experiences, providing space for nuance and fluidity in identity, and coalition-building. Adoptee relationships and identity form a constellation of kinships and offer a new understanding Asian American identity.

Criminalizing Black Reproduction: “Crack Babies,” Black Motherhood, and State Intrusion

Presenter: Dana Glasscock

Faculty Mentor: Sharon Luk, Jamie Bufalino

Presentation Type: Oral

Primary Research Area: Social Science

Major: History, English

The phenomenon of “crack babies” as a public concern addressed by state policies and media focus serves as an example of how intersections between racial ideology, women’s reproductive rights, and state policies frequently functions in a way that negatively and disproportionately affects African American women. Examining the specific historical backdrop of “crack babies” highlights how the issue and state-sanctioned response disproportionally targeted African American women’s reproduction, laying the foundation for understanding how this moment functioned as a concrete effect of negative racial ideology. In the 1980s and 1990s “crack epidemic,” media focused on crack as a danger to society and the new drug of criminals. Through state campaigns including Reagan’s “War on Drugs” and Clinton’s welfare reforms, crack was constructed as the drug of poor, inner-city, predominantly black populations, contributing to the narrative of social dangers and criminality built around the existence of black Americans. The issue of “crack babies” spotlighted black motherhood, portraying their reproduction as the result and continuation of criminality and addiction, where state action was positioned as the solution. Through examining the work of historians and theorists including Dorothy Roberts, Barbara Fields, and Ruth Gilmore examining race, law, and ideology, it can be seen how the issue of “crack babies” stands as an historical example of racial ideology with real repercussions both for the population involved, and in the public’s perception and condemnation of black motherhood.

The Intersectionality of Contemporary Punk Music and Political Dialogue for Latino/a Youth in California

Presenter: Adam Buchanan

Faculty Mentor: Sharon Luk

Presentation Type: Oral

Primary Research Area: Humanities

Major: English

Punk music has created a multinational community for radical political discourse among Latino youth through the creative expression of their emotions, via intense lyrics and musicality, toward a hegemonic society that has consistently worked to confine them to the lower class. Drawing primarily from George Sánchez’s article, “Face of the Nation: Race Immigration, and the Rise of Nativism in Late Twentieth Century America”, David Ensminger’s book Visual Vitriol: The Street Art and Subcultures of the Punk and Hardcore Generation, and several other articles pertaining to the specifics of the growing Latino Punk culture in California, I argue that the counterculture of punk music encourages the diverse exchange of ideas by those who society deems undereducated, too extreme, and ultimately unimportant in the conversation about sociopolitical and geographical standings in the United States. Because of punk music, the Latino youth voice has even greater importance as it is that of the repressed and subjugated which would otherwise go unheard and therefore allow the social structure to go unchanged.

The Loss Of Native Hawaiian Culture Resulting from Migration to the Pacific Northwest

Presenter(s): Kris Galago − Ethnic Studies

Faculty Mentor(s): Stephanie Lani Teves, Sharon Luk

Creative Work Session 4

Research Area: Ethnic Studies

In the past 20 years a significant number of pacific islanders have moved away from their pacific island homelands to the continental United States for perceived ‘better opportunities’. In that migration, some Native Hawaiian cultural traditions were not perpetuated. From a survey of discourse on colonialism in Hawaii in both literary studies and history, the erasure
of Native Hawaiian culture grounds much of the theory and analysis about Native Hawaiian migration to the mainland and the loss of culture when this occurs. I analyze general themes prominent in scholarly literature most grounded in Native Hawaiian colonial studies: experience of relocation, perpetuation of culture, loss of culture, connection to land and family and institutional racism.

I investigate the ways that the Pacific Islander cultures are being practiced and perpetuated in the continental United States. Participant interviews make up the majority of my research data along with insight gained from attending, observing and participating in various community event in the Pacific Northwest centered around the Native Hawaiian culture and arts.
A close examination of archival records obtained from two key archival sources: The Office of Hawaiian Affairs demographic data on diaspora of Native Hawaiians, and the U.S. Census information on Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islanders will also be key to understanding the rate and frequency of Native Hawaiian migration away from Hawaii. I conclude by sharing insight as to whether the decision to perpetuate the Native Hawaiian culture in the Pacific Northwest is a conscious one or not.