Friday, October 31, 2003
Jean Vengua is trying to walk me through the blogging process. I have to learn how to link...sigh!
Intro to the blogname: Katha is a sanskrit word meaning "an act of creation." It is also a Filipino word which means the same thing except in Filipino it usually refers to a literary work. So "katha ng Pinay" means "written by a Filipina." Kathang-Pinay is a contraction.
I thought of using "decolonizethis!" as a name but it won't let me use the exclamation point. The word "Decolonize" didn't circulate much in the Filipino American community a decade ago. Today I hear and see it more and more. I once saw a young Pinay wearing a "Decolonize!" t-shirt and I wish I had asked her where I could get one.
My book, Coming Full Circle: The Process of Decolonization Among Post 1965 Filipino Americans was published in 2001. It is available thru amazon.com and Arkipelago Books in San Francisco. Marie Romero, the owner, tells me that it is selling well. A professor at San Francisco State U is using it as a text in his Filipino American Psychology course.
I am interested in the study of the process of decolonization not just for postcolonial subjects but also for folks who are trying to recover from Western Civilization (which, btw, is the title of a book by Chellis Glendining).
I am drawn to poets like Jean Vengua, Eileen Tabios, Barbara Jane Reyes, Michelle Bautista and to many different authors who speak to my search for an aesthetic as well as a theoretical search for a way to transcendence.
Intro to the blogname: Katha is a sanskrit word meaning "an act of creation." It is also a Filipino word which means the same thing except in Filipino it usually refers to a literary work. So "katha ng Pinay" means "written by a Filipina." Kathang-Pinay is a contraction.
I thought of using "decolonizethis!" as a name but it won't let me use the exclamation point. The word "Decolonize" didn't circulate much in the Filipino American community a decade ago. Today I hear and see it more and more. I once saw a young Pinay wearing a "Decolonize!" t-shirt and I wish I had asked her where I could get one.
My book, Coming Full Circle: The Process of Decolonization Among Post 1965 Filipino Americans was published in 2001. It is available thru amazon.com and Arkipelago Books in San Francisco. Marie Romero, the owner, tells me that it is selling well. A professor at San Francisco State U is using it as a text in his Filipino American Psychology course.
I am interested in the study of the process of decolonization not just for postcolonial subjects but also for folks who are trying to recover from Western Civilization (which, btw, is the title of a book by Chellis Glendining).
I am drawn to poets like Jean Vengua, Eileen Tabios, Barbara Jane Reyes, Michelle Bautista and to many different authors who speak to my search for an aesthetic as well as a theoretical search for a way to transcendence.
Thursday, October 30, 2003
Jean Gier has finally convinced me that I should have my own blog. I asked her if blogging counts towards tenure and I think she said "no"...so here I am. I don't know why I feel nervous doing this. But might as well start off with something that made me laugh first thing in the morning today...the latest in Bushspeak:
"The ambassador and the general were briefing me on the — the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice." —George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Oct. 27, 2003
It is no laughing matter, of course. If this were a Freudian slip, what does it mean?
*****
On the other side of the world, in the Philippines, it is Todos Los Santos. My sister texted me from the memorial park where she brought flowers for our Mom's grave and lit candles. Our Mom died in April and she visits each one of us in our dreams. The other day I dreamt that she was a young surgeon operating on my oldest sister, not in the hospital, but in a ramshackle hut floating down a river...I only remember the shape of her hands - long and slender - and the peace on my sister's face as she lay on her side with a thin gauze on her belly lightly tinged with blood...
"The ambassador and the general were briefing me on the — the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice." —George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Oct. 27, 2003
It is no laughing matter, of course. If this were a Freudian slip, what does it mean?
*****
On the other side of the world, in the Philippines, it is Todos Los Santos. My sister texted me from the memorial park where she brought flowers for our Mom's grave and lit candles. Our Mom died in April and she visits each one of us in our dreams. The other day I dreamt that she was a young surgeon operating on my oldest sister, not in the hospital, but in a ramshackle hut floating down a river...I only remember the shape of her hands - long and slender - and the peace on my sister's face as she lay on her side with a thin gauze on her belly lightly tinged with blood...
