1. We are developing a legitimate website. Check it out here.
2. Speaking of the Intertubez...
(Write for us, Mimi! The Blaaag is waiting for more of your soulful words slash song lyrics. Don't go on tearin' up our hearts!)
Just a personal thought from this Blaaag writer, directing you to a Spec editorial regarding tomorrow's Day Out Against Hate...
The disconnect in the discussion of race and bias on campus is highlighted by the fact that, while an ad-hoc coalition of students planned a hunger strike, Vice President of Arts and Sciences Nicholas Dirks and others were planning the programming for this day.
A comprehensive history of Asian American hip-hop, courtesy of YouTube
8 comments Posted by Heiroku at 3:29 AMHip-hop is no doubt the most influential American musical genre, or comprehensive "culture," since jazz; in its 30-odd years of existence, it's become a worldwide phenomenon, and has stretched from the viciously political to the nonstop party music to the... well... forgettable. Hip-hop journalist, former label head, and author of Can't Stop, Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, Jeff Chang, has dubbed the current era the "hip-hop generation" because hip-hop has been precisely the cultural marker of American youth--whether message or commodity--for decades now.
Yet, where do Asian Americans fit into this mix? While I can't cover everything in the short time that I have before I should get back to my homework, I'll do my best.
One of the first Asian American hip-hop artists was Fresh Kid Ice, a.k.a. Chris Wong Won, a member of the late-80's/early-90's rap outfit 2 Live Crew, known for their raunchy and sexually explicit songs, such as their hit single "Me So Horny." Fresh Kid Ice, of Chinese and Afro-Trinidadian descent, released the 1992 solo album The Chinaman, featuring such insightful songs as "Long Dick Chinese." Out of respect for women everywhere, I'll decline from showing a video of his.
In 1991, however, a new sound arose, this time in the realm of competitive deejaying, also known as turntablism. DJ QBert (Richard Quitevis), a young Filipino American from San Francisco, CA, rose to the 1991 Disco Mixing Club (DMC) USA championship with his unique blend of scratching techniques.
DJ QBert, 1991 DMC USA Championships
He, along with partners Mix Master Mike and DJ Apollo, also of Filipino descent, went on to win the DMC World Championships the next three years straight. They, with other Filipino American DJs, formed the legendary Invisibl Skratch Piklz; Mix Master Mike also became the Beastie Boys' DJ. Filipino American DJs have been fairly commonplace in hip-hop circles; another favorite, DJ Babu (Chris Oroc), is a member of the Los Angeles-based alternative rap group Dilated Peoples.
DJ Babu, 1995 Scratch Routine U.S. Finals
In 1996, a group of three emcees from Philadelphia rose to national prominence through, interestingly enough, a Sprite commercial. The Mountain Brothers (CHOPS, Styles, and Peril-L), of Chinese and Korean descent, were the first Asian American hip-hop artists signed to a major label, and released two albums--Self, Vol. (1999) and Triple Crown (2003)--before disbanding. CHOPS is still active as a producer, and has worked with big-name artists like Kanye West. MB's style is somewhat throwback; less about an Asian American identity, it instead embraces a "classical" notion of posse hip-hop and pure lyrical stream-of-consciousness.
Mountain Brothers, "Galaxies"
In 2001, a Flushing, Queens, Chinese American emcee named Jin (Jin Au-Yeung) took to the stage of BET Rap City's Freestyle Friday and won an unprecedented seven weeks in a row, thereby winning a deal with the major label Ruff Ryders outfit, home of DMX and Eve. His first single, "Learn Chinese," gained some attention (albeit slightly ridiculous and self-orientalizing); his debut album, The Rest is History (2004), however, was a commercial flop, despite appearances by big-name artists like Kanye West, Twista, and Styles P. Blaming a lack of decent promotion, and dismayed by the music industry, Jin dropped from his label and instead released a string of independent albums: The Emcee's Properganda (2005), 100 Grand Jin (2006), and the Cantonese-language ABC (2007).
Jin, "Learn Chinese"
At roughly the same time, rock-rap hybrid Linkin Park had the best-selling album of 2001 with Hybrid Theory (2000), featuring emcee/guitarist/producer Mike Shinoda, who is half Japanese American, and deejay Joe Hahn, who's Korean American. While Linkin Park has been phasing out their rap side in recent years, they embarked on a mash-up project with Jay-Z in 2004, Collision Course, and Shinoda released a solo project in 2005, The Rising Tied, under the moniker Fort Minor. The album features the song "Kenji," a narrative of Japanese American internment during World War II.
Fort Minor, "Believe Me"
Pop-rap group Black Eyed Peas also have an Asian American member--apl.de.ap (Allan Pineda Lindo), of Filipino descent. A song on their 2003 album Elephunk, "The Apl Song," features a chorus in Tagalog.
Black Eyed Peas, "The Apl Song"
On the West Coast, Berkeley, CA emcee Lyrics Born (Tom Shimura), who is half Japanese, had his hit single "Callin' Out" featured on a Diet Coke commercial featuring Adrien Brody. A co-founder of Quannum Projects with Blackalicious and DJ Shadow, and an ex-affiliate of Jeff Chang, Lyrics Born is known for his avant-garde, rock-influenced music and breathless delivery.
Diverse (ft. Lyrics Born), "Explosive"
Recent artists have begun to achieve significant prominence. The Seattle, WA-based Blue Scholars, recently signed to seminal progressive label Rawkus Records, have risen to the national scene recently with their 2007 LP Bayani (meaning "hero of the people" in Tagalog, and "the word" in Farsi). Consisting of Filipino American emcee Geologic (George Quibuyen) and Persian American emcee Sabzi (Alexei Saba Mohajerjasbi), Blue Scholars is known for their political messages, proletarian affiliation, and soulful stylings.
Blue Scholars, "Back Home"
Other notable Asian American hip-hop artists today include The Pacifics, a Chicago-based group of 3 Filipino American emcees (KP, Strike III, Norm Rockwell); Denizen Kane (Dennis Kim), a Korean American member of multiracial Chicago group Typical Cats, and a former member of the Asian American spoken word collective I Was Born With Two Tongues; NYC and Berkeley-based Magnetic North, a duo of Direct (Derek Kan) and T-Vu (Theresa Vu); Kiwi and Bambu, West Coast Filipino Americans formerly of the radical duo Native Guns; and NYC-based DJ Rekha, whose styles blend hip-hop and contemporary bhangra (a Punjabi dance music).
The Pacifics, "Story of My Life"
Denizen Kane, "Patriot Act"
Magnetic North, "Drift Away"
Native Guns, "Champion"
Of course, there are many other artists, but naming them all would be really hard, and some probably don't deserve recognition anyway.
...and, that's a (w)rap.
... but not that funny?
Ivygate: "Guy Named Wang Arrested for Stealing Panties..." - haha! The fact that his remarkably common last name is also slang for penis? Hilarious! He steals panties and purses at the same time... so let's ruminate on his sexual preference! The yellow peril-sexual predator scare can be so funny.
And if you're bored enough, watch the news coverage video here. What's actually funny: how Diexia is pronounced on television (Dee-EX-ee-ah). Wow.
What's this? Our favorite baller Ahmadinejad has a blog?
What is Asian American Studies?
Why do we need AAS when we have EALAC & MEALAC?
How does it relate to life beyond college?
Join us for a teach-in on Asian American Studies, tonight 8pm in Lerner E569! Come meet some of our most beloved professors like Mae Ngai and Gary Okihiro. I would leave it there, but our writer Nhu-Y wrote too many hilarious things onto the Facebook event.
Other serious questions of inquiry:
Why is it so interdisciplinaryly sexy?
How does it transcend the hotness of other fields?
Is AAS so hot that it intimidates you?
Why does AAS drop it like its hot all the time?
Can AAS really walk it out?
Will my biology major get jealous if I want to do AAS too?
Get academically crunk. MMM ACADEMIA.
After seeing this I had to ask... Was Nhu-Y done? No.
Why does it combine history & sociology & other fields to make such hot babies?
Too nervous to approach AAS? Well, now you can in a low-key environment. Don't worry if you can't perform... AAS is hot, but so many people don't hit on it because they're afraid of being rejected... well, AAS is waiting.
(Nhu-Y: i really was going to make a bunch of rap song references but i was like hmm... appropriate?)
And oh right, ... free food! Be there!
Professor Miliann Kang, from
As part of a trio that made a film on this, I've witnessed a great need for more dialogue on Asian American body image. Given the current surge of plastic surgery, beauty in the media, and food fads, it's no wonder that so many female (Asians and) Asian Americans get so obsessed over image and subsequently develop full-fledged disorders.
Happy Thanksgiving from The Blaaag!
(What is my family having? Duck. And tofu soup. Go figure.)
... Fittingly named, because it does relativism so well. A blog attempting to educate on transracial adoptions, Choices features mostly posts by these select adopters themselves (one is a Barnard alum). But, as the New York Times often is with its tunneled, caring-white-person stories, the blog has had quite a number of very iffy, "othering" posts by adopting parents. Take a read...
The inaugural post of Choices is exactly the story of a first-world savior discovering the "magical" history of third-world innocent. In "Finding Zhao Gu", the adopting father writes about his search for the origins of his daughter. In doing so, he says a lot of generally self-righteous and Orientalist things - like "yearn[ing] to know the secrets that he, alone among millions in China, held within himself," how the events of his saviorship "felt like fate", and talking in English at the person who found her in order to achieve his personal sense of closure.
Not all of the posts are terrible. In "Beyond the Lion Dance," the same man writes about offering his two Chinese girls (pathological Chinese baby adopter?) a semblance of cultural belonging in Chinatown and worrying about the identity issues they might be faced with in the future. Another explains how she avoided the demeaning videos from African adoption agencies (but only until she actually forced her way to a child that she found particularly adorable, "with darling eyes and nappy hair that was tightly curled and uneven in appearance.")
One article, however, is just ridiculous. In "The Real Thing", Tama Janowitz tries to make herself immune to criticism about what seems like crass child-rearing ways while telling us the deeply ignorant things she says to people about her motherhood... things like, "I say to Willow: 'Well, you know, if you were still in China you would be working in a factory for 14 hours a day with only limited bathroom breaks!'" Her snarkiness knows few bounds. After calling her daughter's features "Mongolian", she proceeds to minimize the problems that other Asian adoptees have had with not having forged a cultural identity. Great writing, Tama - let me know when you want to peddle more of your irreverent, insensitive garbage over the internet... unless after Googling your own name you found that to be a bad idea.
I'm not alone in my disgust. If you want to see the problems that bloggers have already found with this writing, every word in this sentence links to a verbal lashing of this blog. And this is just what Carmen linked on Racialicious.
There's more... Carmen reports that the Times bloggers have been censoring dissenting comments from adult adoptees. Denying claims of their own racism... wow, we haven't seen this before. Relative Choices, all in all, makes me slightly sick. Of course the posts by adoptees themselves are pretty okay, but this should be a reason why we "loosely ethnicity-oriented" blogs exist - to catch mainstream writers in the very troubling things they say.
At this point, it's pretty obvious that whatever praise or criticisms I give will sound ripped off the commentaries of CU-Strike, Spec, and Bwog. So I'm going to let my commendations remain on the previous entry and move on.
It's easy to package campus events into convenient, airtight time frames; on Facebook, many happenings have set beginnings and ends in a typical "8:00-9:30 PM" fashion. It seems that the CU-Strike blog's sudden silence and packing up of South Lawn tents have marked an equally definitive end to the past two weeks' madness. The general climate on campus seems lighter and happier (partly due to the impending break). So has the wish, "We just want this shit to end", been granted? Can the groups against the Hunger Strike rest in peace?
During last night's IRC One Love/Open Mic event, over a heavenly plate of baked mac & cheese, a friend and I shared some casual conversation about these concerns.
And this is what I learned: Yes, students involved with the strike have consented to hitting the books again. Since South Lawn was cleared, the Kulawiks of Columbia/Barnard don't have to worry anymore about the Gentrification Octopus intruding on their finely-sliced-and-doused-with-wine lives. But they should savor the peace and quiet while they can, because Expansion into Harlem (Demand #3) has mostly been left untouched.
The Manhattanville expansion issue is another time bomb waiting to explode. The Harlem community and groups on campus have been working closely together since before the strike, so don't expect #3 to go ignored (Sorry, Colombo - we see how schlumped and bored you get after meetings). Plus, given the rate at which things have been going, I wouldn't be surprised if some campus riots were to take place in the next few days or weeks.
(Note: there's also a new Barnard dialogue tent. Figure it out.)
