Day 3: A Different Mirror and the scholarship of Ronald Takaki (non-fiction)
An unanticipated rec this evening: the scholarship of Ronald Takaki, longtime UC Berkeley professor and scholar of a multicultural US, who died yesterday at the age of 70.
Takaki was a charismatic teacher and a prolific and persuasive writer who helped shape multicultural and Asian American history in the US. Using graceful language and a storyteller's voice, he made a case for a US that has been multicultural since its origin and shaped profoundly by racism in A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America, which has become a standard textbook for history and ethnic studies in the fifteen years since its publication. (It was my first introduction to multi-cultural history back when I was in college--a history I encountered while shelving in a bookstore, not sitting in a classroom--and all I could think as I read it was "why didn't I learn this when I was in school?") The chapters on Asian American have introduced thousands of students to paper sons and picture brides and inserted Asian Americans into the history of the centuries-long struggle for civil rights and social justice that too often we see in black and white. He also wrote Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans...which I have to admit is still sitting on the shelf, unread. But he's a wonderful social historian with a talent for making the past come alive, and someone who helped me think about the world differently.
If nonfiction isn't high on your summer reading list--fair enough!--you can watch Takaki talk about his experiences as a rising first-generation college student in this charming Youtube clip (roughly 6:00 min.) and see him discuss the central role that African American soldiers played in the Civil War here (scroll down until you reach "One Fact You Should Know About American History," roughly 3:00 min). I hope you're as taken with him as I am! Back tomorrow with the rec I'd originally intended to write.
Takaki was a charismatic teacher and a prolific and persuasive writer who helped shape multicultural and Asian American history in the US. Using graceful language and a storyteller's voice, he made a case for a US that has been multicultural since its origin and shaped profoundly by racism in A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America, which has become a standard textbook for history and ethnic studies in the fifteen years since its publication. (It was my first introduction to multi-cultural history back when I was in college--a history I encountered while shelving in a bookstore, not sitting in a classroom--and all I could think as I read it was "why didn't I learn this when I was in school?") The chapters on Asian American have introduced thousands of students to paper sons and picture brides and inserted Asian Americans into the history of the centuries-long struggle for civil rights and social justice that too often we see in black and white. He also wrote Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans...which I have to admit is still sitting on the shelf, unread. But he's a wonderful social historian with a talent for making the past come alive, and someone who helped me think about the world differently.
If nonfiction isn't high on your summer reading list--fair enough!--you can watch Takaki talk about his experiences as a rising first-generation college student in this charming Youtube clip (roughly 6:00 min.) and see him discuss the central role that African American soldiers played in the Civil War here (scroll down until you reach "One Fact You Should Know About American History," roughly 3:00 min). I hope you're as taken with him as I am! Back tomorrow with the rec I'd originally intended to write.