Monday, July 11th
Touring the University of California, Berkley Campus
​
Comments from Professor Du - This was the first day we were on the ground all together as a group in Berkeley, CA. Dedicating our first day to a tour of the UC Berkeley campus had a two-fold purpose:
First, UC Berkeley would serve as our "home base" of sorts, as our contact from the university, Jianye He, had arranged space in the East Asian Library for our private lectures, meetings, interviews, and workshop.
​
Second, a comfortable stroll in the pleasant Bay Area weather allowed us to familiarize ourselves with our environment while fighting our jetlag in a positive and constructive way. Because I wanted to let the students ease into the week, I did not ask them to reflect on the tour today, but from my observations they were quite impressed with the beautiful campus, extensive library system, and history of this amazing university.
​
Some of the highlights of our tour included: seeing the East Asian Library, experiencing the private Chao Yuan Ren collection in the East Asian Studies department building, climbing the tower (nicknamed the "campanile"), and familiarizing ourselves with some of the history of the campus, including notable professors, students, and administrators. Jianye was extremely knowledgeable and generous with her time.
Tuesday, July 12th
Private Lectures with Michael Chang, Ph.D. and Harvey Dong, Ph.D.​
Comments from Professor Du - Tuesday marked the formal start of our on-site research. Since I did not require Asian Studies training as a pre-requisite to the program, our student team had different levels of experience with the background knowledge necessary for this intensive program. Because of this, even with our extensive pre-trip reading, I arranged private lectures with Dr. Michael Chang and Dr. Harvey Dong, both of whom agreed to give our Knox undergrads a crash course in Chinese immigration history.
Professor Chang delivered his lecture on the earliest known Chinese immigration through World War II, taking an approach equally based in critical theory and history. His insight into the real-world effects of race-based legislation was deep, and his commentary on how the early American approach to engaging with Chinese immigrants inherited structures from existing slave laws was fascinating.
Professor Dong focused on World War II through contemporary times, interjecting many personal anecdotes about civil rights activism by Asian Americans. His perspective combined general historical knowledge with a focus on social movements. Taken together, these two lectures provided an incredibly in-depth primer and needed context for the interviews and site visits to come.
​
Selected Student Entries:
​
Dana Cooper - The day's main activities were lectures from Professor Michael Chang and Professor Harvey Dong. While both focused on Chinese immigration to the U.S. in the 1800s and 1900s, Professor Chang focused more on the laws and court cases that shaped and surrounded Chinese immigration and Professor Dong focused more on sociocultural facets of immigration and how Asian Americans fought for their stories to be told. Prior to Professor Chang's lecture, I had not considered how much laws affected attitudes toward Chinese immigrants and vice versa. After his lecture, I want to learn more about how court cases and the passage of laws changed ideas around Chinese Americans and some of the specific ways that people in the legal system justified their discrimination against Chinese. Professor Dong spoke a lot about his personal experience in the 1960s and 1970s and his family stories, and I found it both grounding and powerful to hear from someone who participated in a lot of the events we have been reading about for the last week. Because of his lecture, I have become aware of some of the interaction between the students at SFSC and UC Berkeley, but I am curious how the idea of ethnic studies spread to other schools and areas of the country afterwards, how successful it was, and whether that curriculum stayed for the last 50 years. Now with the latest wave of anti-Asian prejudice, I would like to know how accessible that curriculum is to students, how near to the mainstream of college class selection it is, and whether there are places where schools are more or less likely to offer courses about Asian American history and culture.
​
Areesha Saif - Today we had two lectures at Berkeley. The first one was by Professor Michael Chang, who talked in detail about the notion of citizenship and the origins of the idea of naturalized citizenship. He delved deep into what being an immigrant in America means and what the history of migration of Chinese immigrants looked like. He connected the history of Chinese migration to the current situations in America to demonstrate how elite discourse and what is defined as "common sense" can be challenged by advocacy groups and translated into policy by judges of the Supreme Court. He also made it clear that migration from China increased after the Emancipation Proclamation as a need for cheap labor arose once slavery ended. He substantiated his points with court cases. The second lecture was by Professor Harvey Dong who aimed at improving our understanding of the standing of Asian Americans in the US today and in the recent past. He talked about immigration during the Gold Rush, Exclusion, post-Exclusion, the world wars and Cold War periods in Asian American history. He introduced us to immigration quotas and picture brides, and provided us with an in-depth understanding of the issue by relating his personal family background about immigration to the US.
Thomas Keegan - Our main activity today involved detailed lectures given by Professors Harvey Dong and Michael Chang on both Chinese and Asian immigration to the US, covering a diverse range of history that began with the discriminatory policies of 18th and 19th century immigration standards all the way to the current day. In addition to immigration, both lectures also covered the lives and challenges faced by Asian Americans once they had immigrated to the US. One takeaway that I learned that is particularly powerful for our contemporary selves are the worrying signs that the past is seeping into US immigration policies today. Both professors, but especially Professor Dong, gave multiple accounts and stories of anti-Asian hate and racial profiling of Chinese Americans within the past few years, and how geopolitical issues have sparked new fears about immigration to the US. One question I had after today's lectures was if the information that was covered could be taught about in more universities and schools across the US, and if deeply ingrained stereotypes could be fought against with this important information.
​
​
Wednesday, July 13th
Interviewing Angel Island Descendants Pt. 1
​
Comments from Professor Du - Today we focused on interviewing the descendants of immigrants that passed through Angel Island. Our interviewees were William Warrior, Flo Oy Wong, and Kelvin Quan, and each interviewee covered one or more immigrant stories from their families. Students were asked to keep in mind the information shared during our private lectures and compare it against the testimonies we heard from our interviewees. We utilized many of the questions we prepared before our trip out to California, and I was impressed by the significant amount of notes that a few of the research group members took. The process lasted all day, from 10am until after 8pm, but the information gained from the interviews was well worth the effort. The stories we heard from these descendants of early Chinese immigrants took us through moments of sorrow, joy, laughter, and awe.
In terms of sequence, the interviews were meant to follow the lectures, so that students could "put a face" on what they had previously learned. It is one thing to hear about historical events from an academic point of view (which has its own kind of value), but to learn about the experiences from the families that lived those events and to see the legacy of those times face-to-face is another thing entirely. This provided a humanized aspect to what was just valuable historical knowledge the day before. A theme that I hope will develop over the course of the project is how each piece of our program adds a new perspective to the activities that preceded it; I hope each piece takes the immersion experience deeper.
​
Selected Student Entries:
​
Thomas Keegan - Our main activity today was the critical portion of our trip, that being interviews of descendants of immigrants who came through Angel Island. We conducted three interviews today; first, an in-person interview with William Warrior, who married into a Chinese family and whose grandmother-in-law immigrated through Angel island at 18, then subsequent interviews with Flo Oy Wong, whose parents and 3 older sisters immigrated, and Kelvin Quan, whose grandparents immigrated were detained on Angel Island. Each of these 3 interviews offered a new perspective on immigration through Angel Island, and each had fascinating stories that inspired as much as they were emotional. William had conducted a great deal of research into his grandmother-in-law, and was able to offer a truly comprehensive historical account of his grandmother-in-law's journey, giving specific dates and quotes that she related to him. Flo offered a much more emotional perspective to the stories of Angel Island, showing us how a traumatic event could have deep influence in a family, and how each member of the family coped with not just Angel Island, but the hardships of immigration after Angel Island. Finally, Kelvin Quan offered a mix of both historical and emotional stories by explaining Angel Island and his family's history in the San Francisco area, as well as the emotional event of learning of his mother and father's detention on Angel Island as an adult. The sheer diversity of stories and perspectives regarding Angel Island and the immigration experience as an Asian American are key takeaways from today.
Harini Gunasekaran - Today was the start of the major component of our research program, which was interviewing the descendants/relatives of the immigrants who arrived at the US through Angel Island. The interviews were both very insightful to hear and heartwarming to conduct. We had originally set out to seek answers to the interview questions that we had already prepared. However, the interviews with William Warrior, Flo Wong, and Kelvin Quan became more of a conversation. The interviewees more often than not added their own personal touch to these interviews. Flo Wong in particular talked a lot about her relationship with her parents and sisters who had gone through Angel Island. This also gave some insight into what type of personalities and characteristics the Chinese immigrants held. A recurring theme in these interviews was also the mentioning of "paper" daughters and sons. As William Warrior mentioned to us toward the end of the interview, "[paper families] were a wonderful form of civil disobedience," and the clever way for Chinese immigrants to enter the US. One takeaway from these interviews is that we came to know that there was much more to the lives of the Chinese immigrants who came to U.S. than just their experience at Angel Island. They were not defined by what they went through in Angel Island and went out to mark their place in their respective communities. I would like to learn more about the setting of recreation for the detainees at Angel Island, because we learned that they had various recreational activities that were one of the happier moments during their detainment.
Dana Cooper - The day’s main activity was interviewing descendants and relatives of Angel Island immigrants, including William Warrior, Flo Oy Wong, and Kelvin Quan. William shared a lot of research he has done on his grandmother in law’s journey to the U.S. and through Angel Island, and he was able to provide a clear picture of both institutional records of her time on Angel Island as well as her personal stories. I felt like it was a good way to start off the interviews because of the institutional history he was able to provide. Flo’s interview was very interesting to me because part of her family went through Angel Island and the rest were born in the U.S. Even though her interview focused more on her family dynamics and how they adapted in America, I think it was still incredibly valuable because it showed the Chinese immigrant experience in this time. How they came to the U.S., their experiences at Angel Island, how their family was affected by Angel Island after landing in San Francisco, and how their family coped and reconciled with their immigration proceeding are all part of the Chinese immigrant experience. I learned a lot about other parts of the immigrant experience in addition to the short time they spent at Angel Island, which I think is a really valuable perspective that we had not looked at yet. Kelvin’s interview was also incredibly informative and touching, and the fact that relatives on both his maternal and paternal sides immigrated through Angel Island made it so that he was able to share a lot of information about many people. I learned a lot about his family and was able to get a good understanding of his family in both China and the U.S. and how his family immigrated into the U.S. over generations and decades. I’ll probably think of more questions later, but right now I’m curious if there was a typical length of time to be on Angel Island. In each of the stories we heard today, people were held for different lengths of time. I’m curious to know if there was a typical length of stay and if different types of people-ones they were going to admit, potentially going to admit, or deny entry to had different typical stay lengths. we
Thursday, July 14th
Private Lecture, Translation Workshop, and Angel Island Interviews Pt. 2
​
Comments from Professor Du - The activity arranged for today was quite special. Jeffrey Thomas Leong, a Bay Area poet and educator, gave both a private lecture in the morning and a translation workshop in the afternoon. His lecture, titled "Reading the Walls: Chinese Detainee Poetry at Angel Island" built upon the social and historical contexts of our previous lectures, but then specifically addressed a valuable historical artifact at the Angel Island immigration station: poetry etched in the walls by Chinese immigrants that captured their emotional states and sentiments while being held there. After a short lunch break, Mr. Leong then led us through a translation workshop that delved into how to understand Chinese poetry as presented at the island. As part of the workshop, we tried our hand at translating a few of the poems ourselves, which gave us an inside look at what researchers today do to approach this important work of historical preservation. Because these activities followed our lectures that covered historical, political, and legal considerations, I hope that this injection of culture into our research on Angel Island and early Chinese immigration in general helped make the group's growing understanding feel even more holistic. To put it another way, the considerations of our previous lectures were more of an "outside looking in" perspective, whereas this lecture helped us see the experience through the eyes of Angel Island detainees to a certain degree, which I believe will be quite valuable when we make our visit to the island itself.
After our lecture and workshop, we had one final individual interview left to conduct with Marolyn Chow. Her predecessors arrived just before Angel Island became an immigration station in 1910, and her stories added another dimension to our understanding of early Chinese immigration. Her family's story complemented how we conceptualized early journeys to the United States, framing them not with a stay on Angel Island, but with the sojourner experience. Just as compelling and useful for humanizing the history of early Chinese immigration, our interview concluded with a conversation on some contemporary immigration topics.
​
Selected Student Entries:
​
Katherine Xu - This morning we listened to a lecture by Jeffrey Thomas Leong and had a translation workshop with him during the afternoon. We read a lot of tibishi (a kind of Chinese poem) and tried to translate them. As a native Chinese student, I could better appreciate the helplessness and anger of the early Chinese immigrants trapped on Angel Island. Also, I compared my translation with Jeff's, and he translated from the first person perspective while I translated from the third person perspective. This was interesting because we both read the original version of the poem, but made different choices due to our different interpretations. The emotions they conveyed through the detainees' creative poetry and inscriptions on the walls are something we can still relate to more than a hundred years later. This art, created under extremely difficult circumstances, is not only amazing for its authenticity, but also for what it reveals about the history of early Chinese immigrants, their living conditions, and even Chinese philosophy and culture.
​
Thomas Keegan - Our activities today consisted of a lecture on Angel Island poems and a poem translation workshop led by Jeff Leong as well as one final interview with Marolyn Chow, who talked about the paternal side of her family and her grandfather's story of immigration prior to Angel Island's opening in 1910. The lecture and subsequent translation workshop were of particular interest to me. We read tibishi, a style of Chinese poetry with origins in the Tang Dynasty, that had been carved into the walls of buildings on Angel Island. During the lecture, Jeff Leong read aloud some of the poetry, and it was very moving to hear such poems that talked of the grief, hope, fear, and sadness on Angel Island. The translation workshop was also a unique experience, as we learned about how translators make decisions regarding how to translate between languages, and whether or not rhyming, wordplay, mythological references, direct translation, or aesthetics should be retained when translating. Our interview with Marolyn Chow was also interesting, as her story offered a perspective on immigration prior to the Angel island station, and how her parents and extended family adjusted to living in the U.S. One question I still have about the poems on Angel island was if the detainees from different countries ever discussed their writings to each other, or shared their own stories if they were able to speak each other's language.
​
Harini Gunasekaran - The lecture by Mr. Jeff Leong was extremely informative as not only did he give us context of the poetry inscribed on the walls of Angel Island, but he also taught us the creative process through which translators would translate the poems from Chinese to English. The translation workshop was particularly interesting because we had to immerse ourselves in the work that translators do. My takeaway from the workshop was that no translation will be identical to the original text and the intention of the poet. There are bound to be various interpretations of the same text and this gives poets the creative liberty and the responsibility to retain and capture much of the meaning as possible to do justice to the poem. Our interview with Marolyn Chow was very zestful. Her youthful energy at the age of 78 could be felt across the screen as she managed to hold our attention during the entire span of the interview with her optimism and passion for life. While our other interviews focused on the hardships that the Chinese immigrants went through, our interview with Ms. Chow focused on the positives of the experience of living in America. We learnt that the Chinese people had really progressed tremendously in short period of time. One thing that intrigued me about what Marolyn Chow shared with us was the story about her uncle being married to a white woman. She mentioned that this union was largely frowned upon because of the taboo surrounding interracial marriage, especially between a Chinese and white individual during the time of the Chinese Exclusion Act. I am curious as to what would have happened if the genders were reversed, meaning if a Chinese woman was married to a White man--would society have been more accepting because of how Chinese women were perceived: domestic, quaint, and submissive? Today was a very insightful day with many takeaways.
​
Friday, July 15th
Visiting Angel Island
​
Comments from Professor Du - In many ways, our trip to Angel Island can be considered the cornerstone activity in our summer immersive experience. In a program that aims to teach undergrads about early Chinese immigration, I can think of few better experiences than a well-informed site visit to a historically significant immigration site. Not only is the site itself important because of the role it played, but it also holds precious cultural artifacts from the detainees that stayed on the island: poetry carved into the walls that captured and froze their living emotions in time so that they could be rediscovered and vocalized anew.
​
Our visit to the island began with a little bit of adventure: a ferry ride across San Francisco Bay. While "adventure" isn't necessary for an academic learning experience, it definitely doesn't hurt, and the smiles on our students' faces told me that the experience was special.
​
While on the island, we were fortunate enough to have a private tour led by both the Executive Director of Angel Island, Ed Tepporn, and one of the island's most knowledgeable and experienced park rangers, Casey Dexter-Lee. Our island tour began with a brief introduction from Ed, followed by a short hike. When we neared the immigration station, we first examined the wall of donors. This was more striking than that description might suggest, because on the wall, constructed of beautiful dark stone, were not only donor names, but dedications to the immigrants that passed through the station. Much in the way our interviews lent a "face" to the book knowledge we were engaging with earlier in the week, seeing these names made the site even more real; though the wall contained probably a few hundred names, it was a testament to the thousands and thousands of immigrants that passed through the island on their way to the United States.
​
We moved on from the dedication wall to the fog bell, which sat at the location of the original wharf on Angel Island, where immigrants were dropped off for processing. While the old administration building that originally sat at the foot of the wharf had burned down in the 1940s, we were able to visualize what it was like to arrive at the island. Situated around the area were many displays of stone that documented the number of immigrants known to have passed through the station and their countries of origin.
​
The main draw for the island was our next station: the detention barracks. The Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation has done an incredible job setting up period-specific recreations of some of the elements at the station when it was used for holding immigrants. The displays gave us a sense of how crowded it would have been and the authentic realia used in the cramped "recreation room" helped transfer our imaginations to the time the scant distractions there would have been a part of retaining one's sanity throughout one's detention on the island. The displays of bunk beds, as accurate as they may be, required a little visualization on our part, as the beds were far more numerous and suffocating at the time the station was in use. However, the smaller number of beds is for good reason--when one examines the walls, you can see the traces of poetry etched there, bringing past yearnings into the present. Our guides told us that at the time they were carved (over many years), the immigration officers routinely covered them. If they were written, they got painted over. If they were carved, they were filled with putty and then were painted over. It is ironic that this attempt at covering the detainees' creative expressions (mostly of sorrow and anger) was precisely the mechanism that preserved them for us to study today. As implied in my journal entry about Jeff Leong's lecture and workshop, the poems at Angel Island are a priceless cultural and historical artifact, and in my mind, arguably one of the earliest forms of Chinese-American writing.
​
After a short lunch, the last stop on our tour was the old hospital. This location was important to our experience for two reasons. First, the hospital was in operation at the time of the immigration station, and part of Angel Island's infamy relates to humiliating medical exams, discriminatory views about foreign health risks, and the poor condition of the medical care in general. Learning about its past helped us further construct our understanding of what it must have been like to live, even briefly, on the island. Second, the Angel Island Immigration Foundation has decided to transform the interior into a museum. It houses a mixture of exhibits based on the hospital's history and contemporary issues related to immigration. The balance achieved by this approach allows visitors to use what they've been exposed to at Angel Island as a way to comprehend the continuity of issues in the immigrant experience in the United States.
​
In all, the trip to Angel Island allowed us to walk part of the path of early Chinese immigrants, utilize much of the historical knowledge we had been exposed to earlier in the week with lectures and interviews, witness the expression of culture by detainees frozen in time, and draw connections to present issues in American immigration.
​
I am so thankful to Executive Director Ed Tepporn for his work behind the scenes to make this possible for our small group of Knox students.
Selected Student Entries:​
​
Thomas Keegan - Today was another critical day on our journey, as we boarded a ferry and toured through Angel Island in person. After arriving on the island, we were greeted by director of Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation, Ed Tepporn, who gave us a comprehensive tour of the island, which included the remains of the administration building and dock, the men's quarters, and the former hospital (now a museum). In addition to the guided portions of the tour, we were able to explore each of the buildings, view the carved poetry we had talked about yesterday, and go through the newly opened museum. The museum explored the parallels between immigration through Angel Island and immigration policies today. One takeaway from today was the many emotions that an immigrant would feel on Angel Island. I was struck by the natural beauty of the island, and its close proximity to the mainland. It must have been a confusing and saddening feeling for many, being so close to the mainland and the opportunities it offered, yet they were imprisoned and interrogated relentlessly, never knowing if they were to be deported, all for wanting a better life. One question I still have after this experience concerned descendants of immigrants that passed through the station. Upon visiting the island, what range of sentiments do they experience?
​
Harini Gunasekaran - Our trip today to Angel Island was one of the most significant parts of our program here at San Francisco. As we arrived at Angel Island, we hiked up to the immigration station. Over there we saw a glimpse of what life was like for the immigrants who had to be detained there at Angel Island. It was truly and eye-opening experience as we are able to understand the trials and tribulations that these people had to go through during this experience. The trip to Angel Island had in fact reinforced the things that we had learnt before from both our interviews and lectures and it was very enlightening to see all that in person. In today's day and age where xenophobia and racism is still prevalent, imagine this to amplified ten times more in the 1900s, that was the construction of Angel Island. A place that was built on the foundations of hatred and discrimination. However, it is at the same time inspiring to see that these immigrants did in the end get out of this. They escaped the vicious cycle that had entrapped them. The many stories of success that we saw at the end of the trip at the exhibits in the Hospital Monument were a testament to this. A lot more people should know and learn about Angel Island as there is a rich history and symbolism surrounding this and I will definitely also do my part in educating my family and friends about this place. I am however curious about the type of funding that Angel Island receives from the government (if any) to help the board continue to restore and preserve the site.
​
Areesha Saif - Finally visiting Angel Island was a very rewarding yet emotional experience. We learned the different parts of the world immigrants arrived from and pondering the short distance from San Francisco to Angel Island made me ponder over the seclusion and hopelessness the detainees would have felt being so close to their destination, yet so far. We saw the men's detention barracks, which bore bunk beds to recreate what it was like for the detainees even though the director of Angel Island, Ed, reminded us that for the actual detainees, the room was overcrowded. We saw in-person the poems carved into the walls and heard more about the immigrant experiences. Then we saw the building that used to be a hospital at Angel Island, through three exhibits that documented immigrant histories, their medical examinations by doctors and what immigrants today have done within the United States. The last exhibit was extremely significant for me as I learned how immigrants who bore so many obstacles to get to the US have created businesses, and made academic contributions that make America what it is, which it couldn't have been without the people it sought most to eliminate. My question at the end of this eye opening trip is what different ways can awareness surrounding Angel Island be raised and how can we take action to make this history more widely known.
Sunday, July 17th
Visiting the Historic Locke Community
​
Comments from Professor Du - We got an early start today, as our activity for the day included a short road trip out to the Sacramento River Delta area, which is just a little bit under 2 hours from where we are staying in Berkeley. After a pleasant drive through the California countryside, we arrived at the historic Locke community with the sun beating down on us.
We were greeted by Stuart Walthall, James Motlow, Dee Kan, and Lili Kan, who would serve as our special guides to the history of Locke, CA. Stuart is the chairman of the Locke Foundation, James is a historian and an expert on the Locke community, an author and photographer, Dee grew up in Locke and is the direct descendant of the founder of the community, and Lili is Dee's wife and an expert on the history of the town as well as Dee's family lineage. We started in the old boarding house, where we were introduced to the general history of Locke. There, we observed the welcome center on the first floor as well as the second-floor museum, which included many period-specific artifacts and valuable information. Afterward, we moved on to the schoolhouse, complete with busts of Confucius and Sun Yat-Sen to complement the American flag. There, Stuart, Dee, and James, discussed what school was like in this American, but culturally Chinese town in the past. Dee recounted stories of going to Chinese school there as well as the ways life in Locke was unique compared to other American towns.
After the schoolhouse, we explored the town's main street, where we were treated to the history of some of the various buildings there--a former brothel, an old deli, the memorial park, and various buildings that have passed between private owners for years. ​Included among these buildings were the Dai Loy gambling hall and the Cultural Center. These, to me, were a real treat. Mr. Motlow provided an in-depth perspective on the gambling hall and its role in both the regional politics and rural entertainment scene at the time, while Stuart Walthall graciously expounded on the history of the Cultural Center, which housed artifacts and the storied history of its members.
​
Afterward, our research group was treated to a lunch at Stuart Walthall's private residence, where we conducted an extensive interview with Dee, Lili, Stuart, and James.
​
Our interview covered quite a bit of ground. While our research group was focused on the experience of early Chinese immigrants, our interlocutors encouraged us to use the story of this early immigrant town to understand current and even earlier cultural encounters. Pressed to share our takeaways from the experience in this town (and the summer program as a whole) by Lili Kan, our group shared a diverse set of lessons learned. Overall, the moments shared by our research group and Stuart, James, Dee, and Lili demonstrated an instance of growth and valuable dialogue for everyone. I felt that I witnessed a two-way street of learning between older and younger people, united by the theme of the project.
​
​
Selected Student Entries:
​
Dana Cooper - Today's activity was going to the town of Locke. We got a tour of the town, had lunch at Stuart's house, and then had an interview with Stuart, James, Deedee, and Lili. Stuart and James are involved with the Locke Foundation, Deedee grew up in Locke, and Lili, Deedee's wife, is an avid researcher of Locke and family history. I didn't know as much about Locke going into this visit, especially about present day Locke. I learned a lot about the evolution of the town by talking with all four of our interviewees, and I learned a lot about this different facet of the Chinese immigrant experience. I was surprised to learn how quickly Locke was created and how quickly its heyday ended. I do understand the societal reasons for this, but I found this to be a really interesting part of the town's history. Although Deedee was able to paint a vivid picture of what it was like to grow up in Locke, I am curious to learn more about what it was like during the the 1920s and 1930s for folks living there, while the town was in its heyday.
​
Harini Gunasekaran - Today we visited the historic Locke community. Our visit comprised of two parts: a walking tour to some of the significant buildings in the Locke Community and a group interview with the important members of the community. During the tour, we went to the boarding house, the school, and the gambling hall. Lee Bing, the founder of the Locke Community had truly been a visionary in terms propelling the Chinese community at Locke to success...His grandson, Dee, had a lot of stories to tell us about his time in the Locke Community during his childhood years. We were fortunate to be able to talk to someone who had actually lived in and gone through the experiences in this community. During the group interview, when we were prompted by Deedee's wife, Lili, to share our own experience throughout this project, I was able to truly reflect upon what this project has meant to me. It has been a rare, one of a kind experience in that we were able to have a conversation with these individuals who are highly accomplished and valued by society. I am curious about how the interviewees think that the role of Locke has evolved over the years. They briefly talked about this but not in full detail so I was interested in knowing their perspective in relation to the change in the role of Locke.
​
Thomas Keegan - Today's activity involved visiting the town of Locke, a small town located in the Sacramento River Delta. Locke, now a national historic site, was once one of the largest completely Chinese American towns in California, with at least 2,000 residents at its peak in the 1940s. We toured through the main street of Locke, viewing many of the preserved buildings that housed grocery stores, restaurants, barber shops, and gambling halls. After the tour, we sat down with Stuart Walthall and James Motlow, both leading board members of the Locke Foundation, as well as Dee and Lili Kan, prior residents of Locke, with Dee growing up and attending Locke's American and Chinese schools. We interviewed these 4 leading members of the Locke community and listened to their stories regarding the history of the town and the experiences of the residents. One key takeaway from the tour and interview was the feeling of community and family that was present for residents in the community. Almost all Chinese-American residents in Locke came from a single region, Zhongshan in Guangdong, and spoke the same dialect. Dee was able to tell us a vast array of stories about growing up in the hamlet of Locke, and believes the most important words to describe Locke at its peak were "community" and "family." One question I still have about the Locke community is about the privately owned buildings in Locke, and whether or not an outreach campaign could bring the owners closer to Locke and even convince them to donate or continue to preserve such an important piece of immigrant history.
Monday, July 18th
Accessing the Angel Island Archives at the UC Berkeley Ethnic Studies Library and Touring the Oakland Chinatown.​
​
Comments from Professor Du - Today, we split our day into morning and afternoon activities. In the morning, we made our way to the Oakland Chinatown, led by our UC Berkeley contact, Jianye He. The purpose of this visit was to see a Chinatown that had very little to do with tourism and more to do with the daily life of the Chinese diaspora in the Bay Area. This short trip consisted of a brief tour of a family-owned fortune cookie factory, observation of the local businesses, and an authentic Hong Kong-style lunch.
​
Later in the afternoon, the students were granted access to the Angel Island Archives at the Ethnic Studies Library at UC Berkeley. There, with the assistance of librarian Sine Hwang Jensen, our group was able to look at and study a plethora of artifacts related to Angel Island: interviews, immigration records, posters, newspaper articles, and more. When I reflect on this day, the first thing that I feel like commenting on is sequence. As I have referenced in previous journal entries, the sequence of the "Roots on Angel Island" program is very deliberate and we have been fortunate enough to have it work out mostly as planned. After being primed with the lectures by Michael Chang and Harvey Dong, the interviews with the early immigrant descendants, the poetry exploration with Jeff Leong, and the visits to Angel Island and Locke, the students were developing a degree of expertise on this subject, and I was pleased to see that they dove into the materials at the archives with that knowledge. Arriving armed with our recent experiences, the students were able to utilize the archives as scholars, and the visit there was truly fulfilling. I noted, too, that when the archives needed to close, the students weren't quite ready to leave. That is something that I found fulfilling as an instructor.
​
​
Selected Student Entries:
​
Dana Cooper - Today we went to the Ethnic Studies Library and looked at a small part of their Angel Island archives. The diversity of materials was quite vast, including interview transcriptions, newspaper articles, books, and slide photos, and it provided a lot of different ways to look at Angel Island. I found the transcripts of interviews with interpreters and maintenance men particularly interesting because those are perspectives that we had not yet looked at during this research project. I also really liked the poster from what was presumably a museum exhibit related to the publication of Island, the first book with translations of the poems on the walls of Angel Island, because there was a lot of information on this poster that provided a lot of historical context and information for the publication of that book and everything surrounding it. Looking at these archive materials gave much more context for the time and the people who were involved, and answered a number of questions I've had throughout this research project. I definitely want to look at these materials more to keep learning about everything that was done relating to Angel Island in the 1970s and 1980s, and I am also so curious what other types of materials are in these archives.
​
Harini Gunasekaran - Today we were able to visit the Ethnic Studies Library at UC Berkeley. The librarian had already laid out samples of the Angel Island Archives for us to peruse. With a large allocation of resources dedicated to Angel Island research, it was very fascinating to see these archives in person. They were like missing pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and helped us connect the dots in the knowledge that we had previously acquired. One folder I went through contained many newspaper clippings spanning the 1970s to 2005 regarding Angel Island. It was interesting to see the various reporting on Angel Island and how in many of these articles, the headline was "Ellis Island of the West." However, from what we know now, the similarities stop at the fact that both of them were immigration stations located on islands. I also managed to read a thesis paper written in 1966 by a professor on the assimilation of the Chinese people in Delta which was particularly relevant after our visit to the Locke Community the day before. All in all, it was very enlightening and exciting process to look at these archives and I am intrigued about what other archives there are related to the early 1900s.
​
Thomas Keegan - Our main activity today involved visiting the UC Berkeley Ethnic Studies Library, specifically to examine their Angel Island archives. Within this library, we were able to view a vast array of transcripts, interviews, and newspaper clippings related to Angel Island. The sheer volume of extra information about Angel Island is an enormous benefit, as such information helps to reinforce our interviews and prior research on Angel Island immigration and preservation. One takeaway from this experience would be the extraordinary effort made by Asian Americans to preserve the Angel Island site in the 1970s. Without their voices, experiences, and input, such history would be forgotten and lost to time. One lingering question from this experience would be about the current state of the archival work, and if the vast amount of information present within the Ethnic Studies Library has been researched yet.
​
Annika Miller - The Ethnic Studies Library at UC Berkeley was very impressive. They have a collection of over 600 boxes regarding Angel Island history. I was very grateful for this opportunity because of the way it added to our interviews. Looking through the archives gave me the opportunity to physically see transcripts of the questions that detainees were interrogated with on the island. I had the opportunity to look through a file for a woman named Mrs. Chang, who had the longest stay on the island at 20 months. She expressed how sad and depressed she was while being there as well as how often she would cry along with other women. Every time a woman arrived at Angel Island and every time someone would leave the island, Mrs. Chang would cry. Looking through the archives gave a greater perspective of what life was like on Angel Island for the detainees.
​
Areesha Saif - It was very interesting to take a look at the Angel Island archives at the UC Berkeley Ethnic Studies library. We saw transcripts of interviews, translations of poems, and microfilms of the immigrant experiences at Angel Island. It was rewarding to gain in-depth information about the experiences of the immigrants through their interviews and I enjoyed reading more of the translated poems. I read several poems about deportation and also read one about a detainee feeling happy to be deported because his perception of America completely changed as he remained in detention. The experience was very informative as they complemented our interviews with immigrant descendants, but I got a lot out of reading the transcripts because they were direct words of detainees who experienced what Angel Island was like first hand.
​
Tuesday, July 19th
Visiting Eastwind Books of Berkeley and Diving Into Project Work
​
Comments from Professor Du - Our day today was mainly about starting the writing portion of our project. At the suggestion of Ed Tepporn, Executive Director of Angel Island Immigrant Station, we will record the histories of our four interviewees for publication on Angel Island's Immigrant Voices website. Student groups have been assigned to write up an account of one of the oral histories revealed to us during our interviews. The challenge will be to use the knowledge and experience they gained throughout the immersive experience so far and combine that insight with the personal details shared by our interviewees. It is both an exercise in historical writing and a preservation of oral history.
Because the major writing is just beginning and the students will have more time for working on the projects, I incorporated a very short trip to Eastwind Books of Berkley, which is the oldest Asian bookstore in the Berkeley area. Well known for its history and selection, I thought the students would enjoy taking a look here and perhaps pick up a book or two. This store happens to be run by Harvey Dong, one of our private speakers, and he arranged for a very brief history lesson on the store by one of the workers there.
By the end of the day today, my hope is that the students have a rough outline of the story they will tell. It will take a lot of thought, writing, and revision to get things just right.
Selected Student Entries:
Nick Fadel - Today's activities included beginning work on our writeups and a visit to Eastwind Books of Berkeley, a famous bookstore notable for being one of the first Asian-American bookstores in the U.S. The project work was primarily brainstorming along with outlining the beginning of the actual writeup. I'm not quite sure how difficult it will end up being, but I think it'll be interesting to create. After the morning worktime, we convened at around 1pm in order to walk over to Eastwind Books. We met with Harvey Dong, who had given us a lecture previously, and he gave us a small tour of his bookstore, going into its history and importance. Before leaving the store, I decided to purchase Jeff Leong's book, as it looked quite interesting.
​
Areesha Saif - Visiting Eastwind Bookstores was an exciting experience. I was gratified to visit a bookstore rich with books from East Asian, South Asian and Asian American authors and poets. Under-represented authors such as Ocean Vuong, whom I had only heard of before, were honored at the bookstore. We also learned about the history of the bookstore and its commitment towards preserving Asian American literature and ethnic studies texts was heartwarming to hear about. I was happy to see works of Asian American authors, read about immigrants' experiences, particularly relating to adapting to life in the U.S., and I definitely intend to go back to take a closer look at the unique range of books I saw. It was also good to see Professor Harvey Dong, who previously gave us a lecture about the current status of Asian Americans in the U.S. Professor Dong reminded us of the value of the bookstore to the rest of the community.
​
Harini Gunasekaran - Today we visited the Eastwind Books of Berkeley. It was a vibrant center for books with the Asian American experience as its focal point. Many of the books are either about that or are authored by Asian Americans. It was described by Harvey Dong as a safe and sacred place for Asian Americans to convene. The warmth and comfort of this small nook in downtown Berkeley could definitely be felt the entire time I was browsing through their books. Some books connected with me more because I relate to the South Asian American experience. As an Asian and a minority, it was very heartwarming to see our experiences and heritage being represented. It is crucial for more Asian Americans especially the younger generations to visit this bookstore and see what this bookstore can offer.
​
Thomas Keegan - Our main activity today involved visiting Eastwind Books of Berkeley, a bookstore that focuses on Asian-American, Asian, African, and Native American voices, books, and topics. We had a brief discussion about the history of the bookstore and what it means to the local Berkeley community, and then we were able to browse and purchase books related to all sorts of topics. Within the bookstore, there was a clear attempt to provide access to multicultural media to all. There was an immense diversity in books, and I was able to find interesting research- and history-related books. I bought a variety of helpful books that had both Mandarin and English translations, which I hope I can use to continue my studies in Chinese. Another takeaway from today was the sense of community in Berkeley; Eastwind Books developed as a place of comfort and almost a second home for many in Berkeley who wanted media, books, and materials related to many different cultures. I'm curious as to if bookstores that are more specialized in certain topics could expand outside of Berkeley and into other areas of the US.
​
Wednesday, July 20th
Walking Tour of San Francisco's Chinatown and a Self-Guided Visit of the Chinese Historical Society of America's Museum​
Comments from Professor Du - Today, the group took a trip to San Francisco's Chinatown for a guided tour of some of the history and sites there. While the tour was short, the information was excellent. We learned about the reasons for Chinatown's self-aware "Oriental" appearance, the historical and contemporary quality of life there, struggles for representation, and much more. If visitors to the area can step back for a moment and view the area from a broader perspective, what unfolds is an interesting mixture of immigration, historical legacy, daily life, and tourism. These four factors (and more) all speak to different events and developments in the life of this Chinatown. In writing this brief journal entry, I feel somewhat guilty, as the descriptions laid out above provide little justice to the richness of the area's past. For each stop on the tour, our guide Rachel Forbes provided a glimpse into a specific aspect of Chinatown's history, and it is impossible to capture the dynamics and nuance in such a brief entry.
After our Chinatown tour, we went to the Chinese Historical Society of America's museum for a self-guided tour of their new exhibit, We Are Bruce Lee, which focused on Bruce Lee's career, family history, philosophy, identity between cultures, his efforts to encourage cross-cultural understanding, and his anti-racist views.
What struck me about our activities this day was "continuity." I mentioned something similar in a previous journal entry when I discussed the connection between all the activities leading up to our Angel Island Archives visit--how each activity built a new perspective into the program--but today, I was struck by the realization that signs and artifacts (physical or abstract) from various generations of immigration were all around us simultaneously:
-We were walking in the first American Chinatown, established by the earliest waves of Chinese immigrants and occupied to this day by Chinese people still living their normal, everyday lives.
-We had just interviewed people whose family members from a generation or two ago had come through Angel Island, only a handful of miles away.
-We were looking at an exhibit of Bruce Lee, one of the most culturally influential Chinese Americans, who shot to stardom in the 1960s and 70s.
​
The continuity of it all struck me as beautiful and, truthfully, left me with a little bit of awe, because, like we learned during our visit to the Locke community, we just don't think about these things that frequently, and we end up missing gigantic truths unfolding (still) around us. Despite our everyday ignorance, though, they're there, pressing on.
​
Selected Student Entries:​
​
Areesha Saif - Rachel, from the Chinese Historical Society of America, offered us an hour-long walking tour of Chinatown in San Francisco, starting with Portsmouth square. She told us about the single room occupancies (SROs) in old Chinatown, where people, sometimes several, lived in spaces intended for single individuals. We examined the architecture there, and noted that the streets decorated with red lanterns. Rachel told us that the buildings were so colorful and almost Disney-like because at one time Chinatown was going to be moved to a more remote area and the people decided to organize Chinatown in a way that it would generate revenue for the city of San Francisco. By becoming an important part of the city, they changed their fate. It was interesting that by playing into the stereotypes of the "exotic," Chinatown was protected and also given a unique appearance in comparison to other parts of San Francisco. We also saw the house for an association that in the past offered help to women who were victims of sex trafficking. Rachel told us about the free-food programs in Chinatown to help those who lived below the poverty line. It was heartwarming to hear about the community spirit still surviving in Chinatown, especially bearing in mind that Chinatown began as a safe space against racism for early immigrants.
​
Thomas Keegan - Today's activities were twofold: A trip and guided tour through San Francisco's Chinatown, and a tour of the CHSA (Chinese Historical Society of America) museum, which featured an interactive Bruce Lee exhibit. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable about Chinatown, and we stopped at each major place in Chinatown for information about the rich history of the area and the major figures who fought to keep Chinatown's culture alive, despite developers attempting to buy out the land. Rachel, our tour guide, toured in and around Chinatown, and our guided experience ended at the CHSA museum. The museum's major exhibition at the moment was a tribute to Bruce Lee, a Chinese American celebrity and icon in San Francisco. One key takeaway from both the tour and the exhibit was the idea of community. The residents, famous "Six Companies," and countless individuals put aside their own personal interests to preserve an important piece of Chinese American culture. In the Bruce Lee exhibit, I learned that many diverse groups looked up to Bruce Lee and his image as a role model who broke stereotypes and brought immigrant voices to the forefront.
​
Harini Gunasekaran - Today, we had a walking tour of the San Francisco Chinatown. Rachel, our tour guide, was extremely helpful in giving us a lot of information about the various places that we had visited during the tour. Throughout the tour, you could see many buildings that had the typical Chinese style architecture which is something that is shared with other Chinatowns both in the United States and in other parts of the world. What is unique about San Francisco's Chinatown is that this typical Chinese style architecture was in fact intentionally designed in order to preserve the town and to attract tourists. After this, we visited the Chinese Historical Society building which was very different from the other buildings in Chinatown as the architect did not want this place to be too "over the top." This modest place was currently host to an exhibit about Bruce Lee. As a Chinese American, Bruce Lee was one of the first Asian celebrity figures to mark his place in Hollywood and gain the admiration of many. It was very inspiring to see his life and the things that he had gone through.
