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Apr. 19th, 2008 09:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
furyofvissarionTNR Past, Present, and Future: A History of the Trap-Neuter-Return Movement - Ellen Perry Berkeley. A short (less than 60 pages w/o notes) book, but a useful one: Berkeley, who has been advocating for humane ways to reduce the population of feral cats for years, here traces the evolution of the TNR movement. TNR is "trap-neuter-return"--ie. trapping feral cats, vaccinating & neutering them, & then returning them to their colonies (managed by human feeder/caretakers). This is much more effective than simply killing ferals, which many municipalities & so-called animal advocacy groups have suggested. This brief work debunks some of the myths surrounding TNR, too; overall a very handy book for cat advocates to have around. It makes Berkeley's sometimes cloying tone bearable.
Charlie Chan Is Dead 2: At Home in the World - Edited by Jessica Hagedorn. It took me a while to make it all the way through this thick (550 pages) anthology, but I am glad I persevered. However, I'm irked that some of the stories were repeated from the original Charlie Chan Is Dead anthology, while some new ones were put in--thus qualifying it neither for the label "revised" or for the "2" tacked onto the name, in my opinion. Anyway--what was heartening was how few of the authors' names I knew, even though I am familiar w/at least the names of many Asian American authors. Now there are so many I can't keep up with them! Excellent. My favorites: Han Ong's "Fiesta of the Damned" (about exoticizing the Philippines through filmmaking) Shawn Wong's "Eye Contact" (about how, when you're one of two Asians at a party, everyone feels it's their duty to introduce you), Ginu Kamani's "Waxing the Thing" (about working in a beauty salon & starting a side business waxing rich ladies' crotches), & Monique Truong's "Live-In Cook" (from The Book of Salt, which didn't make too much of an impression when I read it).
Empire of Care: Nursing and Migration in Filipino American History - Catherine Ceniza Choy. Filipino (mostly Filipina, really) nurses are the largest group of foreign-trained nurses in the United States. If asked about the reasons why, most people would cite the 1965 immigration law change that allowed thousands of immigrant professionals to come to the United States.
Choy's book demonstrates that Filipino nurses had a substantial presence in this country way before that, & that it was no accident. Beginning in the 1920s, the United States, in all its imperialist glory, imposed American-style nursing schools & medical programs on the Philippines, seeing it as part of the white man's burden to clean up the dirty, disease-ridden natives. They then provided exchange programs to these nurses, allowing them to come to the US theoretically to gain professional experience, which they would then bring home to the Philippines. Unfortunately, they were often exploited, both by the agencies recruiting them & the hospitals employing them, as cheap low-skilled labor. Also, many of the nurses then decided to stay in the US--a situation that pleased neither country. Some of the quotes from nursing administrators in the Philippines, bemoaning the extreme shortage of medical personnel due to the exportation of this labor to the US, are really kind of heart-rending; they all but beg graduates, in their commencement speeches, to stay. This was construed as part of nation-building, but then during the Marcos administration he strongly promoted the emigration of nurses, because the remittances they sent back home helped keep the country economically afloat.
Choy also compares two grisly murders that both involved Filipina nurses--the first, the Richard Speck case, where he murdered 8 student nurses, including two Filipinas. The second was the case of Filipina Narciso and Leonora Perez, accused of poisoning several patients in the hospital in which they worked (their conviction was overturned on appeal). In the first case, a lot of media attention went to Speck, whose troubled childhood was played up as a reason to pity him. The one nurse who survived his rampage, Corazon Amurao, was viewed as a feminine, quiet yet strong paragon of exotic womanhood. In the Narciso & Perez case, the two Filipina nurses were portrayed as shifty, untrustworthy Asians (whereas Speck, of course, wasn't made to stand in for white American manhood). The comparison between the two cases is chilling.
Choy packs a lot into a small book (less than 200 pages before notes); she's clearly done a lot of research, & manages to present it all in a way that is academic but not alienatingly, mind-numbingly so. On a personal note, it has made me think a lot about my own family history (my white mother, a nurse, spent some time as the head of the international department of a hospital & did some recruiting in the Philippines--she was originally pulled in because they figured, hey, she's been married to a Filipino for 30 years & has been there). Which is generally a good thing.
The Outlaw Demon Wails - Kim Harrison. This latest installment of Harrison's Hollows series has witch protagonist Rachel Morgan much less lusty, which makes sense, as she's still mourning vampire boyfriend Kisten, who was killed in the last book. At the same time, it makes Rachel a bit duller. Anyway, this book felt a lot like a transition book, or something just written to reveal some important plot points. I suppose the eventual obsession with genetic manipulation on the part of incognitio elf Trent Kalamack would lend itself to a new obsession with motherhood & children in the books, but I was still bored to see it. Why does it feel like every urban fantasy/paranormal I read lately eventually has the woman lusting after children, especially when it turns out she can't have any biological ones? (Carrie Vaughn, I'm looking at you too) First of all, hi, ADOPTION. Second of all... eh, it just feels like every woman protagonist eventually comes down to wanting children, & could we please get some that don't? It's starting to feel awful essentializing to me. I know it makes for easy plot tension if there are paranormals that can't reproduce, but... meh.
Charlie Chan Is Dead 2: At Home in the World - Edited by Jessica Hagedorn. It took me a while to make it all the way through this thick (550 pages) anthology, but I am glad I persevered. However, I'm irked that some of the stories were repeated from the original Charlie Chan Is Dead anthology, while some new ones were put in--thus qualifying it neither for the label "revised" or for the "2" tacked onto the name, in my opinion. Anyway--what was heartening was how few of the authors' names I knew, even though I am familiar w/at least the names of many Asian American authors. Now there are so many I can't keep up with them! Excellent. My favorites: Han Ong's "Fiesta of the Damned" (about exoticizing the Philippines through filmmaking) Shawn Wong's "Eye Contact" (about how, when you're one of two Asians at a party, everyone feels it's their duty to introduce you), Ginu Kamani's "Waxing the Thing" (about working in a beauty salon & starting a side business waxing rich ladies' crotches), & Monique Truong's "Live-In Cook" (from The Book of Salt, which didn't make too much of an impression when I read it).
Empire of Care: Nursing and Migration in Filipino American History - Catherine Ceniza Choy. Filipino (mostly Filipina, really) nurses are the largest group of foreign-trained nurses in the United States. If asked about the reasons why, most people would cite the 1965 immigration law change that allowed thousands of immigrant professionals to come to the United States.
Choy's book demonstrates that Filipino nurses had a substantial presence in this country way before that, & that it was no accident. Beginning in the 1920s, the United States, in all its imperialist glory, imposed American-style nursing schools & medical programs on the Philippines, seeing it as part of the white man's burden to clean up the dirty, disease-ridden natives. They then provided exchange programs to these nurses, allowing them to come to the US theoretically to gain professional experience, which they would then bring home to the Philippines. Unfortunately, they were often exploited, both by the agencies recruiting them & the hospitals employing them, as cheap low-skilled labor. Also, many of the nurses then decided to stay in the US--a situation that pleased neither country. Some of the quotes from nursing administrators in the Philippines, bemoaning the extreme shortage of medical personnel due to the exportation of this labor to the US, are really kind of heart-rending; they all but beg graduates, in their commencement speeches, to stay. This was construed as part of nation-building, but then during the Marcos administration he strongly promoted the emigration of nurses, because the remittances they sent back home helped keep the country economically afloat.
Choy also compares two grisly murders that both involved Filipina nurses--the first, the Richard Speck case, where he murdered 8 student nurses, including two Filipinas. The second was the case of Filipina Narciso and Leonora Perez, accused of poisoning several patients in the hospital in which they worked (their conviction was overturned on appeal). In the first case, a lot of media attention went to Speck, whose troubled childhood was played up as a reason to pity him. The one nurse who survived his rampage, Corazon Amurao, was viewed as a feminine, quiet yet strong paragon of exotic womanhood. In the Narciso & Perez case, the two Filipina nurses were portrayed as shifty, untrustworthy Asians (whereas Speck, of course, wasn't made to stand in for white American manhood). The comparison between the two cases is chilling.
Choy packs a lot into a small book (less than 200 pages before notes); she's clearly done a lot of research, & manages to present it all in a way that is academic but not alienatingly, mind-numbingly so. On a personal note, it has made me think a lot about my own family history (my white mother, a nurse, spent some time as the head of the international department of a hospital & did some recruiting in the Philippines--she was originally pulled in because they figured, hey, she's been married to a Filipino for 30 years & has been there). Which is generally a good thing.
The Outlaw Demon Wails - Kim Harrison. This latest installment of Harrison's Hollows series has witch protagonist Rachel Morgan much less lusty, which makes sense, as she's still mourning vampire boyfriend Kisten, who was killed in the last book. At the same time, it makes Rachel a bit duller. Anyway, this book felt a lot like a transition book, or something just written to reveal some important plot points. I suppose the eventual obsession with genetic manipulation on the part of incognitio elf Trent Kalamack would lend itself to a new obsession with motherhood & children in the books, but I was still bored to see it. Why does it feel like every urban fantasy/paranormal I read lately eventually has the woman lusting after children, especially when it turns out she can't have any biological ones? (Carrie Vaughn, I'm looking at you too) First of all, hi, ADOPTION. Second of all... eh, it just feels like every woman protagonist eventually comes down to wanting children, & could we please get some that don't? It's starting to feel awful essentializing to me. I know it makes for easy plot tension if there are paranormals that can't reproduce, but... meh.