![Sui Sin Far, born Edith Maude Eaton, was
the first writer of Asian descent published in
North America
She was born in England, in 1865 to a Chinese mother and an
English (white) father. Eaton's mother was apparently schooled in
England although she returned to China after her education was
completed. Eaton's father was a merchant who did trading in China; it
was on one of his business trips that he met and fell in love with his
future wife. According to Eaton scholars, Amy Ling and Annette
White-Parks, "interracial marriage was taboo in both cultures[; thus,]
theirs was an unusual union." At age seven, Eaton and her family left
England and immigrated to Hudson City, New York, and in the early
1870s, settled in a Montreal suburb.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/class20summer1b-120805213716-phpapp02/85/Class-20-summer-1-b-11-320.jpg)
Class 20 summer 1 b
- 1. EWRT 1B
- 2. Agenda Quiz Essay Tips Terms Lecture: Sui Sin Far Discussion: Far: QHQ In-class writing: How and why does Far resist? What are the social implications of her doing so? Discussion/Writing: Essay #4
- 3. You have ten minutes Write down the Write down the name of every name of every text author we have read we have read this this quarter. quarter. For each correct For each correct answer (last and first answer (including name) you get one italics or quotation point. marks) you get one point.
- 4. Common errors that are easy to avoid. Italicize (underline if you are handwriting) titles of books, novels, plays, and journals. Put essays, short stories, and articles in quotation marks. Write about literature in the present tense: Jess grows up, not grew up. Feinberg writes about a young girl…
- 5. • Introduce all quotations. Do not just drop them in your essay. Feinberg writes, “…”; Jess says, “…”; Kennedy argues. • Explain and/or analyze quotations after you introduce them. Tell the reader why you think the quotation supports your assertion. • Do not ask questions in your essay. Answer them instead. • Consider the difference between “quote” and “quotation”: Quote is a verb meaning to repeat the exact words of another with the acknowledgement of the source. A quotation is a phrase or a sentence from a book or a speech that reflects the author's profound thoughts. Technically, you quote a
- 6. Terms Transsexuals: People who indicate that they are of one gender trapped in the body of the other gender. A person who has altered or intends to alter her/hir/his anatomy, either through surgery, hormones, or other means, to better match her/hir/his chosen gender identity. This group of people is often divided into pre-op (operative), post-op, or non-op transsexuals. Due to cost, not all transsexuals can have genital surgery. Others do not feel that surgery is necessary, but still remain a transsexual identity. a. Non-operative: People who do not intend to change their primary sex characteristics, either because of a lack of a desire or the inability to do so. They may or may not alter their secondary sex characteristics through the use of hormones. b. Pre-operative: People who have started the procedure to reassign their primary sex characteristics, but have not yet had the surgery. This covers both those people who have just begun the procedure and those who are very close to the actual surgery. c. Post-operative: People who have had the actual genital surgery
- 7. Transphobia: The fear or hatred of transgender and transsexual people. Like biphobia, this term was created to call attention to the ways prejudice against trans people differs from prejudice against other queer people. There is often transphobia in lesbian, gay and bisexual communities, as well as heterosexual or straight communities.
- 8. Persona: a character in drama or fiction or the part any one sustains in the world or in a book. Persona also denotes the “I” who speaks in a poem or novel. Plot: a plan or scheme to accomplish a purpose. In
- 9. • Point of view: a specified position or method of consideration and appraisal. It may also be an attitude, judgment, or opinion. In literature, physical point of view has to do with the position in time and space from which a writer approaches, views, and describes his or her material. Mental point of view involves an author’s feeling and attitude toward his or her subject. Personal point of view concerns the relation through which a writer narrates or discusses a subject, whether first, second, or third person. • Prose : the ordinary form of spoken and written language whose unit is the sentence, rather than the line as it is in poetry. The term applies to all expressions in language that do not have a regular rhythmic pattern.
- 10. Sui Sin Far Edith Maud Eaton 1865-1914
- 11. Sui Sin Far, born Edith Maude Eaton, was the first writer of Asian descent published in North America She was born in England, in 1865 to a Chinese mother and an English (white) father. Eaton's mother was apparently schooled in England although she returned to China after her education was completed. Eaton's father was a merchant who did trading in China; it was on one of his business trips that he met and fell in love with his future wife. According to Eaton scholars, Amy Ling and Annette White-Parks, "interracial marriage was taboo in both cultures[; thus,] theirs was an unusual union." At age seven, Eaton and her family left England and immigrated to Hudson City, New York, and in the early 1870s, settled in a Montreal suburb.
- 12. Eaton started her career at Hugh Graham's Montreal Daily Star newspaper as a typesetter at age eighteen. Her first short stories were published in the Dominion Illustrated in 1888; she also maintained her administrative duties as well as submitted newspaper articles. It was in her journalistic writing that Eaton openly identified herself as a Chinese American and explained her biracial heritage to her readers. She wrote under the pseudonym Sui Sin Far, a childhood nickname that means "water lily" in Chinese. Her sister, Winnifred Eaton, also a writer, used Onoto Watanna as her penname.
- 13. Yi Bu Wang Hua In the mid 1890s, Eaton moved briefly to Jamaica, where she contracted malaria, from which she never quite recovered. During the next ten years, until 1909, she lived in Seattle and San Francisco. She wrote more articles and short stories and gained a literary reputation. Chinese American women were at the center of much of Eaton's writing, and she worked to break down cultural stereotypes. In 1909, Eaton moved to Boston where she compiled a full-length selection of short stories, Mrs. Spring Fragrance, which was published in Chicago in 1912. In 1913, Eaton, stricken by horrible rheumatism and bad health, returned to Montreal. She died on April 7, 1914 and is buried in the Protestant Cemetery there. In gratitude for her work on their behalf, the Chinese community erected a special headstone on her tomb inscribed with the characters "Yi bu wang hua" ("The righteous one does not forget China").
- 14. A Spiritual Foremother Known as "spiritual foremother of contemporary Eurasian authors," Eaton has been the subject of two dissertations, a literary biography, and numerous articles. Notable Sui Sin Far scholars include S. E. Solberg, Amy Ling, James Doyle, and Annette White-Parks. Amy Ling writes, "If we set Sui Sin Far into the context of her time and place, in late nineteenth-century sinophobic and imperialistic Euro-American nations, then we admit that for her, a Eurasian woman who could pass as white, to choose to champion the Chinese and working-class women and to identify herself as such, publicly and in print, an act of great determination and courage."
- 15. The Reception of Chinese by White Americans To appreciate the work of Edith Eaton fully, we must discuss its historical and social context, namely the reception of Chinese by white Americans before and during her period. Though the Chinese were never enslaved in this country, as were Africans, they were brought here in large numbers as indentured laborers. The Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) was only repealed in 1943 and naturalized citizenship for Asians was permitted in 1954, long after African-Americans and American Indians were recognized as American citizens. Initially attracted to California by the discovery of gold in the mid-nineteenth century, by the l860s thousands of Chinese laborers were enticed here to construct the mountainous western section of the transcontinental railroad. Almost from the beginning, prejudice against them was strong. They were regarded as an alien race with peculiar customs and habits that made them inassimilable in a nation that wanted to remain white; their hard-working, frugal ways and their willingness to work for lower wages than whites rendered them an economic threat and thus targets of racial violence.
- 16. Spring Fragrance and Other Writings By Sui Sin Far This text includes “Leaves from the Mental Portfolio of an Eurasian”
- 17. Passing and Sui Sin Far “Ah, indeed!” he exclaims. “Who would have thought it at first glance? Yet now I see the difference between her and other children. What a peculiar coloring! Her mother’s eyes and hair and her father’s features, I presume. Very interesting little creature!” I had been called from play for the purpose of inspection. I do not return to it. For the rest of the evening I hide myself behind a hall door and refuse to show myself until it is time to go home. Why does Far hide after this experience? How does this moment contribute to her identity development?
- 18. “Look!” says Charlie. “Those men in there are Chinese!” Eagerly I gaze into the long low room. With the exception of my mother, who is English bred with English ways and manner of dress, I have never seen a Chinese person. The two men within the store are uncouth specimens of their race, drest in working blouses and pantaloons with queues hanging down their backs. I recoil with a sense of shock. “Oh, Charlie,” I cry. “Are we like that?” “Well, we’re Chinese, and they’re Chinese, too, so we must be!” returns my seven year old brother. “Of course you are,” puts in a boy who has followed us down the street, and who lives near us and has seen my mother: “Chinky, Chinky, Chinaman, yellow- face, pig-tail, rat-eater.” A number of other boys and several little girls join in with him. “Better than you,” shouts my brother, facing the crowd. He is younger and smaller than any there, and I am even more insignificant than he; but my spirit revives. “I’d rather be Chinese than anything else in the world,” I scream. Why does Far fight after this experience? How does this moment contribute to her identity development?
- 19. The greatest temptation was in the thought of getting far away from where I was known, to where no mocking cries of “Chinese!” “Chinese!” could reach. Here Sui seems to want to disappear. Given her desire to escape prejudice, why does she become a champion of the Chinese instead of “passing” as we know so many others do during this time? In other words, which of her life experiences compel her to refuse to pass as white? How does she become the woman who speaks the lines below? With a great effort I raise my eyes from my plate. “Mr. K.,” I say, addressing my employer, “the Chinese people may have no souls, no expression on their faces, be altogether beyond the pale of civilization, but whatever they are, I want you to understand that I am—I am a Chinese.”
- 20. Sui Sin Far
- 21. QHQ: “Leaves from the Mental Portfolio of an Eurasian” What made Sui so much different than her siblings? Why is it that Sui Sin’s has the strength to be herself and not pass? Why was this necessary? “You were walking with a Chinaman yesterday,” accuses an acquaintance. “Yes, what of it?” “You ought not to. It isn’t right.” “Not right to walk with one of my mother’s people? Oh, indeed!” I cannot reconcile his notion of righteousness with my own.
- 22. Why wouldn’t Sui attempt to pass for Japanese per her husband’s request for sake of drama within the family? Why did Sui choose not to pass as a different, more likable nationality? Do you think Sui’s life would be much different if she chose to pass as a Japanese? Would life have been easier or harder for Sui if she had been entirely Chinese? Would Sui Sin Far have gotten along in a neighborhood full of other minorities, not of her own bloodlines?
- 23. In-class writing: How and why does Far resist passing? • Far refuses to pass as white. Why? What convinces her to consciously and intentionally reveal her racial identity? • Consider how Far resists passing. Which behaviors can you specifically identify?
- 24. Posting: Self-Assessment The blogging post points (200) require self- assessment. Consider three aspects of your responses: • First, how many of the posts did you make? • Second, what was the quality of your response? • Third, how timely were your submissions? Write an argument justifying your grade. This is due in our penultimate class
- 26. Homework Post #28 Complete and Developed Outline and thesis for Essay #4 Post #29: What are the advantages of resisting passing? What are the long- term social effects? Studying: Terms Write your self-assessment evaluations (Due on the penultimate class day)