Transcripts For CSPAN2 Julia 20240703

So guess i will start with a short excerpt from an early part of my book is from chapter three. So biting the hand is a memoir and its about, you know, sort of figuring out how to navigate the black white binary in this country from the perspective of somebody who doesnt fit into those two categories. So talking about my upbringing and my young adulthood, childhood, young adulthood, a koreanamerican girl daughter of immigrants who grew up in los angeles. So this comes from the third chapter. And talks about an incident that occurred when i was about ten years old. I was going to a Catholic School in, west los angeles, that was predominantly white. And one of my friends at the school. Had a job opportunity for me, her mother. And so it reveals little bit about the racial experience of how i figured out, okay, where do i fit in my first school up my first friend at my Elementary School was an irish girl named erin, who was born prematurely, had a large scar on her arm, the result of an i. V. Mishap when she was an infant erin lived, with her mother near the school in a duplex that of cigaret smoke and had large signed posters of mash hanging on wall. Erins mother had been a script supervisor on the series, ended its run in 1983, and she was on unemployed cement while trying to get started on a new show. Id never seen mash before, but vaguely knew it was about the korean war. My parents, who had actually lived through the war, had never seen an episode either. Erins mother eventually a new job on a sitcom called women, another show that i did not watch. I was now ten years old, and my favorite sitcom was punky. I watched show every week with my dad and my sister. As punky dealt with the aftermath of the challenger disaster or learned the dangers of hiding in abandoned refrigerators. Although my family lived in los angeles, aarons mom was the only person we knew who was in the industry. When she asked if my sister and i wanted to audition for a part in designing women, i was thrilled. I thought i was to be the next soleil moon. Frye, my mother on, the other hand, was dubious. She thought tv was a bad influence. Writing brain. When i could be practicing the piano or, doing my homework. She also believed actors were one step removed from prostitutes, parading themselves in front of strangers for money and attention. Aarons mom was persistent, though her, that the casting director was having trouble finding enough asian child actors audition for the role. She assured my mother that it would be a wholesome experience id never acted before, not even in a school play, in the car on the way to Warner Brothers studio in burbank, my sister and i rehearsed, the audition script, the part was for a vietnamese boat child named leasing whom ex beauty Queen Suzanne sugarbaker delta burke agrees to foster for a few weeks, i didnt know any vietnamese and i wondered if i was supposed to have an accent. I couldnt even imitate a korean accent. I talk like a valley girl. The scene took place susanns quote powder room where lee played with the fancy Bath Products and bantered with suzanne. Whats a powder room . I asked my mom from the backseat. I have no idea, she snapped. She was in a bad mood. Burbank, on the opposite end of the freeway, opposite of the city across four major freeways. At the height of afternoon hour. An hour later, we pulled into the studio lot and the guard in the kiosk dress directed us to a bungalow as we waited to be seen by the casting director, i saw another girl in a party dress and frilly socks holding a headshot in her hands. She looked like a pro, skipping into the casting room when called her mother i us while we waited my sister and i did not headshots. Wed come straight from school. Were still wearing our plaid jumpers my mother had on her Pioneer Chicken uniform of brown pants, bay shirt and srs shoes. I kept my eyes down trying to memorize the script feeling increasingly nervous. A short time later, the girl bounced out looking pleased and telling her mother she thought, went well. Its now my turn. I was ushered into a small office where a white woman and white man greeted me and seated themselves on director chairs. They asked for my headshot and i told them i didnt have one. No problem, they said. The woman explained it was a big role with lots of screen time in the episode leasing. And suzanne become fast friends and leasing would even get to where suzannes a pageant tiara and dress like her and big hair and makeup and a 1980s power suit. I said id seen a picture of delta burke and thought she looked a member of whitesnake. The woman began running through the lines with me playing Suzanne Sugarbaker my leasing. It was over in minute. Four days afterward, i pestered my mother. Did i get it . Did i get it . Eventually aarons mother broke the news. Say my sister. I didnt quote look vietnamese enough and that the casting director i decided to go with a professional actor. I was crestfallen. So much worse child stardom, but in with my disappointment was a dawning that my race itself required a kind of performance. I knew leasing was supposed to be a ham like any other child actor in a sitcom. But i also understood i was supposed to perform a stereotypical asian ness, which meant speaking in broken english, marveling at american novelties like bubble bath and southern belles, and becoming suzannes doll plaything, lee sing wasnt even a vietnamese name. She might as well have been called oriental girl number one. I wish i could say i felt degree deterred by this realization or. Angry at the white screenwriter for writing such a caricatured role. But i was mostly annoyed at the other asian girl id seen at the audition, the one in the fruit fruit dress. I was certain that had landed the role and that shed been able give them the performance they wanted. She was my competition for white attention and approval, and she had won out. Shorty. Thanks for thanks for being here. This is your first book event. It is. My gosh, my first meeting. Thank you for your first. I mean, im a teacher i read a lot, but that was great. So well talk for a little bit and then at a certain point well open it up to q a. But thanks so much for having do this. Its funny because weve known each other for quite a long time. I never heard that before. And im, you know, throughout memoir, there are all of these moments that are probably processed differently as a child. Like, i think so natural what you describe that scene, you project your grievance toward this rival girl, right . I guess at one point did that story kind of become really meaningful to you as this like not an origin story, but just something that kind of had a broader resonance for who you were . I think, you know, the sense of rivalry of seeing yourself competing with other people of your racial or your Identity Group and feeling like you have to fight with them for the spoils is something that ive been thinking about a lot and you know, i can see the way that it ends up becoming distorted in lots of other ways, too. I mean, i was talking to a friend of mine whos koreanamerican, shes about five or six years younger than me. And its interesting because within that five or six years, you know, she actually, you know, actively pursued a career in acting and modeling and she told me that at that point could tell that the the the things had changed, shifted and now people wanted to have a more diverse and multicultural cast of characters. And so when she would go to auditions and saw that she was the only asian person she knew, she had a better shot of getting the job because she knew she filled that quota. But again, if there had been another asian girl there. She would have known that she was fighting with that same girl for that one asian spot. And i just thought, god, thats so up and so twisted. And its something that so many of us who come from minoritized identities completely get. If weve never talked about it. And it creates such tension within people who should be our allies. Right . These are people who are in the same situation as us. And instead we end up thinking of them as, our rivals. And i, you know, we fight them and we see them as the enemy rather than as the friend. So, you know, you prefer that passage to plan your chicken, your mom wasnt particularly interested in pushing towards this dream of becoming a representation and being on the silver screen. Those for those of the people here who havent had chance to read the book yet like can you tell us a bit about kind of where you grew up, what your horizons were like back then of what success look like within your family . I think that and i still feel this way, i think for my parents, they wanted me to have my parents were korean immigrants. They owned a liquor in inglewood, which is predominantly and brown neighborhood in los angeles. They owned that for a short period of time. And then they purchased a pioneer, which is Fried Chicken Fast Food Restaurant, which was subsequently i mean, it went bankrupt and then it was purchased popeyes. So you guys probably already know ill know about popeyes which is a lot cooler now than pioneer was in the nineties, eighties and nineties, but so for my parents you know, they definitely did not want me to take over the business and know be running a Fast Food Restaurant and so they busted their so that i and my sister could have professional where we wouldnt have to, you know, get our hands dirty, quote unquote, and we could have a steady paycheck and not constantly vulnerable to, you know, the economy. And whether people were buying know Fried Chicken or whether there was enough corporate advertising so that people came in and all of these sorts of things and still feel that way today. I mean, im a professor. Im a College Professor like you are. And i still feel a of gratitude, sadly, because im like, well, actually, this might be changing, but honestly, for a long time i was like, oh, this job is great because. I get a steady paycheck and i dont have to worry about being shot at work, which sadly is changing. But honestly, when i first got into teaching, i was, you know, my parents worried every day that they would go to work and they might be shot to death. And at least i dont have to worry about somebody trying to steal money from the register and, losing my life. But as you all know, nobody is safe from that now. So so, you know, when you were when you were a child growing up, obviously, i mean, we now sort of i think it applies a lot of people are you understand your struggles very much in retrospect like it becomes this narrative that you can, you know, assimilate who you are, but also just recite but like when you were a kid. What did you think about all of this . Like because it sounded, though, there was some sense of, you know envy for other forms of childhood or other forms of of other models of parenting at the schools. You went to. Yeah. I mean it would have been nice to get some affirmation at home like that would have been nice, you know, it would have nice to not have to go to the store every weekend. You know, other people would like i remember just wanting to go to birthday parties, not being able to go because my parents had to work and there was nobody to bring me the birthday parties. And so, you know, sure, those of you who are restaurant kids, you just live at the restaurant, thats where you do your homework, where you take naps there. Thats where hang out on the weekends. So for me, school was really a space where i could actually socialize and hang out. And i did envy, you know, those friends of mine who didnt have those responsibilities or those obligations and who could just yeah, in some ways be innocent you know, just be kids. Yeah. You know i a story in my book about my friend sharon im sorry thats her real in the book. Her name is eileen. Just kidding. Eileen. I mean, shes cool and ivy, whatever. Anyway she would be cool with it. I probably was her last name. Okay. And whats her Social Security . Okay, so, eileen in book, so i talk a lot about her. Shes my closest and in high school and, you know, she had this incident where, you know, she was, you what speech and debate nerd. And she went to this tournament and she had a great time. It was out of town. It was the time leaving los angeles and she came back from this trip and couldnt wait to tell her parents about it. And then her mother picked her up. She started, you know, just bubbling over with all of this excitement. And her mother says, stop, were going to the hospital because your father was shot a robbery this weekend. And my parents owned a liquor store. Koreanamerican immigrants. Sharon just started god. Eileen just started crying because she was wanting to, like, tell her mother about this awesome trip and share with it. And, you know, there was a moment where she just felt such because here where her parents risking their lives so that she could have this nice education in this nice trip. And yet she couldnt even really enjoy it because meanwhile, they had almost her father had almost gotten killed. So i think that tension was always, always there. Couldnt fully enjoy it because you knew much your parents were sacrificing. Allow you those gifts. What was their vision of of success like what did they want for you at that in period of time . I think they a steady paycheck. They wanted physical safety. If i could have health, that would be amazing. Yeah, thats the health and Health Insurance is huge. I mean, i cornerstone asianamerican parenting. Oh, my god. And like i talk a lot about Health Insurance in my i realize but im telling you it like when youre not insured, it is always youre always thinking, how am i going to pay for, you know, my root canal . How am i going to pay if i get shot at work, you know, how am i going to i dont like its something that, you know, is one of the reasons why i believe in universal health care, because i know that the decisions i made in terms of career were very much based on whether or not i would have coverage and i guess im astonished when i meet people who are like, but what do you mean you took that job even though you didnt want to do it . And im like, do take it without insurance. What are you talking about . So yeah. So i think a huge, huge part of it too, you know, so throughout the book are these themes of like anger, grief, rage, shame. Im wondering, like, you know, because when were when were kids, were sort of processing everything and ill say, like kids up until maybe like your twenties, youre just sort of processed ing things in the moment, like where you at what point did you get the to think about like, oh, what ive been feeling all of this time is rage or what ive been feeling this time is shame. Does that make sense . I got the language i think happened much, much later. I mean, in the moment. I think that you just feel those emotions. You dont have a way of translating them or articulating. You just feel terrible. And, you know, i think about how anger is so primal and shame is so primal. And i think all of us right. Thats i think its one of the preliminary emotions that you feel. Its like, what is it . The lizard brain or something . Before right before. Executive functioning comes in and all of that stuff. So i just think its super primal and so, you know, i think it really took until i mean, im like 46 now and i really think it took up until this age to finally come up with ways explaining what i was feeling without trying to you know, punch somebody in the face, you know, i dont know, hurt myself like all of those ways in which you try to cope with feelings of rage and feelings of shame. Well, how did like how did that come about then . I mean, i think its age think its also a lot of therapy, believe so wholeheartedly in therapy. I also believe in psycho pharmaceutical. So i think that you know finding a good antidepressant, i im sorry. Yeah, thats right. I also think just. Yeah. Older i think having children. Mm. Because think some of these things that i didnt want to deal with, i could kind of repress and then when you kids and you see your kids replicating the exact same coping mechanisms and grappling with shame and anger and thats the moment where youre thinking, oh dude, like, i have to, i have to confront this, i have to deal with this because its being passed on to the next and i cannot watch that happen. What role did writing this book have play and sort of like process some of this or sort of being able to kind of understand your own as like these interlinked episodes . So i, i teach black and Asian American literature and we talk a lot about, you know, how does one process trauma, how does one process terrible things that happen in ones life and one of the things that ive determined or that my students have helped me determine is that it really is through the act of storytelling through writing, through committing to sharing ones stories with others that you figure out a way of moving beyond the trauma. Theres. One of my favorite authors is Toni Morrison, and Toni Morrison talks lot about this, about how storytelling and telling stories, revisiting memories, horrible, traumatic memories from the past, historical trauma that many people just want, repress it and forget about it because its so painful that you trying to do that in order to survive. Anybody who has dealt with ptsd the aftermath of some horrific experience understands that sometimes you have to out you have to forget it, order to move on. But that thats just a bandaid because its still there and its still waiting to come at any moment, which is why you have to revisit it. And you have to it and you have to talk about it, which is simultaneously act of re traumatization. Its so painful. And yet you have to retraumatize yourself in order to get to the other side, to heal it. And i have to say, like even, you know, i was talking to somebody about how i had to i had to narrate the or to i was invited to narrate audiobook and i was shocked at how i was reading sections. And i still like sobbed in sections and i thought i had processed it, id written it it was published or not published almost in published and just retell the story made me feel like the wounds had reopened and i had take time and like saw in another room before. I could continue narrating, but i think each time i tell the or each time somebody reads the story and can understand it. That is one step closer to that sense of healing. To writing about it. I because it sounds like a very painful process to write this book. Right . Did did it . I dont know like provide any sense of or a vision of what it would be like to move on to it. Did it feel like you were putting it on the page and sort of cultivating different relationship with these feelings. Or is it just retraumatizing . I was going to say, i mean. I think that i mean, i joke about how i wrote most this on the couch during covid and, you know, i honestly it was i mean. I mean, that was basically survival time anyway. But know something is. Like i literally went to the cat here like two doors down from this room earlier today because sometimes is just like i have like five and im know how many do i have five animals. Two, two dogs and three cats. And literally, like i feel like thats what helped me get through the writing of it because then your cats dont care, your dogs dont care and so they just hang out. Youre like, okay, im running through this terrible section. And you know, in parts of the memoir, i talk about little like my son who definitely not. It was this is not an age appropriate book for him, but he was like eight or nine and he was reading over my shoulder and read some section about spiders and then was like, hey, mom, you know, facts are incorrect because im charlottes web right now and and those are the moments. And i actually integrated them because it was really it was good in some to be like, okay, im in this like not great space. But then heres somebody interjecting with my life. Now and you know, there is a lot of trauma in the book but i also think that doesnt define me or anybody who survives these things that theres a lot of like life and joy and, you know, my life is really good now. And so i wanted to emphasize that and not just dwell in like victimhood or victim re or the title. Can you talk a bit about sort of how that comes about . Because i feel like that is sort of your giving you, you know, a sense of kind of how to turn turn all of these negative feelings, Something Else. So the title of the book comes from something that my mentor, jamaica kincaid, told me, you know, probably 20 years ago i was a graduate at harvard and i was in the English Department, which as well, i can attest, is not a great not a not a super warm and fuzzy environment. But in any case, i i know i, i was i wasnt in it, but facts, major facts. And you have a and so i ended up getting a job as a greater jamaica kincaid, who is actually the africanamerican studies department, which was adjacent, just across the hall and. You know, early on when i was working with her, you she would sometimes say these things, you know, julia, you really you have to learn to bite the hand that feeds you. Otherwise, you know, how can you figure out you really are . And i remember she said this to me and i was like, i dont even understand what that means but okay, you know, and, and i would i she said it in some graduation speech to some students at a small liberal arts college. You know, i think you can find it like so this is something that she often tells students and young people. And it really took me a long time for it to finally sink in because shes not shes definitely shes not, you know, being like as an adult, this is what you should. Shes not like that at all. So, you know, it only much later that i was like, oh, you know, in some ways what shes telling me is this important piece of advice is that you cant just stay grateful, obedient and submissive your whole life you have to at some point, especially if you see injustice, even if its from a figure of authority that you had respected or that had done something supportive of you, that when you see injustice, you have to bite back, you have to bite the hand that feeds you. Otherwise youre going to remain in a space of perpetual subordination. And really when writing book, i mean honestly, it was through writing the book that i kept going back to that image, kept going back to that phrase. And the title of the book came later. I mean, i had written the whole thing and still didnt have a title. What were the alternate titles say . I just always loved hearing these people. I mean, i know, originally i wanted to call the book we to because those are the the final line of my book was we too are america and but and i understand this you know would read it and think oh its a me too or its you know, its it might be deceptive or, confusing. And so i, you know, we were trying to brainstorm titles and so many of the titles just felt like they were a little bit too ambiguous or a little too. I dont know. I really wanted. I really wanted a title that captured the anger. I feel i didnt want wishy washy title, you know, a great memoir and also a memoir lot about pain and mother daughter relationships is crying and heart and. I very much did not want to highlight the crying theres so much crying in my book. Right. But the one its not a sad book. Thats the thing i did not want that to be highlighted. I wanted to be more of a sense of like and anger and also, you know, triumph in some ways. Im not going to be told to, like, sit down and be quiet. No, its a perfect title because. It captures that aggression. Its also kind of yeah, its also kind of funny and i think thats another aspect of the book that those of you who have read it just like im funny, you know, like i was like heartbreaking, but also kind of hilarious. Like the when you went to the designing women thing, right . So, you know, like kincaid gives you this advice now you are entrusted the young minds right . Im wondering if writing this book and sort of processing your experiences, how is that come out in your teaching and your mentorship if it does . Or how is teaching of giving you a different perspective kind of being exposed to people who are going through things that you recognize as having gone through yourself and so much nicer . I joke the book, like when i first started teaching, i was 22 years old and you know, i looked like i was 15. And you know, i really it was hard for me to feel like i was being taken seriously. And a lot of my students didnt take me seriously because i look their age. And so, you know, the joke, i mean, they they secretly called generally because i was so strict and i was like, you know, i just i wouldnt let them take advantage of me was really, really never cracked. Like what was that joke that your teacher dont crack a smile until christmas. That was like i never smiled and i know which is hilarious now because all i do is laugh in my classrooms now. And i think partly thats getting older and you know. Yeah, not feeling like i mean, the students are like my childrens age now, so its not the same, but, but i did considerably loosen up. And i think that a shift in my teaching happened when i shifted environments. I had always taught at places harvard, you know, elite, private, high schools in predominantly white environments. I did feel like the only way to be seen as an authority was to approximate whiteness as much as you could. Whiteness and maleness. And when i started teaching at unlv, university of nevada, las vegas, i suddenly was in a classroom that was about 60 to 70 . Students of color and ranged in age. From 18 to 55. And they a totally different student population and. I suddenly realized, what am i doing . I am comporting myself according to codes of behavior that dont work here. And also i am not and im not a man. Why am i trying to act like a white man . And these students were, you know, like me like a lot of them were immigrants or the children of a lot of them were poor or working class. A lot of them had elderly parents. A lot of them were working three jobs and trying go to school. And i just thought, you know, being a hard about things like, you know, your essay was 3 minutes late or you missed three classes instead of two this semester. I mean, who cares, right . No, but there are people who i worked with who really cared. And i was so that really changed. And then the other thing, because i loved students there, but i also love my students at, Loyola Marymount and one of my former students is here, carrie. And one of the things i also love about my students is that they teach me so much stuff that i think you really have to have a sense of like openness because you know, anything you think you do and you know, whatever, but you dont. You know, one of the things i laugh about, because carrie was last class before covid completely shut down. So i actually never even saw a we just left and is my first time seeing her since 2020 anyway. But but. But carrie cracked a joke in class about a lizzo line about im a 100 and was like, what are you talking about . Shes like, oh, dr. Its a song you wouldnt understand. And three years later, ive been to a lizzo concert. I now teach lizzo in one of my classes, and i totally credit for that. Were going to open up for q a audience in a moment. But you when you first asked me to do this, you said we could just talk about grad school, the whole time, but i thought that would be unwise because the only people who care about grad school are grad students. But do people ask you whether i am curious like it seemed like a very traumatizing experience i mean, it was it wasnt traumatizing for you. Yeah, but i was in a different i was in a much more laid back program. You were so but im wondering, like when students you whether they should go what you like whether they should pursue a ph. D. I mean, you have you know, you do teach now and you sort of draw on presumably things that you did in grad school, i guess, like you look back on that experience, i usually say, do not go that is generally my advice because i would never want anybody to go through what i went through. You know, occasionally i will have a student who still wants to go to graduate school and. Im totally supportive because god knows the profession to be diversified and, you know, we know to be those people there. But i also love my students. I dont want them to suffer in the way that i suffered. So its hard. I dont know. I told you not to go to grad. School, right, carrie . Yeah, i told carrie. You go to grad school, okay . You seem attached. You like i dont look how happy she is and how do you know . Because i love. You, carrie. Cool. So do folks in have questions . Im sure someone has a question. Yeah. Hi. Hi. So i was wondering if you could talk a little bit about your process of like what it was like to write a memoir like so many components, childhood. I feel like i personally have repressed an to not remember so like what was up and mentioned that you had written that well like in the middle of covid and so it essentially you had like a lot of time but like breaks, like do you have to like talk to people, kind of get the details back together. Yeah, we just to about repeat the question first. Okay. For our audience on and on youtube. The question was to talk about the process of writing kind of unearthing old trauma, but also just the process of recollection because theres so many kind of details that youd forgotten, how you recover, that process, writing process, things like, yeah, so i have a bad memory, i have to say in some ways, like feel like im going senile, but, but i hold grudges like you were only so it was not hard for me to remember a lot of. These things, they are burned in my memory and i still i mean i mean i use this term in my book con which is this term to describe is particularly korean sense of vengeance and justice rage hatred like smell like misery. And anyway i have that and so all of these things, i, i mean, i almost was like, oh my god, this is my burn book. Like, im just going from person that annoyed me to the next to next. And people are like, how do you even remember these things . And im like, oh, i remember and so, but so yeah. So that so what the counter to that is that i say this thing in my acknowledgments is that i always remember when people hurt me, but i always remember when people do something to me. And so part of it is, you know, i think it is its like that lizard brain, right. Are the moments where your rage and your shame are activated. Those are the ones that you remember. You dont remember the other stuff . Like, i dont remember, you know what i ate breakfast this morning, but, you know, if you wronged me, just watch. I do not. I do not forget or forget. Whats the oldest grudge you hold on to . Oh, man. What is the oldest . Oh, so when i four years old, im telling you, i went to this easter egg hunt, my local public park, and i swear to god and, my dad was just like my sister was a year. And a half younger than me. Hes like, just join the three and under easter egg hunt. Who cares . Whatever. And i found the golden easter egg and, so i was supposed to get this big Easter Basket. And the lady asked me, how old are you, little girl . And i could not a lie. And i told her i was four and she took the Easter Basket away from me like i spent all of easter crying because i had thought i had. I still that lady that is so cruel. Why would you do that to a kid no, this is i this is this is a ernie suggs is good. Its okay to hold on to one. Yeah. You dont know her name, right . I do not. But think i hate her. Okay, we all do. We all do it right. Thats inexcusable. Unforgivable. I agree. Other questions. Over here describe where it was like moving from the English Department to the african history department. What did you what did it feel like . What were you reading . Why it so different . Good question. So what was it like to make that transition from the English Department to the Africana Studies at the time . I think its still called at the department of african and africanamerican studies maybe. Yeah, but what that its a pretty Pivotal Moment in the book its sort of your discovery that there are other of the Parker Center hang out on and much cooler people on the second floor. Yeah no for sure and always one of them so i so i never officially my departmental affiliation. I was oh, i graduated with a degree from the english but i definitely at a certain point in my graduate education stopped hanging out in the English Department and was always just over in the African Studies department because they had a really study room. So did observe about a nice little not in my not the same not as nice but but after studies it was just like a warmer more comfortable place. And i also befriended a bunch of people were in that program. And so we just hung out you know when they would have events, you know, one of the thing about grad students is that youre always broke, starving. And so they had great food. They had great food. I mean, im telling you, the English Department was like lousy food. Shes cute. Yeah and then pham would have, like, soul food and cuban food and like me and food and and and they were really generous with it. They were like, if youre here, eat. And then i would crash farm studies events where they would go to fancy restaurants and then all of us grad students would like show up like, yeah, like hungry, pathetic urchins. And they would be like, just join us, whatever and so we get a free meal at a restaurant. Mean it was awesome and. I just thought like that. That was the whole like vibe of the department. It was like there is always enough. Come join us. Youre a part us. Whereas english was always like yours, never enough. And get out of here. I dont know. And yeah, and i still like that. If you offer me free food, ill be there and ill love you right . Yeah. There was a question over here, so. Yeah oh, yes. Thank you so much for reading. I wanted to know what you looked up to any writers when you were growing up . Like what kind of books you liked and if you saw possibility of being a writer as you were growing up so well, what were you career people growing up also, if i could add on to that, you know what was on your bookshelf when youre working this . Like, what were some of the models for you as you endeavor, as you sort of delve into your memoir right now . Thats a great and so to start to answer your question and then to move on to was you know growing up i read you know i am thinking all the books that i really loved growing up. I mean in school, in high school, i mean, i love jane austen, i love the victorian writers. Like i charlotte bronte, i remember and i write this in the book, you know, one of my favorite writers growing up, not so much now, but growing up was scott fitzgerald, because i had read the great gatsby in high school and i just thought, wow, this, you know, depiction of the american dream, but also the the dark side of that. And one of the reasons, you know, i was excited to go to princeton, where i ended up going to college, is because it was because of scott fitzgerald, that university and really a moment of heartbreak for me in college was in some ways i had told myself i could be just like him. I can be like him. I going to have a career like him and going to the same school as him can approximate his trajectory. And then there was a moment, you know, i tried to join a club that he joined in a social club at princeton that had been a member of. And it was a very white, very upper and middle, you know, upper class elitist kind of southern. And he was known as the most southern of the clubs. And really, i think deep down, part of me wanted to join the club because i wanted to imagine myself sort of as somebody in his company, he had written his first novel in the library of this club, and i just thought, this is it. Im getting as close to greatness as i can and i got rejected from that club and it was this awful moment, i think, where i just i mean, i knew i was being rejected socially from this particular. But it also felt like if that club was also a literary club, you know, of letters and american, that i also didnt belong that club either because all the people who aspired to be were part of that world, you know, were sort of part of that kind of elite literary world. And so, you know, as i got older, as went to graduate school and my exposure to different forms of literature expanded, i think what was so important about that is suddenly i was seen writers who i adored but whose lives and whose trajectories were more similar to my own, which in some you want to say, oh, but you could still have been like scott fitzgerald. But i think if you are raised in this country and you come from a certain racial or ethnic or or gender, i background those are there kind of preventing you from reaching those spaces. And so for me, the books that were on my shelf when i was reading when i was writing this book were things like, you know, the works of claudia rankine, the works of ralph ellison, the works of james baldwin, the works of Toni Morrison, the works of kathy park, hong. I could just go on and on. And it was more many of the more contemporary writers, but also writers who came from a background that was more similar, mine and whose experiences i could more readily identify with. And they gave me permission to write my book. I would not have written this book. I had not read their books. You know, so first as a clarifying question because i know you mentioned that you think African American asianAmerican Literature they know that one course together too forces but i guess how do you. Not being pigeonholed that an asianamerican into just asianAmerican Literature but also being conscious of the space that you take up in whether you know a job that could go to a black professor or in african American Literature space. How do you balance solidarity, but also not to or too much space or equal pay or job . Or how about Something Else . So more about of your professional track sort of like what you teach, but also sort of how you navigate it kind of showing but also creating space and taking space. Making space. Yeah, thats a great question. And its something that i still struggle with. So teach african American Literature. But when i graduated from my phd program, i actually initially tried to get jobs as a victorian ist. So 19th century British Literature scholar, my had been on the intersection of 19th century british and african literature, but i absolutely did not feel like i was, you know, qualified necessarily or even entitled to apply for African American lit. So i didnt i tried to apply for these century british jobs and could not get a job, which anybody whos in academia, its like, of course, you couldnt get a job. There are no jobs, but, you know, it was just year after year feeling like im trying to do everything. Im trying to follow what my mother said and be like twice as good and work twice hard and, you know, and, and i still couldnt get employment so i was actually going leave academia. I was looking other jobs and what ended up happening. And this is a really interesting anecdote that my advisor, henry gates jr, whos an africanamerican ist, there was a job, it was an affirmative action hire or it was a position, a target of opportunity is basically euphemism for, you know, a job meant for, you know, somebody was from a marginalized group and. The Search Committee at unlv reached out to him and said, hey, do you know anybody who could teach africanAmerican Literature from a marginalized group . And professor gates wrote back and was like, i have a student, julia lee, who is koreanamerican, but she studied under me and i can vouch for her work and she can totally teach your africanamerican lit classes. And i remember know, then they asked me for my materials and i saw i mean, ive been then at that point i had been on the market for five years. I was like, this is not going to go anywhere. Are you kidding me . Its a you know, i was like, thanks, professor gates. But this is not going to happen. And so but then i ended up getting the job and then i had that horrible moment where i was like, oh my god, i got the job because the department is so racist that they will not hire a black person. This job. Theyll hire me though. Im the model minority, so i fit the marginalized identity barely, because sometimes i dont fit that identity when it comes to affirmative action or target of opportunity hires. And so i was freaking out about that. Like, im taking this job, somebody else who deserved it because departments racist, whatever. And it was it. I mean . I had major anxiety about it and its something that i had to work through because. I was so grateful for the job, but i also really wanted to do justice. Yeah, make for students, black students who might see me coming into the room and be like and have students who were like, yeah, you walked into the room. We were like, am i in the right class . Whats going on . You know, and and so, so much of it was about trying to acknowledge that i dont have their experience. I dont have their lived experience, but i have read a lot. And i can talk a lot about the stuff. And i can also speak from the point of view of somebody who is a person of color and that that ends up i think it ended up for a lot of my students, that was kind of a chance them to be like, okay, ill listen, i will consider it. And then the irony that literally three years later, asianamericans were taken out of the target of opportunity, they fell off. And so i wouldnt have been able to get this job three years later and you know and then i white colleagues who told me that i didnt actually count as diverse or i didnt count as a target of opportunity. And meanwhile, you know, i subsequently left and got another job in los angeles. Now the department has zero asianamerican professors, zero professors of Asian American descent, even though they claim that across university they have met the quota of 15 asianamerican professors, the campus. So. I think we have time for one more question. Yeah. Interested in the scarcity idea that you brought up with the design of but also that youre bringing up affirmative action . Because ive been thinking a lot about the Upcoming Supreme Court affirmative action. What do you think are possible solutions to i mean, i dont want to call it scarcity, but really get right. Right. So have you come across what you think are potential solutions or ways to approach scarcity so that you dont look allies as. So the question is sort of how to what are some expansive ways think about beyond scarcity as sort of the only way of thinking about how resources can be allocated. Yeah, ive thought about this lot too. So, you know, in the book talk about how i really think the scarcity that scarcity mindset set is foundation of White Supremacy. So this idea theres not enough. And so you have to fight for every little piece of the pie that you can and what this ends up doing is forcing those of us in positions to fight each other for the same small wedge of the pie, rather than thinking, hey, wait a second, why dont we want more of the whole pie . Like, why are we fighting each other when we really we should be fighting this system of White Supremacy that is preventing us from having access to the whole pie. And i think the affirmative action situation is exactly an example of this where, you know, for those of you who may not be aware of this, but, you know, the the affirmative action, the whole premise of, it is being challenged, the courts because and theyre using asianamericans as the front and it it really is a front its a con using asianamericans the plaintiffs claim that asianamericans are being discriminated against due to affirmative action policies and that therefore it is racist against other people of color. Therefore, as you get be gotten rid of whatever and pitting asianamericans against brown black applicants of same, you know, colleges or whatever would really once again, instead of pitting them against one another for the same small wage of pie, why dont we think about White Supremacy as controlling . I mean, honestly the people who are benefiting most affirmative action are white people. Its people who benefit from legacy admissions or from athletic recruitments and i dont want to get into trouble with people i know. But, you know, i know somebody who is who, you know, is a. You know, who benefits from both. And it just replicates privilege. Right so but again this shows you the way in which Asian Americans have been used, both as a scapegoat, like sometimes when its convenient, like with covid with the covid epidemic or with, you know, World War Two or whatever. Its like, you know, asianamericans, like with the l. A. Uprising, its like, oh, its koreans, theyre the racist ones, etc. Lets throw them out there. Theyre so convenient so theyre trotted out as scapegoats necessary, and then theyre trotted out as poster child when its convenient for White Supremacy. Like, look the poor asians. And its like, no, no, do not be used a pawn for white, do not be used as a way to cover the fact that this is about White Supremacists who want to preserve their privileged position in terms of getting all of these. Theyre the ones who are benefiting from affirmative action. So my solution honestly is we should get rid of legacy admissions, which get rid of legacy admissions. We should get rid of athletic recruitment, which people are always that will never happen, right . Like athletic because, you know, if dont have like an awesome sports team, how are you going raise money whatever whatever and legacy admissions same thing its like well all those donors are going to dissipate and dont care because guess what my are legacies right and i dont care. They dont need to go to my school. They shouldnt go to my school. They they but i keep i keep hearing that this could never happen. But maybe it will. Youve given us all something to work toward. So thank you. Thank you. To a molly. The wonderful staff that puts a magic are our friends at cspan everyone on youtube right now. And thanks for coming out tonight as well. Julia will be signing books and the back, i believe. Yes, but thank you so much. My gosh. Thank you for. My god