volume 19 | issue 2 winter 2015
common ground f
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celebrate 20 YEARS JOIN US AS WE
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CHECK OUT
COMMUNITY'S EXCLUSIVE SNEAK PEAK OF NEXUS*
PAINTINGS
SPOKEN WORDS VIDEOS and more
university of california san diego cross-cultural center "incarceration"
by German Octaviano
"me veo. te veo" by german octoviano
CONTENTS INTRO CCC LIFE JOY DE LA CRUZ
2 3-4 5
COMMUNITY SUBmissions
6-8
ACADEMIC PAPERS
9-16
20th ANNIVERSARY
17-18
contact
19
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
academic 20th anniv contact
- Edwina Welch, Director
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May 23, 2015 will mark the 20 year anniversary of the Cross-Cultural Center at UCSD (see the event announcement and registration information on page 17). While celebration is necessary and wonderful (can’t wait to see you all), equally as important is reflection and examination of Center work over these past 20 years. One way we are marking our 20th anniversary, honoring community who struggled to make the CCC a reality, and continuing to build reflection and growth is through our Nexus manuscript project. For the past 18 months faculty, staff, interns, student researchers, and community have written submissions, reviewed archival boxes, shared art, and conducted research on the impact and implications of having and being involved in the Center over the years. We are humbled and excited some many folks took time and effort to write for the manuscript and hope our story of struggle and growth can help other centers and community grapple with the joy and messiness that is our work. You will find an excerpt from the introduction of the book on page 17.
2
What’s your CCC CCC “Watching interns grow!”
“All
“EVERY M
O
“Gett
ing a ever I hug when ’m he re”
“
3
es!” k o j e Insid
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
the ‘hello’s”
“When w ea dance & s ll ing”
INTRO CCC life
favorite moment?
“Meeting co
mmunity!”
academic 20th anniv contact
MENT”
4
JOY DE LA CRUZ exhibitions exhibitions
For the Cross-Cultural Center's Beyond La Jolla Program this year students where taken to the annual Enero Zapatista Closing Celebration. Students car pooled to El Centro Cultural de la Raza in Balboa Park to learn about the Zapatista Movement. There were performances by community artists that touched upon the topics of activism, capitalism, patriachy, and education through various art forms. The center was filled with vendors from San Diego and Los Angeles selling hand made goods. Community art work filled the walls of the center with vivacious colors and performers livened up the night. The Enero Zapatista committee did an amazing job planning and executing the event. This event could not have happened without the CCC staff and the students who volunteered to carpool people, thank you!
- Elizabeth Uribe, (Joy De La Cruz Art & Activism)
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submissions submissions
Untitled by Jenna C Logan I recall a divine voice, embedded in the rows A face you could never truly see
INTRO CCC life
COMMUNITY
A persona who told us how to move, to speak Behind fabric walls we exposed ourselves projecting our voices to cryptic faces our own faces, simmering under fervorous light
No One’s Burden, Jayne Manuel
we were the indigenous souls, dedicated to our art At awaited nightfall, we’d retreat away from the voice, from judgements - to our den our winding path illuminated by soft light while a constant buzz ran through the walls This place was really something a place to pretend, to explore, to share. but above all, a home for many.
Festival, Jayne Manuel
Brittle under my feet and to my touch it now stands on its last leg The walls rotting; penetrated by that familiar buzz But the voice, it is unclear if its survival. “Hello? Is there someone there?” I call out to the emptiness “Please, don’t hide, let’s talk” distant buzzing and echos continue “I know you’re there" they had grown louder, clearer “I’d just feel better if you came out now” With that, all sound within the room ceased And then came the realization that the voice had moved on, as all things should That this once divine home is now, simply, barren..
-isms, Jayne Manuel
academic 20th anniv contact
Is there anything left to be reclaimed?
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
The reason we learned to survive here.
And so, it is time for me to move on too.
6
My Uncle: A Microbiography by Evvan Young Chul Burke
My uncle knew Tae Kwon Do, the martial art for those who believe in honor and self-defense but secretly hope that asshole's going to try something so you can knock off their jaw. When he was my age, family legend says he could break bricks with his fist. "Real bricks,” my dad tells me as we steal a red block to prop open a door that I can’t carry. Real bricks, dried in a stone furnace, mixed from concrete and tiny rocks that rub your hands raw as you hold them. He moved here from Korea when he was a teenager with four siblings, a mother and an ill step-father who didn't want to die in a foreign country but didn't make it to the correct coast before he moved on. Their family exchanged their hometown, pastoral hills and wading ponds that grew into fields of rice, for an urban edge where students rode their horses to school. The child of my grandmothers first marriage, he didn't inherit my grandfathers virginian pronunciation. His english was a second language, just like my grandmother’s, who got lessons from her children on a toy chalkboard. East County kids back then weren’t ones for multiculturalism, especially those separated from them by an ocean. My family were the only asians in the neighborhood and people reacted as well as you’d expect. As the oldest and most accented, my Uncle apparently got worst of it, but it’s his response which has diffused into family legend. The kind you tell your kids while moving bricks. One of the more persistent bullies was a boy in his grade who followed him speaking gibberish, monosyllables while bowing. My dad acts it out, putting his hands together and bends his neck while muttering “ch” and “li” and “ng” sounds, and I feel embarrassed at how familiar it looks for a story from more than thirty years prior. Eventually, one day, my uncle decided he had enough of it, and so, right as the guy was straightening his neck from a bow, he punched the guy right above the eye. Something cracked under his knuckle, like a brick, and then the guy’s face was wet. The guy saw blood for the rest of the day, like looking through rose-tinted glass. The legend made itself at first. When he started high school, my dad walked into it like a spider web at the door, and it cleared most of the jokes out of the way. It made enough of an impression to inspire him to teach his son about the merits of violence in conflict resolution for years. And like most legends, it’s hard to find the heroes they portray. My Uncle went to college and then graduate school before moving to Virginia. Temper never struck me as one of his character traits; he came off more apathetic or self-centered than crusading. My mother often mentions how thick his accent is, but I can never hear it. But in his yearbook there's a strangers signature on the back page with the words “I don’t know what to write here. I hope I never see you in a fight. I hate seeing blood.”
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Growing Up Cheruvian Diana Li
Diana Li's life and artwork are greatly influenced by her transnational background and female identity. She graduated from UCSD in 2014 with a B.A. in Ethnic Studies and Visual Arts Media, and is currently interning and
volunteering at Asian American art and media organizations in San Francisco.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8GJgim0-Jw
"Maiz Rebelde" German Octaviano
My work is a reflection of the personal being the political. As I juxtapose the self with the world around us, there is learning and growing that lives and is shaped through our past, present and future. Through the scars, ghosts and auras left behind, created, and maintained by dark forces, I make meaning of it on my canvas, Each piece carries that reflection, that violence, that trauma, that acknowledgment and that memory.
academic 20th anniv contact
Kaibigang Pilipin@ GBM STAR Cafe Tristan Baltazar
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
Growing Up Chinese Peruvian in the US was created for my self-initiated project as an intern at the Cross-Cultural Center in 2014. It was presented in the program, CHIFA: Mixed-Identified Storytelling, in order to inspire and empower others to dive deep in affirming their intersectional identities. The video features interviews with my parents about their journey to the US, and the story they want their children to tell through their Chinese, Peruvian and American cultural identities.
INTRO CCC life
https://vimeo.com/117558551
– German Octaviano
8
"tonatiuh y quetzalcoatl� by german octaviano
In this year’s new Common Ground edition, the following section is dedicated to your scholarly works. For a chance to publish your *academic papers, send your submissions to ccc.ucsd@gmail.com!
*Grade marks are required. Submission does not guarantee publishing.
9
The Rise and Fall of Community at UCSD: by Sandra Jon Amon www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDHa
this time of strife and pain? After all,
g_0NjRY [11:36]
the mainstream media coverage
What happened during
framed the events as a Black issue.
Winter 2010? Why was it a time of
However, what the media neglected
contradictions - of great pain, trauma,
to illuminate was the cross-cultural
but joy as well? In this short, a few key
coalitions that included Black and
UCSD students, faculty, and staff
Brown (Chicano) students, as well as
reflect upon this crucial and para-
Asian American students. Indeed,
doxical moment in the college’s
Asian Americans were involved in
history of activism. Through its choice
the student organizing and mobiliza-
of interviewees and its inclusion of
tion during that time. It is crucial that
media clips from that time, the film
we remember this, that the efforts of
works well in breaking down the
Asian American students during that
myth that the only community
time are not erased from the institu-
involved in addressing the blatantly
tional memory. These students
racist and misogynistic events of that
recognized the injustices committed
time period was the Black commu-
daily by the institution and stood in
nity on campus. Instead, it points out
solidarity with Black and Brown
that a coalition across identities was
students. The following shorts will
formed during that point, especially
clarify what exactly happened during
with that of Black and Chicano faculty
Winter 2010, how Asian American
and students. However, glaringly, the
students felt about the turbulent time,
participation and work of Asian
in which ways Asian Americans
Americans with the community is not
spoke out against injustice and
highlighted through the absence of
inequity, and finally, the conse-
an Asian American interviewee. It is
quences of Winter 2010 on students
only implied briefly, with the insist-
still aching from its pain and emo-
ence that the organizing that
tional violence.What stories are
occurred happened along pan-
hidden by the dominant narrative? By
ethnic lines. Nevertheless, this
the end of this program, this question
absence of stories about 2010 from
will have been thoroughly explored
the Asian American community is
and examined.
thus present by its very nonexistence
Short #1: The Compton Cookout
in the dominant narrative.
academic 20th anniv contact
Where were the Asian
American student activists during
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
All within the span of three weeks during the Winter Quarter of 2010, UCSD suffered a series of racist and sexist events that mobilized an already primed group of student activists to organize against institutional and structural racism. These events included: the so-called Compton Cookout; the Koala TV’s use of the n-word on student-run campus television; the discovery of a noose found in Geisel library; and finally, another discovery, this time of a KKK hood in the library. As stated previously, students were ready to organize - UCSD student activists had recently hosted the Students of Color Conference on campus, and were also preparing for the March 4th Rally for Education before the Winter 2010 events. From the efforts of students and faculty who had pushed the administration to be more supportive of its marginalized and underserved populations, the university was changed dramatically, being pushed towards the path of answering to the needs of students, staff, faculty, and the community at large (e.g. the Black Resource Center was established, the Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion was put into place, etc.). Unfortunately, these gains came at a cost schisms within faculty and students resulted from the inward turning of aggression and pain, leaving deep wounds within the activist community.
INTRO CCC life
Black Winter of 2010
10
faces of the students telling of their
nity and coalitions? What can the
4, Rally www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTvWl n9Ymz4 [9:40] Winter 2010 encompassed so much more than reactions to the Compton Cookout-themed party. Often, it is forgotten that the students were mobilized and preparing to interrogate the campus concerning the rising costs of education and the lack of focus on serving the needs of the people. Specifically, students again organized a month after the Compton Cookout, this time to rally for public education, a statewide movement organized months in advance. In this short, now UCSD alumni Sam Jung addresses the crowd concerning the context of the attack on education in California. This film succeeds at showing not only the Asian American activist involvement during that time, but also that participants of the rally drew upon 1960s and 1970s activism through its choice of rallying cries and chants. This use of old-school activism reminds the audience of how much the past truly has a hold on current student activism. Echoes of the past continue to then haunt the present and the future. Short #3: real pain. real action. real voices www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu2TdtCd04 [14:50] In UCSD alumni Thieny Nguyen’s final class project, the often lauded footage and pictures of the
own experiences. Rather, the
future possibly look like as the school
audience is forced to focus on the
moves away further and further from
actual words, the oral histories from
the events of 2010?
events of Compton Cookout are
coalition-building can students learn
downsized extremely, focusing on
from that time? What were moments
only three key images. Instead,
of the highest highs in terms of
through the course of the video, the
organizing, and the deepest of lows in
audience is led to focus not on the
terms of the breakdown in commu-
Short #2: Sam Jung at March
11
that time. A black background dominates the majority of the screentime, with the occasional white text flashed on the screen to emphasize specific feelings and experiences of the interviewees. This proves to be a haunting technique.
Additionally, it must be noted that this narrative finally incorporates the voices of some Asian Americans involved with the 2010 events, thus combatting the erasure of Asian American involvement. Their reflections prove to ground Winter 2010 with testimonies that are heart-wrenching and deeply meditative. This is one of the most recent reflections, having been uploaded only a year ago. Now, considering that it is four years later with the last of the students who were physically here during the Compton Cookout graduating, these haunting oral histories have become all the more important for current and future students to hold on to. This video thus answers the following questions: What lessons about
Coalitional Consciousness in UC San Diego Social Justice Communities by Eliseo Rivas
Costly Disciplining and the Potential-
Student organizing that responded to
ity of the Illegible”, they both
the racist incidents in Winter of 2010
express a profound sense of pain
illustrate the power of organizing in
from organizing and hope from what
coalitions. This propelled many other
has yet to happen. The cost of their
organizations and collectives to work
and many other’s organizing efforts
coalitionally and support student
lead to a moments of deep frustration
demands for initiatives that would
and heavy conflict within the very
improve campus climate for students
community that organized together
of color. Through demands and
during Winter of 2010.While ortho-
negotiations, these students were
dox scholarly material would dismiss
able to secure some of their demands
this as just another facet of organizing
from UC San Diego: namely the Black
or interpersonal conflict inherent to
Resource Center, the Raza Resource
working within communities, examin-
Centro, and the InterTribal Resource
ing this moment opens opportunities
Center. However, this process of
to consider frictions in organizing to
working coalitionally is ridden with
develop a consciousness in the
tensions between activists, especially
cycles of organizing. One that specifi-
after emergency organizing
cally addresses material and ideo-
subsided. These tensions are impor-
logical tensions that arise during
tant to examine so that they can let
organizing efforts. Coalitional organ-
future activists know potential fault
izing against the sequence of racist
lines in organizing that might also
events in Winter of 2010 demanded
result in tensions amongst each other.
the need for long over due change in
I take the beginning of this project,
campus climate. Ties between
from the prologue of two other Ethnic
activists and organizations
Studies Honors projects. In both Mar
where collaborative and coalitional
Velez’s thesis,“Our Student Move-
even before the racist events. How-
ment: Understanding and Decon-
ever, organizers’ coalitional
structing Student Activism at UC San
consciousness shifted from one that
Diego” and Mabel Tsang’s “Symp-
one that was mobilized against racist
toms of Organizing in the University:
events and engaged with each other,
academic 20th anniv contact
Fo r Yo u : This project is for the people wishing to organize conscious of the past and critical of the present at UC San Diego. To those that have intense love for their communities and frustration with UCSD. For some, this is just the beginning to an awakening that will last a lifetime. To others, it may be another institution that pleads for immediate revolution. I hope that by speaking across contexts and conversations, politics and peoples, that new methods for consciousness are built.
Introduction
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
Acknowledgments: This writing belongs first and foremost to the activists on whose shoulders I stand on. These are the people who are building another university every single day: the love from the Campus Community Center’s staff, the principles of the Student Affirmative Action Committee, and the ever supportive professors of UC San Diego.Without their contributions, this thesis would not exist. Additionally, I would like to thank the Ethnic Studies cohort for the 20132014 year. Their support, input, and laughter has helped mature this project. Finally, a thank you to my advisor Daphne for allowing me to struggle and grow with my project. Thank you.
INTRO CCC life
Methods in Movement:
12
13
this research study.
to one where people began to fight
Throughout this project I will use the
within community. As a result,
term coalition instead of community
activists became more vitriolic and
to describe how people organized
establish a “right” way to organize,
reclusive to work with one
together. I think that coalition
name the most “critical” of activist’s
another.This shift in the kind of
provides a greater basis to examine
action, or point to the ways that
organizing activists were willing to
politics instead of sole feelings within organizing should and could have
partake in illustrates the cycling of
communities. Coalition alots for
been different. For now, instead of
coalitional consciousness. In these
heterogeneity while community
focussing on a sole prescription for
sections, I will establish: 1) the basis
masks it. Coalitions are neither
organizing, I hope to understand
of how activists were coalitional since
continuous, nor harmonious. It is this
what happened to situate coalitional
the beginning, 2) then discuss why
kind of fleeting continuity that helps
consciousness. The frame of thought
and how activists organized coalition-
me describe how various people
in coalitional consciousness serves to
ally, and finally, 3) uncover what were
came together, how they separated,
understand the shifts in activists
some of the ideological and material
and how this process recycled. Other
relations with one another. Hopefully,
tensions between organizers. Divid-
scholars may use community to
this section can serve organizers who
ing this section of the study into these
describe the collective biography of
wish to organize coalitionally and
3 components allows us to examine
people I am analyzing because they
examine the ever shifting mobility of
how organizers arrived at the
were a group of people that were
coalitions.
concept of coalition, the ensuing
organizing together.Yet, I am pulled
To situate myself within the
shifts with people’s engagement in
to use coalition because it provides
context of this research, I was a first
coalitions, and their consciousness
the basis to describe greater
year when coalitional organizing
about organizing coalitionally.Within
nuances in politics, desires, and
against the racist events took place.
this section, I will provide a text
contentions. These very contentions
Although I did not formally organize
analysis across conversations
are a radical place to situate a coali-
alongside the central students, I
between4 undergraduate Ethnic
tional consciousness because it
attended most, if not all, rallies,
Studies theses on the Compton
grapples with student organizing
demonstrations, and teachouts. As
Cookout student organizing. I will
from a selfrepresented coalitional
someone from the outside, I saw the
compare and contrast these projects
manner. Students who organized
beauty of people coming together to
with each other alongside conversa-
knew of interconnected and inter-
organize. Tears were shed not only
tions represented Another University
secting struggles. They knew of the
for the racist acts, but also from the
is Possible, the “Do UC Us?” Report,
importance to work together in
administration’s reservation, if not
and the amended demands by the
coalitions. As time persisted, relations outright denial, to accept our com-
Black Student /nion (BSU) to the
between activists splintered. The
munities pain and demands for
administration. Examining the gaps
turmoil from the subsequent racial
action. I hope that my contribution to
and contentions between these
events and tensions from the
activists before and after me have this
various texts allows for a broader
outcome of the demands resulted in
study as a resource around the idea
understanding of the logics of coali-
crumbled relationships between
of coalitional consciousness; so that
tion within circuits of resistance.
activists. Therefore, it is with the
they can meditate with coalitional
Ultimately this is to give material
deepest of reverence for the
struggles, fully aware of all its dimen-
examples to the conceptual idea of
labor, pain, and organizing of activists sions in organizing and conscious-
coalitional consciousness.
before me that I venture forward in
At no point is my aim to
ness.
The primary texts that guide this
from contemporary Queer of Color
converge to make sense of how
study are based in Women of Color
Critique and Women of Color
complex seemingly single issue
Feminism and Queer of Color
Feminism, to Decolonial and AntiCapi-
organizing are and make room for
Critique because the focus on
talist Struggles.
coalition as a territory to relate and
knowledge between forgotten peoples. Ethnic Studies as a scholar-
One of the first convergences negotiate.While Moraga incorporates the body and experience into that help frame coalitions is the
ship emerged as resistance to the
concept that coalitions are a
this theoretical parameters, Cren-
continued exclusion of the experi-
contested space that view the
shaw and Hong illustrate the concep-
ences and knowledge by people of
margins to inform future political
tual complexity of coalition.
color. Knowledge that exalted itself as organization.Women of Color Femi-
The writings of Cherrie
nism emerged from the misrecogni-
Moraga wholeheartedly understand
contextualized within the of color
tion of women of color within white
the importance of making sense of
experience to produce relevant
feminist movements and male
movement and contestation between
critique is important, I want to
Similarly, Queer of Color Critique
reframe these conversations between emerged from queer theories’
racial, gendered, and sexualized lines. In the inaugural book This Bridge Called my Back, Moraga
insufficiency to consider the queer of
writes how “the deepest political
peoples that contest it. I want to
color experience. These are political
tragedy [she] has experienced is
reframe these conversations to
projects that make space for the
how with such grace, such blind faith,
examine how communities of color
continually excluded. Assessing the
this commitment to women in the
relate, struggle, and negotiate with
latter body of literature, these politi-
feminist movement grew to be
each other in coalitions. Coalition is a
cal projects converge to view the
exclusive and reactionary” (Moraga
space that provides the largest
margins as an arena for continued
xiv). Exclusionary or racism within
opportunity for these reframed
theoretical and conceptual contesta-
the feminist movement, and reaction-
encounters because it is a vexed
tion. As organizers continue to
ary to not ponder how the exclusion
heterogenousidentity based space,
struggle with each other and find
functioned or was manipulated.
with complex people organizing with
new ways of relating, decolonial and
Moreover and more importantly, she
and getting to know each other. Even
anticapitalist struggles serve as the
establishes a blueprint for future
though the subjects of analysis are
next grounds to continue building
coalitional organizing with the
communities of color, I do not want to
coalitions in order to make sense of
complex claim that inherent to
reduce the complexity of these
interconnected struggle. The link
meeting someone else. She wants
conversations to simply race. Rather, I
between mapping both together in
to “repeat over and over and over
hope to map the myriad of of political
contemporary struggles is colonial-
again, the pain and shock of differ-
projects, that include race, within
ism.
ence, the joy of commonness, the
coalitions and how the concept of
Initiated by Moraga, high-
exhilaration of meeting through
coalitions have been engaged with
lighted by Crenshaw, and cemented
incredible odds against it” (Moraga
and theorized. This mapping process
by Hong & Ferguson, women of color
xiv). These two last mentioned quotes
looks for convergences and trends
feminism and queer of color critique
capture the essence of the critique by
within coalitions, and divergences, or
became political projects to contest
Women of Color Feminism because
academic 20th anniv contact
universal white scholarship and the
JOY DE LA CRUZ COMMUNITY SUB.
universal was thus critiqued and
material for people of color. Although centered racial justice movements.
INTRO CCC life
Coalitional Theorizing
how each theorization and organizing exclusionary identity politics to make space for the maringal. These authors is differentiated. Mapping Coalitions
Literature Review:
14
they illustrate the common theme of
location at the intersection in order to alizes people within communities of
the insufficiency of exclusionary
name difference, but also understand color and women groups
movements, but also the corporal
movements coalitionally.
is alike. This is a meeting despite the
shaw in her political move to name
odds where coalition can become a
intersectionality as an analytics, in
place of otherwise, with shock, joy,
comparison to Moraga and Hong and
and exhilaration to meet a different
Ferguson, is that she can articulate
similar. This directly connects to
location, or rather intersection, as to
Hong and Ferguson because they
how power is dynamic. This is a
continue this encounter to establish a
development off of what Moraga
Thus, intersectionality provides a way to reconceptualize “coalition between men and women of color” by offering intersectionality as a method to distinguish difference (Crenchaw 300).
scaffolding for organizing.
articulates because while Moraga
As a result of this formulation,“critical
gives body to the idea, Crenshaw
resistance strategy for disempow-
coalition through meeting another
extrapolates her encounter to make
ered groups is to occupy and defend
connects to Hong and Ferguson
sense of identitybased locations at
a politics of social location rather than
because of the connection and
the where violences exist.
to vacate or destroy it” (Crenchaw
similarity in difference. The main
Crenshaw’s formulations simultane-
298). Crenshaw’s work does not
argument by Hong and Ferguson is
ously compliment Hong and Fergu-
diverge from what Moraga and Hong
that they center women of color
son because they consider intersec-
and Ferguson do because they each
feminism and queer of color critique
tionality in a zone of coalition where
make space to think of coalition as a
“as a blueprint for coalition around
new modes of relating can be organ-
vexed space of relating. Crenshaw
contemporary issues” (Hong and
ized. It is these multivaried locations
converges at coalition to make space
Ferguson 3). This comparative
that give importance to marginalized
to think through location at various
analysis allows for a critique of how
epistemologies put forth by Women
marginalized identities
human life is devalued through
of Color Feminism and Queer of
at the intersection. An important
racialized, gendered, and sexualized
Color Critique within the contested
divergence between how coalitions
processes. These modes of compari-
space of coalitions. Each of these
are formed within
son are deeply rooted in and around
three projects still converge to make
Crenshaw’s work and Jasbir Puar’s
difference to 6 “attempt to do the
space for the excluded.
work is the concept of encounter.
complexity of meeting another, who
Moraga’s theorization of
vexed work of forging a coalitional
15
(Crenshaw 279).
What is unique about Cren-
To specify the generative
While Crenshaw’s work takes
politics through these politics of
work Crenshaw does, is that she
on identity and the intersections of
difference” (Hong and Ferguson 9).
challenges how “intergroup differ-
identity, Puar’s work seemingly
The encounter that Moraga speaks of
ences” within identity groups are
diverges from ready made catego-
connects to the “forging” of coalition
flattened to be one identity
ries of identity in order to contest
because neither are assumed to
(Crenshaw 279). Intersectionality
how identities are made at an
inherently exist. The shock and joy in
disrupts this by challenging us to
encounter.What is interesting about
forging coalitions is finding the
think of the multiplicities of the
this work is not simply Puar critique’s
similarity of difference. Along the
intersections for one person to make
of Crenshaw’s usage of intersection-
same lines as Moraga, and Hong and
sense of invisibilized violences. It is
ality, but rather, how important spatial
Ferguson, Crenshaw examines how
the silence and exclusion of
context is to relating amongst identi-
dynamic power is according to
difference that continuously margin-
ties. Crenshaw is thinking through the
and acceptance of sexuality are
of color within the U.S national
imperial strategies to continue to
context. To contrast, Puar’s work
occupy. Although there is tension
stems from the transnational context
between how inclusion and margin
of how sexuality is deployed for
are conceptualized, this a generative
imperial usage in order to inform
site of analysis for coalition theorizing
their theorization of assemblage. Both in social justice movements; it questions to what end is an identity being
function, but Puar pays particular
included, how has something been
attention to the instability of identity
placed at the margins, and what are
because of how identity is simultane-
the dynamics in being critically
ously created at the encounter. In
inclusive without an addandstir
regards to a theoretical framework of
method into a coalition? Examples to
coalition, both provide an analytics to
think through this are Cathy Cohen’s
conceptualize the self in coalitions.
work on marginal identities, and
While Crenshaw allows for one to
Linda Smith’s work on indigenous
name the particularities of their
scholarship that can simultaneously
struggle through the framework of
exist with other political movements.
intersectionality, Puar allows for a continual active identity that changes according to encounter and environment. Both are useful because they allow for unique modes of analysis to A gap between the work of Crenshaw and that of Puar is attention to the margins and politics of exclusion. Crenshaw is thinking through social justice movements that examine where movements are faulty to offer a reconfigurated notion of coalition. Puar does this work within US policies of inclusion to question how sexuality is deployed. Crenshaw is not thinking so much about inclusion, but rather recognition of how a movement already exists as a coalitional space because of the particularities of so many identities. This is
http://ccc.ucsd.edu/aboutus/common%20ground%20archive/com mon-ground.html
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examine power.
*Note from editor: This is only a preview of this honor thesis. To view full academic works, please visit our site:
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examine how dynamic power can
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margins and contestation for women
much different from Puar because they examine how the tactic inclusion
16
Nexus: Contested Community and Centering the Self (excerpt for forthcoming manuscript)
The Taskforce is unanimous in its support of the creation of a cross-cultural center at UCSD. We believe the establishment of such a center would greatly enhance the university; by creating a space that fosters a sense of belonging and community among underrepresented students; facilitating greater understanding and appreciation of cultural diversity on campus and in the community at large, and by being a site for greater interaction and exchange between and among different groups of students, staff, and faculty. (CCC Taskforce August 19, 1994) Cultural Centers in higher education metaphorically and literally stand in the spaces between: between self and institution, between history and present day, between feeling and intellect, between activism and the status quo. Students and communities demand these spaces to counter act hostile campus climates. Groups demand voice and visibility in systems and structures that subtly and overtly show the opposite in practice and policy. Individuals hunger for places of recognition, affirmation, and belonging in islands of isolation and day- to -day micro-aggressions. Very little is known about the inner workings, energies, and stories that happen in cultural centers. Even less is known about the long long-term impacts of these spaces on people's lives. Are the trainings, interactions, and practices meaningful? Do these spaces impact personal life lessons and goals? What impact do these centers have on community building and belonging? What are the effects on student retention or macro macro-institutional climate transformation? Center effectiveness stands at the nexus of these questions. Cultural centers are often seen as a hope for empowerment and voice of students who fought for them, while at the same time being touted by administrations as proof that diversity and social justice is important and practiced within an institutional context. Somewhere along this continuum is the untold story, the unheard voices of and from those who work and traverse the spaces. These types of programs are created and function in “contested domains.'� A contested domain simultaneously holds truth and contradiction, appreciation and disappointment, and finally, validation and conflict. Somewhere between disputed and often contradictory expectations lies the work and value of spaces like the Cross-Cultural Center at UC San Diego. Enter here, is a twenty 20-year retrospective of the University of California, San Diego's Diego’s Cross-Cultural Center. Established in May 1995, the CCC's mission and goal is to support the cultural, social, intellectual, and personal growth of students, staff, and faculty from historically underrepresented and underserved communities. 17
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academic 20th anniv contact
As always, the Cross-Cultural Center sees our work at the nexus of community, influencing and responding to the shifts and needs of those directly impacted by the space and programming. This collection is created within this same context through the voices and experiences of the students, staff, faculty, alumni, and community who gave and continue to give of themselves in service to a greater vision of community and justice.
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The collection also tracks the Center's establishment and interrogates shifts and changes in the political landscape of UC San Diego. What do we know about the interactions and expectations of community and the institution by looking in the mirror of history? Does the establishment and institutionalization of the CCC fundamentally change/diminish the activism that brought it to the fore? Can the Center move from the margins of campus life, policy, and visibility, and can it still be seen as a legitimate tool to challenge university intransigence of diversity and social justice issues? Does the changing nature of student voice and intersectional analysis implicate the Center as not focused on the struggle of historically disenfranchised communities? Can you have ethnic specific and multicultural work in the same space? What will be our next phase of development as the work of social justice is joined by new spaces, more nuanced understanding of community needs, and more explicit demands by historically underrepresented students for more voice and visibility within the institution? A twenty 20-year retrospective is the moment to take stock of these questions, acknowledge all those who have contributed and left their mark on the campus in large and small ways, and to move forward with renewed vision and purpose.
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At the same time, the Cross-Cultural Center was to provide a space of interaction and learning for the entire campus community. In this volume, we critically explore the establishment and growth of the Cross-Cultural Center through the memories and voices of those who left their marks in the Center and at UC San Diego‌.
18 Artwork by German Octaviano
University of California, San Diego Price Center East, 2nd Floor 9500 Gilman Drive, #0053 La Jolla, CA 92093
For more information: (858) 534-9689 cccenter@ucsd.edu ccc.ucsd.edu
@ucsdcrossculturalcenter #ucsdcrossculturalcenter ucsdcrossculturalcenter.tumblr.com @ucsd_ccc UCSD Cross-Cultural Center crossculturalcenter