Writing Crossing Cultural Borders

When I was in the 6th grade, I read Farewell to Manzanar by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James Houston. This slim book is a memoir of Jeanne's experiences while her family resided in the Manzanar internment camp for Japanese-Americans during World War II. Farewell to Manzanar was a huge influence during my childhood because it was my first and only school-required book written by an Asian-American about a uniquely Asian-American experience. Though Jeanne is a second/third generation Japanese-American and I am a first-generation born Chinese-American, I delighted in reading a story about an American girl that looked like me.

When I had the opportunity to actually meet Jeanne Wakatuski Houston and James Houston in person, I jumped at the chance. While fighting extreme jet lag from my Florida trip, I made my way to the Foothill Writers' Conference and attended the Houston's session entitled "Writing Crossing Cultural Borders."

The first speaker to arrive in the room, James Houston is a tall, lanky White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) gentleman who was born and raised in California but has roots in the Bible belt of America. When he found out I grew up in Dallas, Texas, he joked that we could be related. Speaking extemporaneously in a laid back manner, James was an interesting contrast to his wife, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston, a petite Japanese-American woman with long, wavy black hair and a big, wide smile. Jeanne spoke softly, but with fire.

James Houston kicked off the session by listing four kinds of stories that cross cultural borders:

1. Stories of immigration
2. Stories of Americans traveling to another culture, where their sense of selves are tested
3. Stories featuring ethnic minority Americans within America
4. Stories about a specific ethnicity/culture written by authors who are not originally of that ethnicity/culture

I was intrigued by the categories. My two main WIPs are both multicultural novels, but the first is about immigration while the second is strictly about an American Born Chinese teen. I’ve also experienced the last topic as a writer, since one of my short stories (for adults) is told from the point of view from a 65 year old chain-smoking WASP Texan grandmother. While I’ve attempted to write about my travels to other cultures, I have yet to successfully polish something. Perhaps I need to travel more.

Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston opened discussion by reading her personal essay discussing multicultural America through her experiences. My personal interest was that she described America as moving from the traditional melting pot model, where immigrants shed their other culture to assimilate into America, to the more contemporary mosaic model, where immigrants and their children retain and celebrate their cultural heritage, especially in food and language. Because there were writers from Germany, Switzerland, and Denmark at the session, Jeanne also pointed out the fact that typically we think of multicultural Americans as people of color, but European who immigrate into America are also torn between two cultures.

I left their session extremely inspired, and I wanted to apply their categories to children’s literature, as all the examples James Houston listed were from adult literature. In doing so, I’ve actually added two more categories that are particularly relevant to children’s literature today. Every weekday for the next six weeks, we will be exploring and providing examples for these categories at Shen’s Blog.

Go to the revised, expanded list!