Racism In Southland

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Ja Yoon Choi ASAM 308 Southland Essay The book, Southland describes in detail the life of second generation of Japanese Americans during 1990s. It discusses the good side and bad side of LA throughout. The background of this book is based on harsh and cruel racism. The main character of this book is Jackie Ishida who goes to UCLA law school as a graduate student. She talks about how people in Los Angeles has been changing their attitude toward different races. After Jackie’s grandfather, Frank died unexpectedly, Jackie looked over his stuff and found his will. On that paper, she found a strange name, Curtis Martindale. Frank wanted to give his store to him. Upon Lois’s asking, Jackie started to find the guy named Curtis. However, she found…show more content…
Jackie could not have a romantic relationship with her friend named Rebecca in law school. It is described in the book when she described her in the beginning as, “Rebecca was half-Japanese, and despite her green almond-shaped eyes and wavy brown hair, she looked Asian enough to turn Jackie off; to make Jackie think of her as a mirror she didn’t want to look into” (105). In the middle of the book, as Jackie found out the past of her family and her racial identity, she began to love Rebecca. Revoyr says, “She was almost, almost attracted to her. But the Asian qualities of her face – the flatness, the roundness, the slight slant to her eyes – were hurdles she could not clear (192). However, Jackie was afraid to be close with her because the fact that her identity is came from Japanese made her feel ashamed in front of Rebecca. Jackie is not proud of her racial identity so she does not date with someone who has same racial background with her. However, at the end of the book Jackie decided to fall in love with Rebecca. She finally accepted her racial back ground and feel freed to see herself as an Asian. She is overcome her personal hatred toward Asian identity by accepting Rebecca as her…show more content…
She is African American woman and mother of Curtis. She raised him in Crenshaw District when he is young. She had an American Dream too. However, LA is not right place for her. Because as Revoyr writes, “Crenshaw hadn’t even been city when she first arrived, years before, and lived in a house next to a sprawling field of barley. But it was city now, or getting there, crowded and reeming with tension” (125). Crenshaw District became like other actual cities in LA and that leads to several problem in the neighborhood. Therefore, she finally decided to move out of LA. When Jackie visited Alma’s sister, Althea Dickson, She asked her why Alma decided to leave LA, she found out about a little secret of his grandfather, Frank. By moving out of LA, Alma could be away from Frank who is the real father of Curtis and have stronger family relationship Bruce. However, the fact that LA became bad place to live and be unable to have American Dream made her to move priority. As Althea says, “She needed work. And a change of scenery. And the companies up here was hiring” (293). Alma’s story tells that LA has two sides that it is always not the perfect place to live as many people
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