I blogged at Hyphen magazine about a Bruce Lee porn parody that’s being produced. And while the pop icon probably is turning in his grave over being immortalized in an adult movie, the prospect does raise issues of race, sex and stereotypes, particularly of Asian American men.
“Bruce Lee XXX: A Porn Parody” stars Keni Styles, the only Asian male working in straight porn produced by major studios. Styles’s uniqueness in porn is similar to the dearth of Asian Americans in mainstream movies and TV: they’re stereotyped as unattractive or lacking audience appeal.
A few years ago I wrote about similar themes when UC Davis Asian American studies professor Darrell Hamamoto made a porn movie featuring an Asian American couple as a way of reclaiming Asian masculinity and the sexuality between Asian males and females that he say has been lost to Western colonization and stereotyping.
The San Francisco Examiner put David Chiu and Ed Lee on its Jan. 9 front page.
The “Asian Power” headline from the San Francisco Examiner encapsulates what’s happening in politics for Asian Americans, especially in San Francisco, where Ed Lee is about to become the first Asian American mayor. Read more…
Far East Movement from the cover of Hyphen magazine's Throwback Issue. (Photo by Colin Brennan)
Hyphen magazine’s latest issue is published, and with Far East Movement on the cover, it looks great. We were fortunate to get the hip-hop group for the cover and get an interview with them. Read more…
From left: Me, Jason Lloren, Heather Smith and Steve Mateo get our shot with the San Francisco Giants World Series trophy.
Giants season ticket holders got a chance to have their picture taken with the World Series trophy last week. I took some of my softball teammates and former San Francisco Chronicle colleagues, and we waited in line an hour at our appointed time for our moment. Read more…
Jake Shimabukuro is on the cover of Hyphen's New Legacy Issue.
Hyphen is posting a series of Faces Behind Hyphen Q&As with the top editors and directors of the magazine on its blog over the next week or so. Here’s mine.
Congratulations to former Congressman and cabinet secretary Norman Mineta, who is now part of the permanent collection at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC.Mineta was a pioneer and part of the first wave of Asian Americans politicians to make an impact on our country.
“It is with great pride that we see Secretary Mineta’s remarkable story of leadership and service honored in the Portrait Gallery,” said Konrad Ng, director of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program, in a press release. “He represents the key roles that Asian Pacific Americans have played in US culture, history and politics.” Read more…
The NBA draft is tonight and Harvard’s Jeremy Lin probably won’t be picked, but could catch on with a team as a free agent.
The NBA draft only has two rounds, and most prognosticators don’t believe Lin will be chosen. He played against inferior competition in the Ivy League, and some scouts say that while he’s a great passer for a point guard, his offensive skills may not be ready for the NBA.
In this video, he discusses his workout with the Warriors, and here are some highlights of his college career.
If he hooks up with a team, Lin would be a rare Asian American pro athlete, which is why he has a lot of fans in the Asian American community. Lin wasn’t offered a scholarship from a big-time college program when he graduated from high school, and stereotypes about Asian Americans not being good athletes may have played a role, which he also discusses in this video. But he’s proven the detractors wrong with a nice career at Harvard and could make it to the pros.
Jackie Chan trains Jaden Smith in the remake of "The Karate Kid."
Aly Morita contacted me the other day about publicizing her call for a boycott of the remake of the Karate Kid, saying it’s another example of Hollywood perpetuating stereotypes about Asian Americans. Read more…
There are few Asians or Asian Americans playing major college sports and even fewer South Asians at such a high level. And unlike Jeremy Lin, the brothers have recruiters at big-time college basketball programs salivating at the prospect of having one or both siblings on their teams. While Lin certainly has the skills, the Bhullars’ size sets them apart and makes them tantalizing NBA prospects.
Sim, 17, is 7-4 and 285 pounds. Tanveer, 15, is 7-2 and 265 pounds. Both grew up in Canada and now attend The Kiski School in Saltsburg, PA, near Pittsburgh. Their parents immigrated to Toronto from India and sent their sons to school in the United States to help them enhance their ball skills.
Wouldn’t it be cool if someday the Bhullar brothers and Lin were in the NBA together?
I'm a journalist by trade, working now as a writer, editor and social media manager for the University of California Office of the President. I worked in newspapers for more than 15 years.
