scholarly journals Fetal citizens? Birthright citizenship, reproductive futurism, and the “panic” over Chinese birth tourism in southern California

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean H. Wang
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Southern California ◽  
Fourteenth Amendment ◽  
The Past ◽  
Birthright Citizenship ◽  
The Future ◽  
The U.S

In September 2012, residents of Chino Hills, California—a wealthy suburb of Los Angeles—exposed a maternity hotel in their city. Subsequently, controversy erupted as protesting residents argued that Chinese birth tourism is an immigration loophole, where foreigners took advantage of jus soli birthright citizenship guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This paper uses this controversy as a springboard to explore how temporalities—both the past and the future—come to shape politics in the present. Considering reproductive futurism in the contexts of citizenship and migrations, this paper argues that the figure of the fetal citizen emerges as the defining site of struggle between preserving, or exposing, the fantasy of a national future. Reports of panic over Chinese birth tourism, then, show how “backwards” racialized citizenship is continually brought to this present struggle, especially vis-a-vis discourses of the “worthy immigrant” and “anchor babies”, to determine who may give birth to citizens in the U.S.

scholarly journals Fetal citizens? Birthright citizenship, reproductive futurism, and the “panic” over Chinese birth tourism in southern California

2016 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 263-280 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean H Wang
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Southern California ◽  
Fourteenth Amendment ◽  
The Past ◽  
Birthright Citizenship ◽  
The Future ◽  
The U.S

In September 2012, residents of Chino Hills, California—a wealthy suburb of Los Angeles—exposed a maternity hotel in their city. Subsequently, controversy erupted as protesting residents argued that Chinese birth tourism is an immigration loophole, where foreigners took advantage of jus soli birthright citizenship guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This paper uses this controversy as a springboard to explore how temporalities—both the past and the future—come to shape politics in the present. Considering reproductive futurism in the contexts of citizenship and migrations, this paper argues that the figure of the fetal citizen emerges as the defining site of struggle between preserving, or exposing, the fantasy of a national future. Reports of panic over Chinese birth tourism, then, show how “backwards” racialized citizenship is continually brought to this present struggle, especially vis-a-vis discourses of the “worthy immigrant” and “anchor babies”, to determine who may give birth to citizens in the U.S.

Excavating the Future

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shawn Malley
Keyword(s):  
Popular Culture ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Cultural Study ◽  
Homeland Security ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
Adaptive Responses ◽  
Film And Television ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
The U.S

Well-known in popular culture for tomb-raiding and mummy-wrangling, the archaeologist is also a rich though often unacknowledged figure for constructing ‘strange new worlds’ from ‘strange old worlds’ in science fiction. But more than a well-spring for scenarios, SF’s archaeological imaginary is also a hermeneutic tool for excavating the ideological motivations of digging up the past buried in the future. A cultural study of an array of popular though critically neglected North American SF film and television texts–spanning the gamut of telefilms, pseudo-documentaries, teen serial drama and Hollywood blockbusters–Excavating the Future treats archaeology as a trope for exploring the popular archaeological imagination and the uses to which it is being put by the U.S. state and its adversaries. By treating SF texts as documents of archaeological experience circulating within and between scientific and popular culture communities and media, Excavating the Future develops critical strategies for analyzing SF film and television’s critical and adaptive responses to contemporary geopolitical concerns about the war on terror, homeland security, the invasion and reconstruction of Iraq, and the ongoing fight against ISIS.

scholarly journals Postcards from the future

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 12-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristin Miller
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Southern California ◽  
Northern California ◽  
Bay Area ◽  
The Future ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
Photo Essay ◽  
The Way

This article contemplates the way Northern and Southern California have been used in science fiction films since the 1970s. Continuing a trend the author traces to the 1940s novels Earth Abides and Ape and Essence, Northern California represents possible utopian futures while Southern California represents dystopia. The article includes a photo essay featuring science fiction film stills held up against their filming locations in Los Angeles and the Bay Area.

Conclusion

Lewd Looks ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elena Gorfinkel
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Film Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Historical Past

There is no better place to end than in the desires for the future of the past, of sexploitation cinema’s febrile imaginary, materialized by a sex film and reflexively about the sex film as a waning form. In the year 2427, a futuristic culture lives on in what remains of Los Angeles, which was ravaged by an earthquake in 1969. The society is ruled by “Master Computer” and a secret group of cult film viewers gathers each week to view cherished “underground” films from the film historical past, “decadent films which have been outlawed in these enlightened times.” These covert rebels, led by Liana and Jorel, screen sex films from 1969; they espouse the beauty and allure of an extinct film culture that appears to be the “last hope for our civilization.” Our fearless cinephile, Liana, acts as the master of ceremonies, informing her polyamourous congregants—who lie about a mod white set in gold and silver metallic garments—that before censorship was outlawed by Master Computer, such “highly moral films” still existed and circulated freely, artifacts of a culture invested in love and romance....

scholarly journals The National, All-crops Plant Breeding Coordinating Committee

HortScience ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 991C-991
Author(s):  
Linda Wessel-Beaver ◽  
Ann Marie Thro
Keyword(s):  
Plant Breeding ◽  
Recent Progress ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Committee Membership ◽  
National Workshop ◽  
The U.S

The Plant Breeding Coordinating Committee will be a forum for leadership regarding issues, problems, and opportunities of long-term strategic importance to the contribution of plant breeding to national goals. The committee will create the only regular opportunity to provide such leadership across all crops. The nature of plant breeding as an integrative discipline par excellence will be reflected in multidisciplinary committee membership. The past decade has brought major changes in the U.S. national plant breeding investment. In order for administrators and other decisionmakers to understand the implications of the changes and respond most effectively for the future, there is need for a clear analysis of the role of plant breeding for meeting national goals. Although recent changes in investment are the impetus for this committee, the need to articulate the role of plant breeding in meeting national goals is likely to be on-going, regardless of immediate circumstances. This presentation will describe recent progress on organizing this committee, and will ask all plant breeders to begin thinking about the questions to be addressed at the upcoming national workshop.

scholarly journals Writings of Lions: Narrative Inquiry of a Kenyan Couple Living in the U.S

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miranda Gilmore ◽  
Marianne Miller
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Narrative Inquiry ◽  
Southern California ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Life ◽  
The Past ◽  
Interpretive Analysis ◽  
Analysis Process ◽  
Core Components ◽  
The U.S

In this study, we told the story of a Kenyan couple, B. and F., who has left Kenya and moved to Southern California. We followed a narrative inquiry framework, using Clandinin and Connelly’s (2000) guidelines. We delineated core components of narrative inquiry research, as well as related the journey of B. and F., who have created dual lives in both Kenya and the United States. As part of the interpretive analysis process, we integrated the first author’s experiences, both in interviewing the couple and in volunteering in Kenya in previous years. The final product is an intersection of Kenyan and American life that weaves back - and - forth between B. and F.’s and the first author’s chronicle, and between the past and the present.

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