3 Asian Americans and Asian Australians on Screen: Aspiring to Centre the Community Through Comedy
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Sukhmani Khorana
Abstract
This chapter undertakes the work of examining a new kind of aspiration that has collective transformative potential through a close reading of two key Asian American and Asian Australian media texts, and how they have been received by their respective audiences. The texts are Indian American comedian Hasan Minhaj’s Patriot Act series, which aired on Netflix from 2018 to 2020, and Sri Lankan Australian stand-up comic Nazeem Hussain’s Legally Brown series, which appeared on Australia’s ‘multicultural broadcaster’, SBS, in 2013–14. The case study approach employed here pays particular attention to episodes about the status and future of one’s own migrant community, such as Minhaj’s on the importance of the Asian American vote in the 2020 Presidential election and Hussain’s skits on ‘Uncle Sam’ and ‘Muslim Shore’.
Abstract
This chapter undertakes the work of examining a new kind of aspiration that has collective transformative potential through a close reading of two key Asian American and Asian Australian media texts, and how they have been received by their respective audiences. The texts are Indian American comedian Hasan Minhaj’s Patriot Act series, which aired on Netflix from 2018 to 2020, and Sri Lankan Australian stand-up comic Nazeem Hussain’s Legally Brown series, which appeared on Australia’s ‘multicultural broadcaster’, SBS, in 2013–14. The case study approach employed here pays particular attention to episodes about the status and future of one’s own migrant community, such as Minhaj’s on the importance of the Asian American vote in the 2020 Presidential election and Hussain’s skits on ‘Uncle Sam’ and ‘Muslim Shore’.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Acknowledgements vi
- Series Preface ix
- Introduction: Feelings and Migrants Come and Go, and some Stay/Stick 1
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Empathy
- Witnessing as an Expression of Critical Empathy: An Examination of Audience Responses to a Refugee-Themed Documentary 19
- Jacinda Ardern and the Politics of Leadership Empathy: Towards Emotional Communities of Transformation 32
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Aspiration
- Asian Americans and Asian Australians on Screen: Aspiring to Centre the Community Through Comedy 49
- Aspiration for Collective Progress: Diversity and Digital Intimacy as Practised by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (US), Sadiq Khan (UK) and Jagmeet Singh (Canada) 63
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Belonging
- Refugee Storytellers Claim Belonging: Agency, Community and Change Through the Arts 81
- Belonging as Affect: Towards Paradigms for Reciprocal Care in Community-Based Research 94
- Conclusion: Care and Resilience in the Face of Increasing Precarity – COVID-19 and Beyond 108
- References 121
- Index 141
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Acknowledgements vi
- Series Preface ix
- Introduction: Feelings and Migrants Come and Go, and some Stay/Stick 1
-
Empathy
- Witnessing as an Expression of Critical Empathy: An Examination of Audience Responses to a Refugee-Themed Documentary 19
- Jacinda Ardern and the Politics of Leadership Empathy: Towards Emotional Communities of Transformation 32
-
Aspiration
- Asian Americans and Asian Australians on Screen: Aspiring to Centre the Community Through Comedy 49
- Aspiration for Collective Progress: Diversity and Digital Intimacy as Practised by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (US), Sadiq Khan (UK) and Jagmeet Singh (Canada) 63
-
Belonging
- Refugee Storytellers Claim Belonging: Agency, Community and Change Through the Arts 81
- Belonging as Affect: Towards Paradigms for Reciprocal Care in Community-Based Research 94
- Conclusion: Care and Resilience in the Face of Increasing Precarity – COVID-19 and Beyond 108
- References 121
- Index 141
