English 1102: Television and Feminism

Dr. Casey Alane Wilson • Georgia Institute of Technology

Tag: freshofftheboat (Page 2 of 2)

Slight change in direction!: Writing

So I ended up watching Fresh off the Boat, and it’s off to a great start! The cast is definitely very unique and nothing like shows I have previously seen. The writer of this pilot episode is Nahnatchka Khan. Nahnatchka Khan is was on June 17, 1973 and has also been a part of American Dad! and Don’t Trust the B—– in Apartment 23. Khan created Fresh off the Boat with the mindset that minorities are very underrepresented in television. Being part of a minority herself, an Iranian American, Khan experienced what it was like growing up in the United States as a child of foreign parents. The dialogue is very realistic: Khan takes into account how the parents would have an accent, but the children do not. Growing up in American really allowed Khan to imbibe her personal experiences in the writing to make the show more realistic, and so far, she has been very successful. In addition, Khan has found a good line between if the stereotypes she uses are offensive or not. This really adds to the quality of her content because other minorities similar to Eddie’s family would not find that Khan is taking advantage of stereotypes in order to make the content more comical. There are not any voiceovers, that are apparent at least, and in my opinion, this adds to the realness of the show. Something that really stands out to me about Fresh off the Boat is that it reminds me of the show Full House with an awesome twist to it: a large family living together solving family problems with a lot of love. Another important fact about the writing of this show is that it is the first American tv show to star an Asian-American family since All American Girl which first aired in 1994… This is definitely a jump in progress to make American television more similar to life in American, similar to the topic of our class.

I have definitely felt this before lol

Episode 3 of Fresh Off the Boat: Writer’s meaning?

Within the script of Fresh Off the Boat Season 1 Episode 3 “The Shunning”, the writers appear to of cleverly included some moments that are speed through in order to represent a point. These include lines that seem to represent real life problems and how they are often ignored when brought up. Such when Grandma Huang brings up foot binding, “My feet were bound when I was seven.” This reflects the problem of elderly women in China that were the victims of foot binding often being ignored by the general population as when she mentions those lines they are quickly distracted by Louis’s interjection. At the same moment, this kind of passing on shows that this is the type of stuff they expect out of Grandma Huang as it isn’t out of place enough to them for any sort of conversation to happen. The show later  presents the close-mindedness of the neighbor women when Jessica offers them stinky tofu and their unwillingness to try present by Jessica comically saying, “How is this fuller than before?” This also seems to suggest that the Huang family perhaps moved into a more gated neighbor that’s a bit more close off from the world. The writers also cleverly choose to depict Jessica’s characteristic cheap and cold personality by letting Eddie ask her if he could buy Air Jordans without letting Jessica speak as he knew exactly what his mom would say. Later at the block party, the neighborhood women says that Jessica is cutting the cake evenly “Because of the communism in your country?” This is again is used to show the neighborhood women as being ignorant and gated, as since the Huang family are from Taiwan, they don’t come from a communist country but rather a capitalistic one. The writers later highlight the focus of Louis Huang with “You know who win every race? The advertising companies.” This showing that what’s foremost in his mind is the sucess of the restaurant. While grandma Huang response to the NASCAR race was “At those speeds it wouldn’t take much tampering to get revenge on your enemies.” This either suggest the dark personality that she has, or some dark intention that she is planning out just being hinted at. The writers do well to seek the lines in giving a different viewing experience to those that pay close attention and have active imaginations.

Implication that she was a victim of the common tradition of foot binding that was in China for much of history.

 

Fresh Off a Netflix Binge

Hey, y’all! My name is Bailey Moore and I’m from Norcross, GA. I’m a first- year BME student here at GT with a Spanish minor and an anticipated graduation date of 2022 (probably, hopefully, maybe in December #relatable ).

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me, still shook that we get to call enjoying TV homework

I was in the IB Diploma Programme in high school which meant a LOT of writing and speeches and more writing. This is my first English course at Tech, so I’m enjoying a little bit of a twist to the old monotonous English classes I dreaded in high school. Can you tell I’m a STEM major? I do, however, enjoy making infographics and doing oral presentations, especially creative ones rather than the long literary analysis speeches I’m used to because I feel interested and engaged myself when I use those methods of communication and I feel that the comfort and confidence of the communicator has a large effect on how the message is communicated. I struggle with nonverbal communication mainly because I haven’t practiced it or really looked into its significance. I am hoping to improve my nonverbal and electronic communication this semester, especially with infographics, body language, and voice tone, because I feel that they could contribute to making me appear more put- together and knowledgeable than I may be.

In reference to the course theme, I have a ton of experience with both TV and Feminism. I watch Netflix more than I’d like to admit and I even have a tattoo on my wrist of the equal sign which I got after the Women’s March here in ATL, but I haven’t previously combined these two passions, so I’m excited to see what the course has to offer. I also tend to watch the same types of shows when I watch. For leisure, I watch laid- back adult comedies like Modern Family, Bob’s Burgers, and The Big Bang Theory, and for Netflix binges, I go for thrilling dramas like Bloodline, Sherlock, and  Stranger Things. I hope that this course will show me new types of shows and let me expand my thinking about TV and how it can reflect our culture as an art form.

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I guess you could say I’m kinda an expert. heh. (10 points if you understand why I chose Emma Watson for this)

 

For this semester, I have chosen to review Fresh Off the Boat because I like that it shines a light on immigrants in America and I want to widen my scope of TV viewing to include a wider range of characters. It is about a first- generation Asian- American teenager who is uprooted from Chinatown DC to suburban Orlando with his family as his father chases the American Dream. Although the show is humorous, I also think that immigration is a huge topic in our political climate right now and I’m interested to see what opinion this show will argue. With that said, let’s get binging!!

 

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me, in the car, constantly irritating my friends by singing loudly and not well

 

An individual’s English 1102 Introduction

Hello to all passersby, I’m Nelson Jiang. I’m currently a Material Science and Engineering major (subject to be changed with little notice), and I’m expected to be a 2022 Graduate (might be a bit of a stretch).

English 1102 is my first English class at GA Tech as I had taken the standard AP English (AP Lang & AP Lit) pathway in high school and was lucky enough to get the credit for English 1101. As I’ve struggled with languages in my early life, my relationship with English has not been good often being the class I struggle the most in. I enjoy and would like to improve my written and oral communication. However what I most struggle in would be nonverbal and visual communication, those are two communication skills that I still haven’t quite got the hang of yet. Interpretation of nonverbal and visual communication is a bit hard for me, and I’m often unable to understand the meaning that the author had intended. I really hope to get better with the entire spectrum of WOVEN communication.

As with the theme of the course, I haven’t watched television in perhaps four to five years and even then most of what I had watched were kiddie educational cartoons. I did really like Curious George and Martha Speaks as a kid. Most of my viewing screen time goes to YouTube. Most of what I know from television, I’ve picked up from conversations with my friends. As for feminism, I have a habit of wanting to stay in the middle as a moderate and avoid the two divisive sides of politics, so I don’t know much about feminism. Though I do hope to learn more about it, if possible in a nonpolitical sense. My experience with feminism is mostly limited to the Feminist Critique from AP Lit and learning about feminism in history classes.

I’ll be reviewing Fresh Off the Boat for my blog entries. The show is loosely based on Eddie  Huang and his book Fresh Off the Boat. It’s about Chinese-Taiwanese family, from Chinatown in Washington,DC, that sets up a restaurant in Orlando, Florida with a dad that loves the American Dream, a mom that struggles to understand the culture, and kids that try to fit in. The family tries to fit into American cultural; whilst struggling to maintain a sense of their own Taiwanese culture. I choose this by looking through the entire list of recommended shows, looking through their synopsis, and watching the first 10 minutes of each show that interested me. I choose Fresh Off the Boat over the other shows on the list as I felt it was the first time I’ve seen a show try to connect with the upbringing of a first-generation Asian-American family. I connect with it as my sibling and me are first generation Asian-Americans with an immigrant family from China.

This was my parents at the end of each term during most of my school career.

A Piece of my Life

Hey guys! My name is Justin Lau and I grew up in a small city called Ellicott City in Maryland. It’s serene, suburban, and about 20 minutes from Baltimore. My declared major for Tech is Computer Engineering and my anticipated year of graduation is 2022.

In general, English has always not been my subject. Throughout high school, I disliked every moment of English because it was so boring: all we did was read required novels I never cared about, learn grammar/writing skills, and discuss nonchalant daily topics. Long story short, I was never particularly good at English, and I never really enjoyed it. However, I was a summer freshman this past semester at Tech and I took English 1101. It was the first English class I actually didn’t mind taking. Professor Tobias-Bates taught the class and I genuinely enjoyed it because there wasn’t overwhelming work, the projects were fun to do, and the topics we discussed in class were easy to talk about. I struggled mainly with argumentative writing and forming clear points in my essays. I often get too caught up in incorporating advanced vocabulary and making my writing sound more “sophisticated” that it can sometimes result in confusion with the flow of the sentence. Despite this, forms of communication I enjoy are utilizing social media to share life moments and my thoughts and talking to people in person, which represent the electronic and oral nodes of communication.

On the other hand, I am a total TV fanatic; I love binge watching Netflix shows and eating unhealthy junk foods that I know are bad for me. However, that was during high school, I have not had much time to keep up with shows and watch in college, but I hope to return to my old ways in this class. The last show I binge-watched was Friends, a true classic.

The TV show I have chosen to review is Fresh Off The Boat because this show seems extremely hilarious, not to mention the main characters of the show are Asians and will face struggles that I can relate to personally because of my parents’ first generation background. I am excited to dive into the lives of Eddie, his parents, and his two brothers, and I can’t wait to update you guys!

A picture of the family that is mainly explored in the show.

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