This page was created by Eli Simon. The last update was by Kate Mcinerny.
Cultural Politics
What is cultural politics?
Politics touch nearly every aspect of human life—the food we eat, the streets we walk on, the cars we drive, the people we marry, the medication we take. Thus, our initial question became: how are we going to define politics? Where are we going to focus our argument? Electoral politics denotes the traditional way we think about politics—the governmental structures by which representatives are elected and laws are created. Legislation such as the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the California Alien Land Law of 1914 are a few examples of electoral politics at work. And while there is much to be said about the legislation that emerged out of this time period, we wanted to take our project a step further. We didn’t just want to ask what, we wanted to ask why? Why were these laws passed? Why did a group of hardworking immigrants fleeing land shortages, seeking financial security, become targets of xenophobia and institutional discriminaton? We arrived, in the end, at a different form of politics: cultural politics. Cultural politics revolves around questions of representation. In particular, cultural politics focuses on how various facets of culture—media, entertainment, literature—shape public perception and make way for legal realities. Cultural politics often informs electoral politics. In order to understand why local and state legislators were moved to restrict Chinese immigration and limit their access to land ownership, we must understand how Chinese-Americans were perceived in the first place.This page has paths:
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