Third Year Hon. Mention: Childhood, Ethnic Representation and Growing Up in Toronto During the 1990s-2000s

HUMA 3692, Representation of Children's Alterity. CD: Krys Verrall.

Abstract

The assignment asked students to use a classmate as a research subject to formulate a collaborative ethnography that would explore notions of memory and girlhood in the formation of identity and alterity through the analysis of a cultural object of significance to their childhood. This thoughtful and accessible essay analyzes how a fourth-generation Japanese-Canadian student formulated her notions of race, ethnicity, nationality, historical placement, and gender through her fascination with a “Kokeshi doll,” a Japanese wooden artifact. As she faced white dominant ideologies and the mistaken notion that she was Chinese-Canadian, the author concludes, Emily read the Kokeshi doll as a text and an act of resistance against marginalization.