#filipino queer film

[fiercynn]

queer short film: "contestant #4"

queer short cuts is a biweekly newsletter where i share queer & trans short film recommendations. i’m featuring some of my favorite films on tumblr because why not

philippines | 19 minutes | 2016 | narrative short audio in filipino; english subtitles embedded on youtube, and subtitles available in simplified and traditional chinese, english, and thai on gagaoolala

contestant #4, written and directed by celeste lapida and kaj palanca, drifts along slowly and gently through its nineteen-minute runtime, but no minute feels boring or wasted. the protagonist (joel saracho), an older man who lives alone, receives periodic visits from a nineteen-year-old boy (elijah canlas, who fans of filipino queer media may know from the hit series gameboys); their exact relationship is never explained to us, but they have an easy camaraderie where canlas’s character enters the protagonist’s house freely, often bringing food and helping him with chores while teasing him about his solitary and old-fashioned lifestyle. their connection is strengthened when canlas’s character is able to be open with saracho’s character about his sexuality. deepa's full review, including content notes at the end of the post

in addition to youtube, you can also watch the film on gagaoolala, and read more about how film creators celeste lapida and kaj palanca wrote and directed the film when they were 16!

[kalakian]

Saan ba 'to pwedeng panuorin? Sa sobrang aligaga ko kasi sa trabaho, 'yung Here Comes The Groom lang ang napanuod ko, e.

[gyroshrike]

HEY, A REALLY GOOD FRIEND ASKED ME TO SHARE THIS! We've worked together on a lot of films and projects and now their cousin is trying to fund their own film!

"My name is Rez Redacted, I am a queer transmasc Filipino filmmaker in the Seattle area and have little to no representation of myself in the stories I would watch on the big screen, so for this project, I'm taking it upon myself to give Filipinos like me a chance to see ourselves completely. This includes having a full Filipino main principle cast and attempting to have the best 2010s realism with miniDV footage. Of course, like any broke college kid in this country, I just need help funding this big gay dream."

I'd super love if anyone has any spare dollars to throw at this project. I can 100% vouch for it. It's only got FIVE DAYS LEFT as of February 25th, 2024! If you can't donate, I'd really love a share. Please help support southeast asian filmmakers!

[celluloidrainbow]

SEÑORITA (2011) dir. Isabel Sandoval Donna, a transgender sex worker in Manila, moves back to her small hometown in search of a new life. Once there, she reunites with her child, who knows her as his aunt, and becomes caught up in the intrigues surrounding a critical local election, working to unseat the corrupt mayor, a fight which soon becomes quite personal. (link in title)

[milkyberryjsk]

every single time a cool queer movie comes out and overseas friends talk about it i frown and grit my teeth and stare at the sky in frustration

[pariwara]

hi guys i really want to be more active here since i've kind of closed my other social media accs and i want to limit myself to just one :P PLEASE BE MY FRIEND PLEAAASE!!!!!! let's be mutuals :3

i'll mention some of the stuff i like in the tags

btw my name's rian i'm 21 and i'm honestly in the middle of a gender crisis so please use he/him pronouns for now jadhjsjsjshsa

[motziedapul]

SUPPORT A QUEER FILIPINO ANIMATED FILM! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🇵🇭

Do you wanna see more queer and trans animated films, especially from Filipino creators?

If you're following me I assume you do, so:

CHECK OUT THIS AMAZING ANIMATED FILM BY MY DEAR FRIEND AVID!

@misteravid

Zsazsa Zaturnnah is a Filipino icon; a queer comic book superhero who's spawned many franchises, including TV shows, films, and even a musical.

The original comics are by the legendary Carlo Vergara!

A shy gay male*** salon worker named Ada finds a magic stone and eats it, transforming into the bombastic bodacious superwoman Zaturnnah.

With her newfound superpowers, Zsazsa fights against the alien Amazonistas and their many monsters, from giant chickens to zombies.

It's a comedic, action-packed, heartfelt film from the wonderful and talented Animators in the Philippines, who've been animating American cartoons for years, but rarely get to tell our own stories.

***This would take a longer discussion about queerness in the Philippines, but there's a lot of overlap between gay men, transwomen, and drag queens in the Philippines, under the term "bakla". Very often, this identity is attached to an expression of femininity by someone assigned male at birth. Because pronouns are not gendered in the Philippines, whether someone sees themselves as gay, trans, nonbinary, etc, is up to the person, even if they're all "bakla". Ada is, in international discussions, referred to as a gay man; but it's important to note he shows an adoration for his feminine body as Zsa zsa that may resonate with transfem readers. I'll continue to refer to Ada as "he" and Zsazsa as "she", but it's important to note that this is due to the gendered nature of discussing this in English, and culturally, there are nuances in the Philippines around the fluidity of gender as a result of our non-gendered pronouns. Thank you!

THE FUNDRAISER IS SO CLOSE TO THEIR GOAL WITH ONLY 16 DAYS TO GO, SO PLEASE SUPPORT IT AND SPREAD IT AROUND!

For the sake of Filipino animation, for the sake of international, Asian, Pinoy queer rep, and for the sake of longtime fans like myself: HELP US MAKE THIS HAPPEN!

✨SUPPORT IT ON KICKSTARTER HERE✨

[respectthepetty]

Gagaoolala has Golden Delicious which is a Canadian film about a Chinese Canadian teen who joins the basketball team, but when his new neighbor also joins the team, his world is turned upside down!

It did the festival rounds last year and won a few awards, but the real prize is the film is a basically a love letter from out director Jason Karman to himself.

So for those of you who are only using your Gaga subscription for QL purposes, just know it has other crowd pleasers, AND it's getting the Filipino drama The Boy Foretold by the Stars and Love Beneath the Stars, which tell the story of two boys falling in love at a Catholic school, and features Adrian Lindayag who also played the lead in Marahuyo Project.

You're already paying the fee, so might as well venture out.

[misteravid]

Zaturnnah & Sirena

(Share our Kickstarter bit.ly/zaturnnah) "Sirena" is the Filipino word for "mermaid" but it's also slang for being gay. The origin of the term comes from a 1980s "comedy" sketch on local tv where a stereotypical macho father pushes down the head of his effeminate son into a drum of water then pulls them up & shouts "Are you a boy or a girl?!" the child says "Girl" then gets pushed down the water again & again until they beg the father to stop. "ARE YOU A BOY OR A GIRL?!!" Just when you think the tortured child would say "Boy" they weakly mutter "Sirena (Mermaid)" Canned laughter follows. End Scene. Child abuse as a joke. Those were, dumber, scarier times.

"Sirena" has since been more popularly known as a local Pride anthem by the artist Gloc9. The song tells the story of a father violently ashamed of his gay son. Said father eventually grows old & sick with no one caring for him until the very son he drove away comes back. He is humbled, sees the error of his ways & asks for forgiveness. It's a great song, look it up. Pop culture trivia aside, thank you to the kind humans of Studio Heartbreak for boosting our crowdfunding signal

Please help us make the Zsazsa Zaturnnah film (bit.ly/zaturnnah) & help grow queer cinema in the animated medium.

P.S. The Sirena music video of Gloc9 features a cameo by the creator of Zsazsa Zaturnnah.

[clairedaring]

hello claire, love your blog! i want to ask you a question about vietnamese fandom of thai pop culture, is it very big or just dedicated? i did notice that i often can find something translated into vietnamese (especially if we are talking about tpop interviews) while i can't find eng subs for it, and i started noticing it even more after a couple of weeks ago you pointed out another vietnamese blogger who has more access to obscure thai BLs than non-vietnamese bloggers. i am curious now, what's up with that? thank you in advance!

hiiiii \(￣︶￣*\))

i loveeee getting questions about thai pop culture and vietnamese fandom. for the short answer, i would say that it's both a combination of dedicated fandom and a sizable fandom. but please bare with me in my lengthy elaboration of this phenomenon...

i think the first form of 'thai pop culture' that was popularised and successfully exported to viet nam was thai lakorns. in a similar vein to older makjang korean dramas, thai lakorns had very soap opera and dramatic plots that were intriguing to viewers (mostly older grandmas who were at home). it was as if at a certain point, when vietnamese tv channels were running out of kdramas to buy the airing rights to, they looked to their neighboring countries dramas (notably, vietnamese networks were also buying rights to filipino, indian, spanish telenovelas so it wasn't just thai lakorns that they were outsourcing).

and so this was like around early 2010s, which also coincided with the emergence of thai bl series. even though i have absolutely no statistics to back this argument up, i would say that the familiarity that a portion of vietnamese audience had with thai lakorns, thai television, thai language also made it easy for them to get into thai bl series. with a number of thai-vietnamese lakorn fansubbers who were already subbing for thai series, they also took on the fansubbing for thai bl series, since they knew there was a niche but large audience who wanted to watch those series.

that being said, i wanted to make a distinction here because i wouldn't say that the vietnamese lakorn audience are the same audience who watch thai bls or they are the same fujoshi fandom who consume all things queer love/boys' love/girls' love related. but there is definitely a huge overlap between the fujoshis/sao y audience and the lakorn audience, which ended up as a very niche yet dedicated audience -> which was the biggest motivation for thai subbers to take on the subbing for thai bl series and anything related for certain thai actors who had been in bl series which are often lakorns that they've done before.

and i think you're referring to this post of mine about me finding out that @nonkul is a fellow vietnamese which allow us to have more access to "obscure lakorns". rather than this having to do with thai fansubbers for bl series/bl series related content/"bl actors" content, i think there's just more of vietnamese networks which are committed to outsourcing thai lakorns to air them (especially ones with big lakorn names attached to it like mai davika, baifern pimchanok, james jirayu, yaya urassaya, tor thanapob, film thanapat, esther supreeleela...). there are many local vietnamese networks who provide their own streaming services like tv360, fptplay... so they would often go to these film/tv series festivals to "shop" for thai series, allowing them to provide them exclusively in viet nam on both tv or their streaming site.

but to go back to the main subject of your question which is thai pop culture/tpop interviews, i would say that it's very much the result of 2-3 dedicated fansubbers with an equally dedicated audience who are willing to engage/interact with the content put out by the fansubbers. i've also come across a number of former kpop fans converted into tpop fandoms, so i could also see where the dedication-ness is coming from in trying to sub actor-related content.

but that also means that not very actors/ships will get dedicated fansubbers though. i think it mostly depends on how lucky a ship/an actor is to have a long time lakorn/thai series watcher/subber take an interest in them and they'll start basically subbing everything related to a series/ship/actor/group basically. it really does help that a majority of thai lakorn/series watchers have been watching thai series for so long, they're more likely to pick up the language along the way -> it's easier for you to see vietnamese translations for these kinds of content from thai actors/singers.

i know there are a lot of assumptions and generalised statements in my answer and it may not be the case for all the vietnamese fansubbers out there so please just take this with a grain of salt as it's mostly my perspective, after talking to a few fansubbers here and there. ƪ(˘⌣˘)ʃ

but i was really happy to get this question in my inbox though. i'm always over the moon to be sharing perspective of a vietnamese lakorn/thai series/tpop enthusiast.

[youranemicvampire]

My favorite shows and movies that i've watched in 2023

Barbie (2023)

Always been a sucker for great production and costume design. Feminism aside, it’s so fun and smart with all the references. I just don’t like the Ken hype. He’s fun, sure, but a lot of fans are missing the point or just proving the message of the story.

Bottoms (2023)

Need more lesbian chaos as a comedy fan. Sapphic softcore is ok of course, but you know, there should be a variety of WLW cinema. Perfect also for the Y2K nostalgia. ‘Bring It On’ fan here!

Nocebo (2022)

I actually watched it last year, but it was too late to be on my 2022 list. Underrated political-horror film. Underrated cast! It should’ve had the same hype with Parasite and Triangle of Sadness. For me, it was simple and well-written. The structure of the story was smart but easy to absorb.

About Us But Not About Us (2022)

The first and last single-location film that I watched was Kisaragi (2007) and I’ve been waiting for something like that since then. One of the most important things i look for a media is the script so i really enjoyed it especially when they switched characters. Very intriguing.

The Little Mermaid (2023)

Been waiting for this since 2019! I’ve been a fan of Halle Bailey since that announcement. I rarely watch things on the cinema, but it’s something i couldn’t miss. Beautiful, pure and magical. Perfect casting and amazing chemistry!

Si Chedeng At Si Apple (2017)

Another chaotic lesbian film, but make it Filipino! It was funny and bloooody just like Bottoms so if you liked it then you should try this one. Not a spoiler, but part of the plot: That lady in yellow killed her abusive husband.

Maria Clara At Ibarra (2022)

I haven’t finished it yet! But i would recommend it! Brought back my trust and love for Filipino series. If you are not Filipino, it’s a good way to learn our history. Fun, written with passion + great set and costume design.

Mga Lihim Ni Urduja (2023)

After Maria Clara at Ibarra, i became more interested in Filipino series especially with historical fiction. This one is so underrated and empowering! Has the prettiest and hottest cast tbh and a queer undertone *wink*

Betcin (2021)

I have to say that this is the best Filo GL/WLW so far. It has an actual interesting story and interesting characters. Both leads are toxic AF, but it was sooooo entertaining. Top tier chemistry. Top tier acting!

Swarm (2023)

As a Beyhive, i don’t really like how they chose us coz there are more crazy fandoms out there, but still watched and finished it because of Dominique Fishback. SHE IS AMAZING. She deserves awards for this portrayal alone.

Ang Babae Sa Septik Tank 3: The Real Untold Story of Josephine Bracken (2011)

Another mockumentary that is to die (of laughter) for! I’ve always wanted to finish the trilogy, but i started with this because of history. Frustratingly funny. I don’t know if i would root for her or not lmao 

The ultimatum: Queer love (2023)

I admit, watching reality shows is my guilty pleasure so imagine my excitement when it’s full of queer women??? The dramaaaa lmao i need more seasons of just sapphics. It’s also a cool and chaotic concept tho. I thought it was just a normal dating show at first. 

Physical 100 (2023)

This is my kind of reality show! I hope it will have multiple versions from different countries. The best thing about it is how fitness is really measured by getting competitors from different backgroundsand giving them different challenges. 

Rookie (2023)

The most anticipated movie of the Filipino sapphics! And if you’re a volleyball fan? I’m sure this would be automatically on your list. It’s just so cute and wholesome. 

Ladies First: A story of women in Hip Hop (2023)

Must watch! Not only for the history of the rap girlies, but to trace back the struggles they faced and are still facing. You might discover talented women to stan in your music or lyrical style too.

[fiercynn]

queer short cuts week 29: intergenerational queer community

queer short cuts is a biweekly newsletter where i share queer & trans short film recommendations; each set of films is themed and comes out to no more than one hour cumulatively. content notes are included at the end of each post. you can also check out the full spreadsheet of films i've recommended.

this week’s theme is intergenerational queer community: about characters who have forged connections across age gaps and across experiences. whether those relationships become short-term or lifelong, seeing the differences and common places between older and younger queer folks are meaningful for our characters, and for us.

check out the film recs!

[kalakian]

Appreciation post para kay Romnick Sarmienta na nanalong Best Actor para sa kanyang pagganap sa About Us But Not About Us noong Summer Metro Manila Film Festival.

[psi0nics]

Spider-Gwen is Very Likely Trans in Across the Spider-Verse, says One More Person

But this shit matters.

I've rewatched Across the Spider-Verse for probably the eighth time recently, and it continues to be blaringly obvious to me that Gwen is most likely a trans girl. I'm most certainly not the only one to have pointed this out, and I don't really think I'm adding anything new. But we need as many voices to speak up, I feel, and I might as well share what I think of it. Now, this little essay is going to focus mainly from the movie's material alone since I'm not much of a comic reader, and it'll be limited to my own experience as a Filipino trans girl who really wants to express some thoughts.

Spoilers ahead!

Across the Spider-Verse explores the journey of Miles Morales after the first film, Into the Spider-Verse, where he rises up to the mantle of Spider-Man. Now, we follow him as he fights to be recognized as Spider-Man by the rest of Spider-Society, who reject him for factors out of his control—and yet he made the best of them, took pride in them, and rose up to become Spider-Man in all the ways that matter. Unfortunately, the exact circumstances, Spider-Society doesn't like—represented by Miguel O'Hara. From all that I've heard and read, a lot of Miles's story strongly being a very Black story, drawing from Miles being Afro-Latino, and though the story itself never shows racism nor do the different universes explicitly show systemic discrimination and whatnot, his story still clearly draws from that. Miguel O'Hara isn't some racist white dude excluding Miles because he's Afro-Latino, Miguel is an Irish-Mexican man and the entire theme of the Spider-Society is that it is extremely diverse and open. But that doesn't mean that the institution that it represents in the context of literally everything Rio Morales, Miles's Mother, tells him. To remember where he's from, to not let those big institutions tell Miles that he doesn't belong there, and all these things that are brimming with subtext.

The subtext is there, and it's all intentional.

Then there's Gwen Stacy. Who, for her entire arc of the film, hinges on a relationship setup from the beginning—her father, George Stacy. Now, for a lot of trans people, including me, we found it striking that that arc felt pretty queer-coded. Now, by itself, there's nothing much to be gleaned, just Gwen struggling with the fact that she's forced to reveal her superhero identity to her dad in a tense moment, ripping them apart, and later reconciling. Now, I'm quite young for a queer person, but I'm aware of the history of all these subtle things or narratives about identity being all that queer people had in the mainstream for a very, very long time.

But these days, we celebrate every win, for every explicitly queer character, for every confirmation from creators where they couldn't explicitly show anything in the material (except for Rowling bullshit, fuck that fake shit), and every hold that we're constantly fighting for. I know I'm speaking for a lot of people when I say we are so happy to see so many gay and bi characters see the mainstream's spotlights, be left unquestioned, that I, someone on the other side of the world, am left in positive awe whenever I see some middle-aged white dudes casually say, "My daughter's girlfriend." But of course, it's always a fight. We can't be complacent, because for every win, people will always try to tear it down, and I know I just happen to be in pretty inclusive online communities to see what I see in the west. There, people queer sexualities still fight. Here, people still fight. Queer identities will never stop fighting.

All this to say, what of Gwen? Well, one of the moments that made me think about her this way was when I was putting the little hints together. Because her arc does not stand in isolation. Her arc is literally colored by transness. From the big trans flag above her door, the trans colors that literally paint her and her world, the reflections that show her other identity, her reconciliation with her father hitting us with "They can only know half of who I am," the acceptance, and even the tiniest bit of Mary Jane's voice over talking about raising a child that's different than everyone else and learning to learn as a parent, and all these details. Hell, she even hangs out with Hobie Brown, whose entire thing is anarchism, the rejection of what society has considered the norm for bullshit reasons, to hang out with a radical leftist—and as one of those, there's not any other group (or at least from my experience) quite as intersectional with solidarity with marginalized groups as radlefts. To those who say, "Maybe she's just an ally," I challenge you: why would the film stop there?

Why does the film that goes out of its way to casually show more people of color as normal, to show people with disabilities playing basketball, to show an entire arc about Miles striving to fight the institutions that want to keep him down, to drive with progress, to drive the narrative that anyone can be behind the mask, why would it stop at making Gwen Stacy a trans girl?

And very similar to Miles, of course there's no one explicitly transphobic nor are any groups shown to be that. It's a more personal story, and is more subtle about it. And it's crazy how much this reminds of when I grew up watching The Legend of Korra, when Korra and Asami's relationship was only some endgame thing and hinted at with a "vacation." Gay people didn't have that much there. Not much in other places in the mainstream either. They started making their own, of course. Through fan-fiction, through art, making their own stories. But fortunately (I say with as much dripping sarcasm as I can) capitalism now sees it as a big enough market for billionaires to profit off of. (Which is, in a very dystopian way, a win.) And now, it's eerily familiar to see trans people get the same treatment now, stuck in a limbo of infrequent and rare representation in the mainstream if we aren't clawing for every inch.

So, while Miguel O'Hara isn't a racist authoritarian, George Stacy isn't a transphobe—not when he goes out of his way to wear trans flags (and no, it's not a trick of the light; nothing is a trick of the light, it's all intentional in animation). But the conflicts they represent aren't any less meaningful in the subtext. And that means a lot for people who are fighting tooth and nail to be recognized.

And all of this, too, is representative of one of the first and second film's main themes. It's not that it doesn't matter who's behind the mask, it's that it can be anyone behind the mask, carrying with them all the richness of their experiences, bringing forth a Spider-Person unlike any other. And in the second film, to defy the patterns and labels set by the institutions that govern our lives, doing things like using fear and preserving an order for some grand picture.

So, I'm pretty sure Gwen Stacy is trans. What does it add to the story? Nothing. Being cis never added much to the story.

But for someone like me, it's doing a lot. It gives me hope.

[nakibistan]

Allah Loves Equality - A Voice for LGBTQIA+ Muslims & Minorities

🌈☪️Allah Loves Equality is a revolutionary campaign that was started by a Pakistani Gay Muslim Activist Wajahat Abbas Kazmi The campaign amplified the voices of marginalised womxn including Queer womxn,Pakistani LGBTQ community as well as LGBTQIA+ muslims.Hashtag #AllahLovesEquality has been trending since 2016.The campaign gain both supports & criticisms. Through his campaign,wajahat wanted to spread the message of TRUE Islam,wanted to end hate & bigotry within muslim societies.The message of ''Allah Loves Equality'' was spred across the continents.A documentary film by the same name was directed by Wajahat Abbas Kazmi to documents the lives of queer muslims in Islamic State of Pakistan🇵🇰 It was a very courageous thing that he has done.Like A jihad for Love,Poshida:Pakistan's Hidden LGBT, Allah Loves Equality film abled to show Pakistan's underground queer & sexual minority.

Wajahat Abbas Kazmi campaigning in Pride March of Italy 🇮🇹🇵🇰🏳️‍🌈

Turkish Gay muslim model is holding #AllahLovesEquality

#AllahLoveEquality in Europe's first Muslim LGBTQ+ Pride 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈☪️

A Queer Palestianian holding #AllahLovesEquality in Jerusalem Pride.

Filipino Muslim Filmmaker Rhadem Musawah marching with #AllahLovesEquality 🇵🇭🏳️‍🌈

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

reading updates: september 2023

AHOY EVERYBODY!!! the end of the month has really crept up on me and lo, I have no finished as many books as I thought I would by this point! but so it goes.

also I'm fighting for my life trying to get through all of the library books I have checked out, which is a bummer because there are a bunch of creepy books I want to start reading for Spooky Month! but time is an illusion and I've already made my peace with Spooky Month extending into November, so whatever happens happens, babey! but that's the future, right now we need to talk about what I've been reading for the past month.

A View from the Bottom: Asian American Masculinity and Sexual Representation (Nguyen Tan Hoang, 2014) - Nguyen's dissertation is a really fascinating piece of queer scholarship, which gets deep (pun somewhat intended) into forms of media often overlooked by academia - gay porn, softcore art films, gay indie documentaries - in search of a new understanding of Asian masculinity and bottomhood. I really like Nguyen's thoughtful study of bottoming, effeminacy, and sexual abjection, all of which he's pretty in favor of, balanced with analyses of the factors of race, class, nationality, and citizenship that complicate how gay Asian men are perceived. it's wide-ranging, it's meticulous, it's kind of hot? I love you, queers in academia.

"You Just Need to Lose Weight" and 19 Other Myths About Fat People (Aubrey Gordon, 2023) - god, okay, listen: this book was a little dry TO ME but ONLY BECAUSE I have already spent years listening to Aubrey Gordon discuss all 19 of these myths and a bunch of other shit on her excellent podcast, Maintenance Phase. if you don't listen to Maintenance Phase either start doing that or read this book! which is extremely well-researched and great for debunking pretty much every "justification" a person might off to try and make their fatphobia sound reasonable. frankly if I could load up copies of YJNTLW into, like, a t-shirt gun to just have on standby to fire at people, I would do that.

Sorry, Bro (Taleen Voskuni, 2023) - yeah you all already know about this book, which is the one in which a 27 year old brings the narrative to a screeching halt to assure the readers that it's okay for her to hook up with a 31 year old woman because despite the so-called age gap both of their brains are fully-cooked. that's not actually the worst part of this book; the worst part is that the prose is unpolished in the extreme and the main character is kind of a dumb asshole. cannot say I recommend it, no matter how desperate you may be for bisexual Armenian representation.

Brown and Gay in LA: The Lives of Immigrant Sons (Anthony Christian Ocampo, 2022) - I really like the way Ocampo writes his nonfiction, which is very chatty and extremely accessible (if a little prone to editorializing). I love seeing sociologists writing from the community the community they live in, and these interviews come from second generation queer Latino and Filipino men frequenting the same LA clubs and coffee shops as the gay second gen Filipino author. it kills the presumed spectator that a lot of writing on marginalized communities can fall victim to; here, it's not that brown gay men need to be explained, but rather outsiders who need to make the effort to keep up with their lives. I especially appreciated Ocampo's highlighting the disparity between Latino and Filipino men's experiences in education, where very different sets of racial stereotypes impact their ability to succeed in white-dominated school systems; if you're curious about why Latino and Filipino men are categorized together at all in this study I strongly recommend Ocampo's other book, the Latinos of Asia.

The Vanishing Half (Brit Bennett, 2020) - it's always kind of astonishing when something that was extremely hyped-up and buzzy turns out to actually be as good as all that, and the Vanishing Half really was that good. the premise of two light-skinned Black twins separating so that one can "pass over" and live her life as a white woman is compelling all on its own, but Bennett is so committed to every possible angle of this premise: what does it mean to live more than one life? what other ways are people more than one person? it shows up everywhere through this novel: in losing your twin, in transing your gender, in drag performances, in actors, in people moving to new towns where no one knows them and becoming someone else. the moment it really hit me that Bennet Got It was a completely innocuous sentence that identified a Korean restaurant owner in California as a man who had attended medical school in Korea - even this background character, who we'll hardly hear from again, has been a different person in a different life! everyone has these layers and layers and different sides of themselves and it's just beautifully executed. mwah. chef's kiss.