Delia Caparoso Konzett
University of New Hampshire, Durham (Durham, NH 03824-2620)
FT-54246-06
Summer Stipends
Research Programs
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[Grant products]
Totals:
$5,000 (approved)
$5,000 (awarded)
Grant period:
6/1/2006 – 7/31/2006
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Imagining a Multicultural America: Orientalism, Hawaii, and Hollywood WWII Film
This study explores Hollywood's WWII films in relation to Orientalism and America's gradual transformation into a multicultural society. War films set in the Pacific reflect a critical turning point in America's re-assessment of its cultural isolationism, race relations, and international affiliations. In my analysis of WWII film, I will argue that WWII Orientalism, alongside its containing rhetoric of race, also projects an inclusive democratic vision of American society, imagining a multicultural America. With its rich multiethnic society, Hawaii plays a central role in this development and as a cultural gateway to the East provides a model for an emerging American multiculturalism.
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