THE MIGRATION OF RELIGIONS (PART 1 of 2)
BY: SUMITA CHAKRAVARTY
The journalist and food writer, Yasmin Khan, said recently that food is a vehicle to understand how cultures interact in areas of conflict. Religion, on the other hand, is so steeped in histories of conflict that our perception, warranted or not, of religion as a barrier to understanding between peoples separated by their faith is hard to shake.
So any instances of deviation from such expectations (although these are perhaps the norm in today’s multi-ethnic, multi-religious, and multicultural societies) become noteworthy.
Of course, unlike food with its easy pathways to gratification, religion’s codes are less accessible to the outsider, being essentially the province of specialized knowledge communities.
There are no cookbooks for religion; one is not able to become an instant chef and lay out a spread of Indonesian dishes, as we were able to do on a recent visit to Bali, learning the techniques in an afternoon!
Although cuisines, like religions, go deep into the cultural fabric of a people, the latter’s alchemy remains difficult to fathom.
Because religion’s history has been as much about coercion as culture, it remains a sensitive topic in most (tolerant) societies. Dominant practices and institutions tend to eclipse earlier rivals, although some vestiges are allowed to remain. This is particularly true of architectural monuments, now more than ever sources of huge tourism-generated income, the life-blood of many countries.
As a palpable medium, architecture houses the glory of (a) religion without necessarily proclaiming its supremacy in the present/ enjoining its strictures. A curious process of appropriation and mis-recognition can both iconicize and empty a building of its sacred significance. The scholar Benedict Anderson pointed to some of these anomalies in a fascinating description of the representation of Borobudur, one of the most beautiful structures in the world and an ancient Buddhist temple located in Indonesia.
He narrates that in the 1950s, soon after Indonesian independence, some paintings were commissioned by the Ministry of Education to depict the country’s national history. “The paintings were to be mass-produced and distributed throughout the primary-school system; young Indonesians were to have on the walls of their classrooms –everywhere –visual representations of their country’s past.” He goes on to say that “the well-regarded artist imagines the marvel in its ninth century A.D. heydey with instructive perversity, “ painting it white with no sculpture visible, perhaps reflecting the “unease of a contemporary Muslim painter in the face of an ancient Buddhist reality” (Imagined Communities, pp. 183-84).
Borobudur, located in central Java, is the largest Buddhist temple complex (and the most spectacular) in the world. As mentioned above, it is a major tourist attraction, and according to the guide who took me around on a visit there last month, it is the biggest source of tourist income for the Indonesian government. Built in the ninth century by an Indian-Hindu king, but with local artisans, Borobudur was a hundred years in the making. Much of the temple was destroyed in a series of volcanic eruptions, and for several centuries the monument lay in ruins.
The people who lived in the vicinity moved away, and the vegetation of a tropical climate made the ruins almost invisible. Then it is believed that an Englishman discovered the site in the nineteenth century, and slowly the process of reconstruction started. During the 1960s, UNESCO declared it a world heritage site, and millions of dollars were raised to put back some of the major temples and stupas.
A still functioning Buddhist temple, Borobudur is served entirely by Muslims, both as caretakers of the place and in offering prayers. Buddhists come only as pilgrims in May, during what is called the festival of “Buddh-purnima.” The attention has shifted to Bodhgaya in northern India, the birthplace of the Buddha.
Indonesia considers itself a democratic, secular (not Islamic) republic, and although Muslims make up ninety percent of the overall population (except in Bali province), people of other faiths live in peaceful juxtaposition.
The bulk of scholarly attention to Borobudur has gone to its unique architectural features, partly because, as with all old migrations, whether of people or ideas, the origins are little known, or the past is shrouded in mystery. But as always, the past lives on, in a form so spectacular here that one can only be inspired, perhaps the basic impetus of all religions.
THE CRIMINAL IMMIGRANT: MYTH, ENEMY, ICON (PART 4 of 4)
BY: JEN EVANS
Over the past three months, we have explored the evolution of Mafia film; a small sampling of ‘the criminal immigrant’ as portrayed in American media.
First, the fear and vilification of a newly-migrated criminal network.
Then, a relatable and even sympathetic Mafioso, providing needed comfort and entertainment during American prohibition.
And later, a stifled Mafia, as increasing violent and sexual content in American films throughout The Great Depression led to the adoption of the Motion Picture Production Code and strict film censorship. From the time it was enacted in 1934, the Motion Picture Production Code all but abolished the Mafia film genre.
In the new economic landscape following World War II, relatively unregulated films imported from foreign cinemas challenged the American film industry. This competition led to decreased enforcement of American film’s Motion Picture Production Code throughout the late 1950s. By 1970, ‘the Code’ had been abandoned entirely (in favor of the MPAA film rating system).1
The collapse of the Motion Picture Production Code made way for a revival of the Mafia film.
1972’s The Godfather—based on the novel by Mario Puzo, himself the child of Italian-American immigrants—launched a new golden age for the Mafioso character, ‘the criminal immigrant.’
The Godfather was followed by decades of now-legendary Mafia films, including 1974’s Godfather II, 1990’s Goodfellas, 1995’s Casino, and 1997’s Donnie Brasco; as well as later television series such as The Sopranos. Analysis of such acclaimed media would require significantly more space and resources than is possible in our monthly newsletter. What I find more interesting in the context of our specific research—the intersection of media and migration—is that many films and television series produced amid this Mobster ‘revival’ are set not in contemporary times, but in the romanticized golden years of the Italian-American Mafia—and of Mafia cinema.
The Untouchables (1987 film), Road to Perdition (2002 film), and Boardwalk Empire (2010-2014 television series), for example, bring audiences back to the America of the 1920s and 1930s, offering new portrayals of iconic, real-life Italian-American gangsters such as Al Capone, Frank Nitti, and Lucky Luciano.
So what draws us to romanticize and sentimentalize the deadly era that saw near-unparalleled street violence such as the Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre?
The Prohibition-era Mafioso is a criminal and, in many cases, a murderer. But he is also an anti-hero, taking action against oppressive government and policy (at least ostensibly) on behalf of the American people.
The anti-hero is not unique to Mafia cinema. Rather, the anti-hero is a timeless character; portrayed in all eras and genres, including classic literature such as Don Quixote (1612), Western films such as A Fistful of Dollars (1964), and modern popular culture such as The Punisher (1974-present).
The anti-hero, regardless of time or place, emerges as the unexpected defender against oppression or evil.
But then, what sense can we make of the anti-hero character of Tony Soprano, reputed to be the first televisual anti-hero of our present cultural moment? At once violent and vulnerable, a ruthless killer and a sensitive father to his teenage daughter, a blatant liar and a caring son: paradoxes and complexities infuse his persona and render him opaque.
Set in the 1960s in New Jersey, The Sopranos and its anti-hero do not shy away from the violent side of American history. But the series has a paradox of its own: it both absorbs this particular American identity within its mainstream cultural vernacular, at the same time projecting, and thereby perpetuating the narrative of violence that has come to be associated with Italian-Americans as part of that same history.
Amid increasingly restrictive and, arguably, oppressive immigration policy, the anti-hero—and the Italian-American Mafioso, more specifically—serves as an important character in today’s American society.
The paradox of the Mafia anti-hero betrays the humanity of ‘the criminal immigrant.’ We are challenged to look beyond media-induced fear—sometimes justified, sometimes not—to recognize a people who seek opportunity and prosperity in their new homes; a people who, for better or for worse, shape the very fabric of our ongoing history.
This piece is in no way an endorsement of criminal and violent behaviors.
Rather, it serves to question portrayals of ‘the criminal immigrant’—historical and current, Italian-American and beyond. In contemporary times of divisive immigration debate and oft-weaponized media portrayals, let us recall the storied history of Mafia in film and television; a history of fear and sympathy, censorship and sentiment, equally shaping and shaped by societal views.
FOOTNOTES
- Leff, L. J., & Jerold Simmons. The Dame in the Kimono: Hollywood, Censorship, and the Production Code. (Lexington, KY: University of Kentucky Press, 2001), 270-275.