Little Osaka, West LA
Wednesday July 11, 2012
1:15-1:29 Selected Attendees to load buses at DeNeve Round About
1:30 (depart UCLA) – 4:30 (pick up). Drop off and pick up at corner of Sawtelle Blvd and La Grange Ave.
Led by Vivian Wong.
Concept
“Global (re)mix: A tour of Little Osaka” is a non-traditional workshop designed to allow participants to experience a different kind of archive – an archive of sites, sound, and tastes. Taking advantage of the diverse ethnic flavors that Los Angeles has to offer, this workshop presents an opportunity to savor (literally and figuratively) a neighborhood with all of your five senses — Little Osaka on Sawtelle Blvd, between Santa Monica and Olympic Blvd.
The performance – production and consumption – of food are “sites” for the convergence of histories, cultures, traditions, and technologies. Food embodies and performs the personal and collective histories of those who make all we eat. It is an archive in itself of a past that is practiced everyday, as everyone interacts with food daily. Food production and consumption as cultural performance and practice resituated in diasporas become the dynamic presentation and representation of ethnic peoples’ hybrid and diverse histories of migration, experiences, and identities: the embodiment of cross- and trans-cultural production and reproduction, remade, served up, and consumed on a combination platter.
Themes
Within the context of the archive as a place/space/(urban)landscape, this workshop is a means for people to observe and experience the following:
- Old and new: Establishment and Redevelopment
- (Historical) Preservation and (Urban) Renewal
- What is community? Who is the community? Can multiple communities co-exist in one space, and how about across time?
- History, histories, and/or competing histories
- Food as an archive
Outcomes
It is an opportunity to explore and experience a little corner of West LA.
Tentative Schedule
12pm – 1:30pm Lunch on campus – Introduction of the tour and afternoon events
1:30pm Board bus to Little Osaka
1:45pm Arrive at destination: Sawtelle Blvd at La Grange Ave.
2:00pm Tour begins at West LA Buddhist temple with stops along Sawtelle at:
- Giant Robot
- Plan Check
- Granada Market
- Mini-Mall at Sawtelle and Olympic: Beard Papa and Mitsuwa
- Café Tomo
4:30pm Tour ends at the Japanese Institute in Sawtelle and bus pick-up for return to UCLA
Note: People can remain in the area for dinner or more sightseeing; however, they will need to find their own transportation back to UCLA.
Readings
All readings are suggested and optional. The readings will be on Asian and Asian American foodways. They include fiction and creative non-fiction, as well as academic books and articles on food from several disciplines (i.e., history and anthropology).
AERI 2012 