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Essay Instructions: PLEASE READ THESE INSTRUCTION.
Base the paper below, revise it to be a strong paper with a central strong thesis. The thesis SHOULD NOT be that the film represents a kind of prejudice that arises in the context of inter-cultural encounters( which is what I have right now). Instead, you should ask if the film tries to distinguish the particular place in which the story takes place as a distinct region within the United States? Is the prejudice you see operating in the film at all dependent on that place's sense of itself as a region? Does it take a particular shape because of the region? In other words, is there anything about the film that seems more regional than national? So a good hint would be the place in the film does not have preference of any race, but the people living in the island have the prejudice.
The bold parts of the paper are the parts you should pay more attention to improve.
Snow Falling on Cedars
Literature is an art form, which can convey love, hate, beauty and ugliness. Just like a painting, a novel can be an artistic representation of the ideals and opinions of daily life. The David Guterson novel Snow Falling on Cedars and the 1999 film adaptation deal with the issues that a young Japanese American man must face when he is accused of the murder of a white fisherman in the state of Washington. On the surface, the story is a mystery, which focuses on whether or not the young man is guilty, but on a deeper level the novel tells a story of the ugliness of racial intolerance compared to the beauty of the Washington island. On the fictional San Piedro Island, part of the Puget Sound area of Washington, racial tensions were extremely high between the members of the Caucasian majority population and the smaller group of Japanese Americans who also lived on the island. Kazuo Miyamoto is on trial for this murder but in reality the legal procedures are a representation of the racially biased feelings of the people of Washington who are judging Miyamoto not so much for his potential actions, but for his ethnicity. The land itself does not judge its race, but people in the land defending themselves against other race. (rework the thesis)
Regionalism was an art movement, which grew from the Modernism movement. Starting in the 1930s, regionalism focused on realistic representations of the real world outside the artist?s windows. Regionalist artworks gave images of the American heartland which provided the population with hope and inspiration that there was indeed a better future coming for them as long as they persevered. In literature, the regionalist movement is seen in works which focus on rural locations, local characters, and small communities which serve as microcosms of the larger world. Author Josephine Donavan writes that regionalism ?depict[s] authentic regional detail, including authentic dialect, authentic local characters, in real or realistic geographical settings? (50). The heart of the movement was a moving away from large city metropolises and a re-embracing of the rural community, which had gone out of favor during the time of the Industrial Revolution. This included depictions of landscapes and the placement of people within the locations in the natural world. The movement was based on understanding of outsider versus insider and rural versus urban, themes which are present in the narrative of Snow Falling on Cedars. It is a regionalist film based on this principle. Its location, the island off of Washington is extremely rural and isolated. We can feel the remoteness and wilderness of the island through many scenes in the film. Such as in the middle of the movie, ?.we can see a hundred of red wood trees, hearing bird hardly chirping. (1:4953) Thus, the island is separated from the rest of the United States and the rest of the world, but is connected through the opinions of those who live there.
Snow Falling on Cedars is a 1999 film based on the novel written by David Guterson. The film starts with Ishmael who is a reporter investigating a murder largely committed by Kazuo. The film takes place in a remote island and revolve around the trial. Ishmael fall in love with Kazuo?s wife Hatsue.
In the United States during the 1950s, the majority of the country?s population consisted of white people from Western Europe. Those who were not part of this racial group were subject to harsh prejudices, many of them ingrained into the very social structure of the communities. This bigotry was obvious in many aspects of human interaction, including in the legal system, particularly if a member of the minority culture was involved in an action against or with a member of the majority culture. There are stereotypes, which have become associated with every racial type and for the most part they are not dangerous. However, according to sociologist Richard Brislan, there can be a danger when the stereotype becomes so ingrained that the population does not understand it as being a generality and instead accepts it as truth. He argues that: ?[Stereotypes] become dangerous when people move beyond stereotyping and make decisions based on their stereotypes?In many cultures, stereotypes of certain groups are so negative, are so pervasive, and have existed for so many generations that they can be considered part of the culture into which children are socialized. In these cases, the stereotypes become part of people?s prejudiced feelings about other groups? (Dypedahl 14). In large communities, such as metropolitan cities, it was possible to overcome prejudices, although not very likely. The smaller the community, the less likely it was to overcome these biases and the stronger the negative impact of the prejudices of the majority population. The separation of individuals within a community is a popular component of literary regionalism (Campbell). The social stratification in a given area is an important part of the community and is often reflected in fictional works representing the same region. For example, during and following World War II, both anti-German and anti-Japanese attitudes were extremely high. It is Kazuo?s Japanese ancestry that creates the antagonism against him and leads him to be put on trial for the murder of Carl Jr.
The divisive and segregationist attitudes that are prevalent on the island are reflected in the weather. A heavy snowstorm has fallen and continues as the trial progresses. In the film, the snow is portrayed as extremely thick, covering the entire island in a layer of white. Haytock states: ?Like the snow, the issues surrounding Kazuo?s trial blur the ?clean contours? of the truth, and its ?gentle implacability? reflects the quiet but ever-present racism of the island community, a hatred that cannot be faced or avoided? (24). The snow sets the stage for the trial by providing a natural or regional representation of what?s going on / (BY) because it suggests that the very island itself is the part of the racism. As the story progresses and the likelihood of Kazuo?s receiving a verdict of guilty becomes more likely, the storm outside the courtroom windows becomes harsher and more dangerous. While the trial goes on, the winds rattle the window panes, power lines go down all over the island, and even cars are blown into ditches by the force of the wind. Author Michael Bayly describes the film?s weather as symbolic. He says: ?The film re-presents the human condition as a condition that is multi-layered. It is a condition that is awash with ambiguity, with things in process of revelation. The film?s very look and flow emphasizes this understanding of the human condition. Plot details, for instance, are layered ? with events revealed in a gradual, accumulative manner, like the falling and drifting snow of the film?s blizzard? (Bayly). / In a similar way, everyone on the island is impacted by the storm, which is related to the fact that everyone is impacted by the racial biases and the trial of Kazuo. The people involved in the proceedings cannot even leave the courthouse after the judge orders a recess for the day because the weather is so perilous. In the movie, when people are trapped in the courthouse because of the snow. It is like they are trapped in a system by the land where you are judging people racially. It?s like the land/ the region keeps people in the system. Trapped isolation of the courthouse is like the trapped isolation of the island. In the island, people are stuck each other in this racist situation. Even though they don't like each other racially, they are stuck. It shows that the impossibility of escaping. Thus the storm and all the other adverse weather conditions that are described in the book represent the real world difficulties which individuals in the island must face in their lives and of which they have little if any control.
Race and ethnicity serve as divisive classifications in Snow Falling on Cedars. On the island, Kazuo Miyamoto is defended by Nels Gudmundsson while being prosecuted by Alvin Hooks. Interestingly, the name Gudmundsson illustrates a German or Scandinavian heritage. Hooks on the other hand is a clearly Anglophone name. Hooks plays on the stereotypes of the Japanese and the innate prejudices of the jury by telling them to examine Kazuo and see him as ?hard man to trust? (Snow). Those who are ethnically associated with the American enemies of the Second World War are put against those who have a heritage associated with the allies of the Americans. Carl Heine?s mother Etta is a major witness for the prosecution. She believes wholeheartedly that Kazuo is guilty despite the fact that there is little evidence against him. His guilt is in being a man of Japanese heritage and having dared to go beyond his socially limited position and try to become a landowner and therefore symbolically equal to the white population (Dypedahl 15). Anything he has done, including being a war hero who served for the United States in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, cannot make up for the fact that he is part of the minority group. It is assumed that Japanese Americans are only loyal to themselves, just as it is assumed that the white people will be loyal to themselves. This is extremely ironic a position for Mrs. Heine?s because she is depicted as being of Germanic descent, making her just as much connected to the American enemy as Kazuo. It is not just about where you come from, its more about who you are. Why is the case? However, the German population of the United States was never served with the same denigration as the Japanese and so Etta is not treated with the same disdain as the Japanese American man who stands trial. The dialogue of the film illustrates just how divided the two communities are. The Japanese Americans speak in stereotypically stilted English. This is especially noticeable with the character of Hatsue who is not an immigrant but a second-generation American. Still, she is unable to speak English with the fluidity as the white characters in the film. Example. When asked a question, Hatsue pauses before giving an answer.
The attitudes of racial prejudice occur in the supposed motive for the murder, a desire over land. Kazuo and his family wanted to purchase some land from Carl Heine Sr., his former employer and had been giving the elder man money for a decade. Unfortunately, after years of prompt payment, the Second World War intervened and changed the fate of all the people of the world, including the fictional characters of this story. The payments stopped during the war when Kazuo and family, not to mention Hatsue?s family, were forcibly removed because of the Japanese internment program, a legal ordinance which was forced on Japanese Americans out of fear that they might somehow be connected to the Japanese government who were at war with the United States. Following the recommendation of Lieutenant General John L. Dewitt, then Commander of the Western Defense Command, Japanese first and second generation Americans were rounded up and placed into camps. According to Gen. Dewitt: The Japanese race is an enemy race?racial affinities are not severed by migration?[The] very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date?[was a] disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken (Dypedhal 6-7). Just as the Japanese were imprisoned without evidence of the desire to sabotage, so too Kazuo was put on trial for being Japanese and having the audacity to desire land belonging to white people. The land should have been Kazuo?s but Heine Sr. passed away and his widow sold the land to another white man, Ole Jurgensen, ignoring the verbal agreement between her husband and Miyamoto and making ten year?s worth of sacrificial payments without merit. Upon his having a stroke, Ole decided to sell the land and there was contention between Carl Jr. and Kazuo about which man had the right to purchase the land. Why the land is important. They could have disagreement about anything, like car. They want a place in the region. Can Japanese people have a permanent place in the region. Are the White people struggling to keep them from attached to this very place. TALK ABOUT place and region. Symbolism is that Japanese people should have no collection of lands. They should not have a place in the island.
The ending of the film is symbolic too, of the danger that presents itself with avarice and lack of caution. Carl Jr. was a man who was consumed by desire to get whatever he wanted even if perhaps he was undeserving of it. Knowing full well how much the land meant to Kazuo and the amount he had paid to Carl?s father, he still went behind Kazuo?s back to buy the land. Instead of murder, it turns out that Carl was responsible for his own demise. A large freighter vessel had passed by where he had been fishing very early in the morning. Carle had climbed the mast of his own fishing boat to cut down a high-hanging lantern. When the freighter passed him, he was thrown overboard by the force of the freighter?s wake. Not only was Kazuo not responsible for the crime, but also as it turns out there was no crime committed. Instead, it is a symbolic death. Carl Jr. had been fishing few hours the morning, taking advantage of the natural world in which he lived. A freighter, another ship, which was using the natural resources to maneuver itself to the company?s economic benefit, was the cause of his death. Man?s interference with the natural world led to the tragedy. Ishmael finally comes to the rescue at the last moment and reveals the truth based on the notes of the lighthouse keeper. Until he makes this gesture, he is part of the racist ideas of the majority of the townspeople (Bayly). Part of literary tradition when there is an interracial dynamic is that the white person must come to the rescue of the member of the minority population and this story is no exception. Ishmael is forced to put aside his feelings for the love of his life as well as his anti-Japanese biases and do the right thing without anyone else necessarily giving up their own racially prejudiced opinions and viewpoints. Although the White people resist Japanese people having a claim to land, the land is shown having no preference. The region brings people and keeps people together in this uneasy chorus. The region keeps people tight together, even though its not what they do. They do not have a choice. What it shows is not sth about nature as much as that the region is blind. The region is just the region and/ where people trying to make claims on it.
Another theme that is present in the text, which reflects the regionalist artistic perspective is the conflict between feminine and masculine identities. In regionalism, the conflict between accepted social groups is an extremely important factor. Snow Falling on Cedars shows this conflict in a multitude of ways; one of the most important is in the dichotomy between reporter Ishmael Chambers and the main female character of the film, Kazuo?s wife Hatsue. Ishmael finds himself inextricably drawn to the young woman. He desires her both sexually and emotionally. They have a past, which is extremely intoxicating and verging on obsessive, at least on the part of Ishmael. There are many reasons for this attraction, not the least of which is that as a woman of Japanese heritage, Hatsue is the ideal example of the exotic and unobtainable object of affection. As children, part of what made Hatsue so appealing was her ?otherness? and the fact that because she was othered by the community, they had to keep their relationship a secret (Hrezo). Focus on the trial by using the scene from the trial. He likes her because she is exotic and different. But at the same time, he looks down/others on her. The structure of the courthouse where the white people have gives you a visual example.
The racial biases presented in the film are not just those of the majority culture directed towards minorities, but can be reciprocal as well. In Snow Falling on Cedars one of the major subplots is the former romance between Ishmael and Hatsue. As a young woman, she and Ismael had been involved in a teenaged romance, but which was not allowed to flourish because of her family?s attitudes against Caucasians and in favor of her fellow Japanese minorities. The tradition of respectability and the culture that was brought to the United States from the parents? home country was given more value than the new culture into which the immigrants were trying to assimilate. The anger of her parents was increased when the family was sent to the internment camp at Manzanar. At that point, the Asian identity was strengthened and the idea that the white culture would never fully embrace the Asian immigrants was reinforced. Therefore, her mother forced Hatsue to break up with Ishmael via a letter from the camp and encouraged her to forge a more proper relationship with a fellow Japanese American, which she did. Michael Bayly writes of the film: The film doesn?t single out any particular race as being capable of narrow-mindedness and prejudice. Yet without question, it is the prejudice of the white citizens of San Piedro Island (and by extension, the United States) that is the film?s primary focus. For the parents, as well as for the racially prejudiced people of the island, there is a clear delineation between white and Asian and the two groups are not allowed to intermingle. This concept is shown not to just be within this small community, but a reflection of the larger cultural majority. Internment taught Hatsue?s family and Kazuo?s as well that they would never be equal to the white people and so they keep themselves isolated as much as possible to protect themselves from the imposition of prejudices of their neighbor. Racial relationship in the film is not the one way street, to some degree, they are reciprocal. Like the snow traps people in the courthouse together, both racism are stuck in an intense situation. And they both react to it. Japanese people are putting against the White people. This land is fantastic. The whole movie is like a trial of who gets to live in this island. Both sides are pushing against each other and making claims.
American regionalism is an art form wherein the local culture, customs, landscape, and people are presented in realistic terms for the entire world to see. This can be beautiful and inspirational like some of the paintings of the era. However, it can also be ugly and disturbing like in Snow Falling on Cedars. The movie is a regionalist representation, which uses the landscape of the Washington island as a way to understand racial intolerance. The story about a young man wrongly accused of murder is just the outline for a deeper story of racial prejudices, stereotypical beliefs, and socially demanded separation and stratification of the races in order to continue with the status quo. Of course the accused was not guilty of murder, but of trying to move above his station in a time and place which was not ready for social elevation of minorities.

Works Cited:
Bayly, Michael J. ?Theological Reflections on Scott Hicks? Snow Falling on Cedars.? 2000.
Print.
Campbell, Donna M. ?Regionalism and Local Color Fiction, 1865-1895.? Web. Nov. 2012.
http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/lcolor.html
Donovan, Josephine. New England Local Color Literature: a Woman?s Tradition. New York,
NY: Ungar, 1983. Print.
Dypedahl, Magne. ?Reading Snow Falling on Cedars as Historical (Crime) Novel.?
Hrezo, Margaret S. ?Snow Falling on Cedars.? Law and Politics Book Review. 18:4. 2008. 325-
27. Print.
Snow Falling on Cedars. Dir. Scott Hicks. Prod. Ron Bass. Screenplay by Ron Bass and Scott
Hicks. Perf. Ethan Hawke and Youki Kudoh. Universal Pictures, 1999. DVD.

Essay Instructions: The essay should interpret a relatively contemporary text, figure, or event of your choosing. Your field of inquiry should pertain to regional representation. Very likely, it will be a text that could reasonably be described as a piece of regionalism. The paper should have a unified thesis, a genuine motive, offer compelling evidence, and pursue a developmental structure.

The primary text I choose is the film "Snow falling on cedars" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120834/)
The sources should be journal articles or scholarly books.

Here is the paper, but there are two very different arguments going on this paper. You need to come up with a central thesis, either focusing on the weather or the trial.
By focusing on the nature (weather), you can talk about gender and race inequality.
The literal devices used in this movie are highly representatives and symbolic.
Weather and trial are coherent. Try to look at the beauty of island.
Compared to the island, images of the natural world of the island, show how racism affect people. Maybe like the feature. eg: tree/ cliff (feature of geography). You can mention the trial; you can say that human activities are compared to the natural world. It may suggest that racism is natural or unnatural, depending on the circumstances.
In the whole continent of United States, where the movie is taken place. They made up an island ( Japan is an island as well). The place is contest of region. The place is more like Japan or U.S? fishing going on in the island is similar to the fishing in the Japan.
Gender: the main woman in the movie, she appears to be a part of nature. She always wear green and color like natural things are.

Snow Falling on Cedars
Literature is art forms, which can convey love, hate, beauty and ugliness. Just like a painting, a novel can be an artistic representation of the ideals and opinions of daily life. The David Guterson novel Snow Falling on Cedars and the 1999 film adaptation deal with the issues that a young Japanese American man must face when he is accused of the murder of a white fisherman in the state of Washington. On the surface, the story is a mystery, which focuses on whether or not the young man is guilty, but on a deeper level the novel tells a story of the ugliness of racial intolerance compared to the beauty of the Washington island. On the fictional San Piedro Island, part of the Puget Sound area of Washington, racial tensions were extremely high between the members of the White majority population and the smaller group of Japanese Americans who also lived on the island. Kazuo Miyamoto is on trial for this murder but in reality the legal procedures are a representation of the racially biased feelings of the people of Washington who are judging Miyamoto not so much for his potential actions, but for his ethnicity.
Regionalism was an art movement, which grew from the Modernism movement. Starting in the 1930s, regionalism was a focus on realistic representations of the real world outside the artist’s windows. The most famous regionalist artists were Grant Wood who created the world-known “American Gothic,” as well as Thomas Hart Benton and John Steuart Curry. It is believed by art historians that the dour circumstances of the Great Depression created the popularity of regionalism. Instead of the dark homelessness and poverty seen on the streets outside, regionalist artworks instead gave images of the American heartland which provided the population with hope and inspiration that there was indeed a better future coming for them as long as they continued on. In literature, the regionalist movement is seen in works which focus on rural locations, local characters, and small communities which serve as microcosms of the larger world. Author Josephine Donavan writes that regionalism “depict[s] authentic regional detail, including authentic dialect, authentic local characters, in real or realistic geographical settings” (50). At the heart of the movement was a moving away from large city metropolises and a re-embracing of the rural community, which had gone out of favor during the time of the Industrial Revolution. This included depictions of landscapes and the placement of people within the locations in the natural world. Throughout the movement was a thematic understanding of outsider versus insider and rural versus urban, themes which are present in the narrative in many ways. Snow Falling on Cedars is proven to be a regionalist film based on this principle. Its location, the island off of Washington is extremely rural and isolated. We can feel the remoteness and wilderness of the island through many scenes in the film. Thus, the island is separated from the rest of the United States and the rest of the world, but is connected through the opinions of those who live there.
In the United States during the 1950s, the majority of the country’s population consisted of white people from Western Europe. Those who were not part of this racial group were subject to harsh prejudices, many of them ingrained into the very social structure of the communities. This bigotry was obvious in many aspects of human interaction, including in the legal system, particularly if a member of the minority culture were involved in an action against or with a member of the majority culture. There are stereotypes, which have become associated with every racial type and for the most part they are not dangerous. However, according to sociologist Richard Brislan, there can be a danger when the stereotype becomes so ingrained that the population does not understand it as being a generality and instead accepts it as truth. He once wrote: “[Stereotypes] become dangerous when people move beyond stereotyping and make decisions based on their stereotypes…In many cultures, stereotypes of certain groups are so negative, are so pervasive, and have existed for so many generations that they can be considered part of the culture into which children are socialized. In these cases, the stereotypes become part of people’s prejudiced feelings about other groups” (Dypedahl 14). In large communities, such as metropolitan cities, it was possible to overcome prejudices, although not very likely. The smaller the community, the less likely it was to overcome these biases and the stronger the negative impact of the prejudices of the majority population. During and following World War II, both anti-German and anti-Japanese attitudes were extremely high. It is Kazuo’s Japanese ancestry creates the antagonism against him and leads him to be put on trial for the murder of Carl Jr. The separation of individuals within a community is a popular component of literary regionalism (Campbell). The social stratification in a given area is an important part of the real version of the community and is necessarily reflected in fictional works representing the same region.
The divisive and segregationist attitudes that take are prevalent on the island are reflected in the weather. A heavy snowstorm has fallen and continues as the trial progresses. In the film, the snow is portrayed as extremely thick, covering the entire island in a layer of white. Haytock states: “Like the snow, the issues surrounding Kazuo’s trial blur the ‘clean contours’ of the truth, and its ‘gentle implacability’ reflects the quiet but ever-present racism of the island community, a hatred that cannot be faced or avoided” (24). As the story progresses and the likelihood of Kazuo’s receiving a verdict of guilty becomes more likely, the storm outside the courtroom windows becomes harsher and more dangerous. While the trial goes on, the winds rattle the window panes, power lines go down all over the island, and even cars are blown into ditches by the force of the wind. Author Michael Bayly describes the film’s weather as symbolic. He says: “The film re-presents the human condition (i.e. the way that humans experience and engage and/or disengage in life) as a condition that is multi-layered (the personal and communal, for instance, are intertwined). It is a condition that is awash with ambiguity, with things in process of revelation. The film’s very look and flow emphasizes this understanding of the human condition. Plot details, for instance, are layered – with events revealed in a gradual, accumulative manner, like the falling and drifting snow of the film’s blizzard” (Bayly). Everyone on the island becomes impacted by the storm, which means that everyone is impacted by the racial biases and the trial of Kazuo. The people involved in the proceedings cannot even leave the courthouse after the judge orders a recess for the day because the weather is so perilous. Thus the storm and all the other adverse weather conditions that are described in the book, such as the storm that forced Ishmael and Hatsue into the tree and the fog that led to Carl Jr.’s death represent the real world difficulties which everyone must face in their lives and of which they have little if any control.
Race and ethnicity serve as divisive classifications in Snow Falling on Cedars. On the island, Kazuo Miyamoto is defended by Nels Gudmundsson while being prosecuted by Alvin Hooks. Interestingly, the name Gudmundsson illustrates a German or Scandinavian heritage. Hooks on the other hand is a clearly Anglican name. Hooks plays on the stereotypes of the Japanese and the innate prejudices of the jury by telling them to examine Kazuo and see him as “hard man to trust” (Snow). Those who are ethnically associated with the American enemies of the Second World War are put against those who have a heritage associated with the allies of the Americans. Carl Heine’s mother Etta is a major witness for the prosecution. She believes wholeheartedly that Kazuo is guilty despite the fact that there is little evidence against him. His guilt is in being a man of Japanese heritage and having dared to go beyond his socially limited position and try to become a landowner and therefore symbolically equal to the white population (Dypedahl 15). Anything he has done, including being a war hero who served for the United States in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, cannot make up for the fact that he is part of the minority group. It is assumed that Japanese Americans are only loyal to themselves, just as it is assumed that the white people will be loyal to themselves. This is extremely ironic a position for Mrs. Heine’s because she is depicted as being of Germanic descent, making her just as much connected to the American enemy as Kazuo. However, the German population of the United States was never served with the same denigration as the Japanese and so Etta is not treated with the same disdain as the Japanese American man who stands trial. The dialogue of the film illustrates just how divided the two communities are. The Japanese Americans speak in stereotypically stilted English. This is especially noticeable with the character of Hatsue who is not an immigrant but a second-generation American. Still, she is unable to speak English with the fluidity as the white characters in the film.
The attitudes of racial prejudice occur in the supposed motive for the murder, a desire over land. Kazuo and his family wanted to purchase some land from Carl Heine Sr., his former employer and had been giving the elder man money for a decade. Unfortunately, after years of prompt payment, the Second World War intervened and changed the fate of all the people of the world, including the fictional characters of this story. The payments stopped during the war when Kazuo and family, not to mention Hatsue’s family, were forcibly removed because of the Japanese internment program, a legal ordinance which was forced on Japanese Americans out of fear that they might somehow be connected to the Japanese government who were at war with the United States in the days following December 1, 1941, Pearl Harbor Day. Following the recommendation of Lieutenant General John L. Dewitt, then Commander of the Western Defense Command, Japanese first and second generation Americans were rounded up and placed into camps. According to Gen. Dewitt: The Japanese race is an enemy race…racial affinities are not severed by migration…[The] very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date…[was a] disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken (Dypedhal 6-7). Just as the Japanese were imprisoned without evidence of the desire to sabotage, so too Kazua was put on trial for being Japanese and having the audacity to desire land belonging to white people. The land should have been Kazua’s but Heine Sr. passed away and his widow sold the land to another white man, Ole Jurgensen, ignoring the verbal agreement between her husband and Miyamoto and making ten year’s worth of sacrificial payments without merit. Upon his having a stroke, Ole decided to sell the land and there was contention between Carl Jr. and Kazuo about which man had the right to purchase the land. This was the basis for the allegations against Kazuo, although as the whole of the trial is a representational microcosm of the whole United States, so is his issue with Carl Jr. Many if not most of the Japanese Americans who were put into internment camps found themselves upon their release without homes or businesses. Anything that they had owned before their imprisonment had been taken by opportunistic individuals and as they were considered enemies of the state, there was little recourse they had in regaining their lost land and property.
The ending of the film is symbolic too, of the danger that presents itself with avarice and lack of caution. Carl Jr. was a man who was consumed by desire to get whatever he wanted even if perhaps he was undeserving of it. Knowing full well how much the land meant to his friend and the amount he had paid to Carl’s father, he still went behind Kazuo’s back to buy the land. Instead of murder, it turns out that Carl was responsible for his own demise. A large freighter vessel had passed by where he had been fishing very early in the morning. Carle had climbed the mast of his own fishing boat to cut down a high-hanging lantern. When the freighter passed him, he was thrown overboard by the force of the freighter’s wake. Not only was Kazuo not responsible for the crime, but also as it turns out there was no crime committed. Instead, it is a symbolic death. Carl Jr. had been fishing few hours the morning, taking advantage of the natural world in which he lived. A freighter, another ship, which was using the natural resources to maneuver itself to the company’s economic benefit, was the cause of his death. Man’s interference with the natural world led to the tragedy. Ishmael finally comes to the rescue at the last moment and reveals the truth based on the notes of the lighthouse keeper. Until he makes this gesture, he is part of the racist ideas of the majority of the townspeople (Bayly). Part of literary tradition when there is an interracial dynamic is that the white person must come to the rescue of the member of the minority population and this story is no exception. Ishmael is forced to put aside his feelings for the love of his life as well as his anti-Japanese biases and do the right thing without anyone else necessarily giving up their own racially prejudiced opinions and viewpoints.
Another theme that is present in the text, which reflects the regionalist artistic perspective is the conflict between feminine and masculine identities. In regionalism, the conflict between accepted social groups is an extremely important factor. Snow Falling on Cedars shows this conflict in a multitude of ways; one of the most important is in the dichotomy between reporter Ishmael Chambers and the main female character of the film, Kazuo’s wife Hatsue. Ishmael finds himself inextricably drawn to the young woman. He desires her both sexually and emotionally. They have a past, which is extremely intoxicating and verging on obsessive, at least on the part of Ishmael. There are many reasons for this attraction, not the least of which is that as a woman of Japanese heritage, Hatsue is the ideal example of the exotic and unobtainable object of affection. As children, part of what made Hatsue so appealing was her “otherness” and the fact that because she was othered by the community, they had to keep their relationship a secret (Hrezo). In the present, Hatsue is even more tantalizing because he cannot claim her. She is not only married which makes her unavailable for a romantic pursuance, but also of a minority ethnic group which makes her even more beyond his reach. Ishmael had been involved in the Second World War in the Pacific fighting the Japanese and had been gravely injured, losing an arm in the conflict. He not only has a patriotically-inspired hatred of the Japanese as is considered necessary for all Americans of the era, but a personal hatred for their group because he blames them for his loss of limb. In their youth, Hatsue likes Ishmael as well. However, the internment and the separation that Hatsue was forced to endure led her to also identify herself more with the Asian community. As author Jennifer Haytock explains, “It is the war that makes Hatsue see clearly that she and Ishmael not only cannot be together but also do not belong together; war intensifies the cultural differences that separate them” (21). Hatsue still feels some of the same desire but is unwilling to sacrifice her marriage to Kazuo for a relationship with the white man Chambers.
The racial biases presented in the film are not just those of the majority culture directed towards minorities, but can be reciprocal as well. In Snow Falling on Cedars one of the major subplots is the former romance between Ishmael and Hatsue. As a young woman, she and Ismael had been involved in a teenaged romance, but which was not allowed to flourish because of her family’s attitudes against Caucasians and in favor of her fellow Japanese minorities. The tradition of respectability and the culture that was brought to the United States from the parents’ home country was given more value than the new culture into which the immigrants were trying to assimilate. The anger of her parents was increased when the family was sent to the internment camp at Manzanar. At that point, the Asian identity was strengthened and the idea that the white culture would never fully embrace the Asian immigrants was reinforced. Therefore, the mother forced Hatsue to break up with Ishmael via a letter from the camp and encouraged her to forge a more proper relationship with a fellow Japanese American, which she did. Michael Bayly writes of the film: The film doesn’t single out any particular race as being capable of narrow-mindedness and prejudice. Yet without question, it is the prejudice of the white citizens of San Piedro Island (and by extension, the United States) that is the film’s primary focus. For the parents, as well as for the racially prejudiced people of the island, there is a clear delineation between white and Asian and the two groups are not allowed to intermingle. This concept is shown not to just be within this small community, but a reflection of the larger cultural majority. Internment taught Hatsue’s family and Kazuo’s as well that they would never be equal to the white people and so they keep themselves isolated as much as possible to protect themselves from the imposition of prejudices of their neighbors.
American regionalism is an art form wherein the local culture, customs, landscape, and people were presented in realistic terms for the entire world to see. This can be beautiful and inspirational like some of the paintings of the era. However, it can also be ugly and disturbing like in Snow Falling on Cedars. The story about a young man wrongly accused of murder is just the outline for a deeper story of racial prejudices, stereotypical beliefs, and socially demanded separation and stratification of the races in order to continue with the status quo. Of course the accused was not guilty of murder, but of trying to move above his station in a time and place which was not ready for social elevation of minorities.


Works Cited:
Bayly, Michael J. “Theological Reflections on Scott Hicks’ Snow Falling on Cedars.” 2000.
Print.
Campbell, Donna M. “Regionalism and Local Color Fiction, 1865-1895.” Web. Nov. 2012.
http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/lcolor.html
Donovan, Josephine. New England Local Color Literature: a Woman’s Tradition. New York,
NY: Ungar, 1983. Print.
Dypedahl, Magne. “Reading Snow Falling on Cedars as Historical (Crime) Novel.”
Hrezo, Margaret S. “Snow Falling on Cedars.” Law and Politics Book Review. 18:4. 2008. 325-
27. Print.
Snow Falling on Cedars. Dir. Scott Hicks. Prod. Ron Bass. Screenplay by Ron Bass and Scott
Hicks. Perf. Ethan Hawke and Youki Kudoh. Universal Pictures, 1999. DVD.

Essay Instructions: The essay should interpret a relatively contemporary text, figure, or event of your choosing. Your field of inquiry should pertain to regional representation. Very likely, it will be a text that could reasonably be described as a piece of regionalism. I also expect you to use at least one of the critical texts that we read in this unit. As always, your paper should have a unified thesis, a genuine motive, offer compelling evidence, and pursue a developmental structure.

The primary text I choose is the film "Snow falling on cedars" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120834/)
I think you can look at how the screen is arranged, how the certain character is represented(costumes and makeup), the types of settings, is there sth about this region's cultural settings that is the thing people build in for the racism to happen. How people represent as outsiders and how people represent as insiders. Also you can think about gender issues in this film. Please let me know if you have any confusion.

The Research:
Once you have an idea of the theoretical framework you?d like to deploy, you must do some further research using the resources available to you through our library. In addition to your primary source(s), you should locate, read, and fully engage with at least 5 secondary sources. At least 4 of these sources should be peer-reviewed journal articles or scholarly books. You might also want to use non-interpretive, factual sources, like interviews or news reports. These are good sources, but they don?t count toward the peer-reviewed source requirement.

Essay Instructions: Please answer the two questions. You can use 1 1/2 pages for both or whatever you find suitable.

1)In the lecture it is written about sexual projection and the fragmented body image. However, it could also have focused on suppressed and blatant racism and bigotry evident in the film’s characters taken in their historical context. By context I mean, what the circumstances in the United States were when the mass Japanese internment took place. With this in mind can American fears and bigotry be understood and explained during this era?

2)Please read the article written by Alison Dundes Renteln. It had nothing specifically to do with the film. However, it focused on a sub-theme from the film; sexual projection and the internment of Japanese Americans. Explain how Snow Falling on Cedars is an appropriate example of Renteln’s argument.


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