America is (also) in the Queer Heart Part 2
Contributor Sam Hosea reflects on the Bulosan classic from Queer Filipino American perspective Part 2 of 2.
THE QUESTION OF DIGNITY
Beyond personal mirrorings to my lived experience, what if anything would a queer reading of America is in the Heart accomplish? What’s next, those on the perpetually trembling American far right might demand: The Grapes of Queer Wrath? (Actually, that doesn’t sound half-bad.)
Queer critical theory is nothing new; it is, in fact, related to critical race theory — both are approaches that challenge the status quo. Before you cry about wokeness, you should know that these theories are part of the discipline of post-structural philosophy descended from white thinkers; that discipline’s parent of broader philosophy, delivered across generations through liberal studies as a stately pillar of higher education, being derived almost exclusively from western European history. Prior to the societal volatility that has so far characterized the 2000s, epistemology was a relatively uncontroversial area of academic thought, and might have stayed that way as long as it had remained, well, white. In essence, an approach like queer critical theory asks the question: What about my experience as a queer person? It is an investigative undertaking coherent with its philosophical counterparts.
If the queer Filipino American reader is unable to render a trajectory of critique based on their queerness, then I might argue that some responsibility for that lies with Bulosan. America is in the Heart was published in 1946, the same year that the Philippines achieved independence from the United States. This period was also in the wake of World War II and the Allied victories that had ended the war. Bulosan was likely keen on the tectonic socio political movements rippling across the Philippines, and he channeled the fervor of that time into a reflective, confessional novel set in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War and the (more immediate) aftermath of World War I, a period of time that also bore dramatic changes in the Filipino national identity. Set in both the Philippines and then the United States, Bulosan opted for a muted depiction of the Filipino experience. Allos’ upbringing in the Philippines is presented in an almost reverent spotlight in which his family is cast as outsiders for their abject poverty. In one scene, a rich young woman topples over his mother’s vending table for no reason other than how his mother happened to be looking at her the “wrong” way, with the added insult of being looked at the wrong way by a peasant woman. Throughout Bulosan’s novel, Allos’ mother is a saintly figure whose potential was diminished only by the unfairness of their station in life.
In another scene, an older Allos has left his family for the capital city, Manila, where an acquaintance introduces him to a brothel. Other than writing about a “naked man” lying next to a woman and using the word “whorehouse,” Bulosan is quite evidently reserved in his portrayal of sexuality; that is, until Allos is in America. On board the transport ship, Allos emerges from the dark, windowless confines of steerage and treats himself to some sun on the deck. As he lies shirtless, a white woman wearing “a brief bathing suit” and her “young man” partner happen to walk by. The woman is appalled by Allos lying half-naked in the sun, demanding that they “should ship those monkeys back where they came from.” This vignette is striking for how Allos firstly notices that the white woman is scantily clad; the “young man” is never identified as white, though he voices support for Allos that implies he, too, is an immigrant. The young man says, “I don’t blame them for coming into the sun. I know how it is below.” Bulosan, then, demonstrates the sharp divergence of lived experience between white and non-white immigrants.
Later in Allos’ life, when he is already long-settled in America, Bulosan abruptly ramps up the depiction of sexuality when Allos’ colleagues coax him into joining them for a visit to a brothel; there, his colleagues force him into bed with a Mexican woman. Allos is raped, but even this violation is written with an almost distracting contrast in how Bulosan veers into describing the moment of climax almost in verse. When we consider again the period that America is in the Heart was released, and the temporality of the novel itself, one possible queer critique is that Bulosan was keenly aware of how Americans — particularly white people — perceived Filipinos and therefore held back on graphic language about sexuality, a natural biological trait of humanity that white Americans nevertheless weaponized against Filipinos.
BULOSAN’S WILDEST DREAMS
The central tenet of the queer experience is that with displacement comes alienation. Even for queer youth who are fortunate to be accepted by their families, their communities are likely to take a hit in unexpected areas from unexpected enemies — friends who cannot find it in themselves to move forward in allyship. The queer youth who is nominally accepted by his family may also absorb a kind of secondhand grief from their family over hopes and dreams that were made in a non-queer construct. Queers rarely escape loneliness; but unlike bigots who rationalize their hatred by apprehending alienation, loneliness for queers, like for everyone else, is something that can be worked through. For many queers, loneliness is just the beginning of a longer, richer story.
As a child, Allos happily tagged along with his mom and dad, learning to do the work that needed to be done for the family; Allos had only joyful memories of spending time with his siblings — trapping parrots as pets, starting a roadside business. Allos, like so many other Filipinos, goes to America simultaneously to make money for his family back home and because he wants to “carve out a place in the sun,” a phrase that notably appears as a refrain throughout the novel. The phrase also captures the ambitions of his brothers. Each brother paid the same hefty price for their ambitions: leaving behind their family for the lofty goal of that place in the sun. It is a goal for which they cannot be entirely faulted. In the same way that coming out as queer forces an expansion of the world not just for the queer person but for their family as well, the upheaval of the times that Allos and his brothers lived in forced open the world in a way that was impossible to dismiss.
Themes of alienation, injustice, hope, and fear bridge together the queer experience and America is in the Heart. Unlike with the writings of Steinbeck, queer Filipinos are far likelier to see some part of themselves in Bulosan’s novel. But the most important reason for advocating a queer reading of his novel comes from its own temporality: just as the periods after World War I and World War II were historically and personally meaningful for Bulosan, we also must derive meaning from our own times. It is 2023 and social media culture has made an anthem out of a statement that originated in the art of Brandan Odums: “I am my ancestors’ wildest dreams.” As queers, this is our time to carve that place in the sun which the future will look back on in the same way we look back at America is in the Heart.
Part 2 of 2.
About the Author: Sam Hosea (he/him) is a trans Filipino American pursuing graduate study in theology with concentrations in queer and economic intersectionalities. His writing has appeared in academic publications as well as literary journals such as Forum, the long-running journal of the City College of San Francisco, and Drain. He lives on the east coast.