Collection context
Summary
- Abstract:
- Karen Tei Yamashita (January 8, 1951) is a novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and professor, known for her works of Asian American literature and magic realism, including I Hotel (2010), which was a finalist selection for the National Book Award. This collection documents her creative life, reflecting the biographical, academic, literary, and theatrical aspects of Yamashita's professional career. The collection primarily contains material relating to correspondence, story publication, theatrical productions, and research, with some papers relating to professional activities, speaking events, and living abroad.
- Extent:
- 69.85 Linear Feet (109 boxes) and 4.09 GB (approximately 3,791 digital files)
- Language:
- English, Japanese, Portuguese
- Preferred citation:
-
Karen Tei Yamashita papers. MS 465. Special Collections and Archives, University Library, University of California, Santa Cruz.
Background
- Scope and content:
-
This collection documents the creative life of Yamashita, reflecting the biographical, academic, literary, and theatrical aspects of her professional career. The holding contains large amounts of correspondence as well as publication, production, and research materials generated from writing Yamashita's major works, with some papers relating to her professional activities, speaking events, and living abroad. Correspondence primarily includes handwritten and typed letters, cards, email printouts, and mainly addresses specific works and personal greetings. Correspondents include organizations, publishers, colleagues, friends, and family writing mainly in regards to research, draft feedback, publication, publicity, and recognition. Publication and production materials mostly comprise manuscripts at different stages, cover or poster art and illustrations, props, set and costume designs, contracts, and copyright documents, with some original publicity clippings and photocopies of mass market and independent newspaper reviews and articles. In addition are articles, essays, and interviews with Yamashita. Accumulated background research for her works primarily include clippings, handouts and other forms of ephemera related to the topics of Japan, Brazil, Asian diaspora, the arts, and teaching. Some media exists across the collection, such as videocassettes, audio cassettes, floppy disks, and compact discs (CD). Furthermore, some photographic images and materials exist as well. The collection also includes digital files pertaining to a variety of Yamashita's literary works and her professional career.
- Biographical / historical:
-
Karen Tei Yamashita (January 8, 1951) is a novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and professor. Although born in Oakland, California, Yamashita spent most of her childhood in Gardena, Los Angeles County, California. From 1969 to 1973, Yamashita attended Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, and spent her junior year abroad at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan. Yamashita graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1973 with Bachelors of Arts degrees in English and Japanese literature. A year later, contemplating a career in anthropology, Yamashita received the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship and traveled to Sao Paulo in 1975 to research Japanese immigrant communities in Brazil. Yamashita would remain in Brazil for nine years, where she met and married artist and architect Ronaldo Lopes de Oliveira, with whom she has had two children. In 1984, the family moved to Gardena, California, where Yamashita worked for twelve years as an Executive Assistant at KCET, one of the local PBS stations in Southern California. In 1997, Yamashita became a Professor at the University of California Santa Cruz, relocating to Santa Cruz after a six-month stay in Seto, Japan.
Yamashita's literary career began during her first months in Brazil when she wrote and submitted the short story "The Bath" (1975), which would become her first professional publication. "The Bath" was followed by other short stories, some award-winning and published in multiple translations, including "Asaka-no-Miya" (1979) and "The Orange" (1991). Additional short works by Yamashita include "Madama B" (1993) and "The Dentist and the Dental Hygienist" (1995). Yamashita's short stories explore a diverse set of topics, including the Japanese diaspora and technology, and consider the intersections of race, gender, love, and stereotype. At the same time she wrote short stories, Yamashita composed performance pieces including Omen: An American Kabuki (1978), Hannah Kusoh: An American Butoh (1989), Tokyo Carmen vs. L.A. Carmen: A Performance Collaboration (1990), and Noh Bozos: A Circus Performance in Ten Amazing Acts (1993). Many of these were performed around Los Angeles in the 1980s and 1990s. Yamashita's other scripts include the collaborative musical Rock Candy (1987) and the multimedia-inspired Jan Ken Pon (2012). Much of Yamashita's performance work is experimental, using music, dance, videoclips, and imaginative sets and costumes to playfully explore race and gender with attention to the collaborative nature of performance. Selected plays, written from the 1980s through the 2010s, were published in the collection Anime Wong: Fictions of Performance (2014).
Yamashita began work as a critically-acclaimed novelist after returning from Brazil to Southern California in the 1980s. Her first two novels, Through the Arc of the Rain Forest (1990) and Brazil-Maru (1992), take place in Brazil and are influenced by her time in that country. Arc is a story of environmental destruction in the rainforest, while Brazil-Maru tells the story of early twentieth century Japanese immigrants in Brazil. Both Arc and Brazil-Maru have been translated into Japanese, and Arc was also published in Portuguese translation under the title Matacao, uma lenda tropical (2003). Yamashita's next novel, Tropic of Orange (1997), is set in Los Angeles and Mexico and follows a diverse cast of characters in an unsettled future where the Tropic of Cancer is moving northwards. Circle K Cycles (2001), a collection of short stories that was inspired by Yamashita's six-month stay in Japan and based on web journals written during that stay, reflects on Japanese-Brazilian experiences in Japan at the end of the twentieth century. Yamashita's most recent novel, I Hotel (2010), is an extensively-researched exploration of the Asian American Movement in the San Francisco Bay Area in from the 1960s to the 1970s, told through ten distinct yet interrelated novellas.
Throughout her more than three-decade writing career, Yamashita has received numerous awards, grants, and recognitions. Yamashita received awards including the Rockefeller Playwright-in-Residence Fellowship in 1977, the Japan Foundation Artist Fellowship in 1997, and the United States Artists Ford Foundation Fellowship in 2011. In addition to winning several short story contests early in her career, Yamashita received an American Book Award in 1991 and a Janet Heidinger Kafka Award in 1992 for Arc, while Brazil-Maru was voted one of The Village Voice's 25 best books of 1993. Tropic was a finalist for the Paterson Fiction Prize in 1998, and I Hotel was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2010. I Hotel received extensive additional recognition including a California Book Award (2010), American Book Award (2011) and an Asian American Literary Award (2011).
Yamashita began her career as an educator in 1997 at the University of California Santa Cruz, where she is a Professor of Literature and Creative Writing affiliated with Latin American and Latino Studies, East Asian Studies, and Critical Race and Ethnic Studies. She has been a visiting scholar and guest lecturer at universities around the world. Yamashita's commitment to education and diversity has been recognized with an Excellence in Teaching Award (2001), the Chancellor's Award for Diversity (2009), and an appointment as the co-holder of the UC Presidential Chair for Feminist Critical Race and Ethnic Studies (2012-2015).
She currently resides in Santa Cruz with her husband and continues writing to this day.
Date Event 1951 Born 8 January, Oakland, California 1952 Moved to Gardena, Los Angeles County, California 1969 Enrolled at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota 1971 Spent a year abroad at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan 1973 Graduated with a B.A. from Carleton College 1974-1977 Received the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship 1975 Moved to Sao Paulo, BrazilPublished first short story "The Bath"1977 Married Ronaldo Lopes de Oliveira 1978 Play performed: Omen: An American Kabuki 1984 Moved with family to Gardena, CaliforniaPlay performed: Hiroshima Tropical1986 Co-authored the film Kusei: An Endangered Species 1989 Multimedia performance: Hannah Kusoh: An American Butoh 1990 Published Through the Arc of the RainforestPlays performed: Hannah Kusoh and Tokyo Carmen v.s. L.A. Carmen1991 Musicals performed: Godzilla Comes to Little Tokyo 1992 Published Brazil-Maru 1993 Multimedia performance: Noh Bozos 1997 Published Tropic of OrangeReceived the Japan Foundation Artist FellowshipSpent six months in Seto, Aichi Prefecture, JapanPublished pieces for the web journal CafeCreoleMoved to Santa Cruz, CaliforniaBegan work as a professor at the University of California Santa Cruz2001 Published Circle K Cycles 2010 Published I Hotel 2011-2012 Received a United States Artists Ford Fellowship 2012 Appointed as a co-holder of the UC Presidential Chair for Feminist ritical Race and Ethnic Studies2014 Published Anime Wong: Fictions of Performance Date Event 1951 Born 8 January, Oakland, California1952 Moved to Gardena, Los Angeles County, California1969 Enrolled at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota1971 Spent a year abroad at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan1973 Graduated with a B.A. from Carleton College1974-1977 Received the Thomas J. Watson Fellowship1975 Moved to Sao Paulo, BrazilPublished first short story "The Bath"1977 Married Ronaldo Lopes de Oliveira1978 Play performed: Omen: An American Kabuki1984 Moved with family to Gardena, CaliforniaPlay performed: Hiroshima Tropical1986 Co-authored the film Kusei: An Endangered Species1989 Multimedia performance: Hannah Kusoh: An American Butoh1990 Published Through the Arc of the RainforestPlays performed: Hannah Kusoh and Tokyo Carmen v.s. L.A. Carmen1991 Musicals performed: Godzilla Comes to Little Tokyo1992 Published Brazil-Maru1993 Multimedia performance: Noh Bozos1997 Published Tropic of OrangeReceived the Japan Foundation Artist FellowshipSpent six months in Seto, Aichi Prefecture, JapanPublished pieces for the web journal CafeCreoleMoved to Santa Cruz, CaliforniaBegan work as a professor at the University of California Santa Cruz2001 Published Circle K Cycles2010 Published I Hotel2011-2012 Received a United States Artists Ford Fellowship2012 Appointed as a co-holder of the UC Presidential Chair for Feminist ritical Race and Ethnic Studies2014 Published Anime Wong: Fictions of Performance - Acquisition information:
- Donated by Karen Tei Yamashita in multiple installments.
- Processing information:
-
This collection contains unprocessed materials. The processed portion of the collection is stored in boxes 1-84.
Manuscript portion of the collection processed by Annie Tang, with assistance from Melissa Poulsen, graduate fellow in the Center for Archival Research and Training (CART) at UC Santa Cruz. Machine-readable finding aid by Annie Tang.
Digital portion of the collection partially processed by Kate Dundon in 2018. Digital files were received from Karen Yamashita on 22 3.5-inch floppy disks, 10 5.25-inch floppy disks, 34 CDs, 2 zip disks, 1 USB flash drive. With the exception of 5.25-inch floppy disks, files were transferred from original carriers in 2018. Original carriers were retained and are included in the collection. Duplicate files, student and employment records, and other out of scope files were not retained. Files were not reformatted, and file names are original to the creator. Digital materials were integrated into their corresponding series based on content. The original order of the files has been retained.
- Arrangement:
-
There was some original order to Yamashita's papers, with the collection being organized by individual works. Final arrangement was influenced by this original organization. The arrangement of the collection is as follows:
Series 1: Biographical, 1968-2013:
- Subseries 1.1: Correspondence, 1968-2013
- Subseries 1.2: Publication, 1987-2013
- Subseries 1.3: Research, 1987-2013
- Subseries 1.4: Activities, 1991-2012
- Subseries 1.5: Speaking Events, 1990-2010
- Subseries 1.6: Digital Files, 1996-2009
Series 2: Books, 1907-2014:
- Subseries 2.1: Brazil-Maru, 1953-2006
- Subseries 2.2: Through the Arc of the Rain Forest, 1980s-2004
- Subseries 2.3: Tropic of Orange, 1970s-2006
- Subseries 2.4: Circle K Cycles, 1990s-2003
- Subseries 2.5: I Hotel, 1907-2011
- Subseries 2.6: Anime Wong, 2000-2014
Series 3: Dramatic Works, 1978-2013:
- Subseries 3.1: Omen: An American Kabuki, 1976-1989
- Subseries 3.2: Asaka-No-Miya, 1980s-1984
- Subseries 3.3: O Kage, circa 1980s
- Subseries 3.4: Xina, early 1980s-1985
- Subseries 3.5: Hiroshima Tropical, early 1980s-1989
- Subseries 3.6: Hannah Kusoh: An American Butoh, 1984-1993
- Subseries 3.7: GiLAwrecks, aka Godzilla Comes to Little Tokyo, 1985-1993
- Subseries 3.8: Kusei: An Endangered Species, 1986-1989
- Subseries 3.9: Tokyo Carmen vs. L.A. Carmen, 1989-1990s
- Subseries 3.10: Rock Candy, 1986-1991
- Subseries 3.11: Noh Bozos, 1990-1994
- Subseries 3.12: Anime Wong, 1996-2013
- Subseries 3.13: Siamese Twins and Mongoloids: Three Abstractions on Asian America, 2012
- Subseries 3.14: Jan Ken Pon, 2012
Series 4: Other Writings, 1970s-2012
- Physical / technical requirements:
-
The Library is currently limited in its ability to provide access to digital content on 5.25-inch floppy disks. Please contact Special Collections for information regarding access.
- Rules or conventions:
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Indexed terms
Access and use
- Restrictions:
-
Collection is open for research. Audiovisual media is unavailable until reformatted. Contact Special Collections and Archives in advance to request access to audiovisual media. Digital files are available in the UCSC Special Collections and Archives reading room. Some files require reformatting before they can be accessed. Technical limitations may hinder the Library's ability to provide access to some digital files. Access to digital files on original carriers is prohibited; users must request to view access copies. Contact Special Collections and Archives in advance to request access to digital files.
This collection contains unprocessed additions, which require advance notice for access. These additons MAY CONTAIN RESTRICTED MATERIALS. Special Collections staff must review this material prior to access. Please contact Special Collections and Archives in advance to request access.
- Terms of access:
-
Copyright for the items in this collection is owned by the creators and their heirs. Reproduction or distribution of any work protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires permission from the copyright owner. It is the responsibility of the user to determine whether a use is fair use, and to obtain any necessary permissions. For more information see UCSC Special Collections and Archives policy on Reproduction and Use.
- Preferred citation:
-
Karen Tei Yamashita papers. MS 465. Special Collections and Archives, University Library, University of California, Santa Cruz.
- Location of this collection:
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Special Collections and Archives, University Library1156 High StreetSanta Cruz, CA 95064, US
- Contact:
- (831) 459-2547