Remembering Pauline Manaka

Irvine -- The tragic and unexpected passing this past Sunday (18 June 2017) of my long-term colleague and good friend cut short the amazing life of a librarian who reached the pinnacle of her profession (by serving on the Council of the American Library Association) and more importantly, became a strong voice for social justice. 

Hailing from Pretoria, South Africa, Pauline Manaka (photographed) was a student Fulbrighter, in the late 1970s, arguably the first to enter library school at Atlanta University in Atlanta, Georgia, on such a prestigious grant given by the U.S. to a national of South Africa.  She came to Atlanta at a time where her homeland was trapped in the Apartheid era.  In joining the library profession, she followed in the pioneering steps of her uncle, Seth Manaka, who would be the first black librarian and later university librarian and library school professor in the country, honored at his retirement in 2015 with his own festschrift.

Moving to Orange County by 1989, Pauline lessened my burden as a social sciences bibliographer by taking on the responsibilities for selecting in sociology and anthropology. She later also took on Women Studies when another librarian left.  In the 28 years I've known her, she was the voice on conscience as the library and the university took on the formidable challenge of diversifying its staff as well as its collections.

She kept her commitment to the struggles of her homeland.  In 1994 (April 24) she appeared as a committed  African National Congress member on my KUCI Subversity Show to talk about her organizing work among the South African diaspora in southern California for a historic post-Apartheid national election.  She was also quoted in a Los Angeles Times article.

She kept her interest in and her ties with South Africa, teaching in Anthropology a UCI class for many years on South Africa.  She also served as library liaison to the area Model United Nations.

She was active also in the librarians and lecturers union, UC-AFT.  Union president Andrew Tonkovich in fact wrote a very warm profile of her in Coast Magazine in January 2015.

It is fortunate that her voice will not be silenced, literally, since she provided the "clear narration" (as I wrote in a review in the 9 May 2002 OC Weekly) for UCI PhD student and Student Workers Union organizer Marty Otanez's  (he's now a professor in anthropology at University of Colorado, Denver) pioneering documentary short (with Michelle Otanez) on Big Tobacco, "Thangata: Social Bondage and Big Tobacco in Malawi".

In her narration, Pauline indicted the World Bank for causing economic instability in Malawi, described the slave trade,  and called out U.S. tobacco firms for the exploitation of labor in the growing of tobacco and its marketing to women and children in Malwai and other developing countries. That short film is available free online, where you can hear Pauline's lyrical voice.

She was also interviewed with two of her colleagues in an oral history video for the UCI Libraries' 50th anniversary.

I trust her adult son, Lesetja, a budding filmmaker, will emerge from the pain of losing his mother so suddenly, and take his own path, while recognizing his mom's pioneering role in America. -- Daniel C. Tsang.

Sepia-toned photos of Pauline Manaka taken in 2015. © Copyright Daniel C. Tsang.

Tom Hayden, at UCI, Looks Back and Ahead

Hayden as professor. To listen to the audio of Hayden's talk, click . Presented with the kind permission of Tom Hayden as another Subversity Online podcast. All photos © Daniel C. Tsang 2011.

60's activist Tom Hayden ventured on to the UC Irvine campus late last month, to espouse his views to a new audience of largely undergraduates organized by graduate student Alfredo Carlos and Social Ecology Prof. Rodolfo D. Torres.

A former California State Senator, Hayden spoke about "Economic Democracy and Alternative Futures" 29 November 2011 at UCI's Humanities Gateway, at an event sponsored by the Chican@/Latin@ Graduate Student Collective.

Hayden, a one-time Chicago 7 defendant who had authored the Students for a Democratic Society's manifesto, the Port Huron Statement, while a student at the University of Michigan, sounded more reformist than perhaps some old Sixties radicals would have liked. He said one needs take a long view of social movements, given that success may be elusive for decades, even for 80 years.

A pensive Hayden

He called the Dream Act undergraduates the "bravest" and said the cause of undocumented students in California is so "popular" that politicians like Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Lt.Gov. Gavin Newsom could take on that campaign with nothing to lose.

He said the "Sixties were stolen" by assassinations, of JFK, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Medgar Evers. With the dreams stolen from them, "no wonder people become anarchists..."

But before his hour and half discourse on the Sixties through Obama ended, he called on the "fine" dean of the UCI Law School (without naming Erwin Chemerinsky) to have UCI law faculty conduct classes there debating the concept of corporations as people having First Amendment rights to spread propaganda. He avowed that such courses could well "fire up" students and spread across the nation, leading to the U.S. Supreme Court overturning the notorious 2010 case, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

Hayden answers questions from the audience

Jesse Cheng Proclaims His Innocence

Updated 21 February 2011: To listen to the podcast of this program, click
on:

Jesse Cheng in his Student Regent office Friday, 18 February 2011. Photograph © Daniel C. Tsang 2011.

Under seige by fellow activists seeking his resignation as Student Regent of the UC system, Jesse Cheng, a fifth-year Asian American studies major, finally issued a a statement today clarifying his take on his self-described "messy breakup" with his ex girlfriend, a UCLA law student. After the breakup, his former partner, a former UCI Filipina American student, went to the Irvine police, which arrested him last November for attempted sexual battery and attempted rape, but the Orange County District Attorney's Office ultimately decided there was insufficient evidence to justify prosecuting him on misdemeanor charges.

Last Tuesday, the day the New University published a front-page article containing his ex-lover's accusations, Jesse Cheng told me, "I am innocent... this is just so crazy." Last Friday, I met up with the embattled student leader and found him to be still characteristically forthcoming, admitting that he was "stupid" to have agreed to send back to his ex girlfriend words he now regrets agreeing with, in an email now touted by his partner's supporters as a "confession."

Given how activists (including Jesse Cheng) tend to act politically correct on the issue of violence against women, it is not surprising to see the former partner's supporters demanding retribution, while even their target would feel he had to use the same politically correct language. As he expressed in his statement today, "I thought that by adopting her language and meeting the standards she set out, we could both move forward." As he indicated to me on Friday, her former partner had drafted the language while insisting he agree to the wording. As he added in his statement, "I regret lying to her in those e-mails, and it was a mistake to capitulate just so she would stop calling me incessantly." Despite the email, he did not feel he needed to resign as Student Regent.

On today's edition of Subversity, a KUCI public affairs show, we look back at the controversy that has shaken the campus and indeed the activist communities, as well as hear from Jesse Cheng himself during his earlier appearances on this show.

The show airs from 5-6 p.m. on KUCI, 88.9 fm in Orange County, and is simulcast via kuci.org. Podcast audio will be available later.


His public statement follows this earlier photograph of Jesse Cheng.

Jesse Cheng at a happier time in 1999. Photograph © Daniel C. Tsang 1999.

Statement released today by Jesse Cheng:

I'm writing this statement to respond to a number of accusations made about me in various media outlets in the last week. Initially, I did not feel it was appropriate to comment because I was trying to defend the interests and privacy of all the students involved, including my former partner. I now feel like I have no choice but to explain fully what occurred.

I am innocent of all accusations made. These accusations have been extremely painful for me, especially because I have tried to acknowledge the privileges that I have as a man and support gender equality issues throughout my college career. It is work that is essential to my identity, and I would never engage in behavior that would compromise those values.

My former partner and I were in a committed relationship for almost a year. Near the end of the year, it was clear that the relationship was not working out, and I initiated the break up.

Afterward, we agreed to remain friends. We saw each other three times after the relationship ended, all three times we engaged in varying levels of consensual physical contact, none of which was forced or coerced, none of which was intercourse. The first time she invited me to be her date to a UCLA graduate school event. The next week, on Oct. 3, the night that would become the source of the accusations against me, I invited her over for dinner at my apartment in Irvine. That night, although we we engaged in kissing, all contact was consensual and we did not have sex. Afterward, we ate dinner at my apartment and watched a movie.

A week after this visit, she called me, and accused me of sexually assaulting her the week before. The phone conversation lasted for hours. My reaction during the phone call was that her description of events did not happen. In the following weeks, I would get as many as 50 calls a day from her. The amount of phone calls became extremely stressful and disruptive.

During the time of these phone calls, she requested I meet her personally at her apartment. I visited her apartment two weeks after Oct. 3. During that visit, she initiated and engaged physical intimacy. It was the third time we met after the break up, and a few weeks after the night she had claimed I behaved inappropriately.

The phone calls continued, and began to have a serious toll on my well-being. She demanded that I write e-mail apologies to her, and specifying exact language that she wanted to see in those e-mails. Exhausted, I sent out those e-mails. What I said in those e-mails are not true and did not reflect my behavior, but I thought that by adopting her language and meeting the standards she set out, we could both move forward. I regret lying to her in those e-mails, and it was a mistake to capitulate just so she would stop calling me incessantly.

On Nov. 4, the police arrested me on campus and took me back to the police department for questioning. We spoke about the relationship, that particular night and the entire situation. Three hours later, the police released me, and the DA declined to press any charges.

I know this last week has been extremely difficult for the campus community. It has been difficult for me and my friends. I would ask people to please thoughtfully consider both sides of a story and the entire context of a relationship before jumping to conclusions or making assumptions. I do not know why my former partner has chosen to make these accusations or make them at this time. I loved her very much, and I really wish for her the best in the future.

S. Leo Chiang's Documentary on the Mobilization of Vietnamese Community in Versailles

Updated: To listen to the 24 May 2010 edition of the Subversity show, click here: .


Irvine -- Hurricane Katrina, instead of just devastating the Vietnamese American community at the edge of New Orleans, galvanized the residents there into mobilizing against a potentially toxic dump site that the mayor imposed on them without consultation.

That mobilization - among young and old - members of the Vietnamese community, is well captured in a documentary by filmmaker S. Leo Chiang, "A Village Called Versailles" -- to air tomorrow on PBS stations nation-wide, as part of its Independent Lens series.

Earlier this month, the film screened at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, where it won the audience award.

Subversity, a KUCI public affairs program, will feature an interview with Director Chiang this afternoon, from 5-6 p.m., on KUCI, 88.9 FM in Orange County, simulcast via kuci.org.

See: film web site.