I really enjoyed working on this research project. Looking back at my first initial questions, I did not understand a lot about the Shanghai Jews. Their origins, the businesses that they started, what they did for fun and how they functioned in Shanghai along the people who previously lived there. I learned a lot about the reasons that they were able to so easily cross borders and was intrigued to learn of all of the Jewish run businesses that were established. We learned about the Sassoon family as well as the many businesses on East Seward Road. We were able to find some meta data about one of the photos of the ice company within the collection which was so cool to see. We also learned about things like the sports teams that were started and even discovered, from a man whose parents lived in Shanghai during this time, the names of one of the soccer players in the pictures. Our work in this project is now preserved in time, which I can not say about my five other essays required for my other classes. The opportunity to do research and actually make a difference is amazing.
I would suggest to those working on these projects in the future to enjoy it! Take the opportunity to appreciate the larger perspective of the project. The idea that you are saving history from being lost and preserving a moment in time is so rewarding. Take time on this project and just sit down at your desk with a good playlist and explore. Click on links to other sources, browse pictures, read bios, historical facts and quotes and take advantage of this chance to make a difference. Best of luck and thanks for a wonderful semester.
Looking back on my first post, I had written, “I am interested in the images of the Jewish theatrical performances because the audience looks so crammed together and the stage is so small”. Now that I have actually researched the images regarding theatrical performances I understand that this was due to lack of funding and audience members that could afford to attend. I had also written, “It is hard not to make generalizations off of images where explicit text is limited to a caption and a date,” and I still think that assumptions were the toughest part about working with the collection. It is really hard to anchor text information with images when you’re unsure of the intended audience of the images. When I view the collection now I understand more fully the dynamic of a displaced culture.
Read more
Upon reflecting, I must say that the focus of my
research completely changed thus, I didn’t look further into my initial
assumptions. During the actual research portion, I focused on life in
Shanghai, specifically how the existing Jewish community interacted with
the fleeing European refugees.
After engaging
in much research, I can better understand how the Jewish refugee community
lived while in Shanghai. For example, after interviewing Rabbi
Blumenstein, he explained that the reason why in many of the negatives,
we see Jewish refugees in the alleys is because that was essentially
their kitchen and they cooked outside. I am able to make many of these
connections after viewing and researching the Jewish Shanghai refugees.
Suggestions for suture students: I would advise
to begin your research with an open mind really view the Jewish Shanghai
refugees in a different lens than one would view an Auschwitz survivor. I
would also suggest to research anything and everything that has to do
with Jewish Shanghai refugees then, look at the collection to see if
connections can be made with the obtained research and the digital
negatives. Also, if an event is hosted by the Special Collections
department at LMU that regards the Shanghai collection, attendance is
highly encouraged. During that event, I was able to meet the son of a Jewish
Shanghai Refugee and because we met, I spearheaded an interview with him,
which complemented my groups overall research.
Looking back at my first time browsing through the collection, I initially thought that there seemed to be very few pictures that showed the interactions between the two cultures. I thought, simply, that the photographer might have not been interested in that. However, as I did my own research, I found out that there simply was not a lot of interaction between the two cultures. Even though both cultures stressed similar values, they kept to themselves most of the time.
Some helpful advice:
- Try and focus on a topic that genuinely interests you
- Communication is absolutely key
- Don’t be afraid to ask for help, Tumblr is a new medium for many people and it could be overwhelming
I
did not use in my group’s project the same images I initially looked at in my Exploring the
collection post, but I did find it interesting that, in addition to the images
of families, parties, and mundane home life, the photos of the documents seemed
to help document certain important papers, as a kind of copy machine or
insurance. My general impression of the photos was correct in that the Jews
managed to thrive and prosper in the face of conflict, building a community
after having escaped one hostile situation and going right into another (though
not as murderous). After having spent more time looking at the collection and
reading about the Shanghai Jews and their presence in the city, I know now that
the hospitality and integration the Chinese (and to an extent, Japanese) people
allowed in their area. It is interesting
to note that though there was a Shanghai ghetto, it is also called “China’s
little Vienna,” referring to the haven Shanghai provided from the Germans in
Europe. It is highly likely that not once could someone read the memoir or a
diary of a Jew who was sentenced to moving into a ghetto in Poland or Germany
and have the ghetto be called a haven.
For
anyone in the future working on this project, I would advise them to look at
the details. The photographs are in high resolution for a reason, and in being
able to zoom in and really look at the details, one could learn so much more.
There is culture and emotion in the photos, and there are a myriad of ways just
one image can be read. Look at outside sources, look at the discrepancies in
information, look at what isn’t said
about a topic as information. A great start in research is to look at what is
already there; what general information overlaps so much in the articles that
it can be considered fact? When delving further, look at how information
digresses and how aspects of life in Shanghai were diverse. Don’t get caught up in assuming information;
it is better to be vague and correct than specific and wrong. The importance of
research, even though it may not always present answers, paves the way for
others to dig deeper. Lastly, be open minded; these are humans we are looking
at, with lives just as real as ours are today – so when there are individuals
with different opinions or stories, it is important to note that that is why we
examine these images: stories make history, and these people’s realities should
not be forgotten.
Looking back on my first blog post, I realized that while the topic of inquiry may be the same, the scope of my research was far too specific. I learned so much more about Jewish nightlife culture in Shanghai when I broadened the scope of the questions I was asking. I still think that many of the assumptions I am making are very general conclusions, but I still think the information and ideas are valuable to connect.
After discovering so much from the few images I took inspiration from, I can definitely see a greater scope within the Collection that I have not even touched on in my research. There is so much to learn even from the few images rescued from the archive–and that could take years of work to uncover!
To someone new working on this project, I would advise them to take advantage of the multimedia opportunities. Connecting external visual and film sources besides just the Collection to our project brought so much more depth and interest.
Additionally, my group found a great interview transcript with a contemporary who lived in Shanghai at that time, and were able to get more information by contacting the interviewer–another professor at another institution that was interested in helping us with the project! There are so many resources out there on the internet, and it’s up to you to take advantage of them.
Looking back on my first blog post, I remember how initially shocked I was at all of the images. Not knowing that there were Jewish refugees in Shanghai and the fact that the images were so different from the images/films/texts, were the major factors that contributed to this shock I believe. This study in particular is so unique and I had never used tumblr before, so I think I was just overwhelmed and nervous that I wouldn’t be able to represent the collection well.
After diving head first into the project, I got to experience the rewards of what I was so initially shocked and nervous about. The photographs reflect such a special situation that was unique in its time and unique today. The refugees were not in ideal conditions, but the way that they came together and made the best out of the situation was so inspiring. The inspiration that is found is what inspired our group to choose the topic: community relations. There were so many different and even funny ways two completely different cultures were able to come together. Two of my favorite sources from our project have to be the picture of the hot dog stand in Shanghai and the article about how Confucianism and Judaism are similar through through a strong sense of respect to elders, education, etc.
If I were to give advice to future students taking on this project, I would say to definitely split up the work strategically. I think that this project was a lot of work but worth it because it was so rewarding. What helped our group manage the work was that we each worked on elements of the project that we felt confident in. Rachel is very teach savy so she managed the tumblr, Levi was really good at finding articles and citing them, and I was really good at writing blurbs and pulling out significant quotes for the blog. I think this made it easier because we each had a specific job. I would STRONGLY advise one person to handle the tumblr who the group can fully trust at making it look good. You don’t have to schedule as many meeting times if one person is focusing/learning about tumblr and its less confusing with who has permission to write what and who likes what theme better. We created a google doc, and Rachel was able to simply filter in the information and make our blog look amazing! We were like a well oiled machine!
Looking back on my first blog post my group’s final topic was different than my original topic. In the beginning I wrote about sports in the Jewish community. This said, I did not pursue researching sports within the collection and am unable to say if my assumptions were correct or incorrect. However, in my first blog post I proposed a series of questions I wanted to find the answers to. The questions were the following:
1. How did they get there?
2. What was their experience in Shanghai like?
3. Did they leave when the war ended?
Read more
As my group and I explored the Shanghai Jews collection over the course of the semester, we became more and more immersed in the day-to-day lives of the Jewish refugees. I saw snapshots of moments both good and bad as well as obvious and obscure in the collection that gave me a first hand account of the refugee’s lives. After deciding to settle on the relationship between the refugees and the Japanese, I was able to contribute much more informed and educated knowledge to our group and to our class.
My understanding of the Jewish experience is best illustrated in the improvement from my first post to our digital resource. My first post was considering the picture of the Japanese soldier in front of building with a few Jewish refugees in the foreground. My first assumption about the picture was that the dynamic between the soldiers and refugees was similar to that of the relationship with the Nazis and the Jews in concentration camps. More in-depth studying and research, as well as more time spent reading in Professor Levitsky’s class, gave me a much more informed interpretation of the collection. The treatment of the refugees was no where near as brutal and inhumane as the Nazis yet it still left me feeling uneasy about their treatment. Shanghai Jews were confined to ghettos and still treated as less than human throughout the duration of their occupation there. This aspect of negative treatment became the topic of my research and my specialty for our group project. By the end of this semester, I have come across many photos in the collection and been able to identify the source of this prejudice through my research. The main source I found was General Ghoya Kanoh.
I have learned from our workshops in the library how to locate various E-books, scholarly articles and books which has furthered my understanding of our topic. Without these resources, I would not have been able to find the information necessary to write what I have written about Ghoya. He was a notorious figure, however, writing about him was not easily done without the accessibility of scholarly texts.
In conclusion, my advice to students in the future is to pick a topic that you can find a connection with somehow. There are many facets of this topic that one can choose to focus on and you should not be hasty in the decision to pick a topic. This way when it comes time to put in work on your digital resource, you will be interested in what you are doing and seek to make a resource that will have a lasting impact for a long time.
Having completed our final blog, I am really glad that I was interested by the photos of theatrical performances for the exploring the collection assignment. My further research into the theater community of Shanghai proved to be challenging yet fruitful, and even got me in contact with a researcher at another university about the nightlife scene for the Jewish people in Shanghai. Whereas when we first started with the collection I thought of it as the only source of information available about the Shanghai ghetto, but as I did more research I realized that LMU’s collection of photos is only a small piece of a very large puzzle. As researchers, it is our duty to spend the time piecing those scattered bits of information, records, photos, and testimonies into a unified piece of knowledge. Once I had this mentality toward the project, my interest in the collection itself, as well as the Shanghai Jewish community increased: it is exciting to be involved with a topic that has not had a ton of research done on it already. I would recommend that students begin looking for sources outside of LMU’s collection early, as these sources ended up being very helpful for us. I would also recommend seeking out primary sources, such as interviews with people who were there: these sources both provide information and are fascinating to read.