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Notes
1 Broadly speaking, “theo-logic” is rooted in the idea that talk about God is “a situated and collaboratively accomplished, lived-in detail of self-regulating communicative processes, [which is] not an individual state of mind, a belief, or a metaphysical education, but rather a property of certain social communicative processes.” In other words, “theo-logic” has to do not with metaphysical speculation, but with theology as “social process,” hence our reading of Wong Kim Ark as a tacit theological document by virtue of its very form as public and performative. Though operating in a slightly different register focused on the lingustic dimensions of “theo-logic,” see Shelley Schweizer-Bjelic and Dusan Bjelic, “‘God-Talk’ as ‘Tacit’ Theo-logic,” Modern Theology 6, no. 4 (1990): 342–3.
2 United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), 60. Hereafter cited as Wong Kim Ark by paragraph.
3 Thomas, “The Legal and Literary Complexities of U.S. Citizenship Around 1900,” 308.
4 Cited in Thomas, “Legal and Literary Complexities,” 308.
5 Ibid., 309.
6 Kim, “The Racial Triangulation of Asian Americans,” 105–38.
7 See Chang, Citizens of a Christian Nation.
8 Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), 163 U.S. 537, 47.
9 Ibid.
10 Wong Kim Ark, 53.
11 Cf. Kantorowicz, The King’s Two Bodies.
12 Wong Kim Ark, 320.
13 González, Genealogical Fictions, 28.
14 Ibid., 147–8.
15 Blum, Reforging the White Republic, 4.
16 Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), 149 U.S. 698.
17 Although “blood” is not explicitly mentioned in the US Enlistment Oath for armed forces, we suggest the “sacrifice of blood” is implied given the nature of the document. We thus note the religious and theological ambivalence in a 1962 amendment to the oath, which reads: “Pub. L. 87–751 substituted ‘support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same’ for ‘bear true faith and allegiance to the United States of America; that I will serve them honestly and faithfully against all their enemies whomsoever’ and inserted ‘So help me God’ in the oath, and ‘or affirmation’ in text.” The insertion of “So help me God” vis-à-vis the language of “true faith” serves to crystalize the religious orientation of the enlistee and their oath to “shed blood” in defense of the holy writ of the state, the US Constitution.
18 See Burnett, Karlstadt and the Origins of the Eucharistic Controversy, 10–35.
19 Cavanaugh, “Eucharistic Sacrifice and the Social Imagination in Early Modern Europe,” 591–2.
20 As Cavanaugh notes, “The social contract creates a state that polices a certain territory and defends its sovereignty with violence.” Ibid., 593.
21 This section of the article is written exclusively by Franklin Tanner Capps and is not intended to reflect any experiences of the co-author.
22 Note Fields’ trenchant critique of “biraciality” and “multiraciality” as rooted in a uniquely American (racist) preoccupation with “accurate racial identity” in Fields and Fields, Racecraft, 2–6, 56–70.
23 Izumi, The Rise and Fall of America’s Concentration Camp Law, 4.
24 The themes of exclusion and belonging, dual racial or dual ethnic identity, and narratives around generational trauma are explored with reference to a different geopolitical context, the Korean War, in Cho, Tastes Like War. The controversial and contested nature of Cho’s memoir highlights the complicated nature of memory, especially traumatic memory contextualized by elder care, within family systems and care units.
25 Brubaker, “Ethnicity without Groups,” 167.
26 Brubaker, “Ethnicity,” 165–6.
27 Jane Naomi Iwamura identifies this as the experience of “distancing” from various spiritual heritages among immigrant East Asian communities, particularly second and third generation people with no primary knowledge of how the non-Western spiritual practices were conducted “back home.” Writing from the perspective of Sansei Japanese, Iwamura observes that the distancing we feel from practices like ancestor veneration – a practice I observed in the United States and in which I participated in Japan – “is both positive and negative, which can [help explain] feelings of ambivalence Asian Americans may have towards their spiritual heritages. On the one hand, new ways of looking at one’s tradition can have a ‘liberating’ effect, freeing Asian Americans from the oppressive structures which operate in their respective Asian cultures. On the other hand, we have lost touch with valuable human resources which can lend meaning, inspiration and strength to our lives.” Iwamura, “Homage to Ancestors,” 164.
28 Redfield, “Critical Theory for Political Theology 2.0: Diaspora”.
29 Blum, Reforging the White Republic, 113.
30 Ibid., 105.
31 Boyarin, A Radical Jew, 4.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Franklin Tanner Capps
Franklin Tanner Capps, ThD is the director of the Miller Summer Youth Institute at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. Prior to this appointment, he served as Bruce Scholars Lecturer in the Honors College at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.
SueJeanne Koh
SueJeanne Koh, ThD is the Graduate Futures Program Director of the Humanities Center at the University of California, Irvine. She is also the Director of Adult Education and Resident Theologian for St. Mark and New Hope Presbyterian Churches in Orange County, CA.