Not Yo' Butterfly: My Long Song of Relocation, Race, Love, and RevolutionA mold-breaking memoir of Asian American identity, political activism, community, and purpose. Not Yo’ Butterfly is the intimate and unflinching life story of Nobuko Miyamoto—artist, activist, and mother. Beginning with the harrowing early years of her life as a Japanese American child navigating a fearful west coast during World War II, Miyamoto leads readers into the landscapes that defined the experiences of twentieth-century America and also foregrounds the struggles of people of color who reclaimed their histories, identities, and power through activism and art. Miyamoto vividly describes her early life in the racialized atmosphere of Hollywood musicals and then her turn toward activism as an Asian American troubadour with the release of A Grain of Sand—considered to be the first Asian American folk album. Her narrative intersects with the stories of Yuri Kochiyama and Grace Lee Boggs, influential in both Asian and Black liberation movements. She tells how her experience of motherhood with an Afro-Asian son, as well as a marriage that intertwined Black and Japanese families and communities, placed her at the nexus of the 1992 Rodney King riots—and how she used art to create interracial solidarity and conciliation. Through it all, Miyamoto has embraced her identity as an Asian American woman to create an antiracist body of work and a blueprint for empathy and praxis through community art. Her sometimes barbed, often provocative, and always steadfast story is now told. |
Contents
Intro | 1 |
FIRST MOVEMENT | 3 |
A Travelin Girl | 5 |
Dont Fence Me In | 13 |
A Tisket a Tasket a Brown and Yellow Basket | 19 |
From a Broken Past into the Future | 25 |
Twice as Good | 37 |
Shall We Dance | 44 |
Somos Asiáticos | 142 |
Foster Children of the Pepsi Generation | 152 |
A Grain of Sand | 157 |
Free the Land | 164 |
What Will People Think? | 176 |
Some Things Live a Moment | 184 |
How to Mend Whats Broken | 188 |
Chris Iijima and JoAnneNobuko perform in Central Park New York 1971 | 193 |
School Daze | 51 |
Chop Suey | 60 |
Theres a Place for Us | 71 |
IO We Shall Overcome | 79 |
Nobukos maternal greatgrandparents in Japan ca 1918 | 86 |
Wedding photo of Nobukos maternal grandparents Seattle 1912 | 87 |
Nobukos paternal grandmother with her sons Ogden Utah ca 1913 | 88 |
JoAnnes then called JoJo first dance experience ca 1945 | 89 |
The Miyamoto and Hayashida families Utah ca 1945 | 90 |
JoAnne in her Raggedy Ann dance costume 1950 | 91 |
JoAnne dancing with Jim Bates ca 1954 | 92 |
Reiko Sato Jack Cole and JoAnne dancing in The Hollywood Palace ca 1965 | 93 |
SECOND MOVEMENT | 95 |
Power to the People | 97 |
A Single Stone Many Ripples | 110 |
Something About Me Today | 117 |
The Peoples Beat | 122 |
A Song for Ourselves | 130 |
Grace Lee Boggs Yuri Kochiyama and Nobuko UCLA 1998 | 194 |
THIRD MOVEMENT | 197 |
Women Hold Up Half the Sky | 199 |
Our Own Chop Suey | 203 |
What Is the Color of Love? | 209 |
Talk Story | 215 |
Yuiyo Just Dance | 221 |
Float Hands Like Clouds | 228 |
Deep Is the Chasm | 236 |
To All Relations | 241 |
Bismillah Ir Rahman Ir Rahim | 245 |
The Seed of the Dandelion | 255 |
Dream a Garden | 264 |
MottainaiWaste Nothing | 273 |
Black Lives Matter | 280 |
Epilogue | 305 |
Other editions - View all
Not Yo' Butterfly: My Long Song of Relocation, Race, Love, and Revolution Nobuko Miyamoto Limited preview - 2021 |
Not Yo' Butterfly: My Long Song of Relocation, Race, Love, and Revolution Nobuko Miyamoto Limited preview - 2021 |
Common terms and phrases
African African American Angeles Antonello artists Asian American Attallah audience Auntie baby ballet beautiful became Black Boyle Heights Broadway brother Buddhist called camp Chinese Chop Suey choreographer Chris circle color cultural dance dancers FandangObon father feel felt film Flower Drum Song girl going Grandpa Harlem Hatsue Hollywood Jack Cole Japan Japanese American jazz Kamau kids knew Kochiyama learned Little Tokyo living looked Lucy Mamie Mfalme Miyamoto mother moved movement movie musicians Muslim Mutulu Mutulu Shakur never nisei Nisei Week Nobuko Obon Panthers perform play political Puerto Rican rehearsal Reiko Robbins Rodgers and Hammerstein sang Senshin sing singers sister stage story street struggle taiko talk Tarabu temple theater told took trying voice walked wanted West West Side Story White woman women Yoko York young Yuri Yuriko