S1: It's time for KPBS Midday Edition on today's show. The arts and culture scene in San Diego. We'll talk about the San Diego tourists never see. I'm Andrew Bracken in for Jade Hindman with conversations that keep you informed , inspired , and make you think. We speak with the authors of a book on the resistance and activism in San Diego's past. Then we revisit a conversation with the author of a book on his family history and search for belonging , plus what to look forward to in the arts this weekend. Many tourists know San Diego as America's finest city. But what happens when you look past the city's sunny surface ? What side of San Diego will you discover ? The book Under the Perfect Sun the San Diego tourists never See offered up another side of San Diego history , one rooted in resistance and activism. That was back in 2005. Now , 20 years later , it's been updated with new interviews and new stories reflecting the ways the city itself has changed. I'm joined now by two of the book's authors , Kelly Mayhew and Jim Miller. They're both professors at San Diego City College and labor activists here in San Diego. Kelly , Jim , welcome.
S2: Thank you. Thanks for having us.
S1: So thanks for being here. You dedicated under the perfect Sun to one of the original authors , Mike Davis , who passed away in 2022. Before we dive into the details of the book , I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about his legacy and how you wanted to commemorate it with this edition. Jim , I'll start with you. Well.
S3: I think , you know , Mike is probably one of the most prominent , you know , left intellectual figures , not just left intellectual figures , but intellectual figures of our time , a great urbanist. You know , he's most well known for his , you know , seminal book on Los Angeles , City of Quartz. And it was an incredible honor for us to be able to do a similar kind of project on San Diego. You know , and I think that that by keeping the activist history of this place alive , you know , as perhaps the best way we could honor Mike.
S1: Kelley , kind of adding on to Jim said there I mean , I think looking at Mike Davis's work , he also has kind of been somewhat prophetic. I think , you know , I think a lot of people brought up his book on , you know , The Ecology of Fear , you know , as these wildfires have been sweeping up in California. Tell us more about , yeah , how you've been looking to commemorate him with this sedition.
S4: Well , I think one of the most important things about Mike and something that we really got out of our our friendship , our relationship with him was , um , the his , his searing honesty about how things actually are. Um , he , he never , um , he never biased anything. Actually , you know , people would , uh , get angry about that. And in fact , we were accused of being muckrakers when the book originally came out. The hardcover came out in 2003. Um , and that was in part because , uh , Mike always spoke truth to power. And so our , um , friendship with him , our collaboration with him grew out of that fearlessness that actually all of us felt about living in this place where there's a certain kind of packaging that goes on to make it a tourist Mecca and the actual lives of the people who , like , we teach at City College , which is right downtown. The the folks in our community. We live in Golden Hill. Uh , are never represented in in that in in the ways that San Diego is kind of marketed across the country.
S1: So , you know , like we mentioned , the original version of Under the Perfect Sun came out over 20 years ago now.
S3: Right ? It's a place that's that's fallen in love with its own marketing. You know , going back to the days of America's finest city , where that was born out of San Diego , losing the Republican National Convention , something that most people don't , you know , remember , you know , all the way through the fact that this is a place that that relentlessly markets itself as a kind of sunny Paradise by the sea. Where the place where happy happens , you know ? And unlike places like Los Angeles or New York or Chicago , even that are comfortable with the , the noir side of , of the city in their history. You know , San Diego's always had a the impulse to kind of sweep that underneath the rug as much as possible. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Kelly , I mean , talk more about that and why you both wanted to , you know , write this kind of book about San Diego's history.
S4: Well , um , you know , we both ended up living here , spending most of our lives here , our adult lives here. And the thing that has always struck me about the the kind of the kind of marketing I grew up , actually , both of us grew up in Los Angeles. And , uh , when I grew up , my orientation towards was towards Northern California , towards San Francisco. And even though my cousins and my aunt and uncle lived down here in San Diego , I always kind of shrugged it off like it was , um , Shamu. Um , and so when , you know , we both when we landed here , when I landed here and I met Jim , uh , what struck me about the city is how incredibly rich and diverse and interesting it is. And that and that that story was a story that was equally powerful to the stories , to our sister cities , to the north. And I am I'm not somebody who hates on L.A. I love Los Angeles. San Diego is definitely a different flavor , but it has a lot of the same complexities. And of course , those complexities are often born out of poverty. They are born out of segregation. They are born out of racial discrimination. They're born out of all the issues facing the other cities. What fascinates me about this place are the choices that city leaders made To deliberately cut out industry stuff like that. Focus on the military , focus on tourism that has given San Diego its own , uh , I guess , um , way of being in California.
S1: Jim , you mentioned this grit that we I think , you know , we associate maybe more with other other cities.
S3: And , you know , most people don't know that down near fifth and E downtown. You know , San Diego was home to the most brutal free speech fight in the United States. And this was during the kind of era of the first Red scare around 1912. You know , when San Diego banned free speech down at the corner of fifth and a place called Heller's Corner. And , you know , this ordinance was set about to stop the IWW , the Industrial Workers of the world , from standing on soap boxes , which they used to organize. So , so in their minds , it really wasn't a free speech gesture that they were making. They were trying to say , hey , fellow workers and friends , come join the one big union. Why does Spreckels have everything and you've got nothing , right ? But San Diego was so horrified by the specter of a radicalized , militant , multi-ethnic working class that the repression was profound. So , you know , briefly put , the Wobblies were first jailed. They resisted , you know. You know , peacefully resisted , you know , of their imprisonment by , you know , singing until they drove the jailers nuts , you know , doing something called building the battleship , where they all joined arms and jumped up and down and created a racket , you know , and when they couldn't have their spirits crushed in jail , then they were victim to vigilantes , right ? Where they were taken up north around some of them beaten horribly , forced to run the gauntlet. There were people killed , and this was such a brutal kind of repression of this free speech fight that many people who weren't sympathetic with them joined in , like other AFL unionists who didn't like the IWW , people who believed in religious freedom and said , hey , if they can do this to these people , they can do it to anyone. And it really became a kind of national cause , you know ? So so that's , I think , a kind of history that's really both horrible but inspiring , right ? You know , when you think about this with what's going on today with , you know , at the national level , we have national security memorandums which are characterizing whole swaths of speech as un-American. Right ? You know , and opening up whole swaths of the population to be victims of repression. Right. I think that a history like this , and in fact , the history of San Diego's free speech fight , are some of the first things in the archives of the national ACLU. Right. So. So this is something that's both a horrifying history. People were murdered. People were tortured , tarred and feathered during this. You know , press freedom was intervened , was interfered with. You know , and shut down in some cases , you know , but it was also a history of historic and really heroic resistance to the attempts to squash free speech. And I think that the lesson that this holds not just for our city , but really for everybody , every American , is that our free speech rights and our public assembly rights are only as good as we make them at each moment in history.
S1: So , Kelly , I mean , one thing that surprised me about that is , you know , just that's that's a it's a long history. And I think a lot of times people saying , you know , in San Diego , we may not realize it is a fairly young city , again , comparing it to some of the other cities , you know , in New York City and stuff like that. But it does have a pretty rich history as Jim just kind of alluded to , you know , talk more about that and kind of how it's been changing in the ensuing years , even since when you published your first edition ? 20 years now ? Yeah.
S4: So , um , my part of of the book , of all the iterations of the book is to interview folks. So I , you know , I interviewed labor activists and political activists , social justice folks , um , environmentalists , people. Um , living their regular lives. And then in the recent edition , we have some quotes and then a much larger , uh , section of interviews in a companion book we put out called Beyond the Theme Park , which is , um , the more complete interviews that we've , that we , um , our union funded to give away to folks so that we would have this kind of living history. So I've become an oral historian , and I think one of the things that really stands out to me when we're talking about history , and I was noting this the other day is that we have now in San Diego. Most of our a lot of our top , most powerful labor positions are held by women and largely women of color. So Lorena Gonzalez was the secretary treasurer of the San Diego Imperial Counties Labor Council. She's now the head of the California Labor Fund. Bridget Browning is now president of the San Diego Imperial Counties Labor Council. Carol Kim is head of the the building trades. We have women leaders in crystal Irving is head of SEIU 221 , a super powerful union in the city. And there are are more. Um , and so the transformation of San Diego has come not only in terms of class and race , but also giving voice to those who have been voiceless in the past. Jim talks about the talked about the the free speech fight. You know , you fast forward and and , um , you you you look at again this kind of theme of of speaking truth to power and having a presence and being known and , and being able to exert a certain amount of influence in the city in ways that were not possible in the past when it was such a Republican , ruled such a right wing city where the , the , the , the centers of power and economics were wrapped up in a , in a few entities and a few powerful people to be able to take that on over the last , especially 20 years , from the 2005 edition to the to now , our our 2026 edition of Under the Perfect Sun. That has been a really remarkable transformation to to chart in the book.
S1: Yeah , absolutely. Looking at San Diego 20 years from now , thinking of even like the mayor's races and everything. I mean , it's it's transformed quite a bit. You look at the city council and you know , Democratic lead , obviously. So. You know , earlier , Kelly , you mentioned , you know , the initial response to the book. I think you just , you know , muckrakers , um , you know , tell us more about that experience and what what the reaction was at that time in , in 2005.
S4: Um , so the Union Tribune at the time had the the person who reviewed the book was a professor , actually at San Diego State. And she took great umbrage at the fact that we didn't write a hagiography of , of San Diego , that we wrote an overtly progressive book that focused on the voiceless in the city and took a mike section was a is a history of of power and how power grew and got entrenched. Um , so it wasn't fluffy. It wasn't booster history , pretty much. That's all there was. And we were accused of , um , being not just muckrakers , but of really , um , kind of pooping on people's San Diego parties in a way. Um , and so , you know , what what what the , the reviewer said is she assailed us for seeing repression everywhere and predicting that the city's contradictions will soon burst its civic bubble while failing to represent the livable city , with all its faults that most San Diegans recognize. And , um , in my view , when we read that , I was thinking that it was that she was speaking from a really white and privileged perspective. Right. So maybe from your spot in La Jolla or wherever , you could talk about San Diego in that kind of picture postcard way. But where we were at with both the people we teach , the people we live around , the the city that we inhabit. Um , it it it people were living vastly different lives than that whole kind of postcard image conveys. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Jim , do you have any memories ? Just hearing.
S3: San Diego's right. You know , that for some folks , you know , this really is , you know , a kind of , you know , episode of , you know , I'll date myself , an episode of Baywatch. Right. You know , fun in the sun and frolicking and then , you know , going to watch the sunset and having a fine dinner. And for other folks , they're asking , you know , shouldn't one job be enough ? Right. You know , the people who are the workers in , you know , the tourist plantation , you know , are struggling to pay their rent. You know , they can't even dream of owning a house. You know , they live in a San Diego that is not part of this tourist representation , you know ? And it's it's a struggle in a way that's really hard for folks in other parts of the same city to understand. You know , in some ways it you know , you could say that Shell Town and La Jolla might as well be might as well be different planets. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Yeah.
S4: Um , you know , it's it's not. And and some people said that it was , you know , kind of when you compare it to what it could be and what it should be. Um , you think about the richness of being a border city of of our immigrant folks who live here. Um , how we could take care of people in our communities better. Um , housing was a big thing that kept coming up over and over and over again , something which is resonant with Jim and me. We don't. We've never owned a house. You know , it was basically put our kid through college or own a house , so that that also was something that , that that spoke to us. Um , the the costs of living here. Um , the , the , the transit systems that could serve us better. Uh , and and just the ways that , you know , you look at what's happening with the city budget right now , the kind of austerity budget and the cuts to social services. It's the people struggling the most who are going to pay the most and struggle even more. And so a lot of the a lot of my interview subjects really hit on that , that , um , You know , maybe in terms of identity , it's a bit easier. You know , we've had these huge immigrants rights marches. We've had a lot of progress made in the LGBTQIA+ communities in ways that hadn't happened in the past. Um , but when you look at things from an economic perspective , it's still ridiculously hard to live here.
S1: Jim , you know , kind of about , um , a little under two minutes here. But I'm just wondering earlier you mentioned just the moment in time we're in here like you're dealing , you know , you're telling the story of San Diego's history , but we're in a very pertinent moment of history right now. How do you reflect on that with this new addition ? Yeah.
S3: Well , I think , you know , when we're looking about that last question , is that , like in some senses there's been a huge amount of progress , right ? You know , that we've got , as you mentioned , a Democrats rule , the city council , we have a Democratic mayor. And at the same time , you know , many of the same Democrats are like the dog that caught the car. They could have got here and said , well , now what do we do ? And now we have , you know. You know , the same perpetual budget crisis. And a lot of that is through , I would say , a kind of failure of imagination , of trying to think of other ways of raising revenue rather than , you know , regressive taxes , for example. Right. You know , so I think that , you know , one of the things that local Democrats have gotten by and gotten elected by for , for many years by not being Carl DeMaio. Right. And now we're in an era where that's just not good enough. Right.
S1: They're both professors at San Diego City College , labor activists and co-authors of the book Under the Perfect Sun. They'll be previewing the book at the Book Catapult on Thursday , May 21st. That's at 7 p.m. , and we'll have a link on our website at npr.org. The book officially comes out May 26th , so we'll include more details. Kelly , Jim , thanks so much.
S2: Thank you.
S4: So much.
S1: Welcome back. You're listening to KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Andrew Bracken in for Jade Hyneman. A microwave woven out of baskets , convenience stores , art about a friendship park , and lots of music. That's some of what's going on in our arts and culture scene this weekend. Joining me with all the details is KPBS arts reporter and host of the finest podcast , Julia Dixon Evans. Hey , Julia.
S4: Hey , Angie.
S5: Thanks for having me.
S1: It's great to have you here , but I got to hear more about the basket. Microwaves.
S5: So this is an exhibit. It opens Saturday at the Minga. It's by local ceramicist and sculptor India Thompson. There's also a basket woven toilet , by the way. She was interested , like as a renter , in exploring the way we like , attach ourselves to the objects in our homes and what it means to feel at home when it's a space that's not ours. Um , so sort of like the emotional attachments , things that define the home. And for India Thompson , this is also something that's inspired by her own childhood , the way that she was brought up. Her parents , she said , didn't have a lot of money. And this changes the way you value things. Like her parents really took care of the things in their home , and so she wanted to study this with this really domestic craft of basket weaving. And what's kind of uncanny and interesting to me is that these items are not at all functional. Right ? And they're drawing on this really functional history of this craft. So yeah , like obviously that toilet is not super functional. Like , please don't use the toilet.
S1: Um , really interesting though.
S5: There's a Brita pitcher as well. Condiment bottles. Her entire bathroom is recreated in basket weaving. And of course , that microwave is all really fascinating stuff and makes you think. It opens Saturday through mid-October. This is the Ming. Great.
S1: Great. Really interesting. So there's also a new production at the Old Globe. Tell us about Kim's Convenience. Yeah.
S5: Yeah. So this was written by INS Choi in 2011. It was written for and first performed at Toronto Fringe Festival. Kind of a cool shout out because we're in in. The.
S1: The.
S5: Midst of Fringe Fest right now. Um , and then it was taken on as a full production by the Seoul Pepper Theatre in Toronto , and then it was picked up by Netflix. There was a show for a while , Kim's Convenience. It was based on the script. It's about the Kim family , a Korean family in Toronto who run a convenience store , and this is based on Troy's life. His own uncle owned a convenience store called Kim's Grocer. His father worked there. It was just like this big part of his life. And the play kind of explores the generational struggles within the family , like the different outlooks between those younger and older generations , especially when it comes to the way that the shop is weathering gentrification and neighborhood changes and things like that. And the play here at the Old Globe. Actually stars in Troy , the playwright , and it's directed by that same director who first produced it almost 15 years ago. It opens Friday night in previews , and it'll be up on stage through June 14th.
S1: So next , if you're hitting up the downtown library , there's an interesting new exhibit in the ninth floor art gallery there.
S5: She started it something like a decade ago , exploring the idea of third spaces in contemporary society. So. Third spaces , like a place that's not work nor home , but this really broad idea of the other places that people gather. And throughout history these have changed , obviously like , but places like town squares , cafes , dance halls , libraries , parks. And I think like after this gradual devaluing right of these public places , a lot of people today are really hungry to find third spaces in communities today. And this installation , it's co-curated by Natalia Ventura. It's about one particular park , Friendship Park , which is right on the border on both sides of the border. Actually , it opened in 1971 as a way to help families and communities like literally connect through the border fence. There was a little park in Tijuana , a little park on the US side , and the park on the Mexican side is still open , but the US side has been closed since 2020. And this exhibit , it opened earlier this week , and it has installation works by a couple of collectives that really like explore the history and the meaning through Art of Friendship Park. It's pretty immersive stuff , really great. And the art gallery , it has slightly different hours than the library , but it's open noon to five Wednesday through Saturday and 1 to 7 Monday and Tuesday and it's free. The exhibit will be up just through July 25th , so check it out. Great.
S1: Great. Um , there's a lot going on in music. Um , let's start with something a little outside the box. Tell us more about this algorithmic rave. Right.
S5: Right. So this is from Project Blank. Um , I'd say that this event is like part dance party , part , um , concert of experimental music , particularly machine music. And one of the performers is Vijay Uber geek. This is a like AI DJ persona of artist Amy Alexander. Um , and this is 730 Friday at Mujeres Brewhouse in Logan Heights. Tickets are $15. Suggested donation or pay what you can.
S1: Okay , just real briefly.
S5: Could be people who are using like machines to create music or like AI generated DJ stuff a lot.
S1: That sounds really interesting. Okay , let's go to more something a little bit more traditional. The San Diego Symphony's performing this weekend.
S5: So , you know , like the polar opposite of machine music AI generated. Yeah.
S2: Yeah.
S5: Um , this has Raphael Perry conducting , violin soloist Jeff Thayer , and one piece that they're playing is Alban Berg's violin Concerto. Fun little tidbit about that is the piece was written in memory of , quote , an angel. And that Angel was supposedly the daughter of alma mahler and her second husband , who had just died a couple months before Berg composed the piece. They're also doing Mendelssohn's Scottish Symphony , inspired by traditional Scottish music and folklore , and then there performing this piece by Jimmie Lopez , the San Diego Symphony composer in residence. It's actually an older piece written in 2012. It's called Peru Negro , inspired by his Afro-Peruvian heritage from his home country. And there's two performances Friday Saturday nights at 730 at Jacobs Music Center downtown.
S1: All right. So we got some machine music , some AI stuff. Got classical. Next up is jazz.
S5: I'm just going to tell you about one thing. Um , this is Friday night at the Jazz Lounge. It's the Harley Maxine trio. It's the project of electric bass and composer Harley Massino. He'll have Joshua White on keys and Kevin Higuchi on drums , and we're listening to a track from Mexico from about ten years ago. It's called The First Time. The Jazz Lounge is this great hidden gem venue in Rolando , and this is the show starts at 615 and then music starts at seven.
S1: Okay , let's do one more live music pick before we go.
S5: Um , she's coming to town. She's this folk pop singer songwriter from Canada. Her music is lovely. Kind of haunting and gothic at the same time as being really simple and folksy. And she just released a new album called Hard Hearted Woman. Just the spring and we're listening to The Smoke , which is one of my favorite tracks from that album.
S6: Earlier this month.
S5: And also performing tonight is locals Drex , who has this incredible blend of like dramatic , powerful vocals and then doom metal , and another local alternative songwriter , Emo Cloud , who just put out another great album last summer called mausoleum. The shows tonight doors are at 730 at the Banshee and tickets are 17 bucks , including fees.
S1: It's such a great range there of of events and definitely showing off San Diego's music scene. They're pretty wild.
S5: I know , good job , San Diego. Yeah.
S2: Yeah.
S1: Good job to you , Julia. We appreciate you. You can find details on these and more arts events on our website at npr.org. I've been speaking with KPBS arts reporter and host of the finest podcast , Julia Dixon Evans. Julia , thanks so much.
S5: Thank you. Andrew , this is Ben.
S1: And thank you for joining us today. That'll do it for our show. If you missed anything , you can always download KPBS Midday Edition wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget to forget to watch Evening Edition tonight at five. For more in-depth reporting on San Diego issues , you can always reach out to us by emailing us at midday at KPBS or leave us a message at (619) 452-0228. Before we go , I'd like to thank the Midday Edition team host Jade Hindman , producers Ashley Rush and Juliana Domingo , senior producer Brooke Ruth , art contributor Julia Dixon Evans. Our technical producers this week were Briana Tufa and Rebecca Chacon , and the Midday Edition theme music is from San Diego's own Surefire Soul Ensemble. Join me here tomorrow at noon for the weekly roundtable I'm Andrew Bracken. Have a great one.
