Jennifer Lopez ‘s recent chinky photo shoot for TOUS jewelry has stirred up a cacophony of “Orientalist” alarms from Angry Asian Man to 8Asians. As a former student of postcolonial criticism, I have mixed feelings about these discourses. Although those photos do showcase a creative stylization of Asian themes and aesthetics that may not be culturally coherent and authentic, I don’t feel they are done with bad or politicized intentions to subjugate Asians or Asian Americans.
Even though I’m natively Asian or Asian American, who am I to be the arbitrator of other people’s taste, style and rendition of culture? Do I own Asian culture just because I’m Asian? Why should I feel threatened by other people’s liberal use of Asian culture? Even if it is misappropriated, does it reflect badly on me? Does it threaten my own identity and culture?
Let’s look at clothing from a place like Shanghai Tang. Isn’t Shanghai Tang as Orientalist as the TOUS photos as it uses the same Asian motives? What makes good Orientalism or bad Orientalism?
Is it fine then if we Orientalize ourselves just like African Americans use the N-word on each other for signification or irony?
One of my favorite music videos is Janet Jackson’s “If” which used not only highly stylized Asian themes but also fabulous Asian American dancers and actors. If you think about the video, none of it is culturally coherent or authentic in the sense that it is a total cultural imagination. But it’s nonetheless cool and marvelous to look at. Not only that, it’s fun, it features so many beautiful Asian American faces and bodies that the current cultural mainstream lacks.
Now is that good or what?
Then also look at one of my favorite films Big Trouble in Little China. It’s a Hollywood film as chinky as it can get, but it’s loaded with fun, cheekiness and excellent Asian American actors. As Orientalist as it may be, it’s also an homage to Hong Kong action movies. Can an homage be Orientalist when it’s paying respects to original Hong Kong culture?
Like many Asian Americanists, I have used “Orientalist” a million times. But really, Orientalism, popularized by Edward Said’s groundbreaking book Orientalism, refers to the system of Western discourse (from politics to art) that exotifies and essentializes the Middle East in order to subjugate nations and people of the Middle East for Western imperialist intentions.
For us in a first world country (namely the USA) to use “Orientalism” so lightly and broadly, we are in fact putting the very critique of Orientalism under erasure and threat.
Bad Asian American critique!
But then we are in a world of free speech, aren’t we? We certainly have the right to speak wrongly, which is the very good right that we fight for, right?
Thanks Q. I couldn’t have said/blogged it better.
thanks, Bill =P
This is an excellent post I can use for teaching! Thank you! I was giggling at the idea of “good orientalism.” Are white folk the only ones who can appropriate culture? Why not people of color? And if they do it tongue in cheek, is that so bad?
Good response, and I tend to agree. I think it’s easy to go ballistic without thinking about what is really Orientalist. And for me, the use of Said’s work by Asian Americans without any real discussion or thought about the Palestinian struggle to which it is most directly tied, or the recent revolutions and peoples’ movements in the Arab world is disingenuous and seems contrary to what the Asian American Movement was supposed to be about.
Great post Quentin. You’ve said some things that definitely need to be said and have placed a nice balance to the argument. Level-headedness wins again!!
“Why should I feel threatened by other people’s liberal use of Asian culture? Even if it is misappropriated, does it reflect badly on me?”
Because it has the effect of dehumanizing people and reducing them to ethnic stereotypes. And that makes it much easier for criminals to rationalize hate crimes because “they’re not one of us”, and “they shouldn’t be here in the first place”.
As a student who is studying post-colonial/critical race theory, I think this post is somewhat problematic in accepting these stereotypical images as “good” stereotypes. Why should we accept this as something “good?” If we do accept this image imposed on us, we are inherently buying into a culture that poses us as the racialized other.
“I don’t feel they are done with bad or politicized intentions to subjugate Asians or Asian Americans.”
If we think about who owns/have control over the US media market, it is mainly owned by corporations–and so, they have control over how “Asians” are portrayed in the media. If we look at Hollywood today, there are some actors making it into mainstream media–television shows+movies (Go FastFive!). However, approximately 6 out of 10 movies, either the Asian character resorts in the background with none, one, or two lines … or if they get to speak, they speak with in another language or with an accent. Asian Americans barely make it on to mainstream media unless they play off some sense of the perpetual foreigner: speaking with an accent, dressing up in ethnic costumes to pose as ‘orientalists’ .. which is a concept underlying the gaze of the ‘racialized other’ through US imperialist/Euro-centric lens. I don’t see this trend changing drastically over the years .. and I really wonder why–until I started thinking more about the system instead of the actors themselves.
In terms of who has the authority to dress up as “Asians” or “Orientalists,” Asians or Whites/other, I really think neither group should perpetuate what others want/assume us to be. If we look at the Shanghai fashion model video and think about the rapid industrialization of the city and who is investing in the growth/development, it is clear how western influence + capitalism–roots of colonialism–is in the center of its economy. On another note, there’s also no particular yellow-face or playing stereotypes within this video, so this video cannot be ‘oriental.’ However, the Jennifer Lopez pictures, Janet Jackson + David Lo Pan video highlights ‘oriental’ culture because it is produced by the US media market, where Asian Americans or non-Asian Americans are dressing up to play what American culture perceives Asians to be [list all stereotypes here]. Whether an Asian or White/other person is performing ‘orientalism,’ it is not okay because there is no such thing as a “good stereotype.” It’s almost an oxymoron to put those two together.
I’m writing a response, in part, because if we decide to accept this notion of ‘good’ orientalism, we might resort to complacency and stop challenging the system established to control us in the first place. Thank you for bringing up this issue and challenging the notions of performativity, authenticity, and orientalism.
**In this post, ‘we’ and ‘us’ can mean so many different things. I used we, at times, to bring our attention to the issue together. But in the other sense, I’m referring to allies of the community who continue to challenge notions of the stereotypical other.
@Judy Lei: Thanks for bringing up the dissenting opinion. I was hoping somebody would bring up the whole “cultural imperialism” angle.
I believe that this NMA parody perfectly embodies the current state of affairs:
http://www.nma.tv/panda-express-invade-china/
Food so perfectly represents the “chinkology” of occidentals towards Asians, and Panda Express is the best example of the main theme here. Will Panda Express be considered “Chinese-American food” in China?
“Orientalism” as it applies to the modern world isn’t valid anymore. China has resumed the yellow peril status. It’s no longer every sailor has a Chinadoll in Singapore, but China is going to build air craft carriers and all Chinese-Americans are potential spies like the Japanese-Americans were in WW2 hysteria
I was also always uncomfortable with the notion of “orientalism” as it was used in context of the “near East” and Arabic world rather than the “far East” – and was no doubt co-opted by Asian studies people.
As far the media issue goes, I find it hilarious how in sci-fi movies and tv shows there are hardly any Asians left. They have all the trappings of Chinese hanzi writing and philosophy around, but somehow no Chinese people are left.
And as far “positive stereotypes” go, we all have seen where the “model minority” caricature has gotten us: admissions quotas and bamboo ceilings.
I agree with Judy. Although I understand the ambivalence I found the post pretty worrisome for those reasons.
Chunk, I’m not sure how your example of how Orientalism isn’t relevant works. Aren’t those examples just two sides of the same coin? Both of them emphasize the otherness of Asian/Americans.
There’s another thing that hasn’t been clarified for me. It’s true that Said was writing from a Middle Eastern perspective, but haven’t our critiques of essentialism and exotification up until now still been valid? Does a different context preclude us from talking about those ideas and how it affects Asians and Asian Americans? The post leaves us only with the idea that it’s a different context, but doesn’t specify exactly why it’s “bad Asian American critique,” nor does it draw examples.
Incidentally, while Said popularized the term Orientalism, it’s also important to think about the term Orient and its usage historically. From an “Occidental” perspective it’s changed from first being Egypt and surrounding regions, to all non-European areas in Eurasia, to further east outside its original range… (check Lewis and Wigen’s Myth of Continents). If we are thinking about how we are being *perceived* as Orientals, I’m not sure I understand how the idea of Orientalist has lost its relevance.
I’m not a humanities nor social sciences major so I’m probably talking nonsense mostly on this subject.
But from my understanding of Said’s book and later usage of that term, it’s applied to the “near East” and my feeling is that Asian studies people later co-opted the term for other “far East” countries.
It seems in terms of Said’s time of post-colonialism, “Orientalism” refers to the colonial world paradigm where exoticism is based on perceptions of “the inscrutable other” as inferior people and subject of ridicule at the tea parties.
Books and movies with that theme still exist: Lisa See’s “SNOW FLOWER AND THE SECRET FAN” is probably the best upcoming example of such chinkology of foot binding and evil Chinese patriarchies.
But I would think today’s occidental perception is less “orientalism” and more “yellow peril” with the constant fear of China’s economic and potential military rise. You read about it everyday in the news.
Again, I’m not an Asian studies major, but that’s the sentiment I think I’m seeing these days. cheers