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Across these movements, illustrators formalized Chinese influence as fictitious characters-ghosts, apes, Godzilla communists, Uncle Sam-eaters-neglecting the reality of what actually met the eye: exploited workers, opportunity-seeking immigrants, new markets for Western enterprise interests, etc.Īlthough authorientalist art seeks to be critical of China, it does so in counterproductive ways. It draws on Red Scare propaganda, and the Yellow Peril illustrations of the 19th century that shaped racist measures like the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.
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Turning authoritarian behavior into an exclusively alien phenomenon also implies that it does not apply to Western political culture, making it harder to recognize totalitarian behavior in more familiar contexts.Īuthorientalism demonstrates how hostile our attitudes become once these visual patterns set a status quo. It conflates the culture and the government, and reinforces the state’s own frequent claims that authoritarianism is innate to Chinese history or society. Using repetitive, stereotyped tropes to signify that China is exotic, authorientalism visually links these tropes to abuses of government power, thereby promoting the view that authoritarianism is part of the essential character of Chinese-ness. This framework has been used to uphold the anti-democratic or authoritarian characteristics of the Chinese government in an aesthetic we have dubbed “authorientalism.”Īuthorientalism in visual media distorts and flattens the reader’s view of China and Chinese people. Historically speaking, the West’s visual vocabulary tends to champion a fascination “with abjection and violence” in foreign subjects, whether that be the sinister depictions of Japanese people in World War II propaganda, Native American mascots in sports, or distressed communities in Africa and the Middle East.Īrt and public policy professor Hentyle Yapp refers to these aesthetics as “all look same,” a framework that flattens perceptions of historically racialized groups by emphasizing sameness in their representation. A lot of red.Īesthetic choices have long shaped how American audiences see the world. The usual suspects appear: dragons, President Xi Jinping, the five-star flag, and red. It’s easy to tell when a magazine cover is about China.