Fu Manchu Stereotypes

As a result, the Asian females lost their sense of “individuality” and “diversity of what it means to be Chinese.” As Connie accents, the stereotypical representation of Asian women increased during “the US involvement with the Philippines wars, Japan and China in World War II, and more recently, the Korean and Vietnamese Wars” because the American soldiers saw Asian women “as prostitutes and sexual objects who provide rest and recuperation from the war zones” (as cited in sitemaker.umich.edu). As time passed and media came into existence, stereotypical names, such as “Dragon Lady” and “China Doll,” of Asian-American women began to represent the Asian American women as sexual and erotic objects in the media.

Asian American actors and actresses are portrayed in Hollywood movies as always being the silent and yielding foreign victims to social injustice and prejudice. Whether or not these depictions are true, they are nonetheless stereotypes that Hollywood producers have come up with. According to the US Census in the year 2000, Asian Americans make up 4.2% of the entire American population, and knowing that most Asian Americans live on the west and east coast of the United States, many Americans living in central parts of this country have not really been exposed to any Asian Americans. Because of this fact, it is highly probable that most Americans get their exposure to the Asian American lifestyle only through television and movies. Even if

Chinese Americans have arrived to the United States through three waves of immigration. The journey of immigrating to the United States consisted of many obstacles and hardships. Chinese Americans have been in this country for centuries, and still remain one of the smallest minority minorities. To this day, they are still perceived as foreigners in the eyes of other Americans, and have been victimized for their successes. To gain a deeper understanding of Chinese immigration, we must look at the Chinese American experience of immigrant jobs, exclusion and discrimination, and the model minority stereotype.

Perhaps, the powerful storyline of the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was what encouraged one of the greatest cinematic martial arts directors Ang Lee, to make a film out of the Chinese novel. In this film, Lee’s primary function is not only to portray skillfully choreographed fighting scenes, but also to connect powerful sequences of events that touches upon the emotional complex human condition that is associated with both the Taoist and Buddhist belief systems. By not allowing action to be the sole guiding force of the narrative of Crouching

Asians aren’t represented often in Hollywood films, but when they are, they’re usually confined to stereotypes or one dimensional character traits. In Chan is Missing, however, though the characters may at first seem as black and white as the film itself, by the end, many of the characters are well developed and seem like real people. This is conveyed through the film’s simplistic cinematography as well as the casts’ naturalistic performances. The camera seems to have both an ominous third person and, at times, first person perspective. This almost documentary-like cinematography coupled with the actors’ performances make the story seem much more genuine and interesting than many conventional films. The film also punctuates the complexity of its

directors have stated that they cannot well-finance their film if the name of their leading actor is not mainstream name (Kim). White Americans during this time too, probably believed that if Asians were casted in the film, it would not be as good as they did view Asians as inferior in every way including in the performing arts. Even when Asians actors were casted to play Asian roles, Asian Americans would go out of their way not to watch. David Henry Hwang, who would later go on to write his own version of Flower Drum Song, said as a young man growing up in the sixties, watching how Asian characters were featured made him feel “icky”. All the Asian characters that he saw were either portrayed in an unrealistic or comical way or as a character that was dependent on the leading white character (Hwang). It made it hard for Asian Americans to look to media for role models when they were hardly ever represented and represented in inhumane ways.

The Chinese Exclusion Act was established in 1882, in which the first time United States prevent a group of immigrants with nationality (Lee 4), marked United States’ from welcoming nation to an enclosed and discriminative nation, has monumental impact on each Chinese immigrants and culture of the entire American Chinese community (6). The poor conditions and lack of opportunities in the 19th century China and the Chinese’s hope of accumulating wealth to support their families in China fostered the huge influx of Chinese immigrants to United States. The discovery of gold in California also fuelled many Chinese’s dream of fast wealth (112). Due to the need for mass labour stemming from industrialization and high productivity of Chinese labours, employers would enthusiastically hire Chinese labour, which in turn sparked the increasing competition with the local workers and a growing anti-Chinese sentiment (114).

A Chinese immigration political cartoon by Thomas Nast from an 1871 Harper’s Weekly magazine, displays criticisms of Chinese immigrants to the US on a wall (Doc. B). These complaints include, “They are dishonest and false, vicious, immoral, and heathenish”, and, “Coolie, slave, pauper, rat-eater.” These harsh comments affected the image of the Chinese. Americans made the immigrants appear inhumane and cold-hearted. Because the immigrants were stereotyped to the point they were called the “lowest and vilest of the human race,” Americans were influenced to pass the Chinese Exclusion

In the late 1800’s, Chinese immigrants were largely discriminated against in America. Considering the past, and the way white Americans have treated anyone different from them, it’s no surprise they treated these immigrants with disdain. The Chinese Exclusion Act was a law passed in 1882 to stop the influx of Chinese people immigrating into America. Two huge factors in passing the law was that the Chinese were viewed as lower class barbarians and were seen as anti-white. Some say the law was passed due to the economic tensions between the Chinese and whites, however this is false.

My name is Kade Rose and I am a student at Oakwood University. I am writing this because I believe the attitude expressed by white Americans towards the Chinese was racist and xenophobic, but I feel like this section of history is too frequently glossed over.

Throughout American history, the Chinese were never talked about in great detail despite their impact. The first generation of Chinese that came to the U.S after the California Gold faced finding their identity in a new country. They defined themselves in american culture with the establishment of Chinatown and the construction of the continental railroad, but they also faced hardships of discrimination leading to the Chinese exclusion act. America talks about the blacks, the latinos, the Irish being discriminated but hardly ever about the Chinese. Since the moment they arrived, the Chinese adapted to the new land around them and strived to make America their new home despite constant setbacks employed by the United States government.

The Chinese weren’t alone in discrimination; when the first Irish immigrated due to the Potato Famine in the 1840’s they were suspected of being devoted to the Catholic pope instead of the president and were portrayed as lazy drunkards in multiple political cartoons. But they did have many similarities: they spoke English and practiced a form of Christianity. The Chinese were vastly different from the Irish; they didn’t speak the same language and they looked very different from Northern Europeans. They also had many diverse customs compared to Western societies. They worshipped statues that represented a god rather than praying to them directly. Christians were taught idolatry was a sin and saw it as heathenism, thereby assuming the Chinese were barbarians without religion . In a testimony regarding a bill that could ban Chinese immigration, C.W. Cross asks whether “the future schools of this land… [teach] the principles of science and progress… or merely the writings of Confucius? ” He was not the only one concerned about preserving the American image; C.R. Kleine, a German immigrant, also testified before the same Congress and expressed trepidation about how white females had to resort to prostitution in order to earn money , which was seen in an particularly negative light and furthermore tarnishing to the proper image women were expected to

Asian American are face some types of stereotypes in today’s society, and it may produce by media or historical propaganda. For example, from the economic views, the Asian American should be successful than other race. From the education view, the Asian American kids should be smart, good at the math or engineer etc. particularly, the stereotype of the Asian women we can easy discover in the media, such as the Hollywood movies. the Asian American actresses are viewed as sexual and erotic objects of the society. From the history, most the Asian American actresses limit in the roles, such as "Dragon Lady", and "China Doll", in addition, both two role's characteristics represent sexual and erotic nature of Asian women. Even in today, these stereotypical

The satirical play Yellow Face by Jeff Liu exposed the racism toward Asian- Americans in the United States. Yellow Face began as a reaction to the casting of a Caucasian as an Asian role in the Broadway play M. Butterfly but unraveled to be a challenge of the status quo and stereotypes. In the play, almost all the actors were cast to represent multiple characters, but I was mostly impressed by the performances of the father Sab Shimono since he added an emotional appeal, the protagonist of the play, Ryan Yu, due to his alert reactions, and Christopher Gorham through his emphasis on his role as an ”Asian.”

Ang Lee’s Crouching tiger Hidden Dragon is probably one of the most successful foreign films to ever be screened in America. Being the number one film of the year in 2000. On the other hand it was reportedly considered a flop in China. While it was influenced by American film styles, it still kept true to many aspects of its Chinese film heritage. With very apparent love story, it lacked the Extreme amount of Kung Fu fight scenes eastern audiences have come to enjoy. This is a stunning love story between a monk and widow. While it does have its share of over the top fight scenes, when you start to dig deeper the films many social implications become apparent. With ties to subjects such as religion, martial arts, philosophy, love, and even gender issues. This film is a representation of the modern era and how long practiced traditions are being challenged. Each character and plot line allows a glimpse into the Social and Traditional understanding of a culture.