Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

Orientalism is sadly a huge part of American culture. From books to movies, Orientalism is deeply embedded in nearly everything that has to do with the Middle Eastern part of the world and Asia. A few instances that I can think of include movies such as The Great Wall starring Matt Damon as a white hero in Asia, Lone Survivor which portrays the Middle East as run down and poor, and The Dictator which is a comedy film in which the main character is a man of Middle Eastern decent and is born with a full beard. All of these films contain heavy instances of Orientalism. The specific film that will be focused on in this blog is Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom starring Harrison Ford and directed by Steven Spielberg, two of the biggest names in our film culture.

From the beginning of the film, there is a savage/barbaric portrayal of non-whites in the movie. For instance, in the first scene Indiana Jones is at a night club and encounters a group of Chinese men. Eventually, the Chinese men pull out guns on Indiana and he has to save the white woman, Willie, from harm. Indiana somehow eliminates all of his opponents, even though there was clearly an uneven ration of "gangsters" to him. Although, this is not entirely the point. Steven Spielberg labeled these Chinese men as savages by instantly having a scene of violence. Despite this, the fact that Indiana killed every single one of these men and he left the scene without a scratch creates a mindset that white men are better and more heroic than other men of different races.

Not only does the first scene of the movie depict Orientalism, but the entire plot does. Indiana Jones's plane crashes in a small, poverty stricken town called Pankot in British India. When Indiana arrives, the villagers of the town all tell him that their children are going missing and are no where to be found. So of course, the heroic white man attempts to find the children. He visits a beautiful Indian palace and while there he notices an underground area where the children are being treated as slaves. Also while in the underground area, he finds a human sacrificial venue where people against their will are being sacrificed to the gods. Undoubtedly, this is one of the most random and racist plots that many people have watched but have not thought for one second that the film is completely wrong to make. For starters, crashing in a poor Indian town and then traveling to a beautiful ruler's palace exhibits the false class status in India. It creates a mindset in viewers that people in India either have it all, or have nothing. Secondly, the use of child slaves and human sacrifice adds an entirely new layer of Orientalism. Hollywood made it seem as though Indian culture is barbaric in the ways that they treat their children. To add on, the human sacrifice for the gods creates a thought process to viewers that India is ancient in their ways and are still lagging far behind America. The first time I watched this film was when I was twelve years old. To a young audience, this film only creates false concepts about other cultures, influencing a person's outlook on places other than America.

Aladdin the Corrupter

Being in the class Modern Middle East this year has really opened my eyes to Orientalism and its widespread influence. One of the first works we read was in fact Edward Said's Orientalism. I was truly shocked at the nonchalant stereotypes that plague Western Society. After watching Aladdin, I was very disappointed with how a childhood classic portrayed the entire region in the Middle East. From clothing, to actions, to the scenery, the production lumped together all the possible stereotypes there are, to brainwash young Western children, which included me.

I think we as a Western society must be mindful of Orientalism. It has been ingrained within us from a young age and it goes unnoticed in many cases. The media plays a huge part in this because there is a constant skewed portrayal of the Middle East region. Therefore, Orientalism is very present in our world today. The first step in getting rid of this mindset is by recognizing that it is a problem. Although it may be my lack of faith in the world, I think that we as a Western and Eurocentric society have a tough time even recognizing this idea as a problem. Either way, after recognizing the problem, we would have to diligently and consciously try to prevent Orientalism from entering our day to day to lives. Overall, Said really opened my eyes to a huge underlying problem we have in the West, and I hope we are able to work of it.

Arabian Nights

My absolute favorite childhood movie is, or, was Aladdin. The mysterious opening scene and song were favorites and always caught my attention whether I was watching the movie on my own or more recently, with kids that I was babysitting. Only in the past few years have I realized the image and stereotypes that just this first song have played into, and especially how bad that is as the movie was predominantly created for Western viewers. In the first few lines the narrator sings 

Oh, I come from a land, from a faraway place
Where the caravan camels roam
Where it's flat and immense
And the heat is intense
It's barbaric, but hey, it's home

In just the first verse the narrator paints a picture of an almost unimaginable place, and the animated imagery is inciting which I guess is similar to the stereotypical seduction that is tied with places like Egypt, China, Morocco, Thailand, etc. Along with this seducing imagery, the story is supported with a soundtrack of mystical drumbeats that are seriously unfamiliar to the typical genres of music listened to by most of the Western culture. Worst of all in setting up this magical scene for children and families to view, the narrator labels his own land "barbaric" much in the same self-deprecating way that Chacko in God of Small Things perpetuates his culture and compares it to the culture he studied in at Oxford. 

I hate to connect everything back to The Stranger, but it's hard not to see the Orientalism that takes place in that novel as well. The Arabs that follow Meursault and his friends to the beach are characterized as lower-class than Meursault, as he was a Frenchman by blood. The setting of the novel also seems stuck in time and very Casablanca-esque. Something that I've noticed in many stories about Western people traveling to Asia or Africa, is that they are always in search of something they can't seem to find at home. For Margaret Kochamma in God of Small Things Chacko is the "spice" that she needs in her bland, white-washed English life. For Humphrey Bogart's character in Casablanca, the thing that he finds in Morroco isn't a native, complex woman, but another European looking girl from his past. 

Perhaps ignorance plays a role in why Orientalism is still prevalent today, but I also think that in a big way the Western world has lost its sense mystery or magic, and seeks to keep it alive through characters and stories that they have no right to tell. I'm really interested in learning more about this topic as it's clear that there are many layers to it, but I can't lie, as horribly as this movie maintains the ideas of Edward Said and Orientalism, the Genie in Aladdin will always be one of my favorite Disney characters. 

Harley Weir's Photos of Senegal

 

The day after our Orientalism discussion, I was flipping through Frank Ocean’s Boys Don’t Cry magazine, and saw these photos of Dakar, Senegal by Harley Weir in a new light. After the grim examples of Western art in the class period, it kind of relieved me. Here’s a talented, young, Western artist who is capable of documenting a non-Western country with respect and nuance.

While I don’t really have any way of knowing how true to life these photos are, I don’t see the cliches of Orientalism encountered in other Western art. There’s respect and admiration here that I don’t know how to quantify with analysis, but I think I can feel its presence.

In addition to being great portraits, the thing that immediately sticks out to me is the Western iconography in these lives. In the first photo, the model’s face is out of frame and a Calvin Klein t-shirt takes up most of the space. And in the third photo, an American car frames its driver in the scene. This reminds me of the growing Western presence in Ayemenem throughout The God of Small Things. I suppose Western influence has become an inescapable part of the lives of the Senegalese men in the photos. And Weir doesn’t ignore that in an attempt to show Westerners what they expect to see of Africa.

And little details like the cross hanging from the car, the drawing on the man’s stomach, and the outfits give actual insight into the model’s personalities. They are not vague foreign stereotypes. They are people.

I think we’re living in a creative renaissance and people like Harley Weir prove it with work like this.

Orientalism and The US of A

Orientalism is all around us. From the Chinese food we eat to the movies we watch. There's no escaping it. Did you know that on the menu's of the Chinese food places, most of the items on there aren't from China? Most of them are from other parts of Asia brought together to make the ultimate menu. When I found this out, I was shocked. I also wasn't that surprised. Then there are the movies. Some of the actors that should be played by people from Asia are represented by A-list actors that seem to "fit" the role. The actors primarily from Asia are sent to perform Kung-Fu Fighters or antagonists in other movies. The one thing I've noticed is that the countries in Asia appropriate our cultures as well. For example, Bollywood. Bollywood is the equivalent to Hollywood. They have there own A-list actors, and they're own area where they make there movies. I've seen part of one of the there movies, and I can safely say that they are as corny as ours. Another example is Japan. After we dropped the nukes and decimated most of the places in Japan, they rebuilt themselves to mirror the US. In the 50's and 60's, they wore our clothing, made movies like us and even started producing cars that looked like ours. One prominent vehicle being the Nissan skyline Kenmeri. The car came out in the 70's and looked a lot like the Mustang fastback at the time. The commercials for the car featured an American couple promptly named Ken and Meri. They went on road trips and toured the countryside. Not only is this a slight robbery of American culture but if you flip the names and add an A to the beginning, you get Ameriken. Interesting isn't it? Throught the years there have been loads of appropriation from all nations. But I thought that we wouldn't have some of the best things like ramen or, even in Japan, burgers. Orientalism has it's good and bad parts, but it partially makes the world go around.

I think that western culture has had a prominent role in establishing orientalism, western culture has ingrained this idea of stereotypical depictions and imitation of Middle Eastern and Asian cultures into the minds of young kids. For example, a childhood classic, Aladdin a very successful movie and voted one of the best Disney channel films ever made. This film is a prime example of modern orientalism still present in western society today. In Aladdin the characters deemed as good and the protagonists are given American accents, where as the antagonists are given Arab accents.

This portrayal of the antagonists allows the audience to associate negative and evil behavior with middle eastern culture, and allows children to view the "good ones" as familiar and not mysterious. I think that having modern orientalism catering to children is a dangerous precedent to set. I believe that movies children watch from a young age for enjoyment have a bigger impact on their personal beliefs an understanding of a culture, rather than reading a textbook of accurate depictions of cultures. This being true the young minds of modern society are being negatively affected from the modern oreintalism that has infiltrated are movies, tv shows, and even art.

Two Sides of Orientalism

Orientalism is overtly mentioned in The God of Small Things when discussing the tourist trap much of Ayemenem has become is Rahel's absence. The demolition of the History House as well as the sad lifestyle the traditional actors now live shows the obvious downsides of the Western fascination with the novelty of their culture. What's more subtle however, is how the orientalist mindset has seeped into the minds of the higher caste Indians in the novel. Chacko is held in high regard due to his English education despite his obvious character flaws, while Baby Kochamma's life has been largely derailed by the enjoyment of Western television. Perhaps the most dramatic case however, is that of Sophie Mol.

Upon her adoptive father's death Sophie makes her first trip to India to escape the turmoil. Although she lives a Western lifestyle, the premise of visiting her family and perhaps reconnecting with her culture isn't an inherently orientalist one. She doesn't seem to view the trip from a touristy perspective like many other English kids might, yet the way her family treats her forces her into this East/West binary. While she is initially off-put but some of her family's foreign customs and foods, Sophie has no opposition to playing with her Indian cousins and bonding with them. The issue arises in how her Indian family puts her on a pedestal for her whiteness, reinforcing her as "better" despite the child's best attempts to reconnect. It seems as though Roy is criticizing Indians for buying into this white superiority mindset just as much as she's criticizing the Westerners who promote it.

It wouldn't be right to blame the negative effects of orientalism on those subjected to it, yet The God of Small Things certainly reveals another angle that Said seems eager to overlook. Whether it be due to promises of status, wealth, or "civility" many individuals have been sold on orientalism and have thus unintentionally propagated the downfall of their own society. In this book alone we see the commercialization of traditional culture and the judgment dealt by fellow Indians in accordance with Western values, all misguided forms of self-deprecation. As stated before, it's hard to place the blame for this on the Indians themselves, yet it remains a sad and often overlooked aspect of colonialism that affects many nations to this day.

The Zohan

As any film that can be classified as orientalism this one is no different. The Zohan focuses on two foreigner groups in New York City who are full of hatred and are classified as terrorist outside of their population. This film uses false accents, outfits, and probably false Israeli writing. The use of the opposing groups present a terrorists aspects. But the thing that really stands out in this film that shows orientalism is the fact that they have a hacky sack tournament with all foreigners and after that a riot breaks out. In my eyes this is saying that they can't live with others but they are too hostile to live among each other. As a whole the movies says that foreigners are violent, aggressive, and don't have the skills to live with others. It is a false perception of other cultures based on an american point of view.

Orientalism

While films that are South Korean, Indian, and Chinese have become more popular in Western countries, there are very few Western films with Asian actors/actresses. I can only name a few films where there have been Asian characters in western films, even films where they take place in Asia, such as Indiana Jones, and films where the character should be portrayed as Asian but is not like we saw in Doctor Strange and Ghost in the Shell. (Scarlet Johansen simply wears a black wig to make herself seem Japanese in Ghost in the Shell, which was an originally a Japanese animated film.)

Examples such as these tend to portray the white woman/man as the hero and the Asians as the side characters, even if the film is about kung fu/karate or takes place in an Asian country. Karate Kid is a good example of a white boy who learns karate from a Japanese maintenance man. There is also the new Karate Kid with Jaden Smith, who learns karate in China (even though karate is Japanese). It interests me that there have been three different actors who have starred in the karate kid movies and not one was Asian, given that Karate originated from Japan.

While I have Asian actors in movies, they are solely for special effects/martial arts performance. While I love seeing kung-fu action in movies, the films rarely go beyond the fighting aspect, making the Asian characters seem flat and lifeless. Ip man is a good kung fu movie where the main character (Ip) is more of a round character, even for a kung fu film. My main point is that there should be more Western films that include Asian actors, and not just simply for martial arts purposes.

Orientalism and Traveling

In my French class, we viewed a short travel video featuring mostly older, white, Americans traveling through Morocco on a "cultural excursion". Although the video is supposed to highlight the "mysterious and wondrous culture of Northern Africa" the video was nearly entirely through the American travelers perspective. The clips often focused on the bewildered and delighted faces of the tourist as they make their way through bazaars, hikes through the desert on camels, visits with nomadic people, and clear night skies. All the scenes were accompanied by faraway chants making the whole country seem mysterious and faraway from western culture.
The video was created by a travel company that took their wealthy clients on these "cultural exchanges". The company made the conscious choice to make Morocco seem like an adventure-filled vacation location full of intoxicating mysteries and curiosities perfect for any risk-taking, wealthy American for the sake of making money. The myth of orientalism is used for financial gain of travel companies looking to benefit from these preconceived notions of life in non-western countries. Traveling is supposed to create connections among people of different cultures, not reinforce stereotypes created over the past hundreds of years through the colonialist mind-set.

A Critique of a Critique

In 1982, Bernard Lewis, a prominent English writer and historian born in the 1916, wrote an article for the New York Review of Books, in which he scrutinized Edward Said's work and the very concept of Orientalism itself. The article had valid criticisms in the context of Said's writing and overlooking of certain key events and details in his chronicling of the Middle East's development. However, Lewis' arguments against the concept of Orientalism and its presence in the European and American view of certain regions of the world was a wholly misguided approach, and serves here as an example to get rid of premature criticisms and counter arguments to Said's work.

My biggest problem with Lewis' review came in the very first sentence of the article, and the subsequent example which followed it for another page and a half. Here, Lewis tries to explain the concept of Orientalism, but changing the group in focus to the Greeks in order to somehow reveal the absurdity of the concept. However, his dramatic interpretation of Said's writing is the basis for his entire argument, and fails to analyze the complexity of the issue in any regard.

For example, in Lewis' Greek retelling, he mocks the critics of Orientalism in saying that those who teach Greek history or language (in this metaphor) but are not actually Greek "strive to keep the Greek people in a state of permanent subordination." This line, obviously heavily doused in sarcasm, rests on the assumption that people like Said believe that those who study cultures in the so-called 'Orient' are purposefully perpetuating a system which represses those they study. On the contrary, I believe that Said was writing about the sub-conscious manner in which Orientalism is carried out. Western study of areas like Persia, or China, or India aren't designed to entrap their populations in positions of "less-than," they just do that themselves. The distance between the teacher and subject matter is too great for that teacher to convey the fullness or humanity of the people being studied.

Another line in Lewis' whiny introduction pokes fun at what he thinks to be Lewis' exclusion of Western scholars from his view of the positive Middle Eastern and Asian study to come. I don't think Said would ever argue that Western scholars should be completely rebuked and banished from historical study in those areas. His argument is clearly that those Western scholars should really just back off of the domination aspect of that study, and refocus its lens on time periods and areas untouched or unconcerned with Western infiltration.

You can read Lewis' review here: The Question of Orientalism

The Paradox of Edward Said

To me, Edward Said is more than controversial. He is a repugnant figure who has been in the legislative wing of a terrorist entity that has killed members of my family. Not only is he vigorously anti-Israel and Anti-Semitic, but he is also a hypocrite.

Let me explain, throughout the literature of the Anti-Zionist perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict the authors dive deep into orientalist mindset, only from the perspective of the Arab countries toward the Jews. To them, Jews are the other, the lesser people, the ones without agency. Their power is taken away in a system similar to the structures taking away the power of the East in the West.

Perhaps the best example of this is written by Edward Said himself, “Zionism from the Standpoint of its Victims.” This piece of academia, in addition to being filled with factual inaccuracies of and logical fallacies, displays Jews in a truly orientalist mindset.

To demonstrate this we must first define what an “orientalist mindset” is. First, it must be pervasive throughout an entire culture. This view is in no uncertain terms. In a majority of Arab countries, in which a majority of these authors either reside or are from, Jews are the devil of the world. They are the other to the Arab’s not other in just the same way that the East is the other to the West’s not other. Said plays into this fact with his description of Zionists throughout his piece.

Said also takes away the agency of the Jews in this literature in just the same way that most western literature describes the east as people to be subjugated by the west. He places them in one of two boxes, either servants of the Europeans with no agency at all or bloodthirsty savages lusting for the land and heads of Arabs. This portrait of the Jew is typical of this literature and fits perfectly into the orientalist mindset.

Finally, throughout this essay he bends the facts of the story in a way to tear down the accomplishments of the Jews in a way similar to western literature demeaning the east. He takes away any claim they have to the land of Israel painting them only as conquerors of the land. He goes back from before contemporary time to when the Arabs owned the land instead of the British or Jews, but conveniently stops before going to when the Jews own it. He also brushes over the violent and hateful acts the Arabs of this land perpetrated on the Jews when they were living in harmony.

Said when he is writing this essay ignores his own ideas and paints the story of the Zionist movement in an orientalist mindset simply one oriented to put the Arab world in power.

Obviously, this is a minuscule look at a 50 page essay that is truly disgusting and filled with factual inaccuracies and failures of logic at every turn. I encourage everyone to read the full essay here.

Orientalism

For the foreseeable future, I don't think that orientalism is going anywhere. It's too easy for the entertainment industry to make exploitative movies and tv shows, for them to just vanish. Want an easy gimmick for your bland generic Hollywood blockbuster? Just set it in Bangladesh. Show some shots of packed in chaotic slums and marketplaces in the trailer. Maybe include a guy sitting on a velvet throne with a mustache and a turban. Oh, and a tiger. Certainly the director of this film could cast Bengali actors, shoot scenes in regular locations instead of fake sets, bother to learn about the culture in Bangladesh and shoot a film that actually reflects that culture. Not the made up, exaggerated American version.

But why would they? Why would they put in all that extra effort to make a film that American audiences wouldn't be nearly as interested in? At large, consumers like the white-washed movies, the exaggerated stereotypes. They don't actually care about Bangladesh, or any Country/culture that would fall into orientalism's scope. And it's likely that they won't start to care any time soon. As frustrating as it must be for many people to see a faux, stereotyped version of their culture, it's just a movie. Orientalist works aren't nearly racist enough to cause a strong uproar. Not to mention, everyone in America has grown up surrounded by orientalism. By now, we're numb to it. It's not some shocking new development, it's something that we have more or less accepted as a culture. I can't see that just changing, at least not any time soon.

Eat, Pray, Orientalism

Liz Gilbert thought she had everything she wanted in life until she faces a divorce and turning point in her life. Previously she had: a home, a husband and a successful career. However, now as she faces her divorce and a turning point in her life she doesn’t really know or is confused about what is important to her. She tries to attempt to step out of her comfort zone and goes on a quest for self-discovery that takes her to Italy, India, and Bali.

Eat, Pray, and Love illustrates the Middle-East as a place of wonder. It is just one of many that has romanticized the Middle-East. It made it out to be “someplace timeless, otherworldly, incomprehensible, waiting to be discovered by Westerners in search of self”(NPR, Mia Mask). While in India Liz meets a girl who is being forced into a marriage by her family and the other Indian’s in the movie are either carrying her bags or just serve in the background. This suggest women in the Middle-East are mistreated, and her seen nothing more as a symbol of an arranged marriage. In Bali women are seen carrying fruit on their heads, there are merchants, and a couple of men with their roosters. They serve to convince Western consumers that Bali is a pre-modern, magical, timeless wonderland. You never see any of these people doing anything modern. You also don’t see any other types of men besides an enfeebled, toothless old soothsayer.

Western countries definitely have an orientalist mindset. That’s why there are still movies made based of orientalist stereotypes, and they make millions of dollars and seen all over the world. Orientalist stereotypes lead to a single story, actually it is a single story. It makes others treat people as less than equal. It makes people of the Orient feel less than equal from the rest of the world and sometimes less than human. Orient people are seen as the other, the less desirable, the powerless. The world shouldn’t want other people to feel this way or look this way. Therefore, we should stop supporting these movies that have Orientalism in them. There should be more coverage n movies like these so people understand and see what they are doing. We need stop feeding the fire or the fuel to these stereotypes or they will continue to live on.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

A well known film franchise that most of us (hopefully) have seen is Indiana Jones. Through its famous main character, Indiana, to the many elaborate action scenes Indiana's escapades lead him through the Middle East and India and lead him to encounters with the stylized Eastern culture that Hollywood uses regularly. In all three movies of the Indiana Jones trilogy the Orientalists viewpoint shines through. As the definition of Orient became more prominent the more we began to see its use through our everyday media and its displaying of the binaries Orient/Europe, Exotic/Normal, etc. Specifically in the second installment of Indiana Jones, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, there are profound examples of these binaries.

In The Temple of Doom the main setting is in India, there is a scene where Indiana is sitting at a dinner table and dining with the Indians. In this scene, the "exoticness" of the Indians is shown through their extravagant clothing, adorned with jewels and bright colors, compared to the Westerners (Indiana) where he is neatly dressed in a suit and more conservative in clothing which seems to be our normal for when we go out to dinner. The elaborate food spread is supposed to shock the Western viewers with an array of insects, innards, chilled monkey brains, and eye soup but ultimately ends up representing the Indian culture as barbarians who consume unusual and unsavory meals.

We as Americans have come to embrace these movies, filled with action and adventure but subtly slip in these Orientalism undertones that even myself at times fail to notice. This idea of comparing Eastern cultures to our very own in movies will not go away in a blink of an eye because that is what these big budget films use in order to draw big crowds. To make it habit that the white Westerner is always and the only one that can save the day while the Easterners are the savages.

Fine Porcelian

Orientalism has nothing to do with any specific culture, it is all about the European viewpoint of the world and the ideology of a colonist. The entire notion of the eastern world is constructed from the idea that European countries are at the center of the world, and all other countries/continents revolve around and exist.

Western culture is parasitic, drawing on and relying on other nations for influence. It sees value only in the possessions of its colonies and absorbs what it wants to strengthen itself. The most obvious example of this could be the fine porcelain that Europeans called China since the only thing the explorers and traders who went to China cared about was the material goods they obtained. In 2018, Americans and Europeans still value fine porcelain and call it China, without any regard to how idiotic that name is (We call a dish China just because we took it from Chinese). Another example of this is England's national dish, Chicken Tikka Masala. A nation whose national dish is a dish from another nation says something about their culture. While it is possible to argue that these cultures are embracing others, it is hard to look past how Europe always seems to seize these things by force, when they go to these places and take things from them. This trading and colonialism has never been a mutualistic relationship as these nations have never been treated as truly equal to Europeans.

Furthermore, I believe the true threat of Orientalism is how we can often fail to accept or even acknowledge that other people's ways of life are more similar to our own than it may actually seem. The notion that developing nations are a land of mystery comes from the idea that the western world that we live in is the only form of "normal" modern living, and that all other nations must live in a state of constant misery or poverty. This distorted image comes from our filtered view of the third world, which is often a failure of our news and education systems.

The Nutcracker Problem

Western dance, like any other aspect of society, is saturated with an Orientalist mindset. Specifically, I'm talking about ballet in this post because it is a highly elitist art form that I have had the privilege to participate in. Many of the ballet pieces that are held in such high esteem by the dance world and its supporters are justified by the idea of 'preserving the art.' Centuries of dance teachers have perpetuated the myth that these stories are acceptable since they are old, and I'll admit that I myself have been a part of quite a few dances that I now look at with regret due to their fetishization of Asian cultures.

One key example of Orientalism in dance is the Nutcracker - what I'm assuming is the most recognizable ballet to dancers and non-dancers alike. The Nutcracker revolves around Clara or Marie, a young girl whose new toy Nutcracker from her godfather Drosselmeyer comes to life as the handsome Nutcracker prince. These aspects of the plot seem fairly innocuous, but Clara/Marie and the Prince end up in the Land of Sweets afterwards, where they encounter many dancers representing various foods and drinks from specific ethnicities. These include roles known as "Chinese Tea" and "Arabian Coffee."

Obviously, there are numerous issues with these roles. To start, Arabian Coffee and Chinese Tea are frequently played by white dancers, and the costumes are often designers' vague attempts at referencing an 'Arabian' or 'Chinese' aesthetic. The parts also play right into stereotypes of people from these areas. While Coffee is slow, seductive, and mysterious, the Tea dancers perform pointed bows with uncannily huge smiles and deferential tilts of the head.

Arabian Coffee and Chinese Tea are just two duets, but they demonstrate in a few short minutes the deep problems of an Orientalist mindset. These roles exemplify the ways that two Asian groups can become distorted, exaggerated, and oversimplified if portrayed through an indifferent European lens. Unfortunately, there are MANY similar roles within other ballets, as well as in other forms of dance that are more recent.

Ultimately, roles like these are the result of larger questions - Who controls the dominant narrative within a work of art or culture? Who is the subject, and who is the audience? The Nutcracker is a ballet created by and for Europeans, centering around the narrative of a young, white girl who gets to experience a brief, fantastic taste (after all, it is the Land of Sweets) of the world before returning to the safety of her own bed. The nonwhite characters in this ballet are objectified as food items, stripped of any real historical significance and both metaphorically and literally served to Clara/Marie and the audience as a whole. Merely limited glimmers of another world, these parts serve as a metaphor for the ways that white people tend to view Asia in real life. Within dance, film, and other sources of media, anti-Asian racism is too often sold under the guise of intrigue or exoticism without understanding.

A Service Trip, a Cartoon Character, or a Hollywood Blockbuster

A service trip that costs more than it gives, a history squeezed into a cartoon character, a Hollywood blockbuster that perpetuates the fetishization of one or more cultures- Orientalism in all forms is toxic and all too common. As a child I was attracted to the cartoon movies with female leads. I grew into this notion that the Disney classic, Mulan was a signal of the media becoming more progressive and inclusive.
One of the strongest reasons Orientalism is still heavily normalized in the Western world is the lack of motivation to change our ignorance surrounding the history, cultures, and countries of Asia. Ignorance is the very basis of Orientalism, moreover it’s the basis of discrimination, prejudice, stereotypes, and other disparaging social and institutional barriers. We as students know how the majority of public education (predominantly early education) treats the expansion of perspectives and cultures, as a tourist attraction worth a week of class. Something to skim through, memorizing specific names of warriors, rulers, religions, inevitably flowing back into the Eurocentric perspective. We notice classes such as Latin American History, Native American History, Women in History, African American History, are all elective classes. There are only 30 colleges and universities with an "Asian American Studies" as an elective, usually found in a minor curriculum. Even in the cases of elective classes trying to fit in an entire region’s history into a semester long class, vital pieces of our global puzzle are bound to be skipped over, left behind, and underrepresented.
I am not at all trying to say our public education is the sole reason Orientalism still exists. The root of the issue is an unmotivated majority. Westerns are so used to having this one single narrative of every Asian culture be retold over and over again that it becomes normal to be ignorant.
I have fed into Orientalism. I have thought, accepted, and assumed without research, without true knowledge or a larger grasp, and have thus fed into the acceptance of ignorance, stereotyping, and erasure of cultures. One person's decision to learn more can become a sea of self-expansion and open-mindedness when enough people stop to self-reflect. Asia is the largest continent on this planet. The idea that Western culture or Westerners can squeeze 48 countries and 100,000 years of history into a service trip, a cartoon character, or a Hollywood blockbuster is due to normalized passivity and ignorance.

Surprisingly Enough, Japan Does More Than Make Anime

The past few days, we've been reading and seeing a lot about Orientalism as it relates to the Middle East and Southern Asia. However, there also exists an Orientalist mindset towards Northeast Asia - China, Korea, and Japan. Of these three countries and their cultures, I consider myself most familiar with Japan. I am in my fourth year of studying the language, recently completed my third exchange program, and have family who are permanent residents there. I am also incredibly familiar with the way Western culture portrays Japan, and its inaccuracy.

If I were to go up to any random person on the street and ask them to think of a word they associate with Japan, at least 7 times out of 10 I would be answered with "anime". The rather recent rise in anime's popularity in the west, and the subsequent development of 'weeaboo' culture, are directly related to the orientalist view of Japan. If you don't know, 'weeaboo' refers to people who consider themselves to be obsessed with anime and Japanese culture despite very often knowing nothing about it. They revere Japanese customs without knowing the true reasoning behind them. While at first it may seem a positive that people are so awed by a foreign culture, the issue arises in the fact that these people tend to pick and choose which parts of culture they want to understand. Japanese culture becomes a drawing hat, from which random aspects of life are snatched and exaggerated to unreal proportions until a totally new, inaccurate, and borderline offensive culture is created. At this point, Japanese culture is no longer being honored but being rewritten by people with no authority to rewrite it.

Another issue, stemming from the popularity of anime, is the fetishization of Japanese women - particularly school girls. There's not much to say about this besides that it is blatant dehumanization and the most base form of Orientalism. It is taking an aspect of Japanese culture and warping it to please a Western audience in a way that blatantly ignores and disrespects its origin. In Japan, the main purpose of school uniforms is to encourage unity and discipline, but in the US I get told that it's "hot" that my exchange student wears a uniform at her home school.

The final aspect I'll be discussing (though certainly not the only other aspect of Japanese Orientalism) is the way the West views Japanese writing. In Japan, there are three scripts that are commonly used for writing. Hiragana - the alphabet for native words, Katakana - the alphabet for foreign words, and Kanji - the ideographic symbols that come to mind for most of us when we think of East Asian writing. They are sometimes seen as mystical and incomprehensible. Though they can be a pain in the butt to learn, the reality is that they are constructed from components with individual meanings to create a sensible image. Other times, they are thought of as outdated and ancient, full of 'Old World Knowledge'. Funny that Westerners point fingers at countries with ideographic writing systems while absorbing a whole dictionary's worth of emoji meanings into their written vocabulary without a second thought. Sometimes, kanji are stripped of their communicative value and simply looked at as pretty and aesthetic (I know you've seen people with foreign language tattoos), which sends the message that Japanese ideas are not meaningful or important in the West - a similar idea to the "squibbly Arabic" mentioned in the article about Homeland. Through disrespect of the written language and perversion of anime and the schoolgirl ideal into Western culture (among many other things), Japan has become a victim of Orientalism.

Social Media and Orientalism

You're scrolling through Instagram after "service trip season", and see ten photos of your Western friends candidly hugging brown children. The backgrounds of these photos consist of dilapidated houses with colorful paint chipping off of them. You swipe to see beautiful landscapes of mountains, exotic plants and animals, and waterfalls. So many waterfalls.

As privileged Westerners, we grow to understand "service trip countries" such as Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Peru, and Argentina through the photos we see on social media. This process is incredibly problematic because the pictures and stories that our Western friends bring back from their service trips abroad rarely represent the complexity and authenticity of the places they've visited. Every country in the world has cities surrounded by more impoverished areas. Outside the gentrified hipster-heaven of the West Loop awaits miles of hungry kids, failing schools, and overworked parents. Americans pity the starving children in "developing countries", but harshly judge and criminalize those living in our own cities. There is poverty everywhere, so why do Westerners see themselves as superior when we are facing similar problems in our own country?

We learn Orientalism through our media platforms, but we perpetuate it by perceiving these countries through the lenses we've been taught. We look for poverty where we've learned to expect it. With an Orientalist mindset, it is completely possible to come home from a different country and entirely miss its complexity. Studying or volunteering abroad can be such an educational experience, but only if we rid ourselves of our Orientalist biases. I think that it's great that we're learning about Orientalism, but I also think it is important to analyze how we view parts of our own country by comparison.