Chinese "Exoticism"

[Ah-Bin]

I was wondering what some Chinese people thought of the foreign interest in things Chinese for their "exotic" nature.

I read a letter from a reader in the Nanfangzhoumo 南方周末 newspaper a few months ago arguing against the proposal of bringing out a huge statue of Confucius during the Olympic opening ceremony, because he didn't like the way it would encourage outsiders to keep thinking of China as an "ancient and mysterious" (古老，神秘) country rather than a modern nation.

This made me think back on the reason I started to learn Chinese, which was purely out of fascination with the "exotic" script and "mysterious" culture. Of course twelve years on I don't feel like that as far as everyday conversations and reading street signs and menus is concerned, but the fascination with the exotic is still what pushes me on to read more deeply in Chinese and improve my understanding of Classical Chinese.

I wonder how many other people are pushed on into deeper study by this fascination with the exotic rather than, say a wish to learn Chinese simply for practical purposes or for financial gain.

I realise that a lot of the western portrayal of China as "exotic" and "ancient" had political motives behind it, just as the fascination with being "modern" does in contemporary China. I wonder what some other Chinese people think of the "exotic" way of looking at China. Do people find it offensive? Does it do more harm than good?

[heartless]

I really like your thinking about the subject here, especially the political motives (either foreign or Chinese) behind the fascinations with China. In modern China (by modern i mean the period after first opium war), there are always extremes in the way of seeing Chinese culture,history, tradition and even national identity. One of them is to particularly emphasize the five-thousand-year long history and glories in those historical periods which always ends up in a deluded and stupid supriority. In order to correct this, some people place extreme stresses on modernity, modernation,or say, internationalization in the development of the country, even to a degree which leads to further extremes and distortions of China's national identity with regard to its culture,tradition etc. They don't like foreigners to perceive China as "ancient" and 'mysterious" who undergoes no change other modern nations have undergone. This is a relentless effort to put China on the same platform,under the same standard with the rest of the world, especially the highly developed western world, which is immune to criticism under the name of patrioticism. But what is the consequence of it? See the increasing cries for the loss of traditional culture and value in contemporary China. See the rising of Chinese classic learning(we call国学in Chinese), though to a certain extent it has been reduced to mass culture and is apt to formalization with the loss of its spirit and essence. Certainly we don't like to be seen by none-Chinese as kind of strange, mysterious thing which they want to study like the specimen under the microscope, but what about the proud and gratification when hearing a foreigner values our traditional culture? Is that a kind of uniqueness every nation wants to have and reserve?

Surely, i am not a representative spokeperson for the whole Chinese, but at least you can hear how one of them think about this. Hope this can illuminate something for you.

[hudai]

i will be more interested and pride to talk about the traditional aspect of Chinese things that are unique and exotic to foreigners than the modern stuffs and i consider it's a good thing that foreigners have continuous interests for this . Personally i would like to keep this exotic nature in a modern environment. In this case the exoticism should be reevaluated positively and no body will consider this as something too 'ancient' or ' primitive', let alone this 's likely to shadow modernization and development of china.

[muyongshi]

I read the title wrong...swore it said "exorcism"

Anyway....

Very interesting line of thought. So many of my friends are surprised by how much NOT different it is from many western countries. Because they still see the traditional dress overseas, or even in movies like MI3 you see how there is a modern side to shanghai but then the daylight scenes shows you this very old looking area that looks very traditional (yes I know it wasn't actually in Shanghai).

But that is what I love about China: it has maintained (not as well as Taiwan in my opinion due to the cultural revolution) a blend of the modern society and the history of itself. Exotic, mysterious, ancient, however you want to put it. And that is why it is so interesting.

Now, I do not think I would want a statue of kongzi anywhere near the Olympics (unless my teacher's forgot to tell me that he was an amazing athlete) because it just doesn't have to do with the the heart of the Olympics...

[skylee]

I read the title wrong...swore it said "exorcism"

same here.

[rezaf]

i think the way the chinese government has treated it's ancient identity can be an example for other ancient cultures. china is towards future, the chinese are ready to live in an international society and you might have noticed how friendly they treat foreigners. on the other hand the ancient mysterious china is not forgotten. they have put it in museums and the doors are always open for intersted chinese and foreigners. for example unlike some countries like vietnam they didn't change their handwriting to pinyin but just simplified it, and it's easy for someone to learn the traditional characters after learning the simplified ones.

[gougou]

on the other hand the ancient mysterious china is not forgotten. they have put it in museums

Paved paradise, put up a parking lot...

I don't think that should be an example for other ancient cultures. Rather than putting it into museums, I'd prefer to see it preserved in its original place.

[muyongshi]

I agree! And don't rebuild it to make it look nice.... let me see how it was....

(Now I have that song stuck in my head )

[shibole]

First off, I'm not Chinese but I don't understand this dichotomy between "modern" and "ancient and mysterious". Couldn't there be "ancient" ideas that aren't the least bit mysterious and still "modern" in the sense that nobody's come up with a better replacement yet?

This kind of reminds me of a rather arrogant description of a Thai pestle and mortar in a catalog I saw. It went something like "This Thai pestle and mortar design is hundreds of years old, but believe it or not it actually works!" Well duh! Would people be using something for hundreds of years if it didn't work? It's almost like the implication is that Thai people are idiots, using stuff that doesn't work for hundreds of years, until proven otherwise.

I feel like there's some implication that "ancient" people (regardless of where they're from) are just totally stupid and only "modern" people aren't.

[lilongyue]

Interesting topic. I've been fascinated with Asia for many years. Buddhism still remains my greatest object of fascination, which I suppose seems exotic to many. Being a practicing Buddhist for several years now, it doesn't seem that exotic to me anymore. I still love reading the ancient stories of past masters though, which are usually filled with all kinds of "exotic" tales of marvelous powers and miracle-like feats. The 100,000 Songs of Milarepa is easily my favorite story of a great Buddhist teacher, and is indeed very "exotic."

I spent about 2 years in other Asian countries before coming to China. Before coming here I had already started to think about what modernization (which always seems to include Westernization) means for Asian countries. A very complex topic. I've often times wondered what good the introduction of Western "values" has done most Asian countries. Does being "modern" mean massive, unchecked consumerism? Does it mean seeing as beneficial the throwing away of something like Buddhism, an ancient, venerated and much respected religion (even by Western philosophers)? When the moral framework that something like Buddhism gives people is tossed out the window in the name of modernity what replaces it? McDonalds? Having 50 brands of shoes/purses/T-shirts/etc., to choose from instead of two or three? I'm aware that there are benefits to modernization, like health care, sanitation, etc. (lest some of you get the wrong idea).

Honestly, it's always been the Buddhist aspect of Asian culture that's interested me the most. So I tend to view things from that perspective, if you all couldn't already tell. I have to say that of the Asian countries I've spent time in, China feels the most cut off from its past. Places like Thailand or Korea seen to have a better balance of old and new. I think China is in a unique situation because whereas other Asian countries had an intact ancient culture that collided head on with modern Western culture, China had a cultural vacuum that was waiting to be filled.

Things have been changing at such an outrageous pace here. The other day in one of my classes we learned a phrase, and then were told that it isn't used much anymore. My teacher told us that phrase was commonly used about 5-7 years ago, but isn't said much anymore. I've been told this many times recently. It's not only with the language, but with other cultural things like what university students do for friends birthdays, etc., that have changed. Does it seem ironic to anyone else that a country with 5,000 years of history undergoes such widespread linguistic and cultural changes in 5-7years? Perhaps I'm making a mountain out of a mole hill.

Anyway, I have to admit that there is still some element of "mysticism" for me in Asia, but only because Asia is the place where Buddhism flourishes. I still love going to temples perched on the sides of mountains, the smell of incense in the monastery, the sound of chanting and the large, smiling Buddha statues. I find this sort of thing much more appealing than skyscrapers and mega-highways. However, having said that I still love living in Asia, and prefer life here over life in America.

[shibole]

First off, I'd like to note that Buddhism is actually of South Asian origin and not of Chinese origin, so I think it's not really a good example of something Chinese. But anyway....

I still love reading the ancient stories of past masters though, which are usually filled with all kinds of "exotic" tales of marvelous powers and miracle-like feats.

That's great, but honestly I can agree 100% with China not wanting to be identified with stuff that's irrational. This is exactly what I think they want to avoid, appearing as the land where irrational mumbo-jumbo about super powers and miracles is more important than more rational proven things like science.

Now I'm not actually sure how much Confucius falls into the miracles and super-powers category but he's certainly a controversial political figure with some ideas that basically wouldn't be considered appropriate for modern society, if nothing else with regard to ideas about women. Even if he did say many good perfectly applicable things you're communicating a serious mixed-message by showing a statue of him in some high-profile event. I don't know what this has to do with being ancient or mysterious really, seems like it has more to do with basic political messages.

So I just don't get all the stuff about "exotic" and "mysterious". Certainly ancient people everywhere were generally less rational than modern people, at least I'd like to hope modern people are more rational, but what does this have to do with China? This is true everywhere.

Also ancient people certainly were rational when it came to certain things. I doubt that voodoo and mumbo-jumbo produced inventions like the "north-pointing cart" with it's mechanical compass.

[gougou]

This is exactly what I think they want to avoid, appearing as the land where irrational mumbo-jumbo about super powers and miracles is more important than more rational proven things like science.

Maybe then they should stop making Kung Fu movies?

[lilongyue]

@Shibole

First I'd like to note that I never said Buddhism was Chinese. Secondly, the origin of Buddhism has little bearing on its overall impact on Chinese culture. Thirdly, the influence of Buddhism on nearly every aspect of Chinese culture (poetry, painting, calligraphy, sculpture, architecture, not to mention the impact of Sanskrit on the Chinese conception of language) is so great that it would be foolish not to take it into consideration when talking about the culture. Only the Communist government leaves Buddhism out of the equation when talking about China's past and it's culture. Lastly, Ch'an Buddhism is distinctly Chinese. If you're erudite enough in the topic of Buddhism to know that it's originally of South Asian origin, then you ought to know how throughly "Sinofied" it was within 200 years after arriving in the Middle Kingdom. You would probably also know that Buddhism contains an ancient form of logic and debate that is still preserved in Tibet. The ancient Indian monk Nagarjuna is responsible for refining the art of logic and debate within Buddhism. Most major universities in every country (except China, probably) include the writings of this man in their philosophy courses. Ironically, other than in Tibet, the Chinese never took to the brain numbing, hair-splitting dialectical methods of investigation Nagarjuna pioneered.

Monasteries, far from only being places of mumbo-jumbo mysticism, were always places of education in old Asia. Still are in the poorer Asian countries. Children that would otherwise never have a chance to learn how to read or write were able to do so in monasteries. This is a little fact the Communists always leave out of the history books.

Honestly, sound to me like you just don't like Buddhism, which is OK. But you ought to know the difference between not liking something, and ignoring (or perhaps being ignorant of) its ubiquitous influence on China. Also, I feel like I should clarify something. What I wrote regarding regarding my feeling towards the "mysticism" and "exotic" nature of the ancient, Buddhist masters' stories is just that - my feelings. I was referring to the original poster's question about our feelings towards "exotic" China. By the way, you are seeing my quotation marks around the word exotic, aren't you?

OK, enough of that. I've spoken my peace.

[gato]

First I'd like to note that I never said Buddhism was Chinese. Secondly, the origin of Buddhism has little bearing on its overall impact on Chinese culture. Thirdly, the influence of Buddhism on nearly every aspect of Chinese culture (poetry, painting, calligraphy, sculpture, architecture, not to mention the impact of Sanskrit on the Chinese conception of language) is so great that it would be foolish not to take it into consideration when talking about the culture.

Yes, Buddhism is thought to have reached its peak in China during the Tang dynasty, which perhaps not coincidentally is widely thought to have been the golden age of Chinese civilization. China during the Tang dynasty also was minimally Confucian. Think of poets like Li Bai or Du Fu.

[shibole]

lilongyue:

I think the confusion is that I was basically responding to the question of "what's appropriate for an Olympic opening ceremony" and "I wonder what some other Chinese people think of the "exotic" way of looking at China. Do people find it offensive? Does it do more harm than good?"

Something like an Olympic opening ceremony is also a good example of a country demonstrating how it wants to be viewed by the world.

I'm not Chinese, I'm not a Chinese citizen, and I don't even live in China right now. However (and Chinese people might find this odd) I still identify with China to some extent, probably because I'm married to a Chinese woman and thus have family in China and I guess I've bought into the whole Chinese/Asian idea that your wife's family is your family or something. So I feel like I have some stake in how China and even Chinese culture outside of China are viewed.

I'm an American and I don't really like the idea of people thinking of the US as "the land of Christianity" or "the land of Mormonism" or something. I'm not really offended by the former, though I would be somewhat offended by the later since the majority of Americans aren't Mormon, even if Mormonism is a distinctly American religion in the same way that Pure Land is distinctly Chinese.

Now I would be very offended by the idea that America is the land of religious fanatics, and if we were to hold an olympic opening ceremony in the US that centered on the Christianity and the contributions of Christianity in the US I'd be pretty pissed by that, since it's extremely narrow and really doesn't represent the country adequately.

So forgive me if I'm almost offended by the idea of America as "the land of Christanity" and somewhat similarly offended by the idea of China as "the land of Buddhism." Yes, Buddhism has had influence on Chinese culture as Christianity has in the US but get real. Even if we have Catholic schools and Mormon missionary schools and Buddhist monasteries teaching kids and whatnot, so what? These things aren't appropriate as the central piece of a modern national identity when many people are not Catholic, Mormon, Buddhist, etc. Certainly these things are an aspect of identity, but they're far from the central aspect of it. They deserve acknowledgment but they aren't the top items on my list.

When I think of China I think of:

• oldest continuous civilization still in existence
  
• innovations in government (national exams and merit-based participation in government)
  
• technological achievements
  
• art/literature (regardless of whether it's Daoist, Buddhist influenced, etc.)
  
• the relative "golden age" of the Tang and Song dynasties
  

I think of similar things when I think of the US, aside from the "oldest civilization" stuff, plus innovations in terms of individual freedoms and more open competition of conflicting political ideologies without instability.

China has the additional issue that at one time at least it had a reputation as the backward-ass place that didn't want to build railroads because they were "bad 風水." When you start to promote the idea of China as "the land of Buddhism/Daoism/etc." you start to bring back bad memories of people refusing to adapt to the modern world out of blind tradition and fear. This is not something that the US really faced, and it hasn't been an issue in Europe for hundreds of years, but for China it was only 100 years or so ago.

Unfortunately these days China could use a little more 風水 seeing as how a lot of the 風 and 水 in China is getting rather polluted and people are suffering from it. But anyway...

If you're erudite enough in the topic of Buddhism to know that it's originally of South Asian origin, then you ought to know how throughly "Sinofied" it was within 200 years after arriving in the Middle Kingdom.

I don't think you need to be at all erudite to know where Buddhism came from. Really you'd have to be completely ignorant of Buddhism not to know that. And yes I know about what happens to Buddhism as it moves into other cultures. In the West we tend to westernize Buddhism by confusing it with German Romanticism and secular humanism just as it got all mixed up with Daoism and such in China and the traditional animistic beliefs in Tibet.

Honestly, sound to me like you just don't like Buddhism, which is OK. But you ought to know the difference between not liking something, and ignoring (or perhaps being ignorant of) its ubiquitous influence on China.

Actually I do like Buddhism, but I'm one of those evil Theravada Buddhists who think all the Mahayana-specific assertions are nonsense that had nothing to do with the historical Buddha. Still, I don't really hate Mahayana as it carries with it many of the original Buddhist assertions and practices, and it's great that these were still able to spread throughout Asia so ubiquitously. But I personally don't think China contributed anything to Buddhism other than it's spread. If anything Pure Land, Ch'an, and any number of other things are overcomplications, distortions, or degredations of it. On the other hand, these kinds of distortions may have helped some of the core practices to spread more easily as they probably made Buddhism more socially acceptable to a larger number of people at the time.

But really the point here isn't about who's religious beliefs are more valid but simply that people don't agree on religious beliefs and thus something like a national identity needs to take that into account. If nothing else modern societies should acknowledge the influences of religion without necessarily endorsing one religion or being intolerant of various religions.

If I had to guess, based on what I've seen on TV in China, the olympic opening ceremony will probably focus on "look how ethnically diverse and tolerant of minorities we are" without having anything to say about religion. There will be Shaolin monks doing "kung fu" and nobody will think it means "we don't need a modern military because we can punch your tanks with kung fu". But I doubt that anyone will be rolling out Buddha statues, though Buddhist influence of some sort might be visible in certain art forms or something.

What I wrote regarding regarding my feeling towards the "mysticism" and "exotic" nature of the ancient, Buddhist masters' stories is just that - my feelings.

Ok, I guess I thought that you were saying this should be some central aspect of Chinese identity. I don't think China is about fantastical stuff except as fantasy literature.

[Ah-Bin]

These replies are all very interesting to read. Looking at the way affairs are conducted in some powerful western countries I often doubt how "rational" they are too.

Yesterday I went to the bookshop and was looking through a Chinese book with photographs about minorities yesterday called 中华东方 Zhonghuadongfang (China East?) and noticed that the "exotic" thing was going on there with the portrayal of them. There were pictures and deceriptions of all the officially recognised ethnic groups wearing their beautiful costumes and sitting outside thatched huts, stilt houses and old brick buildings. The first entry was about Han people, and the picture? Chinese scientist in lab coat investigating the inside of a piece of machinery! I wonder what sort of message that is supposed to give?

[shibole]

Looking at the way affairs are conducted in some powerful western countries I often doubt how "rational" they are too.

That's why I said "more rational than ancient people." People still aren't rational, and many political decisions are made out of fear rather than a close scientific examination of values and cause-and-effect in a society.

But still, I think modern people tend to be less superstitious, for example, than "ancient people."

[lilongyue]

@ shibole

My post had nothing to do with the Olympics. If people thought it did then I can understand why they would think it crazy. I was only talking about China, Chinese culture, modernization, Westernization, the role Buddhism has played in China, and my personal feelings about China.

I can understand people not wanting to be viewed as "backward." But I don't think modern, Buddhist countries are viewed that way because they are openly Buddhist, and include Buddhism in their national identity. Does anyone see Japan as backward? Or South Korea? Or Thailand? Actually, Buddhism is gaining increasing respect worldwide. Having said that, I don't think Buddha statues should be rolled out during the Olympics, ha-ha! The role of Buddhism is modern life is one of the hurdles developing Buddhist countries face. That's why I specifically brought it up, I thought it related to the post (modernity, etc.). People who aren't Buddhist, and haven't spent time in developing/developed Asian countries might not have made the connection.

I myself and half-Theravadan, half-Mahayana. I spent several months in forest temples in Thailand after a year in India with Tibetans. I place the picture of my Thai teacher besides my Tibetan teachers. It's all good. Although I have to admit I prefer the Asian variety of Theravadan Buddhism, with it's mystical gobbledy-gook, over the sterilized Western variety

[Pravit]

While I find it good that Westerners are drawn to learn more about Chinese culture because of the mystery and exoticism they associate with it, as a Chinese-American, I am also slightly annoyed by it. Too much emphasis is placed on the "inscrutability of the Oriental mind" or some fundamental difference between Eastern and Western ways of thinking. I think we(Easterners and Westerners) are a lot more similar to each other than we get credit for. It's hard to explain, but a lot of times I get the feeling that foreign visitors to China don't see locals as individual people, they see them as a huge, homogeneous mass of Chinese people.

That's another thing that irks me - every time I read something about the mainland written by a foreigner, it inevitably invokes the word "masses." Masses of humanity in the train station. Masses of bicycle-riders. Yes, China has a large population, get over it.

[lilongyue]

I agree with you Pravit. As you probably know, most Americans don't really understand anything about Asia, especially modern Asia. I've known many Americans that came to China expecting to see people still in traditional dress, and were surprised when they didn't see Chinese men walking around with those long braids (forgive my ignorance, I forget which era it was when men commonly wore them). But then again, Chinese who has never been to the West have some pretty crazy ideas about what real life in the U.S. is like, too!

Despite my earlier post on this subject, I don't see Asian people, or Chinese, as exotic or mysterious. I think Chinese are the opposite, actually, very down to earth and concerned with the realities of the country they live in. I think something touched upon in an earlier post is actually quite relevant to this topic, namely that most Westerners come to Asia, and China, looking for something different than what is back in their home countries. Skyscrapers, cars, massive construction projects don't hold much interest for Westerners. We all grew up with it, many of us come to Asia looking for those things that wee see as uniquely Asian, or Chinese. Because they are different, they seem exotic.

An interesting phenomena that is taking place in other Asian countries is how foreigner's interest in things that were tossed into the "exotic, antiquated, irrational" trash bin as outdated is bringing back the local people's interest. For example, yoga in India. For some time, many of the Indian middle and upper classes didn't much care for something like yoga. They also saw it as counter-productive to modernization. But because so many foreigners were going to India to study yoga and ayurvedic medicine, and opening yoga centers in their home countries, Indians began re-evaluating those ancient practices. Now upper class Indians are also taking yoga classes. Modern, Western medicine investigating the health benefits of things like yoga has also helped. The same thing happened in Thailand. Although always a strongly Buddhist country, outside interest and scientific research of the health benefits of meditation has helped fuel the Thai people's interest and respect of that ancient tradition, even in the face of modernization and Westernization (as well as the assault of fanatic, Christian missionaries).

China has a lot to offer foreign visitors. And judging from what I've seen on this forum, at least the foreigners who frequent this forum and live in China don't see China or Chinese as "mysterious." In fact, I seem to be the most "superstitious" person here!