Page 2 of
4 How
beauty shapes power in China and
Japan By Cho Kyo and Koko
Selden
Swedish botanist Carl Peter Thunberg
(1743-1828), who visited Japan in 1775, says:
"[Japanese people's eyes] are oblong, small, and
are sunk deeper in the head, in the consequence of
which these people have almost the appearance of
being pink-eyed. In other respects their eyes are
dark-brown, or rather black... The eyebrows are
also placed somewhat higher. Their heads are in
general large and their necks short; their hair
black, thick, and shining from the use they make
of oils. Their noses although not flat, are yet
rather thick and short." [6] As time passed,
exaggerated portrayals of ugliness became fewer, but
eyes directed toward
Mongoloids did not change much from the cases of
Gaspar da Cruz and Matteo Ricci.
Portrait of Empress
Xiao Xianchun in formal court attire. Qing.
National Palace Museum (Beijing), Qi Gongzhu, ed.
Select Chinese Paintings of Successive
Dynasties, vol. 6 (Zhongguo lidai huihua jingpin).
(Shangdong Meishu Publishing House, 2003.)
Westerners similarly appeared ugly or
grotesque in Asian eyes. Yan Shigu (581-645) of
the Tang period writes in an annotation in
"Traditions of the Western Regions", fascicle 96
of The Book of the Former Han, "The Wusun
[tribe] have the strangest features among the
various peoples of the Western Regions. [7] The
reason that today's Hu people [ethnic groups in
northern and western regions], with their blue
eyes and red beards, resemble monkeys in
countenance is that they derive from the same
ancestors as the Wusun." When Tang people saw blue
(or jasper-green) eyes and red beards, they
reflexively thought of animals. Of course, peoples
of the Western Regions are not Westerners. But to
Tang, Chinese, deep sculpted faces of the
Caucasoid type appeared ugly.
Likewise
when they directly described Europeans.
"Biographies" 213 in fascicle 325 of The
History of the Ming (1368-1644) characterizes
the Dutch as having "deep set eyes and a long
nose, with the hair, eyebrows, and beard equally
red". Seemingly an objective depiction of physical
characteristics, the passage employs the words
"deep set eyes and long noses" with a clearly
derogatory nuance. The term "red hair"
(hongmao) as a disparaging alias for
Westerners began to be used around then. Likewise,
"red hair, jasper eyes" (hongmao biyan) was
a negative expression. As in Tang China (618-684,
705-907), red hair (or gold hair) and blue eyes
were directly connected to the image of wild
animals. Such a view finally reversed itself in
modern times.
Following the Opium War
(1840-1842), China and the West experienced a
reversal of power, and Chinese views of Westerners
gradually changed. In 1866, the Qing official Bin
Chun (1827-1910) was sent as the first formal
representative to observe Europe. European women
had come to look beautiful in his eyes. [8]
Interestingly, his memoir, called Occasional
Jottings Aboard a Raft (Chengcha biji) makes
no reference at all to the color of hair and eyes.
When looking at people of a different race
or ethnicity, whether the observation is of the
same gender can affect aesthetic judgments. There
are many examples in which, in the eyes of male
observers, foreigners of the same gender look ugly
yet women look beautiful. Siebold and Thunberg
mentioned above, as well as the German physician
and naturalist Engelbert Kaempfer (1651-1716),
write in their travelogues that Japanese women are
quite lovely. Likewise, even if Western women
looked attractive to a Qing government official,
he may not necessarily have similarly assessed
Western men. Ascribed to Gu Kaizhi,
Instructress Writes a Letter of Advice
Eastern Jin. British Museum. Liu Changluo et al
(ed), Zhonghua guwenmin datuji (Collection of
ancient Chinese culture) , People's Daily et
al, 1992, part 7 (Customs and Manners).
In
China, too, once it was recognized that the West
had overwhelming power, "red hair" and "jasper
eyes" became gradually less ugly. Indeed, in the
20th century they were transformed into a symbol
of beauty. Western fiction in translation exerted
great influence on the reversal of the image.
Along with that, approaches to the portrayal of
Westerners also changed. In Chinese fiction,
poetry, and non-fiction, "red hair" changed to
"golden hair" (jinfa) and "jasper eyes" to
"indigo pupils" (lan yanjing).
Leng Mei, Out in
the Garden on a Moonlit Night". Qing.
National Palace Museum (Taipei). Glimpses.
A similar trend was common in Japan as
well. There seem to be two stereotypical
depictions of Westerners in modern Japanese
fiction: extremely ugly or exceedingly beautiful.
When portrayed as ugly, physical characteristics
suggestive of non-humans such as a bear-like huge
body, intense body odor, and uncanny blue eyes are
heavily emphasized. [9]
Whether or not
people of a different race appear beautiful is
less a matter of judgment based on looks and
styles than a product of one's evaluation of that
race's culture. From the start, it is meaningless
to try to determine whether Caucasians or
Mongoloids are more beautiful. To compare the
appearances of races that differ in eye color,
hair, and skull structure, is like comparing chow
and bulldog, as it were, and judging which animal
is more aesthetically appealing. In this sense,
the Miss World competition can hardly be expected
to have any "fair criteria of judgment". The
interracial comparison is predicated on a myth
that humans are all the same.
Aesthetics and power relations among
cultures Judging comparative beauty of two
human groups invariably involves a perception of
hierarchy, or power relations, between them.
Aesthetic judgment about racial and ethnic groups
involves power relations between cultures. Stated
simply, a people whose civilization is regarded as
highly developed is likely to be viewed as
physically appealing, whereas an ethnic group
deemed "backward" is considered ugly. So long as
the "backward" culture remains unaware of its
backwardness, members do not think of themselves
as ugly. But once hierarchical consciousness is
established, the aesthetic of physical features
rapidly changes.
This is the reason that,
today, Westerners are considered beautiful. It is
not just Westerners themselves who think this,
people in developing countries also do. Such
aesthetic sense perfectly corresponds with
ideologies pertaining to "the West" and "the
East," and "advanced" and "backward" countries.
The point also can be illustrated by
reverse examples. Those who consider Westerners
more beautiful than Japanese do not necessarily
think that Russians, belonging to the same
Caucasoid race, are better looking than Japanese.
Some Iranians have looks that can hardly be
distinguished from those of Westerners. But when
it is known in advance that they are Iranians, few
Japanese would feel physically inferior to them.
Take for example the minority Uyghur in
Xinjiang, China. Their features divide into two
types, one that is close to Mongoloids and another
to Caucasoids. The latter, with deep sculpted
faces, resemble Westerners. Uyghur men who used to
come to large cities like Shanghai before economic
opening were shy about their tall noses. They
tried to hide them as much as possible by pulling
down their hats.
Other factors can of
course shape judgments about beauty. In recent
years, young Japanese men and women with darkly
tanned faces, pierced ears, and Afro hair can be
spotted in Japanese cities. They identify with
African-American culture, which grew out of
slavery and oppression, for a variety of reasons:
these include the attraction of rebellion or
difference from the American or Japanese
mainstream, or identification with the music and
art associated with American blacks. On the other
hand, African blacks have not become a target of
imitation or emulation by Japanese.
The
foundation for acceptance of a view of female
beauty In present-day Japan, an oval face
with a tall nose is favored. This is not entirely
due to Western influence. The forensic
anthropologist Suzuki Hisashi once conducted
detailed research on the skeletons of the Tokugawa
family and their women. In the early years of the
Tokugawa Shogunate (1603-1868), political
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