Thursday, 22 August 2024
Authors: Adriana Ribas
Country: Brazil
Source: Landmark Media/Alamy, 1981
SUMMARY
The representation of Eastern cultures in Hollywood films serves as a profound reflection of historical and contemporary power dynamics. This article seeks to interrogate how these cinematic portrayals reinforce stereotypes and perpetuate colonial ideologies, drawing from post-colonial theory to uncover underlying biases. Through the lens of key theorists such as Ashis Nandy, Homi Bhabha, Gayatri Spivak, and Edward Said, I explore how Hollywood films construct and manipulate images of the East, often reducing complex cultures to simplistic and exotic tropes. This introduction sets the stage for a critical examination of how these representations are not merely artistic choices but are deeply embedded in a legacy of colonialism and ongoing Western hegemony. By examining films like “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” and Disney’s “Aladdin,” I will reveal how these narratives not only reflect but also reinforce the West’s dominance and distorted understanding of Eastern cultures.
BACKGROUND
In his work “The Third Space”, Bhabha (1990) points out the crucial difference between cultural diversity and cultural differences. In the context of multiculturalism, although there is always an encouragement of cultural diversity, there is always a corresponding containment. The dominant culture is responsible for establishing the norm while also stating that other cultures must be accepted. However, the acceptance of cultural differences is controlled and localized by the dominant culture. In this sense, the creation of cultural diversity is based on what Bhabha describes as a musée imaginaire, in which the dominant, civilized culture has the duty and responsibility to collect and appreciate other cultures, controlling and managing them.
Bhabha (1990, p. 210) proposes the concept of cultural translation to suggest that all forms of culture are, in some way, related to each other, as culture is a significant symbolic activity. The articulation between them is not possible due to their similarities, but rather to the fact that all cultures are interpolative practices, symbolic formations, and constitutions of the subject.
The act of signification, the act of producing the icons and symbols, the myths and metaphors through which we live culture, must always – by virtue of the fact they are forms of representation – have within them a kind of self-alienating limit. Meaning is constructed across the bar of difference and separation between the signifier and the signified (BHABHA, 1990, p.210).
From the passage above, it is observed that, beyond the intentional representation of the Other as dangerous, exotic, different, and mysterious, the desire to unveil it is a frustrating process, considering that cultural translation is inherently alienating. In other words, cultural translation always carries with it the subversion of the ´original´, making the interpretation of the other culture and the Other necessarily a form of representation. Given that the West holds a monopoly on knowledge and determines which interpretations are valid and legitimate, the representation of the Other is always based on preconceived moral and ethical values.
Being a form of imitation – pernicious and displaced – of the original culture through copying, simulation, transfer, and, primarily, transformation, the ´original´ is never finalized, denying its essence and reflecting alienation and the assignment of a secondary role in the relation to the subject (BHABHA, 1990, p. 210). However, it is worth emphasizing that this thinking should not be interpreted as a way of absolving Europe of its responsibility in colonial projects and the grave consequences observed today.
In dialogue with Bhabha, Spivak (2014, p. 60) adds that the clearest available example of epistemic violence lies in the remotely orchestrated, vast, and heterogeneous project of constituting the colonial subject as the Other. This is justified because the project represents the asymmetric obliteration of the trace of this Other in its precarious subjectivity. In simpler terms, the Other is conceived in an essentialist manner, endowed with a unitary and monolithic essence.
This passage can also be inserted and understood in the context of the representation of the Orient and its subjects in films produced by Hollywood. In “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom”, for example, the plot is built around the protagonist´s unexpected arrival in India. In the context of British colonization, the country is portrayed as miserable and in need of the white man´s tutelage, which becomes evident when the population says they prayed for the protagonist´s arrival and implore him to recover the village´s protective stone and liberate the children who have been kidnapped by the followers of the goddess Kali.
The evil that plagues the country is thus attributed to the local religion in opposition to Western Christianity, which is responsible for bringing salvation to uncivilized peoples. Moreover, British colonization is pictured as peaceful and accepted by the entire population, which even sees it as necessary to expel the evil from the country, metamorphosed into the figure of the goddess Kali and the customs of her followers. The British colonizers consider such customs condemnable and, therefore, subject to prohibition, clearly establishing the need for salvation by the white man.
In addition to the profound lack of knowledge about Hinduism and its traditions, in which each deity plays a fundamental role in the balance of the world´s energies, and the dark fantasy built around a native ritual, there is the reproduction of the dominant colonization narrative, intentionally omitting the Indian Rebellion and the extreme brutality with which it was repressed by the British. The Indian Other is constructed from stereotypes, exacerbating them and turning them into almost a caricature. This can also be observed in the banquet offered by the Maharaja to the British and the protagonist and his companions, where the foods are exotic – monkey brains, baby snakes, among others – corroborating this distorted view of the Other.
It is possible to draw parallels with Sharma´s thought. According to the author, this control and localization of subaltern cultures is what marks the difference between imperial orientalism and contemporary orientalism. While imperial orientalism marked the boundary of difference between the Self and the Other, portraying the Other as exotic and dangerous – as observed in the aforementioned film – contemporary orientalism marks this difference through a false strategic integration that recognizes and incorporates the Other.
(…) The precarious maintenance of white universality, in the era of the “multicultural empire,” has to negotiate and control the dissonance produced by the proximity of cultural differentiation through a mimetic identification with the non-self as an idealized object. The white individual demands that the Other authorize the universality of white culture by identifying with it. This idealized Other is necessary to sustain the hegemonic position of white culture, driven by a narcissistic fear of racial authority and power, dependent on a known and controllable Other (SHARMA; SHARMA, 2003, p. 63, my translation).
According to the passage above, this incorporation is achieved only to a certain extent, given that the process of cultural appropriation feeds on the characteristics of the Other considered positive and, therefore, can be consumed by whites, to a certain degree, keeping them in a subaltern position. It is no coincidence, for example, that the movement for the representation of Asian actors to play Asian characters in Hollywood films is recent, as white culture avoids confrontation directly with real and diasporic Asians.
Nandy (1983, p. 4) emphasizes that the West not only produced colonialism but also held – and still does – the monopoly over its interpretations, determining which are legitimate and valid. Colonialism, beyond its direct manifestation on bodies, also colonizes minds. This type of colonialism “releases forces within the colonized societies to alter their priorities once at all (…) it helps generalize the concept of the modern West from a geographical and temporal entity to a psychological category” (NANDY, 1983, p. 3, my translation). In this sense, the West becomes present both within the West itself and outside it, in the structures and minds of individuals.
In dialogue with Sharma and Bhabha, Nandy also points out that Westernization has become more subtle and sophisticated in terms of acculturation, producing not only models of conformity but also models of “official” dissent. In other words, it is only possible to be anticolonial in a specific manner, promoted by the modern world as “rational” and “appropriate.” Even when there is opposition to dominant thinking, this opposition is predictable and controlled (NANDY, 1983, p. 7, my translation).
The hegemony of white Western culture and the marking of cultural differences can also be understood through Said. According to the author, knowledge about the Orient must be comprehended from its intrinsic relationship with power, which is embedded in the Orientalist discourse and responsible for producing subjects, objects, and an asymmetric relationship between them.
Moreover, knowledge about the Other produces regimes of truth, hierarchizing and legitimizing some discourses while invalidating others. It also allows for control, and as Western institutions are dominant, they (re)produce the Orientalist discourse, maintaining its durability and acceptance. According to Said (1978, p. 58, my translation), “transforming even the simplest perception of Arabs and Islam into a highly politicized, almost strident issue: first, the history of popular prejudice against Arabs and Islam in the West directly reflects the history of Orientalism"
In Disney´s “Aladdin”, the opening song already demonstrates what Said points out in the passage above: “I come from a place / Where you always see / A caravan passing by / They’ll cut off your ear / To show you how barbaric our home is.” These references to barbarism not only reaffirm the idea of the exotic but also confirm the notion constructed about Arab peoples as dangerous. The song continues: “Winds from the East / And the sun comes from the West / Your camel wants to rest / You can come and jump / Fly on a magic carpet / Arabian nights will come / Arabian nights / And the day too / It’s always so hot / It makes us feel so good / There’s the beautiful moonlight / And too many orgies / Whoever gets distracted / Might even fall / Be left behind.”
In addition to what has already been mentioned, other conceptions can be inferred from this song, such as the mysticism and exoticism of Arab peoples, with references to flying carpets and “too many orgies.” As this is a children´s movie, it is particularly striking and reinforces the imaginary of deviant sexuality present in non-Western peoples.
It is also noteworthy that the animation confuses elements of Arab culture with those of Indian culture, such as snake charming, fire-eating, and sitting on beds of nails, which are characteristic of the latter. Furthermore, it fails to show the diversity of Middle Eastern people, homogenizing them and ignoring the particularities of each culture, especially in terms of religion, which is one of the critical points of conflict in the region.
Furthermore, the sultan, the highest leader of the kingdom, is depicted as highly childish, spending most of his time playing with plastic dolls and giving cookies to the parrot, besides being manipulated by the royal Vizier, Jafar. He uses his staff in the shape of a cobra to enchant the sultan to achieve his objectives, attributing a dark mysticism to the Arab people. This figure, one of the most Orientalist representations in the film, corroborates the negative imaginary by depicting them as dangerous, dark, and cunning, and therefore, untrustworthy and controllable.
Excessive violence is also a constantly portrayed element in the animation, which begins with the treatment given to the protagonist when he steals a piece of bread. The idea conveyed is that Arab people take “justice into their own hands”, without any respect for the law and by overlooking the possibility of fair judgment, reinforcing the negative stereotype attributed to them, in contrast to the Western judicial system, which is portrayed as fair and egalitarian.
Nandy (1983) asserts that, despite the rhetoric, academics and intellectuals who oppose the West are not located outside the dominant model of universalism. On the contrary, their roles are distributed within a dominant consciousness, as “ornamental dissenters”. Spivak´s concept of native informants is similar, arguing that intellectuals from the East end up being integrated into Western educational institutions, reproducing the dominant structure and maintaining the hegemony of Western knowledge. The role of the native informant is dual: on one hand, he is beseeched to provide the researcher with information on his culture, while on the other, he is marginalized because he is not located as a subject/narrator, but rather an object.
In conclusion, the representation of the East in Hollywood films should be understood as being embedded within these dominant thinking structures. As white culture integrates the Other to a certain extent, the Other is maintained in a subordinated position, as an object to be desired based on its positive attributes. Moreover, this integration is fetishized through the construction of stereotypes, primarily negative. In this sense, the main question of this article concerns emancipation beyond the dominant discourse. Is it possible to break away from the dominant thinking structures? How can critics and intellectuals from the Global South contribute to this movement?”
REFERENCES
BHABHA, Homi. The Third Space: Interview with Homi Bhabha, in Rutherford, J. (ed) Identity, Community, Culture, Difference, London, Lawrence & Wishart, 1990.
NANDY, Ashis: The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under colonialism, India, 1989.
SAID, Edward W.: Orientalismo: O Oriente como Invenção do Ocidente, Companhia das Letras, São Paulo, 1990 (Introdução).
SHARMA, Sanjay; SHARMA, Ashwain: Paranóia Branca: Orientalismo na Idade do Império, A Revista da Moda, Corpo e Cultura, Vol.2, números ¾, setembro/dezembro 2003.
SPIVAK, Gayatri. C. Can the Subaltern Speak? In: C. Nelson e L. Grossberg (Ed.) Marxismo and the Interpretation of Culture. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988. Can the Subaltern Speak? Pp. 271-313.
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