On Yellowface

Mary Pickford as Cho-Cho San
Madame Butterfly (1915)

 

Boris Karloff as Fu Manchu
The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932)

Katherine Hepburn as Jade Tan Dragon Seed (1944)

Jim Sturgess as Hae-Joo Chang
  Cloud Atlas (2012)

Yul Brynner as King Mongkut
The King and I (1956)

David Carradine as Kwai Chang Caine
Kung Fu (1972-75)

What's wrong with these pictures? 

YELLOWFACE.

Yellowface is when films cast non-Asian actors in Asian roles and use heavy makeup to make these actors appear Asian. Hence, the actors are putting on a "yellow face." Much of the time, these roles are also that of stereotypical Asian characters. The term yellowface stems from its older counterpart, "blackface," in which excessive makeup was used in minstrel shows to create a heavily stereotyped and racist caricature of a black person. Blackface is regarded as highly racist and is rarely seen nowadays.

Blackface - Insulting and Racist

So why did blackface die out, for the most part, after the U.S. Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's while yellowface can still be seen in prominent Hollywood films?

Speaking at an event for Duke's Asian American Association, Dr. K.T. Chun stated that Asians are seen as the "model minority." The idea is that Asians have integrated well into American society due to their work ethics and personal traits. Typically, others see Asians also as generally submissive, not outspoken, and will not speak up if they are depicted negatively in the media. If today, blackface occurs in a Hollywood film, most likely all black Americans and the NAACP would voice their dissent.

Consider this MadTV skit, "Ms. Swan at the Drive-Thru"

This video clearly invokes yellowface and the "Perpetual Foreigner" stereotype of Asians as rude, stupid, clueless, and with a foreign accent. If a video this insulting was made with blackface, there would most likely be a large outcry from the black community demanding that video be taken down.

Why do Asians not band together to fight yellowface and all of the stereotypes that are imposed on them? Dr. Chun states that one reason is that Asians are so segmented into their own races within the title of "Asian" - Chinese will stick with Chinese, Koreans will congregate together, Japanese will stay with other Japanese. This segmentation makes it difficult for all Asians to come together to fight racism. At the end of her speech, Dr. Chun voiced how she believes that Asian Americans should set aside their differences and come together in an effort to dispel all of these racist views on Asians.

Why is yellowface a big deal? Why do some people get so upset about yellowface?

There are two main reasons why yellowface is unacceptable.

1) Yellowface is simply insulting. It is the depiction of a white person's crude idea of what Asians should look like and how they should act. A white person playing as an Asian gives off the impression of, "Look, we're better at being Asian than you are!"

2) Yellowface takes away lead roles that should go to Asian Americans. This has been a trend since the inception of yellowface in the late nineteenth century. In Yellowface: Creating the Chinese in American Popular Music and Performance, 1850s - 1920s, author Krystyn R. Moon states that "Asian and Asian Americans who had decades of theatrical experience in vaudeville were unable to find work or were relegated to stereotypical roles - laundrymen, prostitutes, or servants" (164). Because of yellowface, Asians are only cast into roles for "marginal or sinister characters" and not "positive, substantial roles" (I., Michelle). Thus, Yellowface "helps to ensure that top acting roles continue to fall into white hands" (Npstad).

All in all, yellowface confirms the casting bias of "white superiority" of Hollywood directors, makes insulting depictions of Asians, and harms Asian actors who are trying to break into the industry.

Case Study: Yellowface in Cosplay 

Yellowface expands beyond film and television and into fandoms themselves.

In general, many cosplayers believe that cosplayers doing anything to their appearance (tanning, using bronzer or other makeup, etc) to look like a person of color is either yellowfacing, brownfacing, or blackfacing. Blogs such as Damn Lay off the Bleach and Korra is Not Tan readily point out instances of white cosplayers cosplaying as Asian or dark-skinned characters. The authors of these blogs claim that characters of color in comic books, video games, films, and television shows are found far-and-few-in-between compared to white characters. As the moderator of Damn Lay off the Bleach states:

"It bothers [the moderators] that out of the MANY white/pale-skinned characters available, of the VAST reserve of white representation, a white person would choose to cosplay a character of color. People of color do not have the equal representation in the media, nor the same support in cosplaying circles. Even when they are cosplaying characters of their skin tone/race, it is evident that white cosplayers are lauded/praised over them, regardless of style or intensity. There are so few characters of color to begin with, a white person cosplaying a character of color just adds insult to injury."

Thus, people of color have so little choice in accurately cosplaying a character that is not a white person that when a white person cosplays as a character of color, it is rather insulting. The moderator also subtly mentions "white superiority" - white cosplayers are often praised for their cosplays, while people of color can get called out for cosplaying a character who is not a person of color.

 An example of "white superiority" in cosplay:

Wonder Woman Cosplay

This cosplay of wonder woman was circulated on Tumblr, and soon someone made the following comment, "Since when has wonder woman been asian????? o.O"

A person of color gets called out for cosplaying a canonically white character, making her seem 'less than' the character because of her race. Fabyenn of the Tumblr community sums up this "white superiority" phenomenon in the cosplay community accurately, "White people think they’re entitled to be whoever they want to be, but people of color cannot be anything other than people of color."

References:

http://www.racebending.com/v3/background/history-of-yellowface/#Intro

I., Michelle. "Yellowface: A Story in Pictues." Racebending. Racebending.com, 09 2009. Web. 04 Dec 2012. <http://www.racebending.com/v3/background/history-of-yellowface/

Moon, Krystyn R. Yellowface: Creating the Chinese in American Popular Music and                             Performance, 1850s-1920s. Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005.                              Print.

Npstad, Peter. "Fu Manchu and the Yellow Peril." The Illuminated Lantern. N.p., 01 2001. Web. Web. 08 Dec. 2012. <http://www.illuminatedlantern.com/cinema/archives/fu_manchu_and_the_yellow_peril.php>.