Group 2: Thousand and One Nights and Orientalism

Orientalism: Difference Between the Images and the Reality

Many reader of the ‘Thousand and One Nights’ which is the representative of South Asian classic literature might realize that most women in the story have to be passive and unconditionally obedient towards men while men are described as being very authoritative and coercive such as the king Shahrayar. Some of the readers would be surprised at excessively docile attitude of the female plots in the story. The feeling of jolt from cultural difference may lead them to have stereotype toward Asian culture, or Orientalism. However, is the fact that Asian women have to be passive and submissive toward men definitely correct? I would say it is not totally correct. Edward Said who is the writer of ‘Orientalism’ said, “The ideological suppositions, images, and fantasies about a currently important and politically urgent region of the world called the Orient.”.  The word ‘Oriental’ which refers to all Asian cultures has some stereotype about Asian women, however, I would say the reality is not always the same as the stereotypes or images of many people.

Few weeks ago, there was an unexpected distraction during a live interview on BBC News. According to an article, international relations professor Robert Kelly’s interview about South Korea was briefly interrupted when his two small children walked in. He managed to keep his composure, and his wife ushered the two young intruders out and the video has been viewed hundreds of million times and delighted hundreds of thousands of people on social media. A lot of commenters on social media and initial reports from news outlets assumed that Jung-a Kim, the Asian woman who ran in to usher the kids out, was the nanny – not his wife. In the video, the woman rushes in and desperately herds the children away after a few amusing moments and a lot of people convinced that the woman should be a nanny because she seems scared, flustered, her posture is low to the ground and to behave in a subservient way. It has sparked a wider discussion about assumptions about race, gender, and mixed-race couples. Then, why did people assume an Asian woman in BBC viral video was the nanny? There should be several reasons but the biggest reason might be their unconscious stereotypes toward Asian women.

Most people who live far from Asia are exposed to Asian culture through literature, TV and films. Not only the ‘Thousand and One Nights’, however, many famous storylines for Asian women cannot avoid this kind of stereotype that they are passive and always should be helped by someone (especially by men). For example, in Miss Saigon, a hero is attracted to Asian woman for a short time but then leaves and she dies. Another example is that an Asian woman is distractingly sexy but White man overcomes this and wins mission in the movie ‘You Only Live Twice’. Likewise, the western orientalism make the image of Asian women based on their thoughts assuming Asian women should be like this. However, it is not always correct and the description of Euro-American scholar’s Orientalism has errors. Even if some assumptions come from real life, Asian culture is rather less patriarchal than the western culture in some points. One example is taking husband’s last name when getting married. In some Asian countries, such as Korea, China and Malaysia, women don’t take their husband’s last name unlike most American and European women do but they just keep their last name whether they get married or not. It might be pretty unconventional to some European or American people who have some typical stereotypes. As Edward Said said, the word ‘Orientalism’ is hard to be a fact of nature but it is a fact of human production, specifically production of White people in the process of being their colonies.