The Chinese Exotic: Modern Diasporic Femininity (transasia: Screen Cultures)

The Chinese Exotic examines new representations of diasporic Chinese femininity emerging from Asia Pacific modernities since the late twentieth century. Through an analysis of cultural artefacts such as films, popular fiction, food and fashion cultures, the book challenges the dominant tendency in contemporary cultural politics to define Chinese femininity from a mainland perspective that furthermore equates it with notions of primitivism. Rather, the book argues for a radical reconfiguration of the concept of exoticism as a frame for understanding these new representations. This engaging study raises important questions on the relationship between the Chinese diasporas and gender. The Chinese Exotic provides a timely critical intervention into the current visualizations of diasporic Chinese femininity. The book contends that an analysis of such images can inform the reconfigured relations between China, the Chinese diasporas, Asia and the West in the context of contemporary globalization, and in turn takes these new intersections to account for the complex nature of modern definitions of diasporic Chinese femininity. [C:\Users\Microsoft\Documents\Calibre Library] Contents 6 Acknowledgements 8 Introduction: The Chinese Exotic 10 I: Fold 34 1. Folding Chinese Boxes: Sensing the Chinese Exotic 36 II: Cross Over 76 2. Spies, Vamps and Women Warriors: Translating the Exotic into the Technics of Chinese Femininity 78 III: Ornament 120 3. Ethnic Supplementarity and the Ornamental Text: Asian American and Asian Australian Diasporic Literary Production 122 IV: Region 158 4. From the Chinese Exotic to the Asian Exotic: Critical Regionalism and Pop Culture Asianism 160 Conclusion: Heliotropic Manoeuvres 178 Notes 182 Filmography 206 Bibliography 208 Index 224 With great sensitivity and originality, Olivia Khoo shows us how to read popular films, female movie stars, quotidian cultural artifacts, novels, and other 'Chinese exotic'phenomena in contemporary global circulation."--Rey Chow, Brown UniversityOlivia Khoo is a lecturer in film studies at the University of New South Wales, Australia Through an analysis of cultural artefacts such as films, popular fiction, food and fashion cultures, this book challenges the dominant tendency in contemporary cultural politics to define Chinese femininity from a mainland perspective that furthermore equates it with notions of primitivism Chapters include: 'Folding Chinese Boxes: Sensing the Chinese Exotic', 'Spies, Vamps and Women Warriors: Translating the Exotic into the Technics of Chinese Femininity' and 'From the Chinese Exotic to the Asian Exotic: Critical Regionalism and Pop Culture Asianism' The book examines new representations of diasporic Chinese femininity emerging from Asia Pacific modernities since the late twentieth century Olivia Khoo. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 199-213) And Index. Includes Filmography (p. [197]-198).