Comparison of the Chinese Occidentalism and Western Orientalism in The True Story of Ah Q
Introduction
Lu Xun in his literature Ah Q managed to portray the negatives within the national Chinese character and decades after, the Chinese people used the fictional character’s name, Ah Q as a label for those that complacently remained unhygienic, parochial, indolent, ignorant and slavish. The true story of Ah Q served as a societal mirror to warn the Chinese and urge them to seek change. Unfortunately, the use of the term Ah Q by some people to relate some negative characteristics to constitute the natural character of a Chinese national ironically accepted and reinforces the stereotypical Chinese image. The usage of this literature has over the years associated with Occidentalism and orientalism.
Literally production in the early twentieth-century took a parallel development with the increase in the national consciousness in China. Literature not only played a key role in constructing national identity but also deconstruction through the critique of some national character traits in china, which paradoxically formed an ironic nationalism. Lu Xun is an example of ironic nationalism since his literature ideally helped build the nation by criticizing their very own Chinese character. The true story of AH Q encouraged the Chinese to envisage a new civilized character by escaping and abandoning the one portrayed and represented by Ah Q, thus creating a new breath of national consciousness.
Occidentalism is a body of simplified views of the Western culture that are often biased. Occidentals’ mental constructions bear either negative or positive undertones which can easily form ideological instruments used in politics and polemics. Orientalism involves an often demeaning and disparaging view that portrays non-Western people as uncivilized with backward cultures and requires enlightenment by the West. Cognitively, Orientalism is a name for all the views of the East that held by critics and writers in the West while Occidentalism, on the other hand, is the reductionist perception of the West that the critics and writers from the East have portrayed. The views are often partially distorted or completely wrong.
Lu Xun’s Orientalism and Occidentalism in The True Story of AQ
The true story of AQ is a literal work that represents both self-orientalism and Occidentalism. Self-orientalism referring to the willful actions of the non-Western individuals in the same manner as the Western portray them. The story primarily highlights the shortcomings of what eventually shows as the national Chinese character. The True story gained international recognition with the work getting praise from Romain Rolland, the French Nobel Laureate. However the same brought a lot of debates and struggles with cultural and literal authorities. Ah Q then represented all that was ever backward and despicable and tragic in Chinese society.
The self-orientalism proceeded to portray the negative status of the revolution. This was from Lu Xun’s decision to have Ah Q’s life ended casually right when he had chosen to become a revolutionary. This type of portrayal was detrimental in itself to the promotion of positive and healthy imagery of those that were politically-awakened in China. Ah Q came off metaphorically as a representation of the chronic nature of the social and cultural ills in China. This ideal impeded their chances of dissemination of the forecast and hope of approaching revolutionary conquest.
The self orientalism proceeds when Lu Xun re-asserts his ideas about women in the story. Lu Xun refers to a woman as the menace to mankind. The writer proceeds to name families that were destroyed by women. The families were actual dynasties that poured down to nothing, according to Lu Xun, due to a woman. The writer even goes ahead to speculate that the Chin dynasty’s failure was related to a woman. This ideology re-asserted the Western view that the Chinese were uncivilized with backwardness and unable to treat and respect women properly.
The True Story of Ah Q hints a bit of Occidentalism, in the way he reacted to Mr. Chien’s son that studied in a foreign school. After their son attended a foreign school he came back with his pigtail cut off and straight-legged trousers. Though the mother gave a story about a scoundrel being the one that cut her son’s pigtail, Ah Q did not believe this. So much so that Ah Q in his head nicknamed the young man the imitation foreign devil. Ah, Q’s disgust for his new style was visible. He was completely unable to appreciate the cultural exchange and saw this as a traitor that was in foreign pay.
Occidentalism and Orientalism in the May Fourth Revolution
Much of the story’s impact on nationalism was not in the writing itself but in the brewing debates and conflicts that sprung after. Lu Xun the writer alongside other iconic intellectuals engaged in questioning whether holding on to Chinese traditional values was valid at all. They did so in a series of literal work but more so during the May Fourth period. They deliberated the value of traditional Chinese values most especially those of Confucianism. The latter was mainly because involved trying to reform a China that was previously subject to the imperialistic aggression of the West and the domestic political fragmentation.
My fourth was ideally one of the greatest peaks of Occidentalism. Lu Xun alongside other intellectual preached forsaking the old and embracing the new, one of the scholars, said that it was not western culture but a new culture. Lu Xun was both an agent of modernity and a product of it. The debate set crossroads between tradition and modernity, and culturalism and nationality. One glaring issue was whether the West was new or were the intellectuals so deep in Occidentalism that they were completely blind to the fact they say their own culture as inferior thus their devotion to switch to a new one that they perceived as civilized.
The story of AH Q created a character, more significant to a specific social class rather than a national character. The interpretation of Lu Xun’s main character as a whole Chinese national character ought to be the biggest misconception. it bore the spirited desire for change, it contributed more to orientalism. The claim that every Chinese could see a little bit of themselves in Ah Q does not satisfy reasoning for national change and shift in culture since all cultures including the West are flawed to an extent. Occidentalism in the viewing of these literally works as eye-openers for change was merely a short-sited vision. Having misguided parts of culture does not call for the adoption of a new way but rather enhancing one’s own culture. The fact that no other culture could fill the gap they needed to correct but the West even spurred the occidentalism narrative even more.
The admission of Chinese nationals that their own culture was backward and embracing the Western somewhat fueled orientalism. Western learning no longer remained in the external category but instead made its way to the internal category. Its incorporation was to help the nationals enlighten themselves. The May Fourth cultural movement continued to make such changes that posed an honorary reception of everything that was from the West. So much so that they sought a completely new slate that didn’t involve holding on to any of their past ways. Lu Xun even criticized late-Qing reformers for their dual systems of thought, according to him, their inability to fully let go of the old even when taking in the new was a deterrent to progress. Such a mindset coming from the non-Western had to carry the impact of fueling superiority complex in the West.
Both the Occididentalism and Orentisialsm of May the fourth created idealization of the Chinese culture while at the same time the universalization of the Western Culture. Although the nationalism was claimed to be at the core of the May Fourth Occidentalism, the reasoning given behind it was more denationalizing. The drivers of the movement essentialized the recreation of the national Chinese character so much so using hyperbolic phrases that demeaned the present so bad that it just necessitated the urgent need for Westernization. An instance of this was the frequent characterization of the Chinese national in the New Youth journal. May fourth intellectuals referred to Chinese people as incompetent, stealthy, and negligent, other times they used the terms shameless, timid, and withdrawn and when they were kind, they termed the Chinese as low-grade peace-loving communities that desired grace and leisure, all these in publication. Lu Xun’s Ah-Qism theory grew famous and led to the idea of the Ah-Q spirit which referred to having a slave mentality to represent Chinese-ness. Yet another strong instance of self-orientalism that all aided Westernization, to an extent the self-orientalism was the biggest driver of Chinese occidentalism since the intellectuals re-affirmed so much of what the West believed of their culture that they wanted to be anything but it, which for their case was adopting the more civilized ways as they believed.
The May Fourth Movement under noted a highly condescending attitude towards the Chinese national. The nationals in the process of abandoning the old were expected to carry the burden of having to learn the Western culture meticulously and as correctly as sanely possible in order not to violate the sanctity of the Western ways. Those that attempted to retain both mindsets were condemned for failing to grasp the depth and sophistication of the western culture.
Comparison of the New Age Western Orientalism and Occidentalism in today’s China
Westerners living in China, continue to coexist with the Chinese in an oriental high horse. Only a few Westerners that reside and work in China speak Chinese, the rest just live without knowledge of it with the expectation that ‘the Chinese’ is to understand English, going ahead to criticize those who don’t. A lot of Westerners even complain of the lack of road signs, which exist in Chinese, but since they are not in English, the road lacks signs. Lack of lingual knowledge which translates to a lack of basic cultural sympathy has bit by bit led to the re-emergence of the expatriate life. Though the cultural and language standards present in the academic world have significantly shown improvement, there’s still a long way to go when it comes to lived orientalism.
Expatriate attitudes from the treaty port eras have reappeared. The young businesspeople from the West operating in China mostly reside in enclaves that constitute foreigners. During the Maoist Era, living apart from the Chinese people was mandatory for foreigners, currently, they choose to live secluded. They meet at Western-themed bars and often jump into the newest Starbucks openings. Publications on the Western architecture within china nostalgically express missing Shanghai in the good old 1920s and 1930s. Shanghai was Western enclaves and its inhabitants popularly known as Shanghailanaders.
New Age Occidentalism
The Chinese portray the waste as hypocritical, uncaring, corrupt, and degenerate. Washington and Beijing often end up in a tit-for-tat human rights battle. When Washington highlights the human rights violations happening in China, Beijing claps back by citing the rather inhumane treatment given to the disadvantaged people living in the United States. Particularly, China cites what they view as the West lacking social responsibility. For instance, the Chinese highly value respecting their elders. To the Chinese, homes for the elderly are a lack of respect for the long life lived by the elderly and a way of disposing of them.
Western values according to the Chinese lead to chaos and disharmony. While the West observes the rule of law, China, on the other hand, lives by the rule of man with obedience to superiors as one of the highly promoted values. China’s way is questionable in the essence that the rule of man idea sounds self-serving since the society is run by the monolithic political and ideally China cannot become democratic. However, the rule of man is bound to observing the rule of autocrats, which are benevolent rules. A classic case of Occidentalism was when a student in 1989 who demonstrated by putting a statue known as Goddess of Democracy as a replica of the statue of liberty, was publicly denounced and referred as a traitor to China. The statue was later smashed in public.
Reverse Occidentalism is an almost equal counter current to the Chinese Occidentalism. Chinese show unqualified admiration and imitation of the West, right from the type of clothing, to the English language, fast-food, and even Western music. Most Chinese especially the young ones have associated the West with lavish lifestyles and economic growth. A huge part of this mentality sourcing from the material they consume such as films and also literally works that describe success in a Western-like environment. Occidentalism in either its forms just like orientalism remains an inhibitor to understanding and enjoying the fruits of cultural exchange.
Conclusion
The construction of the West by the May Fourth revolution as an embodiment of modernity and one to emulate came with many and mostly contradictory effects. The prime was the West gaining a symbiotic power over China, during the May revolution was when the West gained the highest symbiotic power over China. The west was no longer an external theory but a psychological category too. Apart from the economic impact of the legendary May Fourth, the May Fourth Revolution spearheaded Chinese Occidentalism and Western Orientalism that not only lasted that period but mothered a whole new culture, nationalism, and education system for the Chinese. A new generational mindset was bored with it. Intellects like Lu Xun carried a great power to transform the minds of people which they did in their literally works like Ah Q. Occidentalism and Orientalism to this date are as present as ever. Not all of the works of these two theories can be negatively spoken off, the Chinese national at that time did have a lot of flaws that needed change, the biggest loss can, however, be accredited to the Chinese culture. A century later and a lot of what the West would have termed as backward like the culture was lost. Politically, however, the Chinese regained a great part of their autonomy and it is safe to call it one of the biggest most influential forces in the global economy. Occidentalism and Orientalism are very much alive to this point and the two have a symbiotic and relative relationship whereby one mindset is the reason the other is thriving. The only true way the negative effects of the two could be separated and somewhat stopped would be through a new movement that celebrates and appreciates all the different cultures individually while at the same time appreciating the perks of cultural exchange.
Bibliography
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Hsun, Lu. The True Story of Ah Q. ReadHowYouWant. com, 2006.
Lary, Diana. “Edward said: Orientalism and occidentalism.” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association/Revue de la Société historique du Canada 17.2 (2006): 3-15.