Feb 16, 2018 08:00 PM
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-43081218
EXCERPT: A skit on China's biggest Lunar New Year TV show has sparked widespread criticism and accusations of racism. In a comedy routine celebrating Chinese-African ties an Asian actress appears in blackface and with exaggerated buttocks.
[...] The skit praises Chinese-African cooperation, showing how much Africans benefit from Chinese investment and how grateful they are to Beijing. At one stage, the character of the African mother exclaims how much she loves China. China has over the past years stepped up investment into many African countries. The sketch was set around people working on the Nairobi-Mombasa railway project.
[...] In recent years [...] there have been grumblings that the gala is taking on a more political tone and this year was no exception - with the whole event a kind of pageant to China's rising power and national rejuvenation.
The Africa skit was clearly meant to be part of this same vision and is, if nothing else, proof that art is rarely improved by a large dollop of propaganda. But what's particularly striking about the whole toe-curling spectacle is that it is also strangely at odds with China's own message. Chinese investment in Africa is one of the defining economic stories of our time and it has been accompanied by a massive publicity drive.
Bristling at any suggestion that it is involved in neo-colonialism, China insists that it comes not to exploit, but in partnership with and for the mutual benefit of its African partners.
The sight then, of a Chinese actress in blackface, leading an African man dressed as a monkey around a stage as a way of celebrating a vital trading relationship on prime-time national TV, seems particularly ill-judged. Simply naive and clumsy? Or a sign of something deeper? Either way it suggests China's soft-power project is still a work in progress....
MORE: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-43081218
You've come a long way, baby
To get where you've got to today
You've got your own hegemony now, baby
You've come a long, long way
- - -
EXCERPT: A skit on China's biggest Lunar New Year TV show has sparked widespread criticism and accusations of racism. In a comedy routine celebrating Chinese-African ties an Asian actress appears in blackface and with exaggerated buttocks.
[...] The skit praises Chinese-African cooperation, showing how much Africans benefit from Chinese investment and how grateful they are to Beijing. At one stage, the character of the African mother exclaims how much she loves China. China has over the past years stepped up investment into many African countries. The sketch was set around people working on the Nairobi-Mombasa railway project.
[...] In recent years [...] there have been grumblings that the gala is taking on a more political tone and this year was no exception - with the whole event a kind of pageant to China's rising power and national rejuvenation.
The Africa skit was clearly meant to be part of this same vision and is, if nothing else, proof that art is rarely improved by a large dollop of propaganda. But what's particularly striking about the whole toe-curling spectacle is that it is also strangely at odds with China's own message. Chinese investment in Africa is one of the defining economic stories of our time and it has been accompanied by a massive publicity drive.
Bristling at any suggestion that it is involved in neo-colonialism, China insists that it comes not to exploit, but in partnership with and for the mutual benefit of its African partners.
The sight then, of a Chinese actress in blackface, leading an African man dressed as a monkey around a stage as a way of celebrating a vital trading relationship on prime-time national TV, seems particularly ill-judged. Simply naive and clumsy? Or a sign of something deeper? Either way it suggests China's soft-power project is still a work in progress....
MORE: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-43081218
You've come a long way, baby
To get where you've got to today
You've got your own hegemony now, baby
You've come a long, long way
- - -