Chinese views of skin colors are fascinating and diverse. For examples, girls buy skin whitening lotion and rock umbrellas on sunny days to avoid tans (and wrinkles). Central to Chinese understandings of ethnicity are the famous 56 which supposedly make up China's ethnic fabric. The majority, Han, make up 91% of the population and live along the Eastern seaboard and fertile provinces inland. The other 9% are 55 minorities which are supposedly all Chinese and part of the colorful harmonious nation China purports to be. These ethnicities were categorized in the 1950’s by Han scientists using four Stalinist criteria: economic life, language, geographic location, and culture. Despite severe overlap and a complete lack of distinction in some areas, 56 ethnicities were determined. No more. No less. So today we have Tibetians who don’t want to be Chinese, Manchu who completely indistinguishable from the Han by the four criteria yet still receive five extra points on their college admissions scores (similar to our Affirmative Action statutes), Hui who are just Han Muslims, and yet no Jewish ethnicity though there are many in China. The system has many noteworthy faults, but questioning it is futile because the Chinese Communist Party has spoken. This is how it has been since 1960, this is how it is now, and how it will be in the future. No new groups are being added, and if makes Americans mad they are forever foreigners even though there is a Korean ethnicity, then tough beans. Today, these ethnic divisions fantasy or not, are as good as real. They have been etched in stone.
Each ethnicity has its own cute logo, ostensibly designed by a Han party member. Here you can see the Hui icon on the left. Of course it’s nothing more than a big mosque since there’s nothing else which could uniquely identify them. Then some other Muslim ethnicity also has the crescent but a bird as well. Each minority also has a picture which gets used whenever the government publishes concerning the famous 56, like the map I have with the fancy minorities all around the border. Only 3 of the 55 are represented by males; instead they are mostly women in colorful bright ethnic costumes. In fact ,the feminization of the minorities is part of a larger discourse which aims to construct the Han as the center of China’s modern progress--humorless, asexual, suit wearers--while treating the minorities as the other which is more pastoral, quaint, primitive; and thus more free sexually, emotionally, and perhaps creatively too. It’s all pretty fascinating.
If you can imagine the US proudly proclaiming it’s 32 (or some other arbitrary number) ethnic minorities, you can probably understand China’s minority situation. We’d have African tribals with orange and red traditional garb, speaking click languages while dancing around beating drums. During halftime shows and New Years celebrations they’d come on stage and do spear tricks. Hispanics would be represented by a sombrero, and we’d often recount their rich history of innovative cuisine involving cheese. Inuit would be represented by a fuzzy jacket because all we’d care about--wherever they’re from—is that it’s really cold. Native Americans would always have huge feathered headdresses, and their primitive, aboriginal existence would lend legitimacy to our identity as a modern, progressive, unbeatable American force. Men would lust after Haitian babes because they’re so much looser than white women. Irish would be renowned for their ability to drink. So on and so forth. The whole thing would be a mythology based on some historical traditions, perverted, exaggerated, and molded to fit what white Americans want to see. All we’d need to be set is an ethnic theme park where we could traipse around gawking at the minorities in their natural habitat.
Which China has.
Welcome to the Beijing Ethnic Minorities Park.
It’s quite a beautiful park. The scenery is a great escape from Beijing which is largely grey with pollution and bland soviet-styled housing blocks.
Now that we’ve got the good out of the way, here’s what’s interesting about the park.
All of the 55 minorities are represented, meaning there’s a section with authentic housing and ethnic themes for everyone! Of course, most of these sections are depressing because the minorities who work there, which Beijing apparently went out and got from the actual minority region, just sit there looking depressed at their status as a human zoo animal. That’s just my guess though.
The more civilized an ethnicity is the closer it generally is to the entrance. The wilder the ethnicity the more rope bridges and dirt trails you have to cross to get there. And it’s great, because you can really tell which of the minorities are more dirty and primitive. They have pretty contrasting sections:
Most of the plaques read something along the lines of “{ethnicity} people are famous for their ability to sing and dance and their colorful style of dress. They are from {some place} and the {size rank} ethnicity in China.” It’s really clever the way all these minority cultures have such great singing and dancing. The Han must be very entertained.
As cynical as this is getting, it actually is a very well-designed park from an aesthetic and entertainment standpoint. So lets watch some singing and dancing, and some beautiful and exotic girls flinging water on each other. Hell, we may as well even participate, go primitive for a moment.
If you get a "movie no longer availible" message just go to youtube by double clicking on the video. All the videos are viewable, just maybe not more than 3 at a time or something
If you’re like me, you can’t really get to into any of it because you realize you’re watching ethnicities perform for a mostly Han audience so the Han can feel superior, much like animals at a zoo. So if that doesn’t make you angry, maybe this pathetic, shit-eating goose will:
Beijing Ethnic Minority Park has it all.
As easy as it is to accuse the Chinese of being naive, perhaps this is one place where we’d be unaware of our own naivety. America has a history of exoticizing its minorities as well. Think about the Washington Red Skins, Kansas City Chiefs, or the Cleveland Indians with their big red faces, feather dresses, and tomahawk chants. Only instead of a colorful costumes our urban black wears baggy clothes and gold chains. But man can negros dance. How about those pastoral Mexican laborers—“they work so hard!”
In the end I suppose we can pat ourselves on the back because we don’t have any ethnic parks, and our educational system takes time to defeat stereotypes, even requiring “difference, power and discrimination” credit in colleges. But as those courses teach us, we still have work to do to create a more inclusive and merit-driven society.
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