Race, Occidentalism/Orientalism and Sino-centrism in Contemporary Chinese Theatre

Building on Chen Xiaomei’s Occidentalism: A Theory of Counter-Discourse in Post-Mao China and Claire Conceison’s Significant Other: Staging the American in China, this chapter focuses on how race is performed on the contemporary Chinese stage, especially in relation to its white other counterpart, discussing whether Chinese Occidentalism may further perpetuate a discourse of cultural Orientalism by constructing racialist stereotypes. By examining, in particular, the work of Wang Chong as one of the new faces in Chinese theatre, this chapter will point out to the Chinese global and transnational presence, asking if we can we talk about a form of cultural Sino-centrism disguised under a deconstructed racial fluidity. In addressing these questions, the chapter will more specifically be considering when the white other enters China through the vehicle of adaptation and translation of Western contemporary theatre on the Chinese stage and most importantly when China looks outwards exporting their own history abroad.