The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan

Abstract

Research Article| August 01 2018 The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan Fang-chih Irene Yang Fang-chih Irene Yang Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google boundary 2 (2018) 45 (3): 149–172. https://doi.org/10.1215/01903659-6915629 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter Email Permissions Search Site Citation Fang-chih Irene Yang; The Politics and Aesthetics of Chinese Drama (Huajyu) in Taiwan. boundary 2 1 August 2018; 45 (3): 149–172. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/01903659-6915629 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search nav search search input Search input auto suggest search filter Books & JournalsAll Journalsboundary 2 Search Advanced Search Chinese Drama, a new genre produced for the Chinese language market (with China as the center), while rhetorically legitimized through Taiwanese economic nationalism, has to negotiate the divisions between Chineseness and Taiwaneseness aesthetically, expressed through “traditional Chinese culture” and “Taiwanese multicultural reality.” Using the first Chinese Drama production, Inborn Pair, as an example, this essay argues that the aesthetic transaction narrates Chinese traditional culture in ways that appeal to the imperialist gaze while multicultural reality is presented in ways that reproduce the ethnic hierarchy and maintains the privileged status of Chineseness in Taiwan. The reprivileging of Chineseness operates through the commodification of Taiwaneseness as ethnicity, and thus as difference, in the age of globalization, which works to the advantage of the CCP and the KMT’s goal for unification. Chinese language market, TV drama, visibility, commodification of ethnicity, multiculturalism The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright © 2018 Duke University Press2018 You do not currently have access to this content.