We are Siamese if you please...

Within the Westernised median Asian cultures have often been portrayed as simple, if not rather backwards cultures whose people were often vilified. With the people in these cultures viewed not as human beings but as caricatures of themselves, with cartoons, television shows and films helping to indoctrinate these stereotypes into Westernised societies. Now after looking at 'Indiana Jones' and 'Aladdin' in class, films that I had not seen since I was young I was a little shocked to say the least. It seems even from a young age children were force fed this orientalism, just look at the 1955 Disney film 'Lady & The Tramp'. While the film itself is still considered a children's classic in much the same way that 'Aladdin' is, it still projects eurocentrism values and beliefs along with blatantly racist imagery onto the audience.

I, like many other young adults around the world grew up on a steady Disney diet, everything from 'Bambi' to more recent films like 'The Lion King' and 'Toy Story'. But it isn't until I re-watched these films as an adult that I could really understand the often times startlingly blatant racism in them, Just take the Siamese cats in 'Lady & The Tramp' for example. Their arrival signals the first real signs of disruption for what would otherwise be a picturesque traditional white family, and they become the catalysts for the danger and drama that follows. Even their very images are caricatures of what people during the 1950's viewed Asians, with overly slanted eyes, buck teeth and overly exaggerated accents.

And these are not the only stereotypes present within the film; we of course cannot forget the Italian chef Tony.

As if often the case with Disney films, the racism and orientalism within the movie is brushed over with humour, but does this make it any less racist? I can only give my personal opinion, which I'm certain some will disagree with, but racism is still racism.... No matter how you package it.

I want to present an example of the application of this theory of Eurocentrism to the TV series, “My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding” which is screened on Thursdays, on TV1 at 8.30pm. Additionally there is the contributing factor of miscegenation addressed as the couple getting married are not from the same culture.

Eurocentrism is the notion of placing Europe as the central model for the “values, beliefs, cultures and judgements as ‘normal, natural and ideal” (Sue Abel).

“My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding” documents the culture of a minority ‘Other’ group in the UK who call themselves ‘Travellers’ but are also labelled as a more negative term: ‘Gypsies’ which connotes ideas of shiftiness, criminal activity and the exotic. The title itself references the film, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” which parodies the Greek culture.

The scene which I have chosen to use as evidence of Eurocentrism was in the programme screened on Thursday 4 August. The documentary maker accompanied an engaged couple on their pursuit to purchase a caravan as their future marital home. As mentioned, the couple were not from the same culture; the young man was a Traveller but the young woman was white and British/European. The young woman was choosing to cross cultures and embrace the Traveller culture. The documentary maker comments to the young woman (he is off camera as he contributes his Eurocentric opinion) of challenging the young woman by stating that a caravan wasn’t a home. She responded to this by saying that a home is where you live so why couldn’t a caravan be a home? Allowing this exchange to be part of the programme represents not only the bias of the documentary maker (despite his efforts - albeit constructed and contrived - to portray a fly on the wall documentary of the culture of Travellers) but also it enforces Eurocentrism by projecting onto her the ‘normal’ conventions of ‘normal’ European people who live in one place and in a house not a caravan. This indicates the convention that caravans for Europeans are mobile holiday homes not permanent dwellings.

A further example of Eurocentrism was the use of a posh female narrator which reinforces the differences between the perceived highest type of white British culture and the perceived lowest type of culture that the Travellers are being represented as.

This programme is not a case of ‘new racism’ but racism of the ‘old’ unmitigated type.