Global Journal of Human Social Science, C: Sociology and Culture, Volume 22 Issue 6

new bourgeoisie needed to use the favorable Eastern image to overthrow feudalism and theocracy in the West, they vigorously advocated the openness and prosperity of the East, and provided inspiration and reference for them, for the sake of inspiring the West to carry out reform. When the West established modernity through the Enlightenment and successfully overthrew the oppression of feudalism and theocracy, they no longer needed the “Utopian” image of the East to help them challenge and deny themselves. China was no longer the birthplace of ancient wisdom, but rather a place of “the Other.” After the emancipation of the mind, a new round of Western centralism came back in a more rampant way. They desperately needed to find a sense of self-identified superiority by proving their strength compared to the weaknesses of “the Other.” The words, such as “darkness,” “backwardness,” “decay,” “stagnancy,” “autocracy” and “barbarian,” all became synonymous with China. Cultural hegemony and the thinking mode of superiority/inferiority formed a common concept in western society. It was just like the saying of Edward W. Said: “Everything in the East, if it is not obviously inferior to that in the West, also needs the correct study by the west to be understood. ” 14 American critics generally claimed that everything in Peking Opera had been artisticized. It was an unrealistic art, and its performance was formalized, which couldn’t reflect the social reality. Commentator Gilbert Seldes complained: “The same thing holds to a degree, for Mr. Mei, since the voice, the make-up, the gestures, all of them meaningful to the Chinese, are empty of significance for the American.” 15 J. Brooks Atkinson held that, Peking Opera was “an arrested form of classical drama” with virtually no striving after illusion and hardly a suggestion of realism . 16 “Everyone admits that the drama of the western world is in a more advanced stage... For most of us Americans, we are accustomed to western dramatic photographic performances. Chinese performers’ mime performances, such as raising feet to show crossing the threshold, bending down to show entering the low porch, turning a few circles on the stage to show entering another space, embody undecorated ‘Simple and natural.’ It’s kind of like what children do when they play games.” 17 Atkinson regarded the rules of the Chinese theatrical imagination, the most essential premise of drama activities, as the naive imagination in children’s games. He thought that Peking Opera lacked the realistic concern for society and was, therefore, more inferior than Western drama. After seeing Mei Lanfang’s 14 爱德华·W·萨义德著，王宇根译：《东方学》，北京：生活·读书 ·新知（三联书店），1999年，第50页。 15 Moy, 11. 16 Atkinson,18 17 Moy, 26. performance, American audiences unconsciously fell into the Orientalism misconception that China was a naive, uncivilized country. IV. C onclusion We cannot deny the significance of Mei Lanfang’s performance in the Sino-U.S. cultural exchange. But in a specific historical environment, the American attention to Mei Lanfang’s performance was only a selective preference for the exotic ancient culture. Equal cultural exchanges between China and the United States have been hampered by the arrogance of American culture and the inferiority complex of Chinese traditional culture. For some historical, political, and economic reasons, Chinese culture is still at a disadvantage in competition with Western culture nowadays. © 2022 Global Journals Volume XXII Issue VI Version I 25 ( ) Global Journal of Human Social Science - Year 2022 C Mei Lan-Fang’s American Tour and China’s Images in the U.S.