Timeline of Asian American Representation: Yellow Peril and Yellowface by

ekandres — 2025-09-16 00:56:37 UTC

This cartoon depicts a Chinese man (dressed in traditional Chinese clothing), his face is exaggerated with sinister features, reinforcing racist caricatures. Hw has a sword in his mouth, flames in another hand, and a gun in the other hand. He is shown to be walking over a white woman on the ground with blood. The cartoon visualized fears in the late 19th century of Chinese immigration and Asia’s rise, portraying Asians as violent, barbaric, and intent on overthrowing Western civilization. I think this cartoon was to justify the Chinese Exclusion Act / other hostile policies which was passed years prior to this cartoon.

ekandres — 2025-09-16 00:56:37 UTC

This is the poster for the film The Mask of Fu Manchu. It depicts the main actor in yellowface as the character of a villainous mastermind, hoping to unite the East against the West. We see a Buddha statue in the back which further exoticize Asian culture. Within the broader Yellow Peril framework, this poster reinforces stereotypes of Asians as sinister, mystical, and out to take over the West, basically piling racist fears into "fun to watch" movie for white audiences.

WWII - Anti-Japanese Sentiment

ekandres — 2025-09-16 00:56:37 UTC

This image is a public health image from WWII illustrated by Arthur Szyk in 1942. It features grotesque depictions of the leaders of Italy, Germany, and Japan. The Japanese leader Tojo, is made to represent one of the venereal diseases, "chanchroid" and is depicted with oversized features and slanted eyes. The pockmarks, and red skin are used to depict the disease, and associating the disease with the Japanese. It's designed to associate the war effort with sexual health.

ekandres — 2025-09-16 00:56:37 UTC

Use of White actors in place of Asian actors for Asian characters
Yellowface and cultural appropriation
- Major body modification that plays into Yellowface
Stereotyping of Asians
Not as much backlash for this representation as expected

Representation is used to reinforce the ideology that Asians are an inferior group of people. In media, this translates to casting an Asian character for comedic relief rather than a critical part of the storyline.

Yellow Peril Stereotypes during COVID

ekandres — 2025-09-16 00:56:37 UTC

During COVID-19, there was an uptick in asian hate due to ideas of the virus being spread from China. Through racial lumping and continuous yellow peri, many people faced discrimination and were not allowed into public places out of fear of the virus spreading. From March to December 2020, 2,800 anti-Asian American hate incidents were reported. This shows the continuous impact of the yellow peril and how easily the othering of asian americans can cause violence and hate. This racist framing keeps asian Americans away from gaining power or ever feeling comfortable when immigrating, and there will always be this othering that continues throughout the yellow peril stereotype

Model Minority Myth

ekandres — 2025-09-16 01:05:33 UTC

Describing how these kids are part of the boom of asian american progress. This was a form used to put down other immigrants by granting a higher status. This was done during the Cold War and the civil rights movement, where they were framed as ideal immigrants.

The ideology that this was serving was to show that the United States' way of capitalism was superior. They wanted to show that the United States democracy was superior and that model immigrants could succeed here instead of within more communist or socialist countries.

The second reasoning is that the country wanted to undermine the civil rights movement to show that if asian Americans could thrive without protesting, it was not necessary and that their movement was inherently violent. They also wanted to increase race tensions.

ekandres — 2025-09-16 01:14:27 UTC

Sacha Baron Cohen's The Dictator is a satirist political comedy about Omar Aladeen, the dictator of the Republic of Wadiya. The Republic of Wadiya is a fictional country located in North Africa and it and Aladeen are said to take inspiration from real-world dictators such as Kim Jong Il of North Korea. The film received criticism as an Islamophobic portrayal of Arabs, having portrayed Muslim Arab ruler as closely linked to themes of terrorism, hypersexuality, and exoticism. The film plays into Orientalist perspectives of the Middle East, particularly the representation of Arabs and Muslims as barbaric compared to "Western Society". Sacha Baron Cohen has received similar criticisms for his titular role in the film Borat.