Catalysts and Consequences (Part 3)
What all this means is that the introduction of wet rice agriculture took a region that was relatively stable for nearly 10,000 years and in the span of 1,000 years rapidly stratified and centralized it. The conditions in Japan were not adverse to the presence of agriculture, rather they were so hospitable throughout the country that it took a very particular and rich alternative to disrupt the existing subsistence methods in place. That alternative, by its very nature, was an advanced and intensive form of agriculture that demanded a cohesive, community-driven approach for its to succeed. As Duus remarks, “Geography and technology conspired to produce a stronger sense of communal interdependence in Japan” (1993; 18). The research here has shown that despite the productivity and superior output of rice cultivation, it was not capable of displacing the indigenous populations in the north nor was it limitless in what it produced – and both are signs that indicate environment still determined the success of farming in Japan. Furthermore, the nature of this complex and resource intensive form of farming brought forth an increasing demand for rice by a growing population as well as a demand for a strong, centralized authority to direct it.
As Diamond’s thesis argues – the fates of human societies are guided by the conditions they encounter and create through their interactions with their environments. Given what my research has shown, I believe Diamond is correct in his assertions that environment and circumstance do indeed shape the developments human societies undergo – and the interactions between societies as well. Not only was wet rice agriculture revolutionary in Japan, but rice itself goes on to become the foundation of the early Yamato state’s economy (Ohnuki-Tierney 1995; 228) and later was a key resource of the Tokugawa Shogunate a thousand years after that (Tsukahira 1996; 15). Duus says it was land and not money that was the primary source of wealth, but it was really the rice itself that became powerful in Japan (1993; 32).
For the predecessors of the modern Japanese, the Jomon era of Japan was a lengthy period of stability ruptured open with (to borrow a few words from Dr. Brown in Back to the Future) ‘the promise and the perils’ of intensive agriculture, and it was extraordinary in its repercussions.
Works Cited
Aikens, Melvin C. and Takayasu Higuchi.
1982 Prehistory of Japan. New York: Academic Press, Inc.
Bleed, Peter and Akira Matsui
2010 Why Didn’t Agriculture Develop in Japan? A Consideration of Jomon Ecological style, Niche Construction, and the Origins of Domestication. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 17: 356-370.
Crawford, Gary W.
1992 The Transitions to Agriculture in Japan. Transitions to Agriculture in Prehistory (Monographs in World Archeology No. 4). Madison, Wisconsin: Prehistory Press.
Diamond, Jared
2005 Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fate of Human Societies (Revised Edition). New York: W.W. Norton and Company.
Duus, Peter
1969, 1967, 1993 Feudalism in Japan, 3rd ed. New York: McGraw Hill, Inc.
Imamura, Keiji.
1996 Prehistoric Japan: New Perspectives on insular East Asia. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.
Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko
1995 Event and Historical Metaphor: Rice and Identities in Japanese History. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Vol. 1. No. 2: 227-253
Shinoda, Minoru
1960 The Founding of the Kamakura Shogunate 1180-1185. New York: Colombia University Press.
Tsukahira, Toshio G.
1966 Feudal Control in Tokugawa Japan: The Sankin Kotai System. Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard University Press.
Zeanah, David.
2011 Classroom Lectures: Origins of Agriculture. California State University, Sacramento.
Catalysts and Consequences (Part 2)
According to Duus, wet “rice agriculture could feed a much denser population”… and it was much more reliable then the farming in Europe that relied upon rainfall to sustain crops (1993; 17). However, because only 13% of Japanese land area was suitable for farming (Imamura 1996; 5), the most productive farm land – “swamps or irrigable plains” was quickly developed and soon conflict arose over the food supply and land that could supply it. Diamond notes that there is a influx of skeletons suffering violent trauma/cause of death after agriculture flourishes in Japan (Diamond 2005; 442). Settlements expanded out onto the upper edges of river valleys, and into the surrounding hills, because “development of rice fields increased to such an extent that these areas were required for cultivation”. Furthermore, the shrinking land mass available for farming could be compound by the shortage of water to feed it. (Imamura 1996; 179-180). As noted in class lectures, overpopulation and warfare are two of the results of agriculture and the development of complex societies (Zeanah 2011). Previously, the Jomon period lifestyle supported a (relatively) impressive population of 250,000 estimated foragers and a society that changed comparatively little in “ a fragile, rapidly changing contemporary world” (Diamond 2005; 439-440). But when broad spectrum foraging shifts from people using a cycle of multiple resources throughout the year to a new resource/foodstuff – rice – and ultimately intensifies straight into not just agriculture but intensive agriculture, the cycle is perfectly illustrated. This intensification leads to population growth, which leads to a demand for further intensification (Zeanah 2011). Diamond refers to this cycle as autocatalysis (2005; 285). Perhaps more importantly, it also (eventually) demands a strong center of control and influence to direct it.
There is no literal, definitive break between the Jomon and the Yayoi cultures, because cultures intermingle as one shifts into decline or dominance. However, Imamura’s research sets 500 BCE as the emergence of the Yayoi identity in the archaeological record (16; 1996), and by 200 BCE we see increasing social stratification via burials – whether by the presence of grave goods made of bronze, or specially constructed burial mounds (funkyubo) in parts of Kyushu (14; 1996). Imamura suggests that perhaps the earliest sites were fortified with moats because conflict arose when immigrants from the mainland (likely Korean) settled in the country, although he notes that not all sites feature moat construction. Instead that there are concentrations of their presence in the archaeological record diachronicly implies surges or periods of heightened tension between different sites. (Imamura 1996; 180). In the History of the Wei Dynasty, Chinese records note that “the land of Wa” (China’s name for Japan) was divided into many small “countries” or entities ruled by local chieftains or warlords by 297 CE (Duus 1993, 14). With the influx of wet rice agriculture and immigrants came other changes and ideas as well. Duus states that “with continental contacts came not only technology but also ideas and institutions as well”, including Chinese writing (still evident in the Japanese kanji or complex word-phrase character symbols today), Confucianism, Buddhism, and “the Chinese conception of… centralized monarchy” (1993, 15).
Increasing political unification becomes evident when burial mounds (funkyubo as mentioned above) adopt a more elaborate, uniform style known as Kofun, and imply that whoever ordered their construction were “able to command the labor of hundreds of people over periods of months or years” (Aikens and Higuchi 1982; 334). Starting in the 3rd Century CE, the Kofun period would last until the start of the historical period around 600 CE (Imamura 1996, 16). Duus elaborates on the manpower required and the implications kofun tombs bring in the archaeological record, as they are first found in archaeological record upon the fertile Yamato region of central Honshu and then spread across the country:
The sudden emergence of these mounded tombs,
requiring the mobilization of considerable manpower,
technical skill, and material resources suggest that a
powerful warrior clan or group of clans had emerged
in the Yamato region and then spread their power to other
parts of the country (Duus 1993; 18).
Duus goes on to elaborate the power of the Yamato state was won first by sword and then through the blood ties and kinship with the existing tribal leaders, chieftains, and lords. Through the descendants of the first heads of the Yamato state, the government would gradually begin to exert more control over increasingly distant holdings, eventually appointing some farmers as suppliers for the state itself (Duus 1993; 19-20). In 645 CE, the Taika Reform absorbs all lands as property of the state in an effort to curtail individual clans’ powers and to ensure an equitable distribution of resources (Shinoda 1960; 16). Land was then allocated to individuals over the age of six, with censuses every 6 years to reallocate land as needed – the intent being to feed each “commoner household” (Duus 1993; 21-22). This was to ensure that farmers would in return provide some measure of labor, rice, and locally produced goods to be taken to the capital as a form of taxation and revenue for the government (Duus 1993; 24).
Catalysts and Consequences: Transitions to Agriculture in Japan (Part 1)
What determines the course of a given culture? What shapes how and why a people develop? If the meandering and innumerable paths of history have shown us anything, it is that the human race can adapt to almost any environment and circumstances they encounter throughout space and time. However, because each society faces different challenges, circumstances, and advantages inherent to their environment, they do not develop identically. Rightfully so, each society responds and adapts to the peculiarities and specificities of circumstance, as each unique situation demands and a different behavior and adaptation. Humans adopt and abandon cultural practices, technologies, even population centers as environment and resources shift. Sometimes, they seem to “ignore” or simply do not develop the technologies of a neighbor or contemporary because that facet of culture is not relevant or significant enough to warrant it. In Guns, Germs, and Steel, author Jared Diamond argues that environment and geography are key components that determine how and why societies develop the ways in which they do. Instead of some strand of DNA or mutant strain that makes one culture or society “superior” they are simply products of their respective environments. In Prehistoric Japan, the environment was so rich and stable in resources that its inhabitants developed a relatively complex society but had no need to adopt or develop agriculture – despite its presence in nearby Korea and China. It is not until wet rice agriculture comes to the region that a new era of development is triggered, shifting the country from ten millennia of stable foraging into a millennium of dramatic change.
In the revised edition of Guns Germs and Steel, Diamond addresses Japan, which he remarks is “the most important geographic lacuna of my book” (Diamond 2005; 426). He admits that the difficulties have been twofold – one is that at the time of the book’s initial publication (1997), information in key areas of Japanese research (language and genetics) were still developing. The other was that the Japanese themselves have done an ‘admirable’ job in obfuscating their own origins and any ties they may have to mainland Asia, and in particular with Korea. The feeling, simply put, is mutual – neither people wishes to admit any connection other then the possibility that they brought culture to their counterpart, whom is inferior and clearly better off for the enlightened conquest of their betters (Diamond 2005; 426-430). Diamond spends addresses several theories on the origins of and consequences of agriculture in Japan, some of which I will attempt to corroborate throughout the text.
The end of the Ice Ages in Japan is identified as the Jomon period, for its cord marked or ‘cord motif’ pottery (Aikens and Higuchi 1982, 95). According to Imamura, this time frame can roughly be defined as 10,000 BCE until about 200 BCE when the Jomon are succeeded by the Yayoi (16; 1996). Since the Jomon period the Japanese Archipelago has been isolated physically from the Asian mainland by sea and ocean, but it was still close enough to Korea (and by proxy China) for contact to occur between populations, and its position in the North Pacific meant there were abundant marine resources for the indigenous Jomon population (Bleed and Matsui 2010; 359-360). Furthermore, many Jomon sites were situated in such a way that various foodstuffs and resources were constantly becoming available throughout the year, even as others shifted off-season (Bleed and Matsui 2010; 359). Diamond remarks that it is “the wettest temperate country in the world”, with up 160 inches of rainfall per year, and that “despite thousands of years of dense human occupation, everyone’s first impression of Japan is of its greenness”, which still remains over 70% forested today (Diamond 2005; 430-431). Also of note is that only 13% of Japan’s landmass is actually suitable farmland, because the majority of it is comprised of steep mountain ranges (Imamura 1996; 5). The Pacific and the waterways of Japan provided a great deal of resources for the Jomon culture, which helped to compensate for the lack of red meat found in the Jomon diet (Bleed and Matsui 2010; 359-360). The livestock present was mostly used for draft work, and while deer and boar were hunted in regions of the country, the primary protein sources was from fish (Imamura 1996; 8). The country’s plentiful cycle of resources, along with the richness found in the Pacific Ocean, meant that the Jomon had no reason to adopt to or inadvertently develop agriculture to manipulate their food supply. The environment of Japan was inherently suitable to stable hunting and gathering lifestyle.
According to Bleed and Matsui, plants and animals suitable for human exploitation and management must also be rich enough to outperform alternative resources (2010; 367). Applied to agriculture, this suggests that the agriculture available previous to wet rice farming did not meet this condition (as Diamond explains below). As we have discussed in class, the Diet Breadth Model examines and ranks foods/resources a given forager should consume based upon the searching and processing time each different choice requires (Zeanah, 2011). For Jomon Japan, this would mean that existing resources were superior in returns to those needing agriculture or required less work then the use of agriculture would require. As Diamond puts it, “Early Korean agriculture could not compete with Jomon hunting and gathering”, because those techniques and practices available in nearby Korea (across the Tsushima Straight) were less fruitful then the preexisting subsistence strategies in place (2005; 440). Therefore, the Jomon maintained what was essentially a foraging society until the appearance of Wet Rice Agriculture in 400 BCE (Crawford 1992, 121).
While Imamura discusses several proposed routes and methods of diffusion from China to the Japanese archipelago, one via sea and islands south of Japan and two essentially via Korea, Diamond only addresses the issue of diffusion via Korea and the Tsushima Straight (Imamura 1996; 129-130). Imamura contends that one of the more direct routes would (via islands or jumping from China to the tip of the Korean peninsula and on to Kyushu) would make more sense given rice’s weakness for poor growth in colder climate. But the delay in the adaptation of rice in Japan does give some weight to the idea that it took time for it to arrive (Imamura 1996; 132-133). Considering that wet rice agriculture spreads significantly farther north when it reaches Japan, it is certainly plausible it did in fact spend time diffusing north from China and into Korea, and then (intentionally or not) become more resistant to the cold as a result. Diamond comes to a similar conclusion.
One of the key principals reiterated throughout the course was that agriculture spurs change (technologically, culturally, and in population size), but that it also inherently demands more work then foraging. When agriculture took root in Japan, it was because several things had changed – the varieties of rice introduced were now more successful in colder climates, and irrigation/paddy farming methods came with it (Diamond 2005; 444). Far more then simply putting seeds into the ground, wet rice farming required “canals, dams, banks, paddies” (Diamond 2005, 441). Furthermore, wet rice agriculture suppresses weed growth and constantly supplies the plant with water (Imamura 1996; 214). This implies, no, requires, a certain level of organization. Diamond details several theories of how agriculture possible came to be in Japan: one claims all that happened was a transmission of knowledge and the improved rice strains, another argues for a massive immigrant population from the mainland via Korea, and the third attempts to blend the two together and suggest that this new Yayoi culture simply outgrew and outperformed the original Jomon (Diamond 2005; 444-445). According to class lectures, foragers may respond to the presence of agriculture by adopting it themselves, by being absorbed into other populations (marriage, etc), marginalized into fringe regions, or somehow develop a symbiotic relationship with the farming communities around them (Zeanah 2011). Given the course of research that Diamond conducts, it seems likely the Jomon were indeed displaced and or absorbed into the greater Yayoi population.
Diamond’s examination of morphological data between Korean, Japanese, modern Ainu, the Jomon, and Yayoi skeletons seems to suggest that the strongest resemblances come between the skeletal features of modern Japanese, Yayoi and Korean remains (Diamond 2005; 445-446). However, it would also seem reasonable, based upon the Diet Breadth Model and the hierarchy of foods that there would be some adoption of rice agriculture by indigenous populations when rice proves more potent then the existing resources (Zeanah 2011). Furthermore, it is also clear that Jomon societies did persist despite the advent of wet rice farming in the country. As Diamond’s book argues, geography shapes the development of any society, and in the northern portions of the Japanese archipelago, on the island of Honshu’s Tohoku region, we see a definitive “line” in the archaeological record where wet rice agriculture is not consistently present (Imamura 1996, 138). After expanding across the country, paddy style wet rice farming only extended as far north as it was productive enough to displace subsistence methods as the primary means of food acquisition. Just like the lack of adoption of earlier forms of agriculture throughout the country, the Jomon of the north either did not assimilate into Yayoi style farming culture or were not displaced by it because it was not as effective as it was in the south. Despite adaptations to the cold and the potential of intensive wet rice farming techniques, rice farming and rice crops were not universally superior to the indigenous subsistence lifestyle.
Collect Call of Destiny: The mono myth in Kung Fu Hustle and My Sassy Girl
Scholar Joseph Campbell defines the ‘Mono-Myth’ or Hero’s Journey as a formulaic tale found in many human cultures – a story in which a hero is called from a life of normalcy to an adventure that ultimately brings change to the world at large. Broken into multiple stages, the Journey begins with The Call, wherein some event jolts the hero out of his mundane life, bringing him to a threshold and its gatekeepers which he passes in order to continue on to the adventure proper. But before the Hero can face the challenges of that journey, they must pass the litmus test that is the threshold and its gatekeepers. Not all heroes do so willingly or successfully on their first brush with destiny – they often harbor doubts or insecurities that they must conquer before they can cross the threshold from the known into the unknown. The films Kung Fu Hustle and My Sassy Girl illustrate how heroes grapple with this reluctance – and in the case of Kung Fu Hustle, how a hero can waste half a lifetime struggling to forget his first brush with destiny.
Kung Fu Hustle is the story of deadbeat miscreants Sing and his enormous partner Bone. As a young boy, Sing is hustled by a vagrant selling ‘lost kung fu manuals’ who tells him he’s “a natural kung fu genius” – this serves as Sing’s first call. Embracing the hustler’s claim that he was “destined to change the world”, Sing diligently reads the manual and practices every day, until he tries to stop a pack of boys swarming a deaf girl who clutches a giant lollipop. Calling out her tormentors, Sing’s naïve bravery is quickly squashed as the bullies first thrash then piss on him. The bullies serve as gatekeepers – they represent the challenges ahead for Sing. But when the little girl tries to comfort him, Sing runs away, crushed and ashamed of his failure. He refuses to cross the threshold embrace his destiny.
Sing spends the next twenty years trying to be everything but a hero – as Bone observes, ‘Memories can be painful – to forget is a blessing’. Instead of answering the call, Sing struggles to forget it. After ineptly trying to extort a hairdresser, Sing and Bone petition for admission into the Axe Gang – violent criminals who rule Shanghai. The Axe Gang sends the pair off to Pig Sty Alley, home to a group of kung fu masters who have humiliated the Axes. But Sing and Bone are even more inept as villains than Sing was as a hero – and all they can do is bully a mute ice cream vendor. She recognizes Sing, but he doesn’t seem to know her: she was the girl he protected as a child. Gloating over their stolen ice cream, Sing and Bone head for Pig Sty Alley. Knowingly or not, Sing has ignored the second call to adventure. When Sing and The Girl meet again, he clearly recognizes her and the lollipop she holds out to him. Face to face with the threshold, Sing refuses to accept it. Sing knocks the sucker from her hand, breaking it into dozens of pieces before he runs away. He is, quite literally, running from the Call for the third time.
Sing’s final call comes when he is a Brother of the Axe Gang, having freed the bloodthirsty sociopathic assassin known as “The Beast”, who will destroy the Masters of Pig Sty Alley. Since his defeat as a child, Sing has struggled to be a bad man – but something changes in the moment he watches The Beast locking arms (and legs) with the Landlords of Pig Sty Alley. This is the moment when the Axe Gang could triumph, Sing instrumental in saving face for them all, but he chooses to club The Beast on the head instead, distracting him long enough for the Kung Fu Masters to recover and escape. Twenty years ago Sing faced a similar choice: and it was a choice that left him beaten and reeking of urine because he chose to stand up for the underdog. Sing had spent his entire life running from his past because he was unwilling to face the consequences of rescuing The Girl – but now, presented with a similar choice, he embraces it. He faces The Beast, seemingly to his death, and in doing so he unlocks his true potential to be the hero Shanghai needs.
My Sassy Girl differs from Kung Fu Hustle in that it’s hero, Kyun-Woo, doesn’t spend much of his life running from his calling – but that doesn’t make threshold any less daunting. Kyun-Woo, similar to Sing, is a slacker without much direction in life – he’s a poor son, a poor student, and a poor nephew. But a chance encounter with a drunk girl on a subway platform changes his fate, if he can endure vomit and police pepper spray. Teetering on the edge of a subway platform, Kyun-Woo pulls her to safety as a train enters the station. Soon after boarding, The Girl brashly begins terrorizing the other passengers until she pauses to puke on an older man’s toupe. Delirious, she turns to Kyun-Woo, calls him ‘honey’, and collapses. The Girl calls out to him and Kyun-Woo answers – and in doing so he is answering the call to adventure. Stammering apologies, he sheepishly tries to mop the puke off the old man’s clothes and struggles to carry the girl off the train. But he soon begins to have second thoughts.
When they arrive at Bupyang Station, Kyun-Woo tries to ditch the unconscious girl on the platform, but as he crosses the turnstiles (a metaphor for the threshold), he turns back and takes her to a Love Hotel instead. This illustrates how Sing and Kyun-Woo differ – although Kyun-Woo is reluctant, he doesn’t turn away from the call. Sweaty and probably smelling of alcohol and puke, he washes off as police knockdown the door to their room – likely because the owner though Kyun-Woo was up to no good with a helpless, drunk girl. As Kyun-Woo, naked and helpless, tries to cover himself in front of the female officers, they blast him with pepper spray. Screaming, he falls to the floor. These women, appropriately, represent the gate keepers – and foreshadow the challenges to come for Kyun-Woo. After spending a night in jail, Kyun-Woo receives a phone call – it’s The Girl, and she tells him to meet her at Bupyang Station. Rather than hang up and go on with his life, Kyun-Woo responds to her call and the two meet up. While a reluctant hero, Kyun-Woo accepts his destiny much more readily than Sing – although the ending of My Sassy Girl reveals how the two films explore similar thematic spaces. Just like Sing kept ducking (knowingly and unknowingly) his own love interest, Kyun-Woo unwittingly spent several years avoiding his auntie, who wanted to set him up on a blind date. A blind date that turned out to be his sassy girl from Bupyang Station.
The Call, the Threshold, and the Gatekeepers are the first challenges the hero faces during the course of The Heroic Journey. But unlike the later trials, these components represent the liminal space between this world and the adventure – and are the first test of the hero’s resolve. They are the crux for the journey itself: if the call is not answered and the threshold is not crossed, there can be no transformation. How the hero responds to the call is also indicative of their character – Sing’s shame is deep-rooted and he spends years if not decades fighting to forget it, and it is not until the enormity of The Beast’s threat and power are revealed that Sing chooses to face another beating in order to become the hero. In a sense, The Beast can be a metaphor for the pain and the suffering of his shame as a small child that he has tried to suppress, and it is a wound that he has let fester into the demon he finally faces. For Kyun-Woo, we see him try to shirk his obligations but ultimately embrace his duty to help The Girl – demonstrating that beneath his lazy shell lies a human being with great potential to heal a broken person and set them free. More than any physical journey, Kung Fu Hustle and My Sassy Girl demonstrate that the Hero’s Journey is first and foremost a psychological ordeal in which old thoughts and ways of thinking are purged so that that the character of a person – their very soul and psyche – can be reborn in a new way that brings transformation to others. It is this fundamental change in their nature that is their power, and also the root of all their fears – because in order to change, we must first face the unknown, the most frightening thing of all.
Cultural Chiaroscuro: Depictions of Foreigners in The Host and Ip Man
Construction of self and group identity relies, in part, on the construction of ‘the other’. ‘Others’ are anyone who does not share the same characteristics of the individual or group in question – be they physical, religious, cultural, etc. Like the art technique of chiaroscuro that creates complexity through the contrasting use of light and dark, the use of The Other represents an alternative to the local ‘norm’. Therefore, The Other can be seen as a sort of mirror or contrasting element to the ideas or problems being explored – for the Korean film The Host and the Chinese film Ip Man, ‘The Other’ is conceptualized as foreigners within the countries of South Korean and China, respectively. For The Host, the foreigners are Americans depicted through the media or as authority figures such as the military and scientists. They serve as a critique of America’s self-importance and arrogance. In Ip Man, the foreigners are Imperial Japanese troops occupying the Chinese city of Foshan, and the criticism here is much more scathing: the Japanese are domineering invaders, subjugating the ‘cultured’ Chinese to brutal conditions. Both films use foreigners as a form of commentary on their respective countries, and reflect the sentiment each country feels towards them.
The Host depicts the consequences of an American Mortician ordering the disposal of an unspecified amount of chemicals into the sewer system of a South Korean city near the military base at Yongsan. Several years later, a monster appears and attacks a riverside park, incidentally abducting Hyun Seo, the daughter of main character Gang Du. During the attack, Gang Du and an American Sergeant named Donald White attempt to fight the monster off, but White is grievously injured and Gang Du is sprayed with the creature’s blood before it escapes with his daughter Hyun Seo. Afterwards, Korean media announces that attack was much more serious than previously assumed because a mysterious virus has begun affecting victims. The American CDC criticizes the Korean authorities’ response to the outbreak as Gang Du and his family escape quarantine and start searching for his daughter. As the Americans prepare to release a ‘cure’ in the form of the experimental chemical compound Agent Yellow, Gang Du and his family manage to kill the monster but fail to save his daughter. They do, however, save an orphaned boy who Hyun Seo died protecting. Several months later, Gang Du and his adopted son are politely eating dinner when an American Press Conference announces its ‘findings’ from the incident, and Gang Du shuts the television off with his foot. Able to now enjoy their meal, the two go back to eating.
The movie is essentially a Korean story, with the edges of the narrative framed by the presence of American overseers and authority figures such as the Lazy Eyed Chief Researcher and jumpsuited observers who record the effects of “Agent Yellow’s” deployment. But as the Lazy Eyed Chief Researcher reveals to a colleague, there is no evidence of a virus – despite news reports that Sergeant White died from the disease, its alluded he died from the ‘treatment’ instead. Determined to ‘prove’ that a virus exists and convinced it is hiding in Gang Du’s brain, The Lazy Eyed Chief Researcher orders Korean authorities to take a sample of Gang Du’s frontal lobe. Without anesthesia, they drill into a screaming Gang Du’s skull and extract the sample. Dismissed as delusional, the authorities ignored Gang Du’s pleas to save his daughter and prepare to deploy “Agent Yellow”, their alleged cure. “Agent Yellow” is an experimental weapon that requires field testing, and the situation in South Korea is an ideal opportunity for them. The threat may be nonexistent, but authorities are willing to use the mass panic to test their experimental new weapon since there is no risk to Americans. The Host paints these authority figures as arrogant and dismissive of the pain they inflict on Non-Americans – the Mortician who ordered the dumping of the chemicals speaks condescendingly to his subordinate, as if the man were a very dumb child. After all, what does he care if some chemicals get dumped into Korean water? It’s of no consequence to him. Sergeant White serves as a metaphor for ‘American Exceptionalism’ – he rushes to stop the monster, proclaiming ‘someone’s got to do something’, proceeding to bark orders at Gang Du as he ‘takes charge’ of the situation. This is American egotism at work.
Gang Du and his son dismiss the press conference the United States holds at the end of the film – the words can’t even be made out as the official drones on. The words are meaningless. Gang Du goes so far as to turn the TV off with his foot, a strong contrast to the polite manners he and his son were using a moment before. While fictional, the film does reference a South Korean incident from 2000, where an American Mortician was criticized for dumping gallons of chemicals into the sewer system (1) (2). “Agent Yellow” is a reference to “Agent Orange”, a carcinogenic defoliant used during the Vietnam War – a chemical that the Americans refuse to acknowledge is dangerous to Vietnamese nationals. In other words, only American life matters. The criticism of The Host is in its subtext, referencing contemporary American attitudes. Ip Man, in contrast, is a historical film, and its treatment of foreigners is far more plainspoken.
Ip Man is the story of Wing Chun Grandmaster Ip Man, the mentor of Bruce Lee. The first third of the film is set in Foshan in the early 1930’s, before the Japanese invade China during the Pacific War (WW II). Foshan is a vibrant city with a thriving Martial Arts community, of which Ip Man is shown to be the elusive best of the best, until some rough looking Northern Chinese fighters led by a man named Jin show up and start trashing all the headmasters of Foshan’s kwoon (training halls or schools). Ip Man’s conduct is polite, cultured, and non-confrontational – contrasted against the abrasive and boastful Jin. Subtly, this is a dig from Foshan against ‘outsiders’ – in this instance Jin, who represents Northern Chinese. Jin doesn’t follow the same rules as the ‘cultured’ men of Foshan do: he’s proud and boastful until Ip Sifu soundly defeats him with his superior skill. The film then takes a darker tone when the Japanese invade China on July 7th, 1937.
Foshan is reduced to a ghetto covered in barbed wire and awash in dusty grays, the Japanese flags hang from the buildings as olive fatigued Japanese troops march through the streets. General Miura and his rat-faced Japanese caricatured major domo, Colonel Sato, hold bloody “training sessions” where Japanese Karateka (karate practioners) compete against starving Chinese who might win a sack of rice back from the Japanese stamped with the Imperial War Flag. These choices by the director of Ip Man make the Chinese opinion of the Japanese clear: they are brutal and oppressive; stealing China’s wealth and then making Chinese fight for a bag of rice so they can eat for a few days. More subtly, Ip Man distinguishes the rough Jin – an outsider to Foshan – with the barbaric Japanese: he may be an outsider, but he is “still a Chinese”. Ip Man thus shows us that there levels of outsider – and that despite the delineation between local and distant Chinese, someone like Jin is far better than the likes of the cowardly bully Colonel Sato who delights in the suffering of non-Japanese. Ip Man tells us that there is a nobility and purity in the Chinese – who use kung fu for knowledge and self-improvement – over the aggression and blood thirsty Japanese and their karate.
Each of these films say a great deal about foreigners, both directly and indirectly. But perhaps more importantly, these films say a great deal about the people and the country they come from. The Host is reflective of a country that is accustomed to the presence of foreigners and, despite the criticism it levels at Americans, it feels reasonable and reflective of how Americans behave and have been perceived abroad: nosey, self-absorbed, at times well-meaning but often out of touch with the reality of the countries they visit. For Ip Man, we feel resentment towards Japan and the actions of its government – allusions to the Rape of Nanking in particular in a scene with Colonel Sato and Ip’s wife – that highlight the wounded nationalism simmering amongst the Chinese today. It’s hard to say that Ip Man is as intellectually honest as The Host, considering that political activism within China is severely limited, and often channeled into outrage against Japan. But both films succeed in reflecting how these people – “right” or “wrong” – perceive the world. And as an anthropologist, it is not for me to judge those beliefs as correct or not, all I can do is seek to understand how others see the world. That understanding is the first step to building peace with other people – and finding the same within ourselves.
Works Cited
1.) LA Times Article Referencing the Incident: http://articles.latimes.com/2000/jul/25/news/mn-58541
2.) Asia Times article that describes the incident in more depth: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/FA28Dg02.html
Fierce Winds and Lurid Neon (Examining the use of sound in Chunhyang and Chungking Express)
Chunhyang tells the story of the daughter of a courtesan and her loyalty to her yangbang (noble) husband, the son of a local governor. Prolific Korean Director Im Kwan Taek interweaves this story of faith and devotion with a traditional pansori performance – a UNESCO certified art form where one performer is accompanied by a drummer and recites the story in verse, prose, or song. Chungking Express is a Hong Kong drama by Wong Kar Wai that reflects on how seemingly disparate lives can be more interwoven then we know. Both films use narration and music to accent the moods of individual scenes, but the tone each crafts is different – Chunhyang is a historical romance, whereas Chungking Express is concerned about anxieties of a modern Hong Kong on the cusp of its transferal from British to Chinese control. Both films are similar because they use sound to accentuate the stories being told – emphasizing characters, dialog, or mood. They differ primarily because Chunhyang highlights it’s folktale nature, whereas Chunking Express explores relationships amidst cosmopolitan anxiety.
The opening of Chunhyang features several minutes of untranslated pansori performance. This immediately sets the film’s tone – this is a historical, traditional Korean tale. The performers are on a darkened stage in traditional dress and little scenery save for the drummer’s instrument. While the story is largely a ‘normal’ movie, it is interwoven with moments of the pansori performance and its narrator. Through his words we are sinking into the past, and imagining the story that he creates with the power of his voice. And while the film clearly delineates the pansori stage in the present and this mythic past, at times we can hear the narrator’s voice simultaneously with the dialog of the actual characters in the scene. One example is when Chunhyang is being tortured by the lecherous governor pursuing her, and key lines of dialog are emphasized because both Chunhyang and the pansori narrator speak them in unison: ‘I cannot serve two husbands as you cannot you serve two kings!’. This subtly plays with the idea that we are painting these images from the words of the storyteller, but more importantly it emphasizes the words themselves. It highlights what is being said because they form the crux of what we come to see as the virtues being espoused in Chunhyang: loyalty to one’s husband is as noble and as virtuous as the Confucian expectation of loyalty to one’s king. Other moments simply punctuate the moments of the narrative, such as when the pansori foreshadows the shout of a guard running to first arrest Chunhyang. In this way, the story’s imagery and the narrative work in tandem.
Sometimes, the pansori narrator’s words are literally illustrated on screen – such as when he introduces the glorious forested slopes of Joksong Mountain in the morning, clouded with fog. Other times, the narration is expository dialog for the scene taking place, such as when Chunhyang and Lee are frolicking in bed with the oh-so-suggestive “what would you like to eat?”: cherries, plums, grapes, cucumbers. This is sexual imagery, an erotic metaphor for the different parts of the body that might be ‘good to eat’. Other times, the pansori speaker’s narration serves to transition time – particular during moments of travel, to give context to what we’re seeing on screen – landmarks, regions, etc. Pansori also gives us insight into the minds and motivations of the characters: when Lee is forced to follow his father’s household to Seoul, he leaves behind a weeping Chunhyang. As during her torture later in the film, the narrator accentuates her despair with his voice, but more importantly he lets us into the internal voice of Lee. Visibly torn, the young yangban ‘abandons’ his wife, while the pansori narrator adds “he has no choice but to leave”… and as he and his servant fade into the distance, the voice of the narrator fades as well, as if the narrator himself were like Lee, fading into the distance. This heightens the effect of seeing the receding character – we are watching and hearing the voice get smaller and smaller until they are gone and Chunhyang is alone. At the end of the film, Lee and his envoys make a dramatic entrance, arresting the corrupt governor and his minions as they throw off their disguises and brandish the crest of the King. The narrator’s description of the swirling chaos and waves of colored cloth as the guilty attempt to escape from this ‘fierce wind of justice’ is again a visual and audial reinforcement that heightens the fervor of the cinematography. The metaphors become real.
Just as cinematography and sound complement one another in Chunhyang, Wong Kar Whai’s Chungking Express uses similar techniques to explore an entirely different headspace. The film opens to a disjointed flurry of blurred imagery and lurid neon as detective He Qiwu chases a suspect to the ground. He muses via internal monologue how ‘near but how far’ complete strangers lives and events can be interwoven yet compartmentalized stories that ‘almost touch’. The imagery is meant to reflect how people begin to ignore the mundane details of their everyday lives – familiar surroundings are just a smeared recollection because they are familiar to us and we stop paying attention to them. But combined with the music – an eerie, carnivalesque electronic tune – we’re given a sense of space that’s crowded, indistinct, and hard to navigate. Hong Kong – the Hong Kong and of the everyman – is a warren of ghettos and urban retrofitting-in-action. The use of color, blurred bodies and crowded spaces help evoke what it might be like on a humid night in the crowded, throbbing snarl of bodies in the slums of the city. And for Hong Kong on the cusp of its transfer from British to Chinese control, an atmosphere of unease and disconnect is understandable: no one knew what the future would hold. People worry about what is going to happen when a cosmopolitan node of capitalist commerce collides with the Communist control of China. Unlike the tradition and history that oozes from pansori, the soundtrack of Chungking Express is thoroughly modern and global: synth, rock, reggae, jazz/blues, Indian, pop, and Chinese adaptations of a Cranberries song all express a global and modern city that is true to the spirit of Hong Kong and decidedly different from historical Korea.
More than the sense of unease about the future in Chungking Express, Wong Kar Whai utilizes music to cultivate and trigger distinct identities for different characters and spaces. By pairing music and place or person, we build and recall experiences with them. Examples of this include Dennis Brown’s “Things in Life” for the Smuggler’s bar and “California Dreamin’” by the Mamas and the Papas for the character of Faye. They become more than just set pieces and characters – they become memories more real because they engage sight AND sound in simulacrum of experience that goes beyond imagery and soundtrack. They form ‘signatures’ of mood and memory – we build associations with these spaces and faces that go beyond the framework of the film.
Sometimes, the audio is just a simple accent to the scene – the playfulness of the stewardess stripping for Officer 633, mimicking the visual directions given to the disembodied voice of prerecorded safety instructions. Or it may be a sharp contrast to the moment – such as when Shades the smuggler shoots the owner/bartender of the Smugglers bar against the bar’s jazzy-reggae Dennis Brown theme. It’s a moment of bitter confrontation against the grain of the words – emphasizing the moment through differentiation. For Faye, “California Dreamin’” encapsulates her essence – she’s dreaming of a distant place, warm and lush compared to the chill and barren space she exists in. She’s a dreamer, craving escape. This is a sophisticated and subtle use of ‘show, not tell’ – we learn more about her through these cues, especially because they’re reinforced throughout the film.
Sound – whether music, diagetic noise, dialog, or narration – can be used to manipulate and propel a scene further than the on screen action is able to. It can embody a listless, moody moment in Hong Kong as sheets of rain spill down in front of a dejected He Qiwu – lovesick and without purpose. Or it can bring an authenticity to a traditional pansori tale by using actual pansori as the framework for the film itself – reinforcing the classical nature of the tale and spotlighting the artistry of the actual storyteller. Both Chungking Express and Chunhyang play with the sounds of their environment, whether it’s a fierce wind of justice or the uncertainties whispering in the back of your mind, echoing off twisting streets of a Hong Kong on a new millennium and new identity. In skillful hands, sound is potent – leaving an imprint that lingers long after the vapid spectacle of a summer blockbuster’s FX have evaporated like so much smoke in the wind. Both Im Kwon Taek and Wong Kai War demonstrate the diversity of results that such skill can achieve.
The Work of John Ostermiller 
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