Dur Emperor's Kao
I just had an idea for what would've been a way better, more interesting paper for Leitch than my generic stating of strategies in dehumanizing the enemy in war propaganda films: why is it that American cartoons will use actual German when the Nazis are on screen, but Japanese is always gibberish? "Education for Death" is all in (what I assume to be) correct German, with the narrator at times translating for the audience, and even "Dur Fuehrer's Face" throws in a word or seven of the language that actually exists in the midst of heavily accented English.
However, in "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips," except for a few points where they speak in utter Engrish, the Japanese soldiers sound like a higher pitched version of Marvin's martianspeak. I think out of the entire film the only actual Japanese words I could identify (outside of stuff like "konnichiwa") were "otoko" and something else that I forget at the moment. And I'm not entirely convinced that these weren't accidents on the voice actors' parts.
Before you claim that this difference may be due to the fact that the latter was made by Warner Bros and the two former films by Disney, let's think about "Commando Duck" for a minute. The buck teeth, round glasses and slanty eyes are all back, but this time senshi-tachi all communicate in Engrish. There may be a small part where the guy in the tree doesn't, but it's nonsensical and definitely not nihongo. My point here is that, unlike "Dur Fuehrer's Face," there aren't any Japanese phrases or words sprinkled throughout the short.
Now, why is this observation enough for a three page paper? Well, for the fact that it brings up the matter of (literal) Orientalism. Since German people are ethnically very similar to most white Americans (who are the ones making the films as well as the intended audience), the studios probably didn't want to risk insulting good old Red White and Blue people of Germanic descent by botching their language. As for those of Japanese ancestry, they were all shoved into Manzanar and were in no position to complain.
For the most part I'm just being facetious with that point, but the race relations of the enemy vs. the U.S. (which prides itself on its ethnically heterogeneous nature; after all, my boy Israel Zangwill wrote a play about America called The Melting Pot all the way back in 1908) in WWII is a fascinating subject.
と思う。
EDIT: I just watched a couple Popeye shorts on the same subject, and in "You're a Sap, Mr. Jap," the guys on the fishing boat yell out "sukiyaki!" Wow. Stew is exactly what I think of first when I realize I've been spotted by the enemy. I do like Popeye's "Japansy" line though. It's almost as good as nippwn'd.
However, in "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips," except for a few points where they speak in utter Engrish, the Japanese soldiers sound like a higher pitched version of Marvin's martianspeak. I think out of the entire film the only actual Japanese words I could identify (outside of stuff like "konnichiwa") were "otoko" and something else that I forget at the moment. And I'm not entirely convinced that these weren't accidents on the voice actors' parts.
Before you claim that this difference may be due to the fact that the latter was made by Warner Bros and the two former films by Disney, let's think about "Commando Duck" for a minute. The buck teeth, round glasses and slanty eyes are all back, but this time senshi-tachi all communicate in Engrish. There may be a small part where the guy in the tree doesn't, but it's nonsensical and definitely not nihongo. My point here is that, unlike "Dur Fuehrer's Face," there aren't any Japanese phrases or words sprinkled throughout the short.
Now, why is this observation enough for a three page paper? Well, for the fact that it brings up the matter of (literal) Orientalism. Since German people are ethnically very similar to most white Americans (who are the ones making the films as well as the intended audience), the studios probably didn't want to risk insulting good old Red White and Blue people of Germanic descent by botching their language. As for those of Japanese ancestry, they were all shoved into Manzanar and were in no position to complain.
For the most part I'm just being facetious with that point, but the race relations of the enemy vs. the U.S. (which prides itself on its ethnically heterogeneous nature; after all, my boy Israel Zangwill wrote a play about America called The Melting Pot all the way back in 1908) in WWII is a fascinating subject.
と思う。
EDIT: I just watched a couple Popeye shorts on the same subject, and in "You're a Sap, Mr. Jap," the guys on the fishing boat yell out "sukiyaki!" Wow. Stew is exactly what I think of first when I realize I've been spotted by the enemy. I do like Popeye's "Japansy" line though. It's almost as good as nippwn'd.