Vid rec.
How Much Is That Geisha In The Window? by lierdumoa (Firefly, gen)
This vid ("an ode to the invisible Asians of Firefly") made quite a splash, I gather, at the recent vividcon. I'm not at all surprised, because it's brilliant.
Now, I love Firefly, but I'm also Chinese, and no amount of arguing with myself that the Tams are constructed as being for all intents and purposes Asian (down to the Confucian family, the overachiving offspring, and of course the surname), is going to get rid of all my mixed up offense and fascination with how Asians and "Asianness" is represented (or not) in the show. It's no accident that Simon and River are the characters I most strongly identify with. I've brought the topic up in discussion before, and it was in my mind when I wrote Uncensored (in it I drew a parallel between River being forgotten by her parents while the Academy tries to remake her, to the forgotten history of the vanquished as the winners construct a new society). I'm also fascinated by the way that Firefly fanfic writers use Mandarin in their writing, and how it might differ if the writer her-/himself is Asian.
This vid ("an ode to the invisible Asians of Firefly") made quite a splash, I gather, at the recent vividcon. I'm not at all surprised, because it's brilliant.
Now, I love Firefly, but I'm also Chinese, and no amount of arguing with myself that the Tams are constructed as being for all intents and purposes Asian (down to the Confucian family, the overachiving offspring, and of course the surname), is going to get rid of all my mixed up offense and fascination with how Asians and "Asianness" is represented (or not) in the show. It's no accident that Simon and River are the characters I most strongly identify with. I've brought the topic up in discussion before, and it was in my mind when I wrote Uncensored (in it I drew a parallel between River being forgotten by her parents while the Academy tries to remake her, to the forgotten history of the vanquished as the winners construct a new society). I'm also fascinated by the way that Firefly fanfic writers use Mandarin in their writing, and how it might differ if the writer her-/himself is Asian.