Chou, Shengfang (2019) Re-imagining Chineseness: Chinese people, Chinatown, and British masculine chinoiserie ca. 1850- ca. 1920. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

Preview

PDF WRAP_Theses_Chou_2019.pdf - Submitted Version - Requires a PDF viewer. Download (33Mb) | Preview

Request Changes to record.

Abstract

This thesis examines the construction of Chineseness in Britain between 1850 and 1920. It focuses on Chinese people in Britain, the image of China held by the British, and the British space most associated with Chinese presence, Chinatown in Limehouse. While much of the scholarship on Chinese in Britain often takes up eighteenth-century cultural contact and exchange, this dissertation focuses on the proliferation of exchange in the nineteenth century. Although the image of eighteenth-century China was largely associated with a feminine aesthetic perspective, it was in the nineteenth century that Britain increased its intensity of interaction with China, including trade, immigration and cultural exchange transforming British conceptions of Chinese and Chinoiserie. In particular, this thesis considers Limehouse Chinatown and the London Chinese opium dens as sites that shaped hybrid cultures, heterotopian spaces and sites for flâneurs. Drawing on visual and material culture, the thesis offers a new understanding of Chinoiserie and its impact on British views of Chineseness in the mid-nineteenth to early twentieth century. It suggests that in addition to assessing the construction of Chineseness in Britain, an analysis of the image of Chinese people and Chinoiserie furthers our understanding of how and why fantasy and fear developed toward China and the Chinese in the nineteenth century. It calls for a re-evaluation of our understanding of nineteenth-century Sino-British relations, arguing that the impact of Chineseness and Chinoiserie on British perspectives should not be overlooked.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	D History General and Old World > DA Great Britain N Fine Arts > N Visual arts (General) For photography, see TR
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Chinese -- Great Britain, Chinese -- Great Britain -- Ethnic identity, Chinese -- Great Britain -- History -- 19th century, Chinese -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century, Chinoiserie (Art) -- Great Britain.
Official Date:	December 2019
Dates:	Date Event December 2019 UNSPECIFIED
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Department of History
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Gerritsen, Anne
Format of File:	pdf
Extent:	357 leaves : illustrations
Language:	eng

Request changes or add full text files to a record

Repository staff actions (login required)

View Item

Downloads