Analyzing Visual Text - Essay Example

Task: Analyzing Visual Text Literature is one of the widest areas of study. It involves different branches of knowledge. For instance, movie and film analysis, visual texts analysis as well as photo analysis. This essay will lucidly concentrate on the detailed analysis of the play. It will handle some of the common themes in the play such as racism and gender related issues. In general, the paper will employ the inquisitive and criticism styles of analyzing the given texts. To begin with, racism in the excerpt is evident from the first speaker Song. He is a French man who travelled to China and reveals how the Chinese treated him on his arrival. He says that they never cared for him. He accuses them of being stingy. To him, they are not generous and are unwilling to spend in order to make visitors or guests comfortable. He says he was not directed by anyone on his arrival at the airport, “I walked from the airport into the town, then located by blind groping, the Chinatown district” (Hwang 60). First, Song’s speech in the court depicts bitter and hatred tone to the Chinese. He generalizes and associates all the Chinese with stingy behaviors. The idea that he searched the Chinatown through groping implies exaggeration of the truth. It is not logical for a foreign individual to legally enter into a given country and miss guidance by any of the guides at the airport. His intention when revealing this to the court is none other than to expose his bitterness and deep hatred towards the Chinese people. In short, he is a racist and hater of the Chinese. China is one of the largest geographically and most popular nations in the world, therefore, anyone reasoning in a generalized manner on how he was received, or welcomed in China definitely has a preformed mentality before leaving for the country. It is all about color perceptions and stereotyping behaviors that guides the racial based and irrational reasoning. He says that the tailor who made him the kimono on credit would have been happy to see him in a simple shift and mascara. “Maybe he would have been happy to see me in a simple shift and mascara” (Hwang 60). Analyzed, this behavior has been historically inexistence since end of the First World War in the Middle East. Feminism is also a dominant theme in the excerpt. Toulon, the judge, in Paris courtroom, questions Song concerning his behaviors. He asks him if Monsieur Gallimard knew whether he was a man or not. Song’s reply seems very unclear but proper analysis brings his point to the light of the viewers. He says that he never saw him naked. The judge, however, insists that he must have seen him naked. The point being brought out here is that Song had assumed and behaved as a woman in order to attract men in the western world. Song further states that western men are easily convinced by lies of women. He says, “As a western man comes into contact with the East-he is already confused. The west has sort of international rape mentality towards the East” (Hwang 62). From this, it is succinct that song pretends to be a woman in the Western world, in order, to attract and fool the Western men who, to him, are typical rapists. Song, through his stand of taking the advantage of the Western men, shows an epic level of abusing feminism in the Western society. His behavior shows or portrays little respect to the female in the Western countries. He says that the Western men are rapists in a manner that their women always say no to with their mouths but yes in their eyes. To him, this is what has made the men in the western work adapt to the rapist behaviors when they go to the East. His decision to behave like a woman is the epitome of violating feministic rules, which the court and other legal systems are against. Song has also violated feminism through flashback of her mother’s behavior. He tries to justify his behavior by referring to his mother’s prostitution lifestyle. To him, it is a way of doing service to his country. It is, thus, evident that feminism, as a theme has been portrayed in the play in a way that sideline or favors the women and rejects the men in the society. Song’s mother, in this case, has been used to show the negative sides or reveal that immoralities are always caused or brought about by women in the society. Hwang has also represented Song in a manner that provokes the readers’ mind to come up with a theme that relates the outcome of the existing difference between the Westerners and the Easterners. At the beginning of the extract, Song is revealed as a hater of Chinese as he states that they are stingy and do not care about visitors in their country. This hatred is carried on even after he is back in France, 4 years later. His friend, Rene, is employed as a courier in France, therefore, handles sensitive documents. Rene photographed the documents for him and he passed them on to the Chinese embassy. The documents are sensitive ones and photographing them to another person who is not an employed and recognized courier is very wrong. Their friendship is meant to facilitate hatred and revenge rather than development in the Western world as they claim. They do the photographing on the letters and other important documents to ensure that they go through the documents thoroughly and get to know what they contain. Naturally, it is not allowed by any legal system for a courier to have a view or clue on what is contained within a given parcel. The work of a courier is bound by the laws of a nation or international law as transmitting or transporting a letter or a parcel from one place to another without showing or getting suspicious on the content of the letter. This is because some parcels or letters carry sensitive information like money related messages and others. Therefore, it is human nature for anyone who gets the view on the content to get tempted and steal or do other fraud activities to benefit. Predictably, the intention of Song, as brought out by Hwang in this play, is to revenge by benefiting from any good or precious information or materials being transported to China, a country where he was mistreated, as he claims. This is a high level of revenge, based on racism or stereotyping behaviors and beliefs. Song is the one who influenced comrade Chin to employ Rene as a courier. He is very opportunistic and tactical. He knows how to lay the foundations of his unlawful deeds. Song states that he is an oriental and that makes him an incomplete man. He says that Orientals are partly men and partly women. According to Song, all oriental women make good wives. The implication of this is to undermine the Western women. Only the Easterners are associated with oriental behaviors, according to him. Song says this to relate the Easterners with homosexuality. He is a non-Easterner but pretends that he is one and goes ahead to claim that men from those places are complete only if they behave like women too. This is implies stereotyping of the Easterners with immorality, and of course raising the status of the Westerners as well behaved, moral and responsible people. From the above illustrations, it is lucid that Hwang has used the play to reveal to the readers and viewers on the ongoing rift between the Eastern and the Western world after the French revolution, which took place several years ago. In the given excerpt of the play, he has portrayed to the readers on feminism, racism, and oriental stereotyping in the Middle East and France. Work Cited Hwang, David. M. Butterfly. New York, NY: SAGE Publishers, 2003. Print. Work cited Butterfly, David. Read More