Proceedings of the 2024 3rd International Conference on Educational Science and Social Culture (ESSC 2024)

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Daoist Cultural Imagery in Western Popular Culture

Authors
Jun Cui1, *, Wei Chang1
1The International Dao Academy, Adalaide, Australia
*Corresponding author. Email: juncui@worldtaoculture.org
Corresponding Author
Jun Cui
Available Online 3 April 2025.
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-384-9_96How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Daoism; Chinese cultural imagery; Western popular culture; Orientalism
Abstract

Since the previous century, East Asia has been significantly affected by the derogatory narrative of “Orientalism,” which portrays China and East Asia as subjugated, exploited, and diminished. The author contends that this video exemplifies “Self-Orientalization.” The film amalgamates Eastern and Western aesthetics in spatial architecture, costume design, and character portrayal. This type of artistic amalgamation called a “cultural synthesis”. The utilization of Daoist attire, Daoist Gongfu, and Daoist concepts appears to advocate for Daoist culture; yet, it remains superficial and has little efficacy in promotion. Scholars have defined “Self-Orientalization” as the imposition of “West centralism” upon the East, highlighting the dualistic dichotomy between the West and the East, characterized by narratives of advancement versus backwardness, freedom versus autocracy, and civilization versus barbarism. The concept of “Self-Orientalization” refers to the perceived superiority of the West across multiple domains and the corresponding inferiority of the East. The representation of Daoism in Western popular culture. This raises a research question: how is Daoism formed within the Western popular cultural industry?

Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the 2024 3rd International Conference on Educational Science and Social Culture (ESSC 2024)
Series
Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research
Publication Date
3 April 2025
ISBN
978-2-38476-384-9
ISSN
2352-5398
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-384-9_96How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2025 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Cite this article

risenwbib
TY  - CONF
AU  - Jun Cui
AU  - Wei Chang
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/04/03
TI  - Daoist Cultural Imagery in Western Popular Culture
BT  - Proceedings of the 2024 3rd International Conference on Educational Science and Social Culture (ESSC 2024)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 847
EP  - 853
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-384-9_96
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-384-9_96
ID  - Cui2025
ER  -