Political Correctness in Chinese TV by Tim Bender[1]
Many novels and TV shows are set in late imperial China. Naturally, the conquest dynasties and various
non-Han ethnic groups play important roles in these works, and this can run afoul of
government policies on unity and ethnic harmony.
The linked video is compiled from two recent mainland TV
shows, and illustrates a wide variety of different kinds of censorship:
The first part of the video (covering the first 30 seconds)
is from a 2009 mainland TV adaptation of Jin Yong’s novel “Heaven Sword and
Dragon Sabre”《倚天屠龙记》. The story deals with the rebellion against
and overthrow of the Mongol Yuan dynasty.
Here, several of the main characters are discussing Daiqisi, a woman of
Persian descent.
The TV script tracks very closely the second edition of Jin
Yong’s novel, the relevant excerpt of which is included below. However, in the places where the novel has
the term “Persia” (波斯) the original voice of the TV actor is dubbed
over by a very mechanical pronunciation of the word “Western area” (西边).
Presumably
after the show was produced some official decided saying “Persia” here was
problematic, and there was a rushed (and rather poor production job) of
redubbing over the offending term.
It seems clear Daiqisi is not from Xinjiang – rather she is
from the distant middle east – so at first glance this wouldn’t be a territorial
integrity kind of issue. The problem is
likely in the final sentence, which lists the appearance and characteristics of
Persian people (high nose, deep eyes, white skin), and
contrasts this with Chinese people.
True, the direct statement is that “This is different from central
plains women (中原女)”,
and the TV writers seem to of their own accord taken the initial step of
changing the novel’s description of her as a “mix of Chinese and Persian
descent (中国和波斯女子的混种)”
into the less offensive “mix of central plains and Persian descent”, but
clearly this wasn’t enough. Presumably some
official decided that the implication remained that the appearance of people
from, say, Xinjiang means they are not Chinese (and thus Xinjiang is implicitly, under this strained logic, not part of
China), and Persia was redubbed into Western area.
For reference, below are the relevant parts of the novel
(principal changes marked):
”赵敏道：“黛绮丝？那便是韩夫人么？这名字好怪？”谢逊道：“她来自波斯，这是波斯名字。”
张无忌、赵敏、周芷若都吃了一惊，齐声道：“她是波斯人么？”
谢逊奇道：“难道你们都瞧不出来？她是中国和波斯女子的混种，头发和眼珠都是黑的，但高鼻深目，肤白如雪，和中原女子大异，一眼便能分辨。”
张无忌、赵敏、周芷若都吃了一惊，齐声道：“她是波斯人么？”
谢逊奇道：“难道你们都瞧不出来？她是中国和波斯女子的混种，头发和眼珠都是黑的，但高鼻深目，肤白如雪，和中原女子大异，一眼便能分辨。”
The second part is a series of 5 short clips from a scene in
the 2006 mainland China TV adaptation of Jin Yong’s novel “Return of the Condor
heroes”《神雕侠侣》. The scene involves discussion of plans to
form resistance against the Mongol invasion of the Southern Song, followed by
the arrival of a Tibetan martial arts master who goes by the name “Golden Wheel”
(金轮)
and is the greatest warrior in the Mongol army.
In the story, he is the principal villain.
Here, there seem to be two levels of political correctness. First, the script includes changes aimed at
softening the negative portrayal of Tibetans, many of which Jin Yong made in
the 2000s to the third edition of his novel, which came out about the same time
as the TV show. These changes from the
second edition include renaming a group of minor villains mentioned here, originally
the “Five Tibetan Border Scoundrels (藏边五丑)” into the “Five Sichuan Border
Scoundrels (川边五丑)”,
and changing Golden Wheel’s title from 法王, a high priest in Tibetan religion,
to 国师,
a generic term for a top official of a country.
The TV show script also seems aimed at generally dampening this villain’s
presentation as Tibetan – dropping the description of him as a “Tibetan sacred
priest (西藏圣僧)”
and instead emphasizing his affiliation with the Mongol army. If memory serves, the closest this TV show
adaptation ever gets to stating his Tibetan identity, is when it notes that he
studies 密宗,
a term which some of the audience might associate with Tibetan religion – all
express reference to his ethnicity seems gone.
The other changes are of a variety of sorts, and as in the
first part of the video, sometime after production, a number of terms were
identified for censorship, and a redubbing job was done with a new actors voice
reading over the offending word (though the quality is a little better, so one
has to listen somewhat closely to identify the change in the voice). Here, we see the removal of an offensive term
for Mongolians -蒙古鞑子 – in favor of three different generic words,
first “them (他们)”, then “those
people (那些人)”, and
finally “those bad people (那些恶人)” (in general causing these lines to sound a little oddly worded,
even ignoring the voice change). Also, the
reference to killing “traitors to the Han people (汉奸)” is likewise gone (though
this likely from the original script, not as part of the post production
censorship). Although the show in
general seems fine treating this war as a conflict between a Mongolian nation (大蒙古国)
and the Song (大宋),
it seems that a line was drawn at the use of any potentially offensive ethnic
term, and thus generally we have a striking level of political correctness in
war speeches.
For reference, below I’ll include, in order of appearance,
the various differences between the second edition of the novel and the TV show
(all discussed/translated above), followed by a quotation of relevant parts of
the novel.
蒙古鞑子 - 他们
蒙古鞑子 - 那些人
藏边五丑
- 川边五丑
西藏圣僧 – erased
金轮法王 – 金轮国师
到处诛杀蒙古鞑子，铲除为虎作伥的汉奸 – 到处在杀那些恶人
More complete excerpts from the novel:
方今天下大乱，蒙古鞑子日渐南侵，蚕食我大宋天下，
。。。
。。。
使得蒙古鞑子不敢再犯我大宋江山。
。。。
有五个大坏蛋叫作甚么‘藏边五丑’，奉了蒙古鞑子之命，在川东、湖广一带作了不少坏事，他老人家就要赶去查察，要是的确如此，自然要取了这五条狗命。”
。。。
霍都王子朗声说道：“这位是在下的师尊，西藏圣僧，人人尊称金轮法王,”
。。。
有五个大坏蛋叫作甚么‘藏边五丑’，奉了蒙古鞑子之命，在川东、湖广一带作了不少坏事，他老人家就要赶去查察，要是的确如此，自然要取了这五条狗命。”
。。。
霍都王子朗声说道：“这位是在下的师尊，西藏圣僧，人人尊称金轮法王,”
。。。
要推举一个大家从未闻名、素不相识的甚么金轮法王。若是洪老帮主在此，原可与金轮法王各显神通，一决雌雄，只是他老人家周游天下，到处诛杀蒙古鞑子，铲除为虎作伥的汉奸，没料到今日各位自行到来，未能在此恭候，他老人家日后知道了，定感遗憾，
