>>To overly focus on Coppola’s film is unwise because it tends to divert attention from films that require it, like Steven Spielberg’s new Memoirs of a Geisha. It is based on the bestselling 1997 novel in which every plot component was designed to demonize the Japanese. Professor Anne Allison of Duke University wrote that the book “inspired [readers] to see Japanese men as sexual perverts.” (訳)この本のあらゆるシーンと描写が 読者をして「全ての日本人男性は変態」と思わせるように 仕組まれている (デューク大学教授のコメント)
Politically correct racism and the Geisha novel --- The psychology of sophisticated racism mirrors that of ethnic jokes.
Abstract:
In Section 1, politically correct racism (PC racism) is defined as an act with racist intent, justified by righteous appearance, with popularity or near-total acceptance because of its righteous appearance.
In Section 2, after presenting a theory of jokes based on analyses by Sigmund Freud and Marvin Minsky, I show that the pleasure one derives from PC racism is similar to that derived from ethnic jokes.
In Section 3, I point out the inaccuracies and prejudice contained in the novel "Memoirs of a Geisha" by comparing it with the Japanese version. Based on the study by Anne Allison of the American reception of the novel, I explain its surprising popularity using PC racism. Pleasures of romanticized subjugation and pleasures of hating the Japanese are made acceptable by the politically-correct appearance.
Finally in Section 4, I characterize the geisha film as a watered-down version with the novel's most racist elements removed.