In the mid-nineteenth century, after more than 200 years of isolation from the West, residents of Japan were officially introduced to America, a country with a unique set of artistic conventions for race. As the Japanese encountered Americans of European descent and their images of the American “Indian” and “Negro” in newspapers, magazines, dime novels, and even in scientifically sanctioned history and geography books, they became aware of the racial stratification that existed in the white Western world and were, to some extent, forced to self-reflexively evaluate their place within it.1 This essay examines the exportation of U.S. racial stereotypes and their adoption in Japanese art and culture.
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