Up The Yangtze: Alterity + Privilege + Representation

Up the Yangtze is a documentary that attempts to unpack the concept of privilege and representation. The director, Yung Chang, establishes dualities of juxtaposition that are meant to bring our attention to such concepts. The film also brings to light how privilege and alterity function in the complication of representation.

The major juxtaposition in the film is present within the people-subjects that have been captured on camera: the white westerners on vacation amidst the Chinese workers on the luxury cruise line. These vacation-goers are further contrasted against the backdrop of the Yangtze River itself. There outside a jarring shot of sunbathers on the cruise against the industrialization and depopulation of the land alongside the river. It's so strange to see these people enjoying a vacation at a place where people have been uprooted. A sort of diaspora within their own homeland by their own people. A place that will no longer be the same after the hydroelectric dam floods the river. These people are privileged enough to enjoy this river in such a way and not have to be forced to adapt and assimilate like Cindy and others like her.

I find it strange because I believe it’s intended to make the viewer uncomfortable, to make them question these concepts of privilege and representation. Perhaps a viewer may be uncomfortable with the portrayal of the Westerners because it should. It’s bringing attention to the inequalities that are being demonstrated. Not only this but representation too. Marginalized people are constantly misrepresented in the media, the West likes to typically rely on racialized stereotypes in presenting others from a different country or race. Chang is presenting the Westerners in such a manner as a way of subverting this. It's truly remarkable how this documentarian has conveyed disparity and inequality visually. The images are charged with these ideas and substance.

It’s also worth noting that race is not the only thing that is a part of privilege but also class because there are not only white Westerners but also native Chinese themselves enjoying tours of this place. There is also class stratification seen between the documentary’s main subjects Jerry and Cindy. A lot of factors add up to privilege, not only this but I believe that there are different kinds of privilege you can hold, alterity functions in privilege through stratification. There is white privilege, class privilege,  male privilege, etc. For example, I may not have the privilege of a white male but I do have privilege as an American citizen, a person who has been through university education, etc. Privilege most definitely complicates representation because of this. I will rely on my personal experience to unpack this. This is evident in the complication of designating Hispanics as one singular race: there are a multitude of cultures that are Hispanic but they may differ in race. There are black Latinx, white Latinx, indigenous peoples, European Spanish, etc. It’s really complicated! The privilege of a white Latinx vs. an indigenous person vastly differs as is evidenced by the degradation of Mayan culture in Central America. The Spanish Inquisition clearly highlights the injustices and barbarity of imperialization, they literally destroyed Mayan culture through the destruction of their texts and artifacts. But in regards to representation and privilege one sees that representing Hispanics as a whole is complicated because of the variety of people that it is trying to box. For example, a white Latinx getting cast in a major film is not adequate representation for the race as a whole because that is not representative of the multitudes of people that encompass it, it's not holistic progress. It's only progress for the subset it represents. Representation isn’t as easy as placing a token character to reach a quota. Privilege and alterity are major complications for representing people.


Sidenote: I use the term Latinx for Latinos to be more inclusive of those with non-binary gender identities