I have earlier discussed the beauty contest issue in Hong Kong here and
have received many helpful responses from you. I have now finished a draft
of my initial analysis of beauty contests in Hong Kong, and would like to
share it with you and get your critical feedback and responses if you
are also interested in the topic. It is 29 pages long (double-spaced)
including abstract, footnotes, refs. and appendix. I'm attaching it as a
text file below. (If you're not interested in the topic, just delete it,
and my apologies for crowding your mail box).
Cheers,
Angel
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Under the Male Gaze: Beauty Contests in Hong Kong
(c) Copyright Angel M. Y. Lin 1996
Angel M. Y. Lin, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Department of English, City University of Hong Kong
Tat Chee Ave., Kln., Hong Kong
Phone: (852) 2788-8122
Fax: (852) 2788-8894
E-Mail: ENANGEL who-is-at CITYU.EDU.HK
(A revised version of a paper presented at the International Conference
on Communication and Culture: China Entering the 21st Century with the
World, August 13-16, 1996, Peking University, Beijing, China.)
ABSTRACT
In this paper I attempt at a critical analysis of the subtle
forms of male domination constituted and perpetuated by the
Hong Kong media's practices in, and revolving around, beauty
contests. The analysis also shows how the beauty
contestants' participation in this glamorous public sphere
paradoxically constitutes both a channel for self-assertion
and social mobility and a form of collusion with or
acquiescence to the perpetuation of traditional Chinese
male-defined norms for women and men-women relations. The
different positions available to the spectators, the
contestants, and the researcher are also discussed.
1
...[the processes of male domination in a so-called
primitive society] are the same as in our society, but
a lot more visible. In the former case the dominated
persons, the women, acquire domination through bodily
education. ... We have the equivalent process [of male
domination], but it operates in a much more subtle
manner--through language, through the body, through
attitudes toward things which are below the level of
consciousness. (Bourdieu, 1992, p. 115)
1 Background
Hong Kong is a British colony1 of over six million people.
The majority of the population are Cantonese-speaking
Chinese who are largely immigrants or offspring of
immigrants from the Guangdong Province of China mainly
during the first half of the 20th century. In the 1960s and
1970s, Hong Kong changed from an agrarian fishing port to an
export-oriented, labour-intensive industrial city. Most
working class women were employed in factories in the
manufacturing industry (e.g., textiles, clothing, toys). In
the 1980s and 1990s, with the boom of China trade following
the `open door policy' of China, Hong Kong has gradually
changed from a light-industry based, manufacturing economy
to an economy primarily based on the re-export of products
____________________
1. The colony is to be returned to China on July 1, 1997.
2
processed in China and on business and financial servicing
for China (Ho, 1994). With many manufacturing capitalists
re-locating their factories from Hong Kong to China to
capitalize on the cheap labour there, the manufacturing
employment sector is dwindling and most working class women
take jobs in the low-salary end of the service sector (e.g.,
retail sales assistants, restaurant waitresses2,
receptionists, clerks, telephone operators).
In a sense, the most powerful public spheres in Hong Kong
have been made accessible to women. One can easily quote
the first female Chief Secretary of the government
administration, Mrs Anson Chan, or the outspoken Legislative
Councilor and business executive, Christina Luk as exemplars
of `neuih-keuhng-yahn'3, literally meaning `female-strong-
person' (usually used with some negative connotations,
implying a woman who is politically/economically successful
but perhaps too aggressive or not feminine). It is worth
mentioning that there are many more successful men in these
public arenas, who have, however, never been referred to in
the media as `male-strong-person'.
____________________
2. In recent years, there have been more and more recent
women immigrants from China working in this low-pay
sector.
3. Cantonese names and utterances are transcribed in the
Yale system.
3
The feminists in Hong Kong have been working towards getting
their voices heard. The Centre for Women's Studies at the
University of Hong Kong organizes feminist discussion groups
and seminars. The New Women's Association (San Fuh-Neuih
Hip-Jeuin-Wui) has been active in voicing, and researching
on, women's issues in Hong Kong, e.g., women's opportunities
and problems in political participation (1985), sexism in TV
advertisements (1993). Pressure Groups with a concern for
factory workers' welfare have also been active in advocating
better working conditions and terms for women workers.
It seems that when the issues of injustice concerned are
more visible (e.g., sexual harrassment, unequal pay for the
same job), it is relatively less difficult to rally support
for concern for them. However, when the issues of
domination are not entirely explicit, or constituted in the
form of seemingly innocuous popular entertainment, it is
much more difficult to rally support for the protest against
them. One important example, which also forms the subject
of this paper, is found in the beauty contest practices of
the public media. Although the New Women's Association has
voiced strong protests against beauty contests in Hong Kong
(e.g., in Ming Pao, June 1, 1994), there has been little
effect on the media's practices, nor has there been much
public support for its cause. Beauty contests remain among
the most popular television programmes in Hong Kong (South
4
China Morning Post, February 4, 1996) and are invariably
shown at prime times on weekend evenings. They are packaged
and promoted as a type of family variety show and their
advertising sponsors range from cosmetics, leather
accessories, camera film, travel agencies, air-conditioners,
cars, furniture, to cooking oil, cooking rice, and coughing
syrup.
In this paper I attempt at a critical analysis of the subtle
forms of male domination constituted and perpetuated by the
media's practices in, and revolving around, beauty contests.
The analysis also shows how the beauty contestants'
participation in this glamorous public sphere paradoxically
constitutes both a channel for self-assertion and social
mobility and a form of collusion with or acquiescence to the
perpetuation of traditional Chinese male-defined norms for
women and men-women relations. The different positions
available to the spectators, the contestants, and the
researcher are also discussed.
5
2 The Growing Popular Entertainment Culture and Industry in
Hong Kong
With Hong Kong's booming economy, a vibrant and colorful
Cantonese popular culture and a strong media entertainment
industry have developed among the largely Cantonese-speaking
population. Today, there are two major television
companies, the Television Broadcasting Company (TVB) and the
Asia Television Company (ATV), each operating a Cantonese
channel and an English channel. The majority of Hong Kong
families, especially working class families, who speak
little English, tune in mostly to the Cantonese channels
(Lin, 1996a).
Parallel to the rise of Cantonese television as a major form
of popular entertainment has been the rise of Cantonese
`gong-chaan-pin' (Hong-Kong-made movies). An important
category of Hong-Kong-made movies is `gong-chaan saam-kap-
pin' (Hong-Kong-made Grade III movies). Grade III movies
are movies for adults only, with explicit scenes of nude
women, sex, and/or violence and abusive language.
Since the early 1990s, Hong Kong has also witnessed the
growing popularity of the `info-tainment' type of newspapers
and weekly magazines (Dr. David C. S. Li, personal
communication). Popular `baat-gwaa jaahp-ji' (a popular
Cantonese phrase referring to sensationalized, gossipy
6
magazines) include Next Magazine, Eastweek, and Oriental
Sunday. Popular newspapers include Apple Daily (published
by the same publisher of Next Magazine) and Oriental Daily
(published by the same publisher of Oriental Sunday). These
magazines and newspapers are characterized by a highly
colloquial, Cantonese style of written Chinese and a
blending of entertainment with news, or an
`entertainization' of news or information. They are the
popular reading materials available in most working class
homes (Lin, 1996a).
It is in this context that beauty contests have in recent
years become an increasingly publicized and sensationalized
media and social event in Hong Kong. Each year, two highly
publicized major beauty contests, Miss Hong Kong and Miss
Asia are staged by the two competing television companies
TVB and ATV respectively in May/June and August/September in
the small British colony4. They rival with each other to
make their own beauty contest the more sensational and
entertaining one. Having evolved with this competition in
sensationalism is a set of distinct discourse practices in
the televised and print media. In the televised media,
____________________
4. Apart from the two major beauty contests, there are also
a few other smaller-scale (in terms of the amount of
publicity given to them by the media) beauty contests,
e.g., Miss Air Hostess, Miss International Chinese.
7
beauty contest events can be seen to be organized via
recognizable, specific, recurring discourse and activity
structures. In the print media, beauty contests have served
as anchors on which the info-tainment type of newspapers and
magazines weave pages and pages of sensationalized stories
and pictures of the contestants. Both the televised and the
print media present the contestants in certain ways and from
certain angles that strongly induce, if not impose, the male
spectator's perspective as the natural, taken-for-granted
audience position. To illustrate this, let us look at some
typical examples of how Miss Hong Kong and Miss Asia beauty
contests are `hosted'.
8
3 The Male Gaze Embodied: An All-Male Host Co-hort
A typical organizational feature of both Miss Hong Kong and
Miss Asia beauty contests in recent years is that both are
invariably hosted by an all-male team of `si-yih' (masters
of ceremony). The team usually consists of two or three
middle-aged men who are popular TV/talk show stars already
quite familiar to Hong Kong TV viewers. An example taken
from the 1992 Miss Hong Kong beauty contest will give the
reader a sense of how an all-male host team is indispensable
in structuring and enabling a particular spectator
perspective on the contestants.
3.1 An example: The 1992 Miss Hong Kong beauty contest
The 1992 Miss Hong Kong beauty contest was the 20th
anniversary of the Miss Hong Kong beauty contest. TVB gave
a lot of publicity to it and especially designed a glamorous
slogan for that year's contest: "Faat-fong yaah joi gwong-
mohng, yihn-dim syun-meih mahn-faa" ("Shining through two
decades, kindling the beauty contest culture"). The slogan
seems to conjure up associations of the beauty contest
spirit with the Olimpic Games spirit.
The 1992 Miss Hong Kong beauty contest began with a
glamorous, magnificent Egyptian palace stage set-up. Jang
Ji-Waih, a short, chubby, familiar TV and movie star, who
has a well-established sleazy-guy screen image and has been
9
the principal host in every Miss Hong Kong beauty contest in
recent years, was costumed as the Egyptian Pharaoh and
leisurely seated on the throne. Standing beside him and
conversing with him was another male host, Jehng Daan-Seuih,
a popular radio and TV talk show star, costumed as an
Egyptian palace attendant. Excerpt 1 below was taken from
the beginning of their conversations. They had been talking
about the third host, Philip Chan, who was referred to by
them as `Chahn sihng-seun' (Chief-Secretary Chan):
Excerpt 15
1. Jang: Haih Laa, gong hoi Chahn sihng-seun, aah, yih-chihn
heui hai ngoh-deih go chaan-gwun douh si choi gaa jaa!
<Yeh, talking about Chief-Secretary Chan, oh, he used
to taste food for me in the restaurant!>
2. Jehng: Haih aa! Haih aa!
<Yeh! Yeh!>
3. Jang: Yih-gaa dim wui jouh-jo sihng-seun gum baa-bai ge?
<Now how come he has become Chief-Secretary, with such
a high rank?>
4. Jehng: O! Neih mh-gei-dak aah? Yan-waih heuih tuhng neih
si choi si dak hou, yeuhng yeuhng choi tuhng neih si
saai ne, yihn-ji-houh sin bei neih sihk, neih gok-dak
hou-hou sihk, yyu-sih neih maih sing-jo heuih jouh
sihng-seun lo!
____________________
5. See appendix for notes on transcription.
10
<Oh! You've forgotten? Because he did such a good job
sampling food for you, tasting every dish for you
before you ate, and you found the food so delicious, so
you have promoted him to Chief-Secretary!>
5. Jang: Haih aa haih aa haih aa! Jeui-gahn heui gaau-gan
mat-yeh?
<Oh yeh yeh yeh! What's he up to these days?
6. Jehng: Oh! Heuih gaau-gan go houh wuhn-yi aa! Heih syun
sahp-yih sahn-sing neui aa!
<Oh! He's organizing a fun game! He's selecting twelve
sacred girls!>
7. Jang: Syun sing-neui? Hei-hei! {chuckling sleazily}
<Selecting sacred girls? Hei-hei!>
8. Jehng: Haih aa!
<Yeh!>
9. Jang: BAIH! Yih-chihn heuih bong ngoh si sung go wo!
{in a worried tone}
<OH DEAR! In the past he tasted food for me!>
10. Jehng: Haih aa! GO-GO si wahn gaa!
<Yeh! EACH ONE he tasted first!>
11. Jang: Ngoh sihk di yeh heuih bong ngoh sihk sin go wo,=
<Those things I ate he tasted first,>
12. =Jehng: Mh! Mouh-cho aa!
<Mh! That's right!>
13. Jang: Gum yih gaa bong ngoh syun sing-neui maih... ai-
yaah, mh-hou laa, faai-di giu saai di sing-neui cheuit-
laih bei ngoh tai-haah sin! {in an anxious tone}
11
<But now he's selecting sacred girls for me... oh dear,
oh no, go hurry go call all the sacred girls out for me
to see first!>
14. Jehng: Oh, Wohng-Seuhng cheng fong-sam, di sing-neui
yih-ging yyuh-beih saai hai-douh gaa laa!
<Oh, Your Majasty need not worry, all the sacred girls
have been prepared6 here already!>
15. Jang: Haih me?
<Really?>
16. Jehng: Juhng-yiu heun neih hin bou tim aa!
<Not only that, they're offering treasures to you!>
17. Jang: Aa? Hin-bou? Hei-hei! {chuckling sleazily}
<Yes? Offering treasures? Hei-hei!>
18. Jehng: Ngoh-deih yauh cheng heuih-deih cheuit-leih sin
laa houh-mh-houh aa?
<Shall we invite them out first?>
19. Jang: Gum tai-haah hin me-eh bou bei ngoh laa, faai-di
faai-di!
<Okay, see what treasures they're offering to me, quick
quick!>
____________________
6. The Cantonese utterance "yih-ging yyuh-beih saai hai-douh
gaa laa!" is equivocal; it is capable of either the
active human or passive object interpretation, i.e.,
can be interpreted as either "have prepared themselves
here" or "have been prepared (as dishes by the cook)
here".
12
20. Jehng: Yauh cheng.. sahp-yih sing-neui!
<Would the twelve sacred girls come out to the stage!>
{The background Egyptian Music started; three contestants in
Egyptian costumes, each sitting on a bed-like carrier
which was carried by 4 men in Egyptian soldier
costumes, were carried out from the back stage to the
left side of the front stage and placed in a line
there. Then the music stopped. The first contestant
stepped down from the first carrier, took her
translucent silky scarf up to cover half of her face,
smiling, walking towards the stage centre where the
Pharaoh-host was seated. As the contestant was walking
towards the Pharaoh, she maintained her front largely
facing the audience. While she was walking, Jehng said
the following:}
21. Jehng: Yat-houh, Jeung Yuhk-Waah siu-je, fong-lihng yih-
sahp-yih seui.
<Number One, Miss Jeung Yuhk-Waah, her age is twenty-
two.>
{The contestant stopped in front of the standing microphone
which was placed slightly to the right and a few steps
in front of the throne. The Pharaoh-host leaned on the
left side of his throne to get a better view of the
contestant, who was basically facing the audience, but
with her left side slightly slanting towards the
13
direction of the Pharaoh. In this way, all of them
were frontal to the audience7.}
22. Jang: Aa! Jan-haih leng neui aa-haa!
<Aa! Indeed a beautiful girl!>
{The contestant then spoke into the standing microphone and
started by greeting the Pharaoh-host, usually by
saying, "Wohng-Seuhng, neih-hou" (meaning "Your
Majesty, how do you do"). Then an Egyptian soldier
carried some odd object (e.g., a green hat8) on a tray
to the front stage and stood slightly to the left and
behind the contestant. The Pharaoh asked what treasure
she had to offer. Then the contestant said something
auspicious about the object to the Pharaoh-host. The
Pharaoh-host teased her a bit, usually challenging the
____________________
7. "The audience" refers to both the audience in front of
the stage and in front of the television screen. The
live audience was most of the time not shown on the
screen. They were included by the camera occasionally,
e.g., when the contestants were being carried out from
the back stage.
8. "The green hat" is a familiar Chinese symbol for "horns"
in the Western sense. For example, when a wife is said
to give a green hat to her husband to wear, it meant
that she had an affair with somebody else and had
cheated on her husband.
14
logic of her words, but Jehng, the second male host
usually rounded up the conversation by answering some
of the harsh questions for her, and then thanking her
and hurrying her to recede to the backstage. Then the
second contestant stepped down from her carrier and
walked to the microphone and carried out another
similar conversation with the two male hosts. After
the first three have finished, the music started again,
and another three contestants were carried to the side
stage, and there was the same sequence of events until
all twelve contestants had made their appearance. Then
one more woman with her face all covered under a scarf
was being carried to the front stage. The Pharaoh
queried whether there was one more sacred girl, but
then he immediately remarked that he recognized the
`cylindrical body shape of this woman'. The woman (a
short, slightly chubby, comedy TV star) stepped down
from the carrier and scolded the Pharaoh for selecting
sacred girls behind her--the Queen. There was
immediate laughter from the live audience.}
In this dramatic way, the twelve contestants were introduced
one by one to the Pharaoh-host. By staying frontal to the
audience whether when walking or when conversing with the
hosts, the contestants were at the same time presented to
the TV audience and were for their clear and unobstructed
15
gaze (Berger, 1972). The audience's possible perspectives
on, and interpretive frames of, the contestants are from the
outset under the pre-structuring constraints of the visual
text that they are presented with. The physical, social,
and discourse organization of the beauty contest event,
which is broadcast live to millions of households in Hong
Kong, strongly induces, if not imposes, particular spectator
perspectives on, and interpretive frames of, the
contestants. In the following sections, I shall analyze the
kind of spectator perspective and interpretive frame enabled
by the organization of the visual text (van Zoonen, 1994) as
evidenced in the above example.
3.1.1 The footing9: selecting mistresses for and by the
emperor
The glamorous, magnificent Egyptian palace stage setup (with
a real-life size golden Sphinx in the background) and the
eye-dazzling golden Egyptian costumes of the hosts, the
contestants, and the soldiers all helped to create a
luxurious, royal, magnificent setting that resembles the
Chinese popular image of the golden palace of ancient
Chinese emperors. The earliest form of official beauty
____________________
9. The terms `footing' or `frame' are used by Goffman (1974,
1981) to refer to the situated people's current
definition, interpretation, or understanding, of the
situation, of what is taking place.
16
contests in China took place in the emperor's palace, under
the emperor's gaze. According to Jin-Shu (the History of
the Jin Dynasty, 265-420 A.D.), young beautiful virgins were
selected from all over the country into the palace to await
further selection by the emperor. The selected women were
further ranked into different grades of concubines or maids
to serve the emperor in his palace (Wong, 1994).
The glamorous scenario recreated on the stage for the 1992
Miss Hong Kong beauty contest, albeit an Egyptian one, was
one easily recognizable to the Chinese audience as
resembling the ancient Chinese emperor's golden palace. In
addition, the Pharaoh-host was consistently addressed to as
"Wohng-Sheuhng", which is the Chinese way of addressing the
emperor. The choice of this familiar Chinese address form
for the Egyptian Pharaoh, instead of the proper translation
of the title of Pharaoh, further enables the Chinese
audience to associate or identify the Pharaoh-host with the
traditional Chinese emperor.
The modern day Miss Hong Kong beauty contest was thus neatly
superimposed onto the ancient Chinese practice of selecting
second/third/forth/... concubines for and by the Chinese
emperor. Contextualized in this manner, the beauty contest
can look entirely unproblematic, legitimate, or simply
natural to the Chinese audience. The superimposing of the
modern day beauty contest footing (Goffman, 1974, 1981) and
17
a historical palace footing cast the contestants of the
1990s in the traditional Chinese role of concubine
candidates for the Pharaoh-host, who was himself the product
of the superimposing of an ancient absolute power figure
with a present-day sleazy guy image.
3.1.2 The objects of interest: the contestants as fresh
dishes
The conversations between the Pharaoh-host and the court-
attendant-host about the previous role of `Chief Secretary
Chan' as the emperor's food-taster and his present role in
selecting sacred girls (see Turns 1-14 in Excerpt 1 above)
again superimposed the footing of sampling food and the
footing of selecting sacred girls. The conversations
cleverly interwove the images of dishes and sacred girls,
and superimposed the act of tasting/sampling food onto that
of selecting women for the emperor. Anyone with some
sociolinguistic competence in the Cantonese language will
not fail to `hear' between the lines of the conversations.
In particular, the emphasis on who being the first one to
taste the food of the Pharaoh (see turns 9-12) strongly
suggests the corresponding traditional Chinese men's
emphasis on being the first one to take away the virginity
of a woman. This male-centric norm is crystallized in the
familiar Chinese saying, `yam tauh daahm tong', literally
meaning `to have the first mouthful of soup', referring to a
man's act of taking the virginity of a woman. In turn 10,
18
the court-attendant used and accentuated the classifier `GO-
GO', which can be a classifier for both women and dishes.
He could have used other unequivocally inanimate classifiers
(e.g., `dihp-dihp'). His use of the equivocal classifier
`go-go', however, induced the audience to interpret dishes
as a metaphor for women. The preference for this
interpretation was further hinted at in turn 13 in which the
Pharaoh-host expressed worries over leaving the sacred girls
in the hands of his former food-taster, and hurried the
court-attendant to get the sacred girls out for him to see
first.
3.1.3 The fun: teasing the contestants
To see what was offered as fun to the audience, let us look
at one typical conversation between a contestant and the
male hosts during the introduction phase described above:
Excerpt 2
{The contestant was walking towards the microphone as Jehng
said:}
1. Jehng: Gau-houh, waa, ne go hou-sihk aa, Jyu Huhng siu-
je!=
<Number Nine, waa, this one is delicious, Miss Jyu
Huhng10>
____________________
10. The name of the contestant, Jyu Huhng, happens to have
the same sounds as the Cantonese word, `jyu-huhng',
19
2. =Jang: Waa, jyu-huhng?=
<Waa, pig's blood?>
3. =Jehng: Haahk, fong-lihng yih-sahp-saam seui.
<Yeh, her age is twenty-three.>
{The contestant stopped in front of the standing microphone
and spoke into the mike, greeting the Pharaoh-host:}
4. Jyu: Wohng-Sheuhng, neih hou.
<Your Majasty, how do you do.>
5. Jang: Neih hou, neih hou. Yih-sahp-saam seui ge jyu-
huhng ngoh meih sihk-gwo ha-ha.
<How do you do, how do you do. Twenty-three-year-old
pig's blood I haven't eaten before.>
6. Jehng: Haih, neih seung sung mat-yeh bei Wohng-Sheuhng
aa?
<Well, what do you want to offer to the Emperor?>
{an Egyptian soldier carried a pair of straw sandals on a
tray to the front stage}
7. Jyu: Chou-haaih.
<Straw sandals.>
8. Jang: Ai-yaa?!
<What?!>
____________________________________________________________
meaning `pig's blood', which is a kind of Cantonese
food.
20
9. Jehng: Yiu neih jeuhk-chou11 woh!
<Wants you to flee!>
10. Jang: Wohng-Sheuhng, yih-gaa tin-haah taai-pihng, dim-
gaai yiu jeuk chou-haaih aa?=
<The Emperor, now the country is peaceful, why need to
wear straw sandals?>
11. =Jehng: Haih aak!
<Right!>
12. Jyu: Wohng-Sheuhng neigh mh-hou nau laa=
<Your Majasty please don't be angry>
13. =Jang: Ngoh mouh nau aak.
<I am not angry.>
14. Jyu: Ngoh yi-si ne haih juk neih `chou'-jo wohng-hauh
ji-hauh, fu-chai ho-yih guhng-`haaih'-baahk-sau aa maa.
<What I meant was to wish that after you have `married'
your queen you two will `live happily' ever after.>
15. Jang: Juhng minh-keuhng, chou-haaih, baai-jo go `chou'
jih ji-hauh jauh `cho'-jo wohng-hauh ji-hauh ho-yih
guhng-`haaih'-baahk-sau, jeung go `haaih' jih baai hai
hauh-mihn=
<That makes even less sense: `cho-haaih', you first
placed the word `cho', that is `having married the
____________________
11. `Cheuhk-chou' is a Cantonese slang word meaning `to
flee', usually used to describe criminals fleeing the
police.
21
queen, then living happily ever after', then placed the
word `haaih' at the back>12
16. =Jehng: Haih cheuhng-cheuhng-gau-gau aa maa.
<Yes, that means ever-lasting.>
17. Jang: Gum cheuhng! Waa, gum neih mh-baai maaih tiuh
sing?! {in an ironic tone}
<That long! Hey, why didn't you also place a piece of
string?!>
18. Jehng: Yauh yauh yauh, Wohng-Sheuhng nau laak.
<Yes, yes, yes, the Emperor is angry now.> {the last
utterance seemed to be directed to the contestant}
19. Jang: Yauh sing ge chou-haaih gum maih-=
<sandals with a string, they become- >
20. =Jehng: Jau jau jau.
<Go go go.> {gesturing the contestant to recede to
the backstage}
21. Jyu: Do-jeh. {The contestant walked to the backstage}
<Thank you.>
22. Jehng: Ngoh-deih yauh-cheng sahp-yat houh ....
<We'd like to invite Number Eleven ....>
____________________
12. The Cantonese word for straw sandals is `cho-haaih'.
The first syllable `cho' has the same sound as another
Cantonese word meaning `to marry'. The second
syllable, `haaih' has the same sound as another
Cantonese word meaning `to live harmoniously or happily
together'.
22
The contestant-as-delicious-food image was again projected
in turns 1-5 by the two male hosts. They took advantage of
the contestant's name (`Jyu Huhng', having the same sound as
the Cantonese word for `pig's blood'), describing the
contestant as `delicious' (turn 1) `23-year-old pig's blood'
that the Pharaoh-host `had not eaten before' (turn 5). The
contestant all the time remained smiling and appeasing. In
this conversation of 22 speaking turns, the contestant had
only five speaking turns. The first (turn 4) and last (turn
21) were used to greet and to thank the host(s). The other
three turns were used to introduce the present to the
emperor (turn 7), to appease the emperor (turn 12), and to
explain the auspicious meaning of the present (turn 14).
The structure of the conversations between the other
contestants and the two male hosts resembles the one
exemplified in Except 2. The contestant was given speaking
slots only to greet the emperor, to introduce and explain
the meaning of the present and to say thank you and then she
was to recede to the backstage to make space for the next
contestant to enter into another similar conversation with
the male hosts. The Pharaoh- or emperor-host invariably
found fault with the logic of the contestant's explanation
of the auspicious meaning of the present, which was
invariably an odd object as a present (e.g., a green hat, a
pair of straw sandals, a white candle, etc.).
23
It can be seen that this treasure-offering introductory
phase of the beauty contest has a peculiar social and
discourse organization. The contestant was put into a
difficult position where she was required to give a
`sensible' account (see the Pharaoh-host's criticism of the
contestant's account in turn 15) for something insensible
(the odd-object-as-a-present). There is a built-in
structure in the activity that makes the contestant easily
open to the emperor-host's criticism regarding the
sensibleness of her account. The court-attendant-host
invariably rounded off the emperor-host's criticism and
brought the conversation to an end to move onto another
conversation with the next contestant. All the time, the
contestants remained smiling and appeasing and after all
this teasing by the emperor-host (e.g., turns 15, 17 in
Excerpt 2) and patronizing by the attendant-host (e.g., turn
18, 20 in Excerpt 2), they invariably said thank you (to the
hosts and/or to the audience?) and receded.
The physical, social, and discourse organization of this
introductory phase enables a particular spectator
perspective on the contestants. The contestants were cast
in the role of appeasing subordinates to the male hosts.
They were subject to their teasing, criticizing, and
patronizing, but they were still responding to them with
smiles and obeying their orders (e.g., turns 20-21 in
24
Excerpt 2). The particular spectator perspective that is
enabled by the visual text structured in this manner fits
neatly with the traditional Chinese normative framework
underlying social expectations about the appropriate ways in
which women should behave in relation to their male
masters/superiors.
The limited space of this paper does not permit further
documentation and analysis of more examples from the 1992
Miss Hong Kong contest and from other Miss Hong Kong and
Miss Asia beauty contests in recent years. Suffice to say,
the visual texts offered to the TV audience by these beauty
contest events seem to be variations on similar themes.
They are organized in ways that both enable and induce
particular kinds of male spectator gaze on the contestants.
In this process, the role and the discourse work of the all-
male host team are indispensable.
4 The Contestant Position: Accessing the Glamorous Public
Sphere with Personal Courage and Psychological Strength
In the above section, we have seen that the contestants
apparently willingly participated in a TV show in which they
were assigned a subordinate, appeasing, submissive, and sex-
servant/object role in relation to the male hosts (e.g., the
contestants were cast in the role of candidate
mistresses/food for the emperor). One might ask the
25
questions who would want to participate, and why they would
want to participate in beauty contests.
In TVB's publicity for the 1996 Miss Hong Kong beauty
contest, the slogan, `Sing-gwong chaan-naahn daaih-douh,
Gong-Je yahn-lihng hei-bouh' (`To the starry glamorous way,
Miss Hong Kong leads the way') was used. The glamorous
public sphere that the beauty contest is projected by TVB to
present is vividly summed up in this slogan. The beauty
contest provides an entry point for an anonymous woman to
get famous overnight, to access the glamorous world of the
stars (movie/TV stars), and to become a star herself.
In fact, many of the winners of the contests have become
TV/movie stars. A few have become very famous actresses,
winning local and overseas acting awards. Some, however,
have become Grade III (adult sex) movie stars. A few have
been married into the households of wealthy businessmen and
have left the entertainment circle. A few have become
singers or TV hosts, and a few have started their own
businesses.
In the words of a contestant for this year's (1996) Miss
Asia beauty contest cited in Next Magazine (August 30, 1996,
p. 42):
26
"Keih-saht chaam-gaa syun-meih, yat haih seun cheut-
meng, yat haih seun yahp yyuh-lohk-hyun ...."
<"In fact, one participates in a beauty contest to
become famous or to get into the entertainment
circle13....">
The beauty contest does seem to provide women with a channel
to achieve social and material success. It seems to be the
only alternative path for social mobility apart from the one
provided by the school system (e.g., through getting higher
and professional education). However, unlike the education
path, where the capital required is middle-class linguistic,
cultural, and academic resources (Bourdieu & Passeron,
1977), and where working class school children in Hong Kong
typically lack the linguistic and cultural capital to
succeed (Lin, 1996a, 1996b), in the path offered by the
beauty contest, the capital is the woman's body and her
ability to handle whatever embarrassing, degrading roles
that are assigned to her by the beauty contest organizer, as
well as her ability to deal with the media and to attract
media attention. One could perhaps argue that at least it
____________________
13. The Cantonese word `yyuh-lohk-hyun' literally means `the
entertainment circle'. The corresponding word in
English would be `the show business', but the Cantonese
word seems to have a lower status than what the word
`show business' would imply.
27
is a path that is more equalitarian than the present school
system because presumably there should be a similar
distribution of different body types among working class and
middle class women. The distribution of body shapes among
the population is presumably `class-blind'. It is also a
short-cut to success for new immigrant women from Mainland
China. Apart from the body-capital, the beauty contest
seems to be a test of personal courage, psychological
strength, and social tactfulness. In the words of the
legendary 47-year-old Gung Syut-Faa (real name: Jiang Guoyu;
Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, September 4, 1995), a
mainland Chinese immigrant who participated in the 1995 Miss
Asia beauty contest and won the title of `Winner of the Most
Media Attention' (a prize based on the votes of
entertainment media reporters), what she thought she relied
on to succeed in the beauty contest were:
"....yuhng-hei woh tin-san laih-jat, waahn-yauh ngoh
dik faan-buhn sam-leih...."
<"....my courage and my inborn beauty, as well as my
rebellious psychological complex....">
(Cited in The International Chinese Newsweekly, August
18, 1996, p. 64.)
It seems that the contestants are not simply passive puppets
in the hands of the media. They `bite the bullet' to
achieve their target: to get famous, to access the glamorous
28
public sphere, and to be a winner in it. There seems to be
a strong sense of self-assertion despite the appeasing,
smiling, submissive roles cast for them by the hosting
television companies. It seems that they know what they are
in for, and they are willing to pay the price for it.
5 Still Under the Male Gaze
There is, however, a danger in romanticizing the beauty
contest as an `equalitarian' path to success based on a
woman's personal psychological strength and inborn and
disciplined beauty (e.g., through dieting and exercising to
keep one's measurements). While one might celebrate the
sense of self-assertion, self-determination, and self-
discipline (which are ironically still values of the male
world [Bordo, 1993]) that the contestants have when they
play this glamorous game, one must not forget that it is
still the male spectator's needs and expectations (as
perceived and projected by the media) that get translated
into the rules of the game. The contestants can assert
themselves by choosing to play the game. They can try to
gain social and material success by playing within, or even
exploiting, the rules of the game, but they can never change
the rules of the game. From the case described below of 46-
year-old Lauh Yyuht-Hou in this year's (1996) Miss Asia
beauty contest, we shall see that it is, after all, the male
spectator's needs and norms (as perceived by the media) that
29
govern the rules of the game and the chance of success of a
contestant no matter how hard she tries or how much
sacrifice she makes.
5.1 Collaboration, collusion, and co-exploitation? The media
and the contestants
The success of Gung Syut-Faa in the 1995 Miss Asia beauty
contest depends on her ability to attract media attention
with her legendary background (e.g., having lived in Paris,
having been a red guard during the Cultural Revolution in
China) as well as her elegant classical Chinese beauty
image. The media's attention enabled her to make her
frontal appearance in the public sphere frequently (her
full-size pictures on popular magazine covers and
newspapers). Her high-class ancient classical Chinese
beauty image gradually won her public acceptance and
popularity. This seems to be a happy story of the
collaboration or co-exploitation between the media and the
contestant. The media depends on weaving sensational
stories around her (e.g., her background, her history, etc.)
to attract audience. She depends on the media to access the
public sphere to project her classical Chinese beauty image.
In this case it seems that both sides gain from exploiting
each other.
30
During this year's (1996) Miss Asia beauty contest, an
emulating contestant, 46-year-old Hong Kong local woman Lauh
Yyuht-Hou, also enters herself into this media game.
However, so far only the media side seems to have gained.
On the day of the semi-final contest (August 31, 1996), her
nude-breast pictures appeared on the front page of a popular
newspaper in Hong Kong. She was immediately ousted by the
contest organizer, ATV. The comments given by Ms Yihp Gaa-
Bou, Assistant Production Management Manager of ATV, were,
"Yyuh-gwo chap seung yauh meih-gam, daaih-wui dou wui
haau-leuih gai-juhk bei heuih chaam-choi, daahn di
seung taai louh-gwat laa! Yihm-chuhng ying-heung Aa-Je
yihng-jeuhng, so-yih daaih-wui kyut-dihng cheui-siu
heuih ge chaam-choi ji-gaak."
<"If the pictures can inspire a sense of beauty, the
contest organizing committee would still consider
allowing her to continue to participate in the contest,
but those pictures are too explicit! They seriously
affect the image of Miss Asia, therefore, the contest
organizing committee decided to cancel her eligibility
to participate in the contest.">
(Cited in Apple Daily, September 1, 1996, p. C1)
In the subsequent popular print media (the popular Next
Magazine), where she posed similar nude-breast pictures, she
was portrayed as "cheap", "ugly", "hungry for money",
31
"willingly to do anything for money", in short, as low-
class. The print media went into graphic details to comment
on her "not having even shaved her arm-pit hairs" in her
pictures, and her having a birth-giving scar on her tummy,
etc.. She was cited as expressing the wish to star in Grade
III movies, as considering herself good for roles of triad
society women-leaders, as willing to do anything that can
enable her to buy a house and a car in the shortest period
of time, and as wanting to ask the concerned three
newspapers for indemnities for showing and re-showing her
nude pictures. All through the reporting, the magazine
writer maintained an ironic, despising tone. The writer
reported having asked the famous Hong Kong Grade III movie
maker, Wohng Jing, whether he would invite Lauh to star in
his movies, and then cited Wohng's despising answer, "Saam-
kap-pin mh-haih waah heuih seung paak jauh yauh dak paak!"
("Grade III movies are not there for her to do just because
she wants to do them!") (Next Magazine, September 6, 1996,
pp. 12-16).
It seems that Lauh cannot change the rules of the game. She
falls short of meeting the male spectator's needs and norms
(as perceived by the media). Unlike Gung, her image is
perceived as `too cheap', as not capable of `inspiring a
sense of beauty', nor does she have an exotic, legendary
origin or history as a `selling point' for the media. The
only selling point the media can see in her is perhaps her
32
desperate aggressiveness, her stark openness about her goals
as well as her willingness to pose nude to attract media
attention. Would she be able to achieve social and material
success later on? Would she, in time, be accepted by the
media and the public? So far, it seems that she lacks the
body and image capital (which Gung has) to play well in this
game, the rules of which are still largely defined by the
needs and norms of the male spectator gaze (as perceived and
projected by the media).
33
6 Who's the Winner? Who's the Loser? Who Cares? What's
the Public's Position? What's the Researcher's
Position?
"The beauty contest is not a game", said the Variety Show
Programme Production Manager of ATV. "It is a legal
contract with legal binding power", "We have spent so much
money on the contestants; whoever wants to drop out will
have to pay us indemnities." (Cited in Next Magazine, August
30, 1996, p. 43; original in Cantonese).
But yes, it is a game, a commercial game in which the media
side always wins. Whether or not the contestants can win
depends on the extent to which they can meet the
requirements of the male spectator gaze (as perceived and
projected by the media).
What about the audience or the public? It seems that we are
all implicated in this game. The audience/public represents
a market that the media are trying to produce sensational,
exciting shows and stories to entice. In the process of
their production, they provide an opportunity for anonymous
women to access the glamorous public sphere. The
contestants gain social and material success if they can
fulfil the media's production needs. The production needs
are in turn driven by (perceived) market needs.
34
What are the market needs? Do we enjoy the beauty contest
shows? Do we enjoy the sensational media stories
surrounding the contests and contestants? Who are "we"?
Who is the "faceless audience"?
The rating figures of beauty contests and the sales figures
of these magazines/newspapers seem to prove that they do
have a sizable audience. The feminist researcher's voice is
a lonely one. However, what is more ironic is that the
feminist researcher represents a middle-class woman looking
at how non-middle-class women access social and material
benefits, which the middle-class woman already enjoys. If
we do not work towards changing the society in the direction
of providing better and more equalitarian socio-economic
upward opportunities for women of all classes, can feminist
researchers answer the criticism of being just another
benefitor of the game: getting research publications out of
the material of the beauty contest game? I have struggled
and am still struggling with these questions. It seems that
a feminist-reseacher must also be a feminist-activist. This
is the only way to justify our research.
REFERENCES
35
Age and moxie make ex-red guard a winner in popularity
sweepstakes. (1995, September 4). Asian Wall Street
Journal Weekly.
[Attack on ATV: Miss Asia Contestant No. 8 quitted] (in
Chinese). (1996, August 30). Next Magazine, 42-45.
[Beauty contests instantiate partriarchy] (in Chinese).
(1994, June 1). Ming Pao.
Beauty pageant tops ratings. (1996, February 4). South China
Morning Post, p. 3.
Berger, J. (1972). Ways of seeing. London: British
Broadcasting Corporation and Penguin Books.
Bordo, S. (1993). Unbearable weight: Feminism, western
culture, and the body. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
Bourdieu, P., & Eagleton, T. (1992). Doxa and common life.
New Left Review, 191, 111-121.
Bourdieu, P., & Passeron, J-C. (1977). Reproduction in
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Goffman, E. (1974). Frame analysis. New York: Harper & Row.
Goffman, E. (1981). Forms of talk. Philadelphia: University
of Pennsylvania Press.
[Gung Syut-Faa's love and hate for Hong Kong] (in Chinese).
(1996, August 18). Yazhou Zhoukan: The International
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Ho, H. C. Y. (1994). The state of the economy. In P. K. Choi
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(pp. 75-94). Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press.
36
[Lauh Yyuht-Hou will do anything for money] (in Chinese).
(1996, September 6). Next Magazine, 12-16.
Lin, A. M. Y. (1996a). Doing-English-lessons in secondary
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Lin, A. M. Y. (1996b). Bilingualism or linguistic
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New Women's Association (1985). [Survey report on Hong Kong
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Hong Kong: New Women's Association.
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APPENDIX: NOTES ON TRANSCRIPTION
(1) Cantonese is transcribed in the Yale system. English
translations of Cantonese utterances are bolded and
37
placed in pointed brackets < > beneath the Cantonese
utterances.
(2) The numeral preceding each turn is the speaking turn
number.
(3) Pauses and gaps: A short pause is indicated by ".."
and a longer one by "...".
(4) "...." appears at boundaries of the excerpt, indicating
the untranscribed utterances.
(5) The latching of a second speaking turn to a preceding
one is indicated by an equal sign "=", e.g.:
Jang: Ngoh sihk di yeh heuih bong ngoh sihk sin go wo,=
<Those things I ate he tasted first,>
=Jehng: Mh! Mouh-cho aa!
<Mh! That's right!>
(6) Contextual information: Significant contextual
information is given in curly brackets, e.g.:
Jang: Syun sing-neui? Hei-hei! {chuckling sleazily}
<Selecting sacred girls? Hei-hei!>
(7) Accentuation: Accentuated syllables are marked by
capitalization, e.g.:
Jehng: Haih aa! GO-GO si wahn gaa!
<Yeh! EACH ONE he tasted first!>
38