Sima Qian Analysis
In both Herodotus’ The Histories and Sima Qian’s Records of the Grand Historian, there is a great deal of attention paid to the non-Greek and non-Chinese foreigners encountered by both historians. Herodotus’ work arises from his extensive travels and interest in other peoples, while Sima Qian’s “The Account of Dayuan” serves a strictly strategic purpose to facilitate the Han emperor’s rule. However, both works do share a common theme of ethnocentric superiority. Herodotus and Sima Qian imply the superiority of their own cultures vis-à-vis the foreigners they encounter. Ultimately, their works converge in their similarities as both Herodotus and Sima Qian document the employment of cultural appropriation to further debase the foreign cultures
…show more content…
In Book 4 of The Histories, Herodotus describes the Greeks’ adoption of the Pelasgians’ “practice of making ithyphallic statues of Hermes” (Hdt., 2.51). It is evident that this only takes place because such cultural technologies are useful to the Greeks – Herodotus reports that this only happened after the Pelasgians consulted a Greek oracle who instructed them to adopt the names of gods in their sacrificial rituals much like how the Greeks do so (Hdt., 4.52). Likewise, in Sima Qian’s “The Account of Dayuan”, he documents how the “skills of the foreign magicians and tricksters had been imported into China” by the Han empire solely for the sake of improving the entertainment options available to the Chinese. This is clearly appropriative as these foreigners’ skills are otherwise paraded in a circus-like fashion and objectified through the emperor’s “displays of unusual skills and all sorts of rare creatures” (Sima Qian, The Account of Dayuan, p. 244). This demonstrates how non-Chinese foreigners are viewed by the Han emperor as novelties for the Chinese people’s amusement, and that their skills are cherry-picked for use in China only when they serve a trivial function of entertainment. Hence, both historians emphasise the contrast between their native and foreign cultures by appropriating certain aspects of foreign cultures that are beneficial to them. Their work disregards the complexity of foreign cultures by reducing them to certain cultural quirks which are only acknowledged in relation to how useful they are for their respective native
In Book 4 of The Histories, Herodotus describes the Greeks’ adoption of the Pelasgians’ “practice of making ithyphallic statues of Hermes” (Hdt., 2.51). It is evident that this only takes place because such cultural technologies are useful to the Greeks – Herodotus reports that this only happened after the Pelasgians consulted a Greek oracle who instructed them to adopt the names of gods in their sacrificial rituals much like how the Greeks do so (Hdt., 4.52). Likewise, in Sima Qian’s “The Account of Dayuan”, he documents how the “skills of the foreign magicians and tricksters had been imported into China” by the Han empire solely for the sake of improving the entertainment options available to the Chinese. This is clearly appropriative as these foreigners’ skills are otherwise paraded in a circus-like fashion and objectified through the emperor’s “displays of unusual skills and all sorts of rare creatures” (Sima Qian, The Account of Dayuan, p. 244). This demonstrates how non-Chinese foreigners are viewed by the Han emperor as novelties for the Chinese people’s amusement, and that their skills are cherry-picked for use in China only when they serve a trivial function of entertainment. Hence, both historians emphasise the contrast between their native and foreign cultures by appropriating certain aspects of foreign cultures that are beneficial to them. Their work disregards the complexity of foreign cultures by reducing them to certain cultural quirks which are only acknowledged in relation to how useful they are for their respective native