In my experience, the font has been associated too often with racism aimed at me.”īut can a font, in itself, truly be racist? “I see (the font) Wonton and I see the words ‘Jap,’ ‘nip,’ ‘chink,’ ‘gook,’ ‘slope.’ I can’t help it. “I think of words in anti-Asian or anti-Japanese signs,” wrote Japanese American journalist Gil Asakawa, who began his career during a wave of anti-Japanese sentiment or “Nipponophobia” in the 1980s. While the shirt wasn’t his creation, the art director told various media outlets, “It is something I deeply regret, and my eyes have been opened to the profound ripple effect that this mistake has had.” Lululemon quickly distanced itself from its art director emphasizing that the brand had not produced the “inappropriate and inexcusable” shirt.įor an older generation of Asian Americans, spotting the faux brushstroke lettering can trigger past traumas. The design featured a chop suey font on a take-out box with bat wings, alluding to the purported origins of the coronavirus. In 2020, with the Covid-19 pandemic ushering a new tide of Sinophobia, Canadian apparel brand Lululemon fired its art director after he seemingly endorsed a “Bat Fried Rice” T-shirt design bearing the words “No Thank You,” by posting it to his Instagram. A spokesperson for Abercrombie & Fitch, meanwhile, said in an email that T-shirts featuring caricatures and stereotypical fonts from 2002 “were inexcusable 19 years ago when they were released, and they do not reflect A&F Co.’s values today.” The spokesperson added that the company encourages a “culture of belonging” and is “committed to doing better in the future.”ĬD Projekt, which used stereotypical Asian fonts in game graphics last year, did not respond to CNN’s request for comment. Similarly, online grocer Fresh Direct, clothing brand Abercrombie & Fitch and the game developers behind “Cyberpunk 2077,” CD Projekt, are among the many companies criticized for using culturally appropriative fonts in the last two decades.Ī spokesperson for FreshDirect told CNN that the company “unequivocally” denounces racism and discrimination and regrets using a controversial typeface on advertising and packaging for its “stir fry kits,” adding that no-one involved in the 2012 decision is still at the organization. O’Donnell on a 1876 ballot, as he vowed to deport all Chinese immigrants if he was elected into office.Īn anti-Japanese propaganda poster that circulated during the World War II. In her book, “This is What Democracy Looked Like: A Visual History of the Printed Ballot,” Cooper Union professor Alicia Cheng draws attention to the “chopsticks font,” as she calls it, used by San Francisco politician Dr. White politicians, meanwhile, have been using chop suey fonts to stoke xenophobia for over a century. Critics believe that using chop suey typefaces is downright racist, particularly when deployed by non-Asian creators. It’s hard not to cringe at the Chinese stereotypes bundled up with each font package – especially when seen through the lens of today’s heightened vigilance toward discrimination and systemic racism. Variations on the font are commercially distributed as Wonton, Peking, Buddha, Ginko, Jing Jing, Kanban, Shanghai, China Doll, Fantan, Martial Arts, Rice Bowl, Sunamy, Karate, Chow Fun, Chu Ching San JNL, Ching Chang and Chang Chang. Type designers in the West have since cooked up many of their own versions of chop suey. House of Moy Lee Chin Restaurant, Miami Beach, Florida in 1980. But this has not prevented the proliferation of chop suey lettering and its close identification with Chinese culture outside of China.” “Neither the food nor the fonts bear any real relation to true Chinese cuisine or calligraphy. “Mandarin, originally known as Chinese, is the granddaddy of ‘chop suey’ types,” Shaw wrote in the design magazine, Print. It is perhaps no surprise that this Eastern-inspired lettering emerged in the late 19th century, an era when Orientalism coursed feverishly through the West. Shaw traces the fonts’ origins to the Cleveland Type Foundry which obtained a patent for a calligraphy-style printing type, later named Mandarin, in 1883. These “chop suey fonts,” as American historian Paul Shaw calls them, have been a typographical shortcut for “Asianness” for decades. There’s a good chance you pictured letters made from the swingy, wedge-shaped strokes you’ve seen on restaurant signs, menus, take-away boxes and kung-fu movie posters. Here’s a thought experiment: Close your eyes and imagine the font you’d use to depict the word “Chinese.”
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