'How this font became the face of Chinese food in America'

19:56 May 18
'Chop suey fonts are a subcategory of so-called \"ethnic\" display fonts, and are a unique American invention with roots in the 170 year history of Chinese migrants in United States.  If you enjoyed this video, please consider supporting the great work at Welcome to Chinatown. https://www.welcometochinatown.com/ https://www.instagram.com/welcome.to.chinatown/  Special thanks to Raven Mo for her contribution to the original research, title dividers and personal perspective shared in this video. https://ravenmo.info/ https://www.instagram.com/ravenmodesign/  ---  0:00 This lettering will look familiar... unless you\'re from China. 1:06 What is a Chop Suey font? 1:35 Typographic Stereotypes from repeat usage 2:02 Typographic Stereotypes with design intent 3:04 How Chinese writing works, compared with Chop Suey fonts 4:44 Where it started, how it began 5:22 Some historical context 6:41 Chinatown\'s theatrical reinvention 7:21 How exclusion propelled Chinese restaurant expansion 9:16 Repetition trumps authenticity 10:05 Why Chinese restaurants perpetuated this trope 10:57 Can a font be racist? 11:17 The type equivalent of a fake foreign accent 12:16 Or... don\'t be a hack? 13:14 Where are things headed? 13:50 Chinese food is more than takeout food 15:11 Corporate high-end dining 15:42 Embassy restaurants 16:06 New-school Chinese American restaurants 16:45 An expression of Chinese identities 17:54 TienMin Liao\'s multi-script typography 19:02 How to support Chinatown\'s survival  ---  Sources and further resources: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mmz42awTRsA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2K88pWCimZg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Maîtres_de_l\'Affiche https://www.printmag.com/design-resources/stereo_types/ https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/its-chinatown/ https://cup.columbia.edu/book/chop-suey-usa/9780231168922 https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/chop-suey-fonts-hyphenated/index.html http://fontdata.com/american-typeface-design-patents/?filter=d:Thorp%2C+Henry+H. https://scholars.org/brief/untold-story-chinese-restaurants-america https://www.researchgate.net/publication/334429825_Cultural_Stereotypes_in_Letter_Forms_in_Public_Space https://apebhconference.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/carter1.pdf https://medium.com/aj-news/heres-what-chinese-takeout-menus-can-teach-us-about-immigration-4b41fcf5c0f7 https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3576038/ https://medium.com/@Typeji/bilingual-lettering-2-observation-aa7921df018 https://typeji.com/MultiScript  Type 1 typographic sterotypes: https://linedandunlined.com/archive/new-black-face/ https://firstamericanartmagazine.com/papyrus-bad-fonts/  Plus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waOUNwZA4aQ https://www.vox.com/videos/2019/3/26/18282192/asian-accent-l-and-r https://fortune.com/2020/06/21/chinese-restaurants-food-american-immigrants-businesses-coronavirus/ https://www.mocanyc.org/ https://margaretcho.com/2012/03/21/chop-suey-font/ https://exhibits.lapl.org/chinatown/  Images: http://menus.nypl.org/menus https://www.foodanddrink.amdigital.co.uk/ https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/soete-menu-collection?keywords=chinese https://tessa.lapl.org/cdm/search/collection/menus/searchterm/chinese/order/nosort https://www.loc.gov/collections/genthe/ https://hdl.huntington.org/digital/ https://californiarevealed.org/   

Tags: chinese new year , Typography , lunar new year , Racial Stereotypes , typographic stereotyping , cultural stereotypes , visual sterotypes , chop suey font , chop suey lettering , ching chong font , wonton font

See also:

comments