Anyone who has seen a 1960s Chinese Communist Party propaganda poster will understand that the cult of celebrity is not new in the country. Mao was, is, and perhaps always will be, China's most famous face.

However, modern Chinese market capitalism offers more than just the political stage to launch a glittering career in the public limelight and the country's TV screens, billboards, magazines and posters teem with thousands of well known photo-shopped profiles, with perfect milky skin and glittering teeth. Mao founded the modern Chinese state. But what did the likes of DaShan do to deserve his fame and why is a picture of a two legged, upside down, Henanese pig displayed on my computer screen?

1) Western celebrities
Loved by the Chinese for his flawless Mandarin and loathed by legions of envious Western language students for the same reason, Dashan (Canadian national, Mark Rowswell) has carved out a Chinese TV career for himself since first arriving in China as a Beijing University language student in the 1980s.

A high level of Mandarin language ability will always present a red flag to frustrated language students (myself included), but why does Dashan seem to inspire such strong emotion? Much of it seems to rest on the nature of his fame. It's probably not wrong to hypothesize that had Dashan been CBC, ABC, BBC (or other annoying but handy ethnic acronym of your choice), his linguistic talent would not have been enough to propel him to such stardom. Without detracting from his obvious natural ability (Chinese xiangsheng comedy is highly skilled and regarded) his national fame can be related to a large extent to his being the two Ws: White and Western.

To take an anthropological approach, the idea of the 'noble savage' seems relevant. This term is used to describe an exotic Other who learns, takes on or is taught traits of their adopted country's culture and is thus accepted, or deemed 'civilized', and so gains public fame. This is not a new or China-specific phenomenon. The precedent was set in 1616 by Pocahontas when she travelled to London fully Christianised (forget the cosy Disney cartoon!) and became a star of the English public. A similar scenario was repeated in 1897 in the case of Minic Wallace, when he was transported from Greenland to New York under dubious circumstances and Americanised with ultimately tragic consequences.

Anthropology aside, the moral of the story is, if you're a fame hungry laowai who's got the 'right' ethnic look, put in your 10,000 hours of study to become a master of Mandarin, book yourself a slot on CCTV4's Chinese Language Competition and… fame and riches await! 

2) Sports stars
Any successful sports person in any country will achieve a certain level of fame. But in China, international sporting success catapults Chinese sports people to stratospheric and frenzied levels of stardom within the country. Perhaps this is something to do with the legacy of maltreatment by Western colonial powers and associated issues of inferiority haunting the national psyche. According to the Forbes rich list report, Yao Ming's net worth exceeds $100 million, earned through a mixture of healthy basketball salary and a wide array of not so healthy product endorsements, including McDonald's. Li Na's bank balance probably isn't doing too badly either after becoming the first Chinese national to win a Grand Slam title.  

3) Cultural heroes
Mao has become THE posthumous celebrity commodity in China, but while the chairman is certainly the biggest and brightest, he is just one of many Chinese politico-cultural heroes to attain celebrity status. Lei Feng, hero and communist poster boy, still features in many Chinese school textbooks and March 5th continues to be 'Learn from Lei Feng Day'. Other modern humble proletariat-turned-national-stars include Zhan Qixiong, captain of a Chinese fishing vessel, who achieved unsolicited stardom when he was detained by the Japanese authorities in September 2010. And communist culture singers such as Song Zuying and Peng Liyuan continue to be popular with older generations.

4) Screen stars and singers
China has perfected maddening Western teenage pop culture into a new art form. Clone armies of childish, kitsch 20 somethings smile and cry about love from movie videos, or stare dolefully from CD covers wherever you go. 
As for the silver screen, there are some great Chinese actors, such as Tony Leung or Zhang Ziyi, famous for their acting alone. But knowing your gongfu skills certainly won't hurt your star ratings either. The martial art reserves a special place in Chinese culture, and actors such as Jet Li, Chou Yun-Fat and of course the ubiquitous Jackie Chan are perpetually popular with the Chinese public.

 

5) The weird and wonderful
The end of 2010 saw Strong Willed Pig, a two legged pig from Henan, hit the Chinese internet and TV channels, proving that it's not only humans who have celebrity appeal in China. In fact, if you're a little out of the ordinary, no matter what or who you are, you're bound to find some degree of celebrity success. Another example firmly in the wonderful category is Jin Xing, a male Chinese colonel turned internationally acclaimed female dance star, who demonstrates that being outside the societal normal is no barrier to success in the country.

Celebrity in China is not only defined by Western consumer culture (nothing is simple or straightforward in this huge, diverse country). The concept is multifaceted and involves complex interactions between culture, economics, politics, race and particular social processes, such as the rise of nationalism, to create a particular brand of celebrity with 'Chinese characteristics'.
 

Related links
Survey: Who and What Most Represent China?
Your Guide to the Stars: Popular Chinese Movie Stars
Big in Asia: China's Hottest Female Stars

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Keywords: celebrities in China dashan in china western stars in china movie stars in china sports stars in china