REVOLUTIONARY” BALLETS IN THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY’S DOMESTIC & FOREIGN POLICY TOOLKITS JACINTA CHEN

Jacinta Chen

“REVOLUTIONARY” BALLETS IN THE CHINESE

COMMUNIST PARTY’S DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN

POLICY TOOLKITS: EXPLORING THE POLITICS OF

THE RED DETACHMENT OF WOMEN AND THE WHITE

HAIRED GIRL

As communist China entered the Cultural Revolution (1966-76), Jiang Qing, Mao Zedong’s wife, and other members of the Gang of Four, a dominant faction of officials in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), called for all forms of art to be “revolutionized.” These central leaders in the CCP dismantled traditional forms of Chinese folk dance and opera, spearheading the Central Opera Ballet Troupe’s production of The Red Detachment of Women (1964) as well as the Shanghai Ballet Company’s production of The White Haired Girl (1965)—two highly emblematic and spectacular propagandistic ballets. Since both ballets were part of Jiang Qing’s repertoire of eight model operas, it is no surprise that productions of them dominated domestic and foreign theatres throughout the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). In addition to impressing U.S. President Richard Nixon during his first visit to China, state-sponsored performances of The Red Detachment of Women have recently received acclaim from audiences in prominent Western opera houses. Meanwhile, Chinese President Xi Jinping recently staged The White-Haired Girl to mark the seventieth anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. In a nutshell, this paper seeks to explore how the CCP has leveraged “revolutionary” ballet as a political tool during the Mao and post-Mao eras. More specifically, this paper will argue that the Gang of Four utilized choreographic elements—techniques from Russian ballet, Chinese martial arts, and Chinese folk dance— as well as extrachoreographic elements—costumes, sets, props, and music—to convey its social, political, and economic attitudes through both productions. Additionally, this paper attempts to explain why the CCP has more recently deployed a tour of The White- -Haired Girl within China as a domestic policy tool, on the one hand, and a tour of The Red Detachment of Women around the world as an indirect domestic policy tool and direct foreign policy tool, on the other. With a strong Sino-Soviet alliance in the 1950s, the spectacle of Russian ballet garnered immense excitement in China. Many Chinese strove to learn ballet from their Russian partners, and soon, enough interest mounted that China established its first ballet company in 1959. While the Chinese initially performed typical Russian ballet dances, Chinese choreographers chose to intermingle elements of Chinese folk dance with classical ballet in their first original production, The Magic Lotus Lantern (1957). By mixing in movements, costumes, set designs, music, and props from other Chinese traditions, the CCP stylized “revolutionary modern ballets” like The Red Detachment of Women and The White Haired Girl. These ballets allowed the CCP to transform the landscape of performing arts, instill a strong sense of national pride among Chinese people, and conduct cultural exchanges during the Cold War.

Although the CCP’s sponsorship of ballet—as a dance form that originated in Italy—may seem to contradict its rejection of the West, many Chinese saw ballet as a “universally significant artistic form whose cultural value transcended particular ethnic, racial or class associations.” Agreeing with this perception that ballet was not merely a Western form of artistic movement, the Gang of Four felt justified in adopting ballet as an official dance form. Since ballet could transcend particular ethnic, racial or class associations, the CCP was comfortable utilizing ballet, rather than traditional Chinese dance, as a social, political, and economic propaganda tool during the Cultural Revolution.

Beyond simply producing another Russian-style ballet, the CCP prided itself on creating a “revolutionized” dance form in The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl. One contemporaneous review of The Red Detachment of Women from the choreographer Huang Boshou implies that the production was not considered “copying of Western forms… but rather as an intervention that fundamentally revolutionized the Western form itself.” The Gang of Four saw itself as a proponent of a new form of dance— independent of Italian, French, British, American, and Russian ballet. From the CCP’s perspective, “an intervention” required the removal of “bourgeois,” “feudal,” and “Western” elements. In both ballets, the performers maintained technical elements from ballet by dancing with pointe technique and using ballet postures and lines. However, the CCP claimed this dance as its own by incorporating choreographic elements from Chinese martial arts and folk dance as well as unique Chinese extrachoregraphic elements, which include costumes, sets, props, and music. Ultimately, the CCP used these two types of elements to communicate its social, political, and economic ideals to its audiences.

In light of the feminist, communist, and socialist nature of these ballet’s storylines, Western scholarship has cast these ballets as Mao-era propaganda. Their powerful messages have kept “revolutionary” ballet at the forefront of Western scholarship. Though the dance form of ballet has been tied to the state since its inception, my paper is the first to fully analyze how the CCP’s social, political, and economic beliefs were bolstered by striking choreographic and extrachoreographic elements in The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl.

Chinese dancers in 2007; image from Wikimedia Commons Based on events that occurred on Hainan Island during China’s Second Civil War (1927-37), The Red Detachment of Women tells the story of Wu Qionghua, a female peasant-turned-soldier who fights for feminism, communism, and socialism. Wu barely escapes from bondage of Nan Batian, a wealthy landlord. After meeting Hong Changqing, a Red Army commissar, Wu joins an all-female detachment that battles against the aristocracy and the Kuomintang (KMT) Party. Wu’s detachment plans to attack her former landlord, though she tries to kill Nan on her own. Her attempt is unsuccessful, allowing Nan to eventually gather his own troops to challenge the detachment. The two sides battle, and eventually, the detachment prevails. However, Wu’s commissar, Hong, is killed during this exchange and Wu becomes the detachment’s new leader.

In The Red Detachment of Women, the CCP highlighted gender equality as a sign of social strength by blending choreographic techniques. Although women had long been subservient to men under Confucianism, the CCP encouraged female participation outside of the household. Wu Qionghua, the female protagonist, performs moves from ballet and Chinese martial arts. Sometimes, her arms gracefully glide through the air and her hands serve as an extension of her arms in typical ballet fashion. In certain scenes, her arms gracefully glide through the air with hands serving as an extension of her arms in typical ballet fashion. However, in scenes with the landlord or her fellow soldiers, Wu draws from Chinese martial arts, swinging her arms with clenched fists. This amalgamated choreography allows the audience to appreciate the spectacle of ballet, while underlining the “fiercely determined” nature of women. Additionally, the highly “athletic” choreography performed by both the male and female dancers indicates the practical contribution of women at this time. Arranged in lines with their male counterparts, the female soldiers even stand out for perfecting “masculine” moves. The female dancers’ masterful performance of athletic choreography suggests that women made more practical contributions to society.

Beyond choreographic elements, the CCP used extrachoreographic tools to indicate its support for gender equality. The female dancers often wielded traditionally masculine props, such as swords, hand grenades, and rifles, demonstrating the “readiness” of women to fight alongside male soldiers. For the purpose of reducing the physical differences between men and women, the female soldiers have short hair and don standard gray uniforms—rather than traditional Chinese dresses. However, Mullis notes that “the women wear color-coordinated tailored shorts, puttees, and pointe shoes… and show more of the body than costumes worn by male characters.” Although this costume difference between genders may seem to conflict with the CCP’s feminist perspective, the female dancers likely need costumes that allow them to showcase their advanced ballet technique. Thus, both choreographic and extrachoreographic elements helped the CCP promote gender equality.

In addition to illustrating the social strength of gender equality during the Mao era, the CCP employed choreographic techniques to cultivate Chinese pride in its military and political system in The Red Detachment of Women. The athleticism of the male and female dancers, who often struck poses that accentuated their musculature, helped communicate that the Party had immense military power. Since the Gang of Four had “revolutionized” ballet, Wilcox recognizes many of the dancers’ moves as “xiqu-style tumbling elements and acrobatic highlights borrowed from Chinese dance.” The inclusion of these distinctive athletic Chinese choreographic elements supported the idea that the Party was strong. The dancers also struck poses that accentuated their musculature, demonstrating that the Party’s immense military power. As the CCP mobilized and trained many dancers to perform at a high level, this production showed that its political system and military were very sophisticated.

The CCP further demonstrated its political strength by playing with extrachoreographic details. Mirroring Chinese propaganda posters of strong and orderly youth, the stage was filled by young soldiers “wear[ing] clean uniforms with crisp hairdos.” Each dancer carried out a specific duty to serve the Party, ranging from teaching other soldiers how to use rifles to sewing uniforms. Additionally, the CCP employs the flag of the Red Army, the production’s largest and most central prop, to illustrate the Party’s political importance. The dancers are

constantly oriented toward the flag, marching and dancing around it in unison with perfect posture. Wu Qionghua physically embraces the flag and dances en pointe around it, demonstrating her allegiance to the Party and desire to focus her energy on the political revolution. Since many of the soldiers perform acrobatic moves around the flag, the audience often associated the political prowess and spectacle of the production with the CCP. Ultimately, the CCP manipulated both choreographic and extrachoreographic tools to garner support for communism.

While the CCP conveyed the social and political strength of Chinese society using both choreographic and extrachoreographic elements, it utilized distinctive choreographic techniques to showcase the economic viability of socialism. In order to emphasize its egalitarian ideals, the dancers performed the same moves in unison. Additionally, certain segments of The Red Detachment of Women included “agrarian Yangge folk dances originally used for communal celebrations of spring harvests.” By incorporating stylized Chinese folk dance into the ballet, the CCP not only highlighted the peasantry’s contributions to Chinese society but also sought to impart national pride in Chinese traditions that it did not consider “feudal.”

To supplement this attitude of the peasantry’s importance, the CCP utilized extrachoreographic elements in The Red Detachment of Women. Many of the dancers wear simple peasant clothing. Wilcox observes that certain scenes showcase “women and men in peasant clothing dancing to folk melodies.” (151). Moving to lively Chinese folk music, dancers wave red handkerchiefs and lift baskets full of food from the spring harvests. The CCP connected props that are normally associated with peasants to happy music, suggesting that its rule allowed common peasants to flourish. Members of the dance ensemble hold hands and dance around other baskets of food, demonstrating that peasants happily benefited from plentiful harvests under socialism. how socialism provided commoners with access to plentiful harvests. As Alexandra Kolb suggests, these extrachoreographic elements “conveyed idealist visions of peace and plenty under Communism.” Choreographic techniques coupled with extrachoreographic elements implied the benefits of socialism; the peasant class was strong and stable—with enough food to live joyously, overthrow the landlords, and fight the KMT Party.

Based on the highly illustrious Yangge-style opera (1945), The White-Haired Girl follows the story of Yang Xier, a young girl who is claimed by her landlord because her family cannot pay the debt that they owe. Her fiancé Wang Dachun is distraught and joins the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to fight against the landowning class as well as the Japanese soldiers who had invaded China. While Yang manages to escape the landlord, she lives in an isolated mountain cave. Her hair turns white since she is malnourished, surviving on wild fruits and small animals for many years. At the end, Wang helps bring the villainous landlord to justice and reunites with Yang, who elects to join the PLA. Thus, the CCP has spectacularized this tale in order to convey its social, political, and economic attitudes.

The CCP has emphasized gender equality as a social strength through a mix of choreographic techniques from ballet and Chinese folk dance in The White- -Haired Girl. Yang, the female protagonist, artfully combines elements from ballet and Chinese dance, gracefully dancing en pointe to the slower music and swinging tight fists through the air once the music crescendos. This blended choreography suggests the CCP’s push to erase traditional gender roles, which had confined women to the household and charged men with the responsibility to fight. Her moves largely draw from ballet, yet they are “determined, sustained, and forceful,” indicating the CCP’s desire to glorify women as heroes and mobilize women to rally behind its cause. Once Yang liberates herself from bondage by the landlord, she interrupts her elegant pointe technique with acrobatic cartwheels and handstands. By drawing attention to Yang’s performance of traditionally “masculine” moves, the CCP has shown that women have the same athleticism and thus the same capacity to contribute to society as men.

Beyond these choreographic techniques, the CCP has utilized extrachoregraphic elements to demonstrate its support for gender equality. Whenever landowners abuse Yang, cymbals and drums disrupt the mostly harmonious music whenever landowners abuse Yang. The CCP has problematized the oppression of women under feudal Chinese society by playing jarring music during moments in which Yang is hurt or mistreated. To dramatize the suffering that Chinese women endured, the CCP “create[d] a cold and dark atmosphere” with dim lighting.

As Yang gradually ages, her dark braid unravels into free-flowing white strands. According to the historian Wang Kefen, this transformation in Yang’s physical appearance criticizes traditional Chinese society that “turns a person into a ghost.” At the same time, the fact that Yang triumphantly emerges from the cave and joins Wang as a member of the PLA has signaled the CCP’s belief that women have the power to overcome damage—both physical and psychological— from their feudal oppressors.

In addition to highlighting gender equality, the CCP has combined choreographic techniques from ballet and Chinese folk dance to illustrate the strength of its military and the communist regime. A group of male dancers dressed as peasants jump across the stage with “their backs beautifully arched backward,” showcasing their highly advanced and technical ballet training. The dancers kick their legs in unison to demonstrate the control that the CCP has over its people and its ability to mobilize many people to work toward one goal. Their arm movements are angular and precise, suggesting the intensity and sophistication of the Chinese military. These male dancers are soon joined by some female dancers who hold their fists in the air as they perform the “‘square step’ from the Rice Seedling Dance.” By amalgamating moves from Yangge folk dance and ballet, the CCP has connected China’s large peasant class to the military and sought to lend a sense of legitimacy to the military. In the pas de deux, Wang masterfully lifts Yang in the air to demonstrate that Wang, as a soldier of the PLA and the CCP, has the strength to save Yang from the injustice of feudal society. Thus, the CCP has adopted advanced ballet techniques as well as militant elements from Chinese dance to indicate the sophistication of both China’s political system and military. In order to underscore its political strength, the CCP has employed distinctive extrachoregraphic elements. Many props are red, which is both culturally and politically significant. Once a peasant covers Yang’s white hair with the scarf, “the cave is lit a bold red” and the music crescendos. Since red can represent “good luck, happiness, and prosperity” in Chinese culture, as well as communism, the CCP introduced this red scarf as a prop and lighting to draw attention to its power to renew oppressed Chinese people with strength. Moreover, Wang, as a member of the PLA, wields a broadsword, which he swipes through the air, and a pistol, which he happily directs at the sky. Wang’s possession of both weapons implies the PLA has a diverse arsenal, while his artful usage of the props showcases how well-trained the military has always been. Therefore, the CCP has utilized these particular props and music in order to convey its political fortitude.

Building on this message of political strength, the CCP has highlighted the stability and equality guaranteed through socialism by blending choreographic elements from ballet and Chinese yangge-style folk dance. The CCP has mixed in various yangge dances such as the Rice Seedling Dance and the Ribbon Dance, which are emblematic “of revolutionary ideals that promoted egalitarianism and placed peasants at the center of a new vision of Chinese modernity.” These yangge dances have been polished with ballet posture, pointe technique, and “codified ballet steps” in order to demonstrate the CCP’s power to elevate the peasantry through socialism. Equally noteworthy is the CCP’s decision to reduce the gendered nature of the original opera. While the performance of athletic and masculine moves by female dancers has signaled feminism, it has also reduced the centrality of gender to this story, allowing class struggle—the CCP’s ultimate priority—to come to the forefront of The White- -Haired Girl. Thus, the CCP has employed choreographic elements in order to focus the audience’s attention on how socialism and the erasure of class boundaries has resulted in economic flourishing.

The CCP has incorporated extrachoreographic elements to indicate the economic value of socialism through extrachoreographic elements. Wilkinson notes that the “somewhat stylized peasant and soldier garb (rather than traditional ballet costume)” contributed to the ballet’s success. These bright and colorful costumes would have underscored the military and peasantry’s access to resources—demonstrating the material benefits of socialism. While the music is mostly solemn, it “becomes faster and more dynamic” once the peasants are liberated from their landlords. This music generates feelings of joy, so the CCP has hoped that the audience would associate those positive thoughts with the CCP’s efforts to improve peasants’ lives through socialism. The dancers seem particularly enthusiastic as they swirl around with “fruit baskets on their shoulders,” implying the CCP could guarantee an abundance of food. Furthermore, the colorful ribbons and oval-shaped drums add to the authenticity of the ballet. By filling the air with a flurry of colors in zigzags, circles, and other shapes, the CCP has spectacularized the ribbon dance, impressing the audience with its ability to instill happiness and distribute wealth to the peasants. Therefore, the CCP has

used these extrachoreographic elements to showcase the economic assistance afforded to peasants under socialism.

A Tool for Domestic Policy

Since both The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl have spectacularized the notions of feminism, communism, and socialism, it is easy to imagine how these ballets furthered the CCP’s domestic agenda during the Mao era. In the two ballet productions, the CCP utilized amalgamated choreographic techniques as well as specific extrachoreographic elements to communicate to the audience that it supported gender equality, produced a strong political system that was backed by a robust military, and it raised living standards for the peasantry through socialism. Domestic audiences would have left performances of The Red Detachment of Women particularly inspired by the strength of women and the prowess of the military under communism as showcased in the female rifle dances. In The White- -Haired Girl, the embrace of yangge dance elements would have moved domestic audiences, while the performance of athletic ballet moves would have made Chinese people proud of their military. During the Mao era, both “revolutionary” ballets would have instilled within the Chinese people a strong feeling of pride in the CCP as well as the conviction that the Party was responsible for transforming China into a strong, powerful, and modern nation.

In the post-Mao era, the CCP has sought to advance its domestic policy agenda by sponsoring performances of The White-Haired Girl in China and performances of The Red Detachment of Women abroad. The spectacular nature of the choreographic and extrachoreographic elements transform these ballets into enjoyable shows that foster mass support for the CCP. Due to “their nostalgic value,” Alexander Huang suggests these ballets continue to serve as tools for domestic policy. Di Bai agrees, citing that “nationwide nostalgia” has enabled newer productions of The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl to become “instant commercial successes, and their political messages, previously thought to be outdated, have seemed to regain vigor.” Regarded as “national treasures,” these productions are embraced in remixed forms on television, in karaoke bars, and on the top charts of mainstream music. The overarching social, political, and economic attitudes embe

Chinese stunt acrobatics ballet. dded within the ballets remain relevant, as the CCP continues to value women’s contributions to Chinese society, promote the communist political system as well as its military, and maintain a socialist market economy.

However, The White-Haired Girl has more directly and obviously been utilized as a tool for the CCP’s domestic agenda than The Red Detachment of Women. With an eye to President Xi Jinping’s speech in 2014 about cleansing and utilizing art, the Ministry of Culture marked the seventieth anniversary of The White-Haired Girl with a national tour. In June 2019, President Xi Jinping staged the ballet for the seventieth founding anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. The White-Haired Girl could easily cultivate feelings of national pride in Chinese folk traditions among domestic audiences due to its roots in yangge opera—without invoking the same feelings of trauma as The Red Detachment of Women, which was born out of the Cultural Revolution. A recent study notes that The Red Detachment of Women’s clear “association with the Cultural Revolution” is the primary reason why “it is rarely performed in China now.” However, the study also suggests “the export of Red Detachment and media stories of its acclaim may be seen as a strategy to reinforce China’s seeming international cultural excellence amongst its own people.” Therefore, the CCP has likely employed the performances of The Red Detachment of Women around the world as an indirect means of garnering domestic support for its political agenda.

A Tool for Foreign Policy

Although the CCP utilized both ballets as vehicles to advance its agenda for domestic affairs during the Mao era, The Red Detachment of Women received far greater international recognition. This success was exemplified by the fact that The Red Detachment of Women was performed for more people across

Europe, the United States, and Asia than The White-Haired Girl. While the Shanghai Ballet Troupe performed The White-Haired Girl in North Korea in 1972 and in Canada in 1977, the Central Ballet of China toured with The Red Detachment of Women to Yugoslavia, West Germany, Austria, the United States, Albania, and Romania during the Mao era. This clear difference in the international community’s exposure to these two ballets can likely be attributed to the CCP’s desired foreign policy agenda.

In the context of Cold War geopolitics and the CCP’s split from the Soviet Union in particular, The Red Detachment of Women played a larger role than The White-Haired Girl in furthering its political agenda for external affairs during the Mao era. The CCP’s leadership perceived ballet as a key vehicle to “assert its cultural legitimacy.” Since The Red Detachment of Women premiered just a week prior to China’s first successful atomic test, the central role of weapons as props was likely inspired by the Chinese government’s push to project itself on the world stage as a nuclear power. The highly militaristic storyline as well as the mixture of masculine and athletic choreography were likely closely linked to these efforts. In February 1972, the CCP included a performance of The Red Detachment of Women in the itinerary for U.S. President Richard Nixon’s first visit to China. Given that the CCP had eight different “revolutionary” works in its repertoire, the CCP’s decision to treat Nixon to The Red Detachment of Women signals that it saw this particular ballet as key to humanizing communist China, painting China as a modern nation, and reigniting diplomatic relations with the United States. Although The White-Haired Girl was well-received domestically for its undeniable celebration of socialism and the peasantry, its political attitudes were neither as salient nor as spectacularly portrayed as those in The Red Detachment of Women. The Red Detachment of Women has remained a valuable political tool for foreign affairs in the post-Mao era, though the CCP has not utilized The White-Haired Girl in the same way. The political, economic, and social attitudes in The White-Haired Girl do not quite as effectively convey the CCP’s desired message to foreigners as The Red Detachment of Women in the post-Mao era. To promote its masterful traditions, values, language, and culture on the world stage, the CCP has sponsored revivals of The Red Detachment of Women in major opera houses in Paris, New York, Washington D.C., and Melbourne. Remembering that The Red Detachment of Women was once performed for President Nixon, foreigners tout the spectacular nature of the ballet, calling it “amazing,” “bright,” “iconic,” “bold,” “stylish,” “flashy,” and “epic.” The Sydney Morning Herald praised “its cast of gravity-defying, rifle-toting, flag-flying, stern-faced ballerinas,” while critics from major Western news outlets were astounded by the advanced technical quality of the choreography. Critics have also expressed appreciation for its modern feminist story, the female dancers’ athletic moves, and their striking use of rifles as props on stage. The primarily glowing reviews for this production indicate the ballet’s success in enhancing China’s image and legitimacy all around the world. By maintaining a highly professional and well-funded national company that performs such an apparently awe-inspiring production, the CCP has shown that this ballet is one of many tools it can utilize to leverage “soft power.”

By drawing on the history of the initial adoption of ballet in China, this paper highlighted how ballet, a dance form imported from the Soviet Union, became a vehicle for the CCP to communicate its political, social, and economic beliefs. The CCP valued ballet for its “universal” essence and easily adapted it for “revolutionary” purposes. Through the inclusion of special choreographic and extrachoreographic components in The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl, the CCP not only spectacularized the notions of feminism, communism, and socialism on stage but also ignited strong feelings of pride in the Party among Chinese people or awe among foreigners.

With an eye to this paper’s analysis of political, social, and economic attitudes in both ballets, this paper showed how the CCP has incorporated these two marquee “revolutionary” ballets into its arsenal for both domestic and foreign policy. The two ballets were originally designed with propagandistic purposes in mind, so the messages that they communicated were domestically salient during the Cultural Revolution. In order to cultivate strong feelings of pride in the CCP and its accomplishments among Chinese people, the CCP has transformed The White-Haired Girl into a domestic political tool. Although the National Ballet of China has not performed The Red Detachment of Women within China recently, the CCP has indirectly used this ballet to advance its domestic policy goals; the Party has impressed Chinese citizens with the positive international media coverage of state-sponsored productions in the West. Meanwhile, the state-sponsored company performing The Red Detachment of Women has travelled quite extensively, allowing the CCP to leverage “soft power” through ballet since

the Mao era. Contemporary audiences cannot help but feel special for having the opportunity to view the same “spectacular” ballet that the CCP showed U.S. President Nixon in an attempt to rebuild bilateral relations. One limitation of this study was that I viewed more recent performances of The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl and treated them as static productions. Since both ballets have evolved over time, future studies should point out and attempt to understand the changes that have been made since these ballets’ inception in the 1960s.

More broadly, this paper underscored the importance of dance in advancing the CCP’s political agenda with two particular ballets. Given the domestic and foreign political salience of “revolutionary” ballet, it is the task for future scholars to explore how the CCP has utilized other dance forms for political purposes. The next step in scholarship could involve an analysis of the political implications of the highly “spectacular” opening ceremonies at the 2008 Beijing Olympics with the same social-political-economic framework that I employed in my paper. As dance scholarship continues to expand, we will have a better understanding of the place of dance in the world of politics.

Bibliography

Albert, Eleanor. “China’s Big Bet on Soft Power.” Council on Foreign Relations. Council on Foreign Relations, February 9, 2018. https://www.cfr. org/backgrounder/chinas-big-bet-soft-power Buckley, Chris. “‘White-Haired Girl,’ Opera Created Under Mao, Returns to Stage.” Sinosphere: Dispatches From China. The New York Times Company, November 10, 2015. https://sinosphere.blogs.nytimes. com/2015/11/10/white-haired-girl-opera-created-under-mao-returns-to- -stage/ Chan, Phil. “The Past, Present and Future of China’s Red Ballet.” The Huffington Post. Verizon Media, July 15, 2015. https://www.huffpost.com/ entry/post_9782_b_7794940 Chen, Anna. “Madam Mao's Chinese model operas make a comeback.” BBC News. BBC, July 18, 2012. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazi- ne-18826565 Cheng, De-Hai. “The Creation and Evolvement of Chinese Ballet: Ethnic and Esthetic Concerns in Establishing a Chinese Style of Ballet in Taiwan and Mainland China (1954-1994).” PhD dissertation, New York University School of Education, 2000. “Chinese Ballet-The White Haired Girl Excerption Pt1,” YouTube video, 15:18, posted by “zushiXilaiyi mz,” May 16, 2013. https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=wrpp8d56OGo “Chinese Ballet-The White Haired Girl Excerption Pt2,” YouTube video, 15:21, posted by “zushiXilaiyi mz,” May 16, 2013. https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=0Hh7py_FbbA “Complete Ballet The Red Detachment Of Women HD 720p,” YouTube video, 1:59:01, posted by “Harry_D2012,” December 4, 2018. https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=wUs769eqoE0 Cotton, Pia. “Bringing China to New York, Orchestra and All.” The Wall Street Journal. Dow & Jones Company Inc., July 8, 2015. https://www.wsj. com/articles/bringing-china-to-new-york-orchestra-and-all-1436396434 Dance Informa Magazine Australia. “National Ballet of China to perform ‘The Red Detachment of Women’ for Arts Centre Melbourne’s Asia TOPA.” Dance Informa, October, 2016. https://dancemagazine.com.au/2016/10/ national-ballet-of-china-in-arts-centre-melbourne-asia-topa/ Di Bai. “The Cultural Revolution Model Theater.” In The Columbia Companion to Modern Chinese Literature, edited by Kirk Denton, 234-239. New York: Columbia University Press, 2016. Finnane, Antonia. “The Red Detachment of Women marches forward — but to where?” The Conversation. The Conversation US, Inc., February 16, 2017. https://theconversation.com/the-red-detachment-of-women- -marches-forward-but-to-where-73124 Greskovic, Robert. “‘The Peony Pavilion’ and ‘The Red Detachment of Women’ Dance Review.” The Wall Street Journal. Dow & Jones Com- pany Inc., July 14, 2015. https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-peony-pavilion-and-the-red-detachment-of-women-dance-review-1436911393 Huang, Alexander C. Y. “Model Operas and Ballets.” In Encyclopedia of Modern China, vol. 2, edited by David Pong, 618-19. Detroit: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2009. Jaivin, Linda. “Can we embrace the Asian century?” The Sydney Morning Herald. The Sydney Morning Herald, February 15, 2019. https:// www.smh.com.au/entertainment/can-we-embrace-the-asian-century- -20190206-h1axg4.html Jia, Bo. “Gender, Women’s Liberation, and the Nation-State: A Study of the Chinese Opera The White-Haired Girl.” Master’s thesis, Rutgers University, 2015. Johanson, Katya, Amanda Coles, Hilary Glow, and Caitlin Vincent. “Controversy, uncertainty and the diverse public in cultural diplomacy: Australia–China relations.” In Australian Journal of International Affairs 73, no. 4 (2019): 397-413. Kaufman, Sarah. “China’s high-energy ballet is on trend.” The Washington Post. The Washington Post, September 23, 2011. https://www. washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/chinas-high-energy-ballet-is-on- -trend/2011/09/23/gIQAunMIrK_story.html Kolb, Alexandra. “Dance and Politics in China: Interculturalism, Hybridity, and the ArtsCross Project.” The Oxford Handbook of Dance and Politics, edited by Rebekah J. Kowal, Gerald Siegmun, and Randy Martin, 348-372. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017. Kourlas, Gia. “Review: ‘The Red Detachment of Women,’ by the National Ballet of China, Soldiers On.” The New York Times. The New York Times Company, July 13, 2015. https://www.nytimes. com/2015/07/14/arts/dance/review-the-red-detachment-of-women- -by-the-national-ballet-of-china-soldiers-on.html Liu Siyuan. “‘The Brightest Sun, The Darkest Shadow’: Ideology and the Study of Chinese Theater in the West During the Cold War.” Theatre Survey 54, no. 1 (2013): 27-50. Lu, Hui. “Chinese ballet ‘The White-Haired Girl’ to be restaged in Beijing.” Xinhua. Xinhuanet, June 16, 2019. http://www.xinhuanet.com/ english/2019-06/16/c_138147755.htm Mullis, Eric. “Aesthetics, Ideology, and Ethics of Remembrance in Red Detachment of Women (Hongse Niangzi Jun).” Dance Chronicle 40, no. 1 (2017): 53-73. Osnos, Evan. “Ballet with Guns.” The New Yorker. Condé Nast, March 11, 2009. https://www.newyorker.com/news/evan-osnos/ballet-wi- th-guns Pellegrini, Nancy. “The White-Haired Girl.” Time Out Shanghai. Time Out Group Ltd, March 2, 2012. http://www.timeoutshanghai.com/ features/Stage-Theatre/5629/The-White-Haired-Girl.html “The Red Detachment Of Women (ballet),” YouTube video, 1:41:29, posted by “Bartholomew Smutz,” June 21, 2015. https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=ZHTPcs3lQPU&t=254s Scott, A. C. “The Ballet in China.” In The International Encyclopedia of Dance, edited by Selma Jeanne Cohen and Dance Perspectives Founda- tion. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1998. “ShangHai Ballet_The White-Haired Girl,” YouTube video, 10:47, posted by “kaio113,” May 1, 2012. https://www.youtube.com/watch?- v=Y0mcK-OeEpk Wang, Bin and Shui Hua. The White-Haired Girl (白毛女 ). Changchun Film Studio. 1950. Black and white video, 1:46:06. https://archive.org/ details/the_white_haired_girl “The White Haired Girls (latest version) by Shanghai Ballet,” YouTube video, 6:39, posted by “Ning Han,” August 27, 2015. https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=pYrc1WFHVIU Wilcox, Emily. Revolutionary Bodies: Chinese Dance and the Socialist Legacy. Oakland, California: University of California Press, 2018. Wilkinson, Norman. J. “‘The White-Haired Girl’: From ‘Yangko’ to Revolutionary Modern Ballet.” In Educational Theatre Journal 26, no. 2 (1974): 164-74. Zhou, Naaman. “Chinese ballet show draws protests for ‘glorifying Red Army.’” The Guardian. The Guardian News & Media Limited, February 17, 2017. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/feb/18/ red-detatchment-of-women-chinese-ballet-show-draws-protests-for- -glorifying-red-army Zhu, Liren. “The Red Detachment of Women.” In The International Encyclopedia of Dance, edited by Selma Jeanne Cohen and Dance Perspectives Foundation. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1998. ______. “The White-Haired Girl.” In The International Encyclopedia of Dance, edited by Selma Jeanne Cohen and Dance Perspectives Foundation. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1998.