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The White Review

All the Stain is Tender: The Asian Deluge and White Australia

Jessica Zhan Mei Yu, The White Review, March 2021

‘In Australia, racism is considered an aberration on our society: it is not acknowledged as a crucial inner part of its machinery. Racism has been mistaken for a public scourge, when it is foundational to our political ideologies, national identity, way of life.’

Tracing anti-Asian sentiment all the way back to the colonial period, Yu uncovers a long history of political rhetoric that dehumanises Asians, casting them as a dangerous force of nature, a ‘coloured flood’ threatening to swamp a pure, white Australia.

Yu’s novel (But the Girl) and essay collection (All the Stain is Tender) are due to be published in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

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