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than the character, the actor, or the icon. As Iwamura argues, this
hyperreality ultimately creates new arrangements of intimacy and
understanding.
Framing her argument with Said’s theory of Orientalism, Iwam-
ura comments that conceptions of the Orient appearing in the
Western world actually reveal much more about the subjectivity of
the West than any essential understanding of Asian culture or reli-
gions. Consequently, Iwamura sees visual representations of the
Oriental Monk as key to highlighting the United States’ changing
geopolitical relationship with the Asian world. Images of the Orien-
tal Monk serve as a measure of these relations as people mapped
beliefs and fears on to the icon through aspects of race, class, gender,
and nationality.
Iwamura’s interdisciplinary study provides a compelling, engag-
ing, and thoughtful account of an oft under-analyzed aspect of
American popular culture. Her prose is clear and succinct and the
generous amount of images included in the book helps to make her
arguments accessible and persuasive. Her balance of productive the-
ory and innovative close readings of texts creates a robust argument
that is both entertaining and thought-provoking. Most importantly,
however, Virtual Orientalism offers a stellar and much-needed exam-
ple of quality scholarship addressing the relationship between non-
Christian American religions and popular culture and aptly and use-
fully highlights the significance of this topic in the larger landscape
of American public life.
Dora Valkanova
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign