Hsiu-Chuang Deppman6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Love_from_the_Star. Accessed February 21, 2015.
7 See Zhou Cezong’s The May Fourth Movement: Intellectual Revolution in Modern China (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1960).
8 Song Zhongfu, Zhao Jihui, and Fei Dayang, Ruxue Zai Xiandai Zhongguo [Confucianism in Modern
China]. Hehan: Zhongzhou Guji Chubanshe, 1991.
9 In his study of the origins of capitalism, Max Weber sees Confucian ethics pose an obstacle to the
development of capitalism. “The Confucian gentleman was ‘not a tool’; that is, in his adjustment to the
world and his self-perfection he was an end unto himself, not a means for any functional end. This core
of Confucian ethics rejected training in economics for the pursuit of profit ... Confucian rationalism
meant rational adjustment to the world; Puritan rationalism meant rational mastery of the world.”
Quoted in Arif Dirlik’s “Confucius in the Borderlands” (1995, 233). Tu Wei-ming, in his introduction to
Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity argues that Weber’s idea of finding the “functional equivalent
of the Protestant ethic in the ‘modernized’ or ‘vulgarized’ Confucian ethic” is too simplistic (1996, 3).
10 Quoted in Dirlik (1995, 244).
11 According to Chua Beng Huat, the producer of the first successful pan-Asian drama Tokyo Love Story
(1991), was 28 at that time. “He asked himself, and people like him, what would he/they like to watch
on television and came up with a simple list: beautiful people, beautiful clothes, good food and good
entertainment, the plot is secondary” (Chua 2004, 206).
12 The idea of “unity of knowledge and action” comes from the neo-Confucian philosopher Wang
Yangming (1472–1529). “According to Wang, it is not possible for one to put something into practice
after acquiring knowledge. This is because knowledge and action are unified already, from beginning
to end. We cannot unify knowledge and action because they are already unified...knowledge neces-
sarily/automatically leads to action in its original state. We cannot have knowledge while preventing
it from leading to action.” See the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. http://www.iep.utm.edu/
wangyang/#H4. Accessed July 14, 2016.
13 Emerging in the Tang dynasty (618–907) and blossoming in the Song dynasty (960–1279), Neo-
Confucianism, as scholars have noted, has helped shape East Asian thoughts with an emphasis on the
importance of reason (li), as opposed to Buddhist mysticism and Taoist transcendentalism, for self-
cultivation and social ruling. While a sci-fi fantasy such as My Love from the Star does not strike the viewer
as rational or conservative, the series has sustained an effort to show how the past illuminates the present
by highlighting the importance of reading old sages’ texts as a path to a better understanding of human
relations. The show reinforces a Confucianizing tendency by making Joseon dynasty—a historical
period during which neo-Confucianism was established as a state ideology in Korea—the era of the
purported arrival of the starry alien Do Min-joon who then becomes a trans-historical agent in making
traditionalist ideas about family and social order seem fashionable again.
In a similar vein, neo-Confucianism in Japan took hold in the Edo period in the seventeenth cen-
tury and placed equal emphasis on the Confucian virtues of loyalty, trust, and filiality. A postmodern
drama about backdoor negotiation, ruthless competition, and social justice, Hanzawa Noaki espouses an
ethical view of defending a moral order that highlights the five key principles in neo-Confucianism.
Leaving no room for self-doubt, these tenets establish a network of human relations that validate order,
connection, and distinction. It is the force of such moral unambiguity that presents an alternative TV
universe to attract everyday viewers combating moral fatigue in their complex postmodern reality.
Ultimately the transregional popularity of the shows suggests a revival of neo-Confucian principles,
which galvanize East Asian viewers with the promise of entertainment and social justice.
14 There must be filiality between father and son 父子有親
There must be loyalty between ruler and subject 君臣有義
There must be distinction between husband and wife 夫婦有別
There must be order between the old and the young 長幼有序
There must be trust between friends 朋友有信
15 Reported in China Daily Asia. Accessed February 10, 2015. http://www.chinadailyasia.com/
lifestyle/2014-09/28/content_15171737.html.
16 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nathan-gardels/xi-jinping-confucianism_b_5897680.html. Accessed
February 10, 2015.
17 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/03/opinion/china-sharpens-its-censorship-blade.html?_r=0.
Accessed February 10, 2015.