Fetishized: A Reckoning with Yellow Fever, Feminism, and Beauty

"Rock star and former model Kaila Yu traces the very fine line between Asian representation in mainstream media being empowering and objectifying. In this memoir-in-essays, Yu uses her personal stories as a woman who admits to “cater[ing] to the white male gaze” as a vehicle to explore the fetishization of Asian women, particularly in American pop culture. From her opening anecdote about an “Asiaphile” who wanted to start a class that would have Asian women teaching others how to be the best wives, to her closing reflection on self-objectification and internalized racism, Yu’s memoir is a true examination of the systemic factors that have shaped – and are still shaping – the exotification and fetishization of Asian women in the U.S. today."