TEA LEAF NATION

Map: Chinas
Stereotypes of
Africa, from
Chaotic Somalia
to Awesome
Gambia
They don't differ materially from American views of the continent.

BY WARNER BROWN

SEPTEMBER 30, 2015

Chinas ambitions in Africa are well-documented. Its annual trade with the
resource-rich continent recently surpassed $200 billion, and Chinese agencies
and firms have invested heavily in building badly needed roads, railways, and
public buildings. Meanwhile, more than 1 million Chinese have reportedly left
home to seek their fortunes in African nations.
Those ties may be drawing China and Africa closer, but that doesnt mean
everyday Chinese understand the continent terribly well. For example: Why does
South Africa have so many white people? is the leading autocompleted result for
queries about that country posed to Baidu, Chinas largest search engine. Baidus
autocomplete feature works similar to Googles: When someone begins typing

into the search box, an algorithm displays a list of suggested ways to finish the
query, in part by combing the engines archives for previously popular searches.
Those automatic suggestions often have the added benefit of sifting through
layers of online discourse to uncover the profound and (often
amusingly) mundane questions that often lead people to search for answers.
Below, Foreign Policy plots and translates the most common Chinese-language
Baidu query associated with each African country onto the map below:

The leading queries for many African countries indicate that Chinese web users
feelings about the continent mirror those of Westerners they often associate it
with violence, poverty, disease, and exotic dining habits. This is evident in
country-by-country results but also is clear in searches about Africa as a whole:

Certain results are uniquely Chinese. Baidus top suggestion for Egypt asks why
that country is more ancient than China, indicating that the pride with which
Chinese people compare their civilizations long history to that of Europe, and

especially to that of the United States, wilts somewhat in the shadow of the
pyramids at Giza.
Issues handed down by Africas complicated history top the results for other
countries as well. Netizens ask how Cote dIvoire and Ghana came to be known as
Ivory Coast and Gold Coast, respectively. Queries about Algeria and Libya being
attacked by French and U.S. forces hint at Western interventions old and new.
And then there is the legacy of imperialism, apartheid, and reconciliation that
accounts for the prevalence of Caucasians in Africas rainbow nation.
Perhaps the most puzzling result from either method simply asks why Gambians
are so nb an abbreviation of niubi, a Chinese slang term that loosely
translates as a sarcastic spin on awesome (but which, in fact, means something
far more vulgar). This search leads to multiple bulletin boards bearing a list of
purported threats by the tiny West African nation to variously invade and occupy
the Soviet Union, North America, and most of Europe, as well as help Taiwan
complete its reconquista of the Chinese mainland. FP was unable to verify these
claims independently, though in fairness they dont sound out of place given past
proclamations by the countrys colorful leader.
Searches about violence sometimes take on a Chinese twist with the word luan
usually translated as chaos, a freighted word often used to connote political
and social instability. References to luan crop up in results for South Africa, but
are most common in those of Somalia. Netizens also ask why what
the Economist called the worlds most utterly failed state, Somalia, has no
government, why it hates America, and why it has pirates.

On a lighter note, searches about soccer are common. The African Lions that
top Cameroons suggested searches refers to that countrys national football
team. Baidu also notes that Nigerias team is called the Eagles, though that
search is dwarfed by multiple queries about that countrys brief ban from
international competition last year. Recent headlines also inspired a leading
result for the Central African Republic, where sectarian strife led to acts of
cannibalism.
The methodology involved typing the question prompt Why is [country X],
though limited results for some countries led in a few cases to FPs casting a
wider net by simply typing the countrys name to see what connections Baidu
would autocomplete. This approach yields the out-of-left-field results for
Madagascar, Burundi (a species of fish native to a local lake), and Sudan (the
seeds of a local variety of sorghum), among a handful of others. This more openended method succeeded in generating the results for every country, although the
map above does not plot countries that only yielded results common to many
nations, including references to tourism, travel expenses, business visas, and the
cost of freight. Searches to populate this map were conducted from a computer in
Shanghai between Aug. 14 and Aug. 17, and results tend to change over time, so
readers may not be able to replicate them precisely.
Image: Warner Brown and Ed Johnson for Foreign Policy. Do not reproduce
without permission.
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