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Since modern times, western peregrinators had described Chinese body image from the perspectives of dress and appearance, physical senses and spiritual characteristics. Dress and appearance were the most explicit symbols for western peregrinators to observe and understand the national image of China. Western peregrinators constructed a discourse system about Chinese body. Western peregrinators' conventional speech, the status quo of poor and weak country, the ideological influence of eastward transmission of western sciences, and the lack of body consciousness of Chinese people had comprehensively shaped the fatuous and pathological body image of Chinese people in the 19th century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grand tour is the predecessor of western travel to China. In the process of civilization competition between China and the West, various travel rules in different regions have been gradually established. From the 16th to the 19th century, the Chinese government gradually lost the motivation and willingness to travel abroad. The West is seeking the contact with China and constantly trying the way of peaceful contact with China. After a hundred years of Chinese rites controversy, the West has come to the conclusion that force is the only effective way to force China to give up its policy of seclusion. After a series of wars, the West gradually gained the dominant power in formulating the rules of travel to China, and also gradually mastered the discourse power in constructing China's national image. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the Middle Ages, the collective memory of China in the West had been based on the texts written by peregrinators to China, represented by Marco Polo and the missionary community. After the 19th century, travel guide, another form of text to guide potential peregrinators to China, began to appear. They selectively recorded and subjectively evaluated the landscape and life of China, with distinct individual characteristics, which had significant influence on the formation and dissemination of the image of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]