The original Aladdin story in One Thousand and One Nights is set in China (Aladdin is also Chinese), is based on a middle eastern folk tale, and was written and added to the book by a Frenchman. And then it’s most recognizable incarnation (at least to a western audience) migrates the setting and characters to a fictional Arabic kingdom and gives him an American white guy voice. The character, Aladdin’s, cultural identity as we know it is a little all over the place.
And part of the reason the setting is almost never China in adaptations is that the original 1001 Nights version of the story is very much set in China in name only, with the setting being modeled after the Middle East anyway. I mean, there are two jinns, a sultan, and the sorcerer is from Morocco. And when characters are actually named, they have decidedly non-Chinese names like Mustapha.
The original Aladdin story in One Thousand and One Nights is set in China (Aladdin is also Chinese), is based on a middle eastern folk tale, and was written and added to the book by a Frenchman. And then it’s most recognizable incarnation (at least to a western audience) migrates the setting and characters to a fictional Arabic kingdom and gives him an American white guy voice. The character, Aladdin’s, cultural identity as we know it is a little all over the place.
And part of the reason the setting is almost never China in adaptations is that the original 1001 Nights version of the story is very much set in China in name only, with the setting being modeled after the Middle East anyway. I mean, there are two jinns, a sultan, and the sorcerer is from Morocco. And when characters are actually named, they have decidedly non-Chinese names like Mustapha.