ABSTRACT
Yao Ming, former basketball player of the Shanghai Sharks, was drafted by the Houston Rockets as the first overall pick in the 2002 draft. The impact of Yao Ming’s entry into the NBA is enormous and multidimensional both in and off the court. First, Yao Ming’s performance in the NBA has not only clearly presented his masculinity through basketball but also reshaped the stereotyped body image of the Asian in the postcolonial world. Second, the vast media exposure of Yao Ming has helped propel China into being the largest overseas market for the NBA, which in return has encouraged the local basketball market in China. Third, the celebrity of Yao Ming has promoted cultural communication between China and the United States as well as created a cultural symbol for the construction of a domestic Chinese basketball culture that is resisting the NBA’s cultural homogenisation. Fourth, Yao Ming has significantly advanced the professionalisation and marketisation of Chinese basketball to the extent that he was selected as one of the 100 Pioneers of China’s Reform and Opening-Up by the central government.
