Cultural Appropriation
Cultural appropriation, broadly defined, is the practice of adopting or using cultural customs, ideas, traditions, or components without acknowledging the origin of these elements or adopting them in a way that exploits the elements for unfair gain. Typically, the appropriating is done by a group with significant privilege, and the culture they appropriate is in some way marginalized or has historically been the subject of oppression. In stealing Athena's manuscript, June commits the first in a series of acts that fall under the umbrella of cultural appropriation; as a white woman, she benefits from the Asian American literary audience she's able to tap into by publishing a novel that focuses on Chinese history, without ever truly participating in the culture or history that The Last Front features. However, Yellowface also highlights June's own logic behind each choice she makes when writing the rest of The Last Front—the historical research that she cites as a defense against accusations of cultural appropriation, for example, or the questions June raises about Athena's "rights" to write about Chinese history when Athena herself never resided in China or spoke Mandarin fluently. Yellowface raises many questions about who has the "right" to write a certain story, and in many ways, refuses to provide the reader with a definitive answer, instead demonstrating how complex questions of identity and authorship can be within our contemporary cultural climate.
The Publishing Industry
Yellowface focuses on the contemporary publishing industry, depicting a variety of potential outcomes that a new writer could face when trying to break into the mainstream writing world. The novel's depiction is a cynical one; the publishing industry pits writers against each other, leading to resentment, hatred, and envy. Even outcomes that from the outside appear good, such as Athena's successful career, are later revealed to be harmful, as Candice explains to June how Athena's publisher forced Athena to write books that conformed to audience expectations for what someone of her ethnic background (Chinese) "would" write. June provides another example of the publishing industry's neglect of individual writers, losing out on the first publishing opportunity she had when her publisher abandoned the project and let the novel flop.
Envy
June harbors deep feelings of envy towards Athena. In contrast to June's anticlimactic failure to start a successful writing career after college, Athena was able to immediately garner rave reviews, sales, and awards. A central motivation for June's actions is the envy that she feels towards Athena's career. However, it is also important to note how June's envy fluctuates over the course of the novel; although June envies Athena's success, June also frequently comments on Athena's lack of friends, or criticizes the ways in which Athena's success alienated her from the rest of her peers. While June's envy motivates her, June's ability to selectively envy parts of Athena's life demonstrates that she isn't unaware of how complicated Athena's success was—that Athena may have had a harder time within her "success" than outward appearances would suggest.
Family
Although June's family only makes a few appearances in the novel, June often emphasizes how alienated she feels within her family due to her choice of career and life path. Her mother, even after June successfully publishes The Last Front, continues to try and push June to get a certificate or degree in accounting, just like her sister, Rory. Her mother doesn't read her books; when June's first novel came out and her sister read it, she disliked the novel's portrayal of sisterhood, which June found confusing and hurtful because the two sisters that the novel featured were supposed to be versions of June and Rory themselves. Later in the novel, when June wants support after her career has fallen apart, she goes to visit her mother, and finds that her mother is still unable to give her the kind of attention that June really wants. Her mother is cold and once more, June feels like an outsider.
Money and Wealth
Related to the novel's focus on the publishing industry, money becomes a key motivator for June's decision to publish The Last Front under her own name. Athena and June's friendship is introduced through June's careful attention to all the ways in which their level of financial wealth differs; Athena is able to buy June many drinks, and has a nice apartment, whereas June constantly struggles to make ends meet and has to work a job at a college consulting company. When June receives her first royalties, she begins to live a very different lifestyle, which then makes it difficult for her to reveal the truth about her plagiarism, since she doesn't want to lose everything she's gotten used to. Money sets the stakes and continuously escalates them as June falls deeper and deeper into the web of lies she's spun surrounding herself as an author.
Friendship
At the center of Yellowface is June and Athena's friendship. The story of their friendship unfolds over the course of the novel through flashbacks, making it difficult to make a stable assessment of what exactly June feels towards Athena; is it just envy? Did June really like Athena, or has she distanced herself from the memory of Athena in order to justify her own exploitation of Athena's work after her death? Their friendship is marked by several ethically complicated events, such as when Athena incorporated events from June's own life—a sexual assault she experienced in college and told Athena about in confidence—into a short story that later went on to be published. Are these two women, both in some capacity alienated by their respective families or social circles, simply friends out of necessity? The novel grapples with the nature of loyalty and connection between these two characters, who are united by a shared interest in writing and thus, also inherently compete for the limited attention they can get within the cutthroat publishing industry.
Social Media
Social media features heavily in the novel in a variety of ways; June uses social media to refashion her public image, publicly projecting her supposed interest in Chinese culture, history, and social issues that make her appear allied with issues faced by marginalized identity groups. June obsesses over how her book is received on social media, checking reviews and tracking how many times her and Athena's names are mentioned online. Later, social media also becomes the inciting factor for the rising suspicion and backlash against June, as users pile on to criticize June for her depiction of Chinese history, or attack her in the wake of the accusations of plagiarism that are initiated by Athena's ex-boyfriend, Geoff, through the anonymous @AthenaLiusGhost account.