POPULAR CULTURE, MASS CULTURE

(tongsu wenhua, dazhong wenhua)

Social concept

Tongsu wenhua (popular culture) emerged in the late 1970s, developed in the 1980s, and was transformed in the 1990s, when it came to include commercialized and industrialized ‘mass culture’. From 1979 through the mid 1980s, tongsu wenhua was shaped by Hong Kong and Taiwan-style (popular) culture (Gangtai liuxing wenhua), particularly film and music (see Kong-Tai style). A high ‘culture fever’ (wenhua re) in the mid 1980s created an ‘elite culture’ (jingying wenhua), which promoted ‘enlightenment’ and critiqued traditional Chinese culture. Differing from this elite culture, tongsu wenhua included tabloid newspapers, mass-circulation monthlies, cartoon books, pop music and martial arts films and martial arts fiction. Since 1992, when Deng Xiaoping delivered his Southern Excursion Talks (see Southern Excursion Talks (Deng Xiaoping, 1992)), tongsu wenhua has been gradually transformed into a commercialized mass culture, or ‘consumer culture’ (xiaofei wenhua). The transformation has blurred the boundaries between the ‘high’ and the ‘low’, between the elite and the masses, between official (state) and non-official (society), and between cultural and commodity production.

The recent development of ‘popular culture’ can be traced back to past revolutionary practices. The Chinese Communist Party had incorporated many elements of regional, folk and traditional culture into an official popular culture. Mao Zedong’s ‘Talks at the Yan’an Conference on Literature and Art’ in May 1942 institutionalized the concept of the ‘people’ (renmin). Since then, cultural production has aimed at ‘serving the people’, a departure from the goal of the revolutionary intellectuals who were based in the major cities (Shanghai and Beijing) during the 1920s. However, during the Cultural Revolution, Jiang Qing (Mao’s wife) played an important role in guiding the development of revolutionary popular culture. As a former film star in Shanghai who never liked folksong or folk music, regarding it as naive, vulgar and low, she openly voiced her contempt for kitschy folk plays. Jiang believed in the blending of Peking opera (Jingju) with Western orchestral music and mixing folk dance with Western ballet. As a result of her influence, ethnic and folk entertainment was never a focus in the official discourse of cultural production during the Cultural Revolution. Instead, ‘model plays’ (Yangbanxi), focusing on the representation of heroic characters, dominated the cultural scene (see Xiqu). The representation of such models (i.e. workers, peasants and soldiers) as the basis of cultural production continued until the 1980s when state-run cultural institutions began to seriously consider consumer reception of their products.

Since the late 1980s, cultural production has begun to reject the hero or model principle to focus on the stories of ‘ordinary folks’ (laobaixing). Some successful examples include Wang Shuo’s novels, Ai Jing’s songs, CCTV (Chinese Central Television)’s programme Living Space (Shenghuo gongjian) and Feng Xiaogang’s television series and New Year’s movies. As the representation of the ordinary person becomes the norm in the popular culture industry, tongsu wenhua is no longer the topdown revolutionary ‘culture of the masses’ (qunzhong wenhua), but a commercial ‘mass culture’ (dazhong wenhua) from below.

See also: advertising; beauty magazines; bestsellers; book publishing; consumerism; minjian; rock music, rock bands

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