In most works of art, the tone, costumes, and setting can largely influence the mood of the story. A deep examination of the mentioned attributes can possibly reveal latent messages and intents of the artists. This is evident in both Lao She’s Teahouse and China’s The Founding of a Republic. The Founding of a Republic was funded and produced by Chinese government as a celebration of the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China; as a result, it widely regarded as propaganda. Lao’s Teahouse, however, was written about the Chinese revolution from a common man’s perspective. These differences in the interpretation of the Chinese revolution, along with the intent of the presentations, reveal the creators’ underlying political messages.
When The Founding of a Republic was released by the Chinese government in 2009, it was dismissed, often prematurely, as communist propaganda. While biased interpretations of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) are somewhat explicit through-out the film, the historical events shown are accurate. However, the events portrayed are primarily the malicious acts of the Nationalists, ignoring many of the equally heinous acts of the Communists. An example would be the assassination of 13 Communist party members. While this educates the audience of some of the tragic events of the Chinese Civil War, the communists are clearly portrayed as the virtuous heroes.
The presentation of the characters in The Founding of a Republic gives another look into the Government’s hidden messages. The Nationalists are often shown with a negative connotation. The officials are shown wearing black or very dark outfits and are commonly surrounded by armed soldiers. The KMT scene...
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...and even girls for money and to invoke fear (63). The government also seized virtually any property they wanted by claiming it was “traitor’s property” (74).
Evidently the Teahouse paints a much darker picture of the Chinese Revolution. It offers a common man’s perspective to the economic decline and increased corruption that sometimes went unnoticed in the elite’s eyes. The Founding of a Republic told a much different view of the reform movement from the Communist elite’s eyes. The chosen portrayal of a benevolent CCP and malicious KMT is largely biased, although most of the events are historically accurate. The film can be categorized as Chinese Communist propaganda, but a deeper meaning can be observed also. Examining and comparing both works of art and their viewpoint of the revolution can offer a good look as to the creators’ intent and political message.
After Mao Zedong’s death and the collapse of the Cultural Revolution Weiwei enrolled in the Beijing Film Academy. Film did not hold him long and in 1978 Weiwei became a founding member of an avant-garde group of artist called ‘the stars’, and an obsession with democracy and a deep critique of the Chinese government began to manifest. In 1981 Weiwei moved to the United States to practice and study art. One of Weiwei’s most iconic early pieces, Dropping Han Dynasty Urn (1995) depicts Weiwei holding, dropping, and the subsequent smashing of a Han Dynasty Urn. The performative gesture of this work is entrenched in Weiwei’s personal history, the significance of smashing a valued Chinese artefact symbolises the ‘desecration of cultural heritage (Delaney, 2016 p.30)’ that occurred during the Cultural Revolution and Weiwei’s
There are many things that most people take for granted. Things people do regularly, daily and even expect to do in the future. These things include eating meals regularly, having a choice in schooling, reading, choice of job and a future, and many more things. But what if these were taken away and someone told you want to eat, where and when to work, what you can read, and dictated your future. Many of these things happened in some degree or another during the Chinese Culture Revolution under Mao Zedong that began near the end of the 1960’s. This paper examines the novel Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie and a book by Michael Schoenhals titled China’s Culture Revolution, 1966-1969. It compares the way the Chinese Cultural Revolution is presented in both books by looking at the way that people were re-educated and moved to away, what people were able to learn, and the environment that people lived in during this period of time in China.
legal action because of faith but as a whole it would not prosper. To understand the level
Ever since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, the legitimacy of the revolution of which it was built upon has perennially been in question. For example, in a 1999 issue of the International Herald Tribune, a prestigious scholar claimed that all of China’s tragedies are ‘sustained by a mistaken belief in the correctness of the 1949 revolution’ and that the future progress of China depends on the recognition that the revolution was a failure. However, the CCP government was certainly not perfect and its most significant failures were its political failures such as the Anti-rightist movement and the Cultural Revolution and also economic failures such as the great leap forward. Millions of peoples were falsely accused and persecuted during the political movements of the Mao period as the CCP focused on class struggle instead of economic development during the period and tens of Millions of peoples died due to starvation as there were widespread food shortages during the great leap forward movement.
The Nationalist Party primarily competed against the Chinese Communist party starting in the early 20th century. Leader of said party was Sun Yatsen, he is described as “a patriot whose sincerity permitted him to be startlingly nonideological and opportunistic....”1 While he did not initially adopt the ideals of communism (class battles) he knew it would be necessary to spread a nationalist theory throughout China. In theory they [the communists] violated his Three Principles of the People -- “Nationalism, People's Rights or Democracy, and People's Livelihood...”2 Eventually becoming overwhelmed with warlordism and misfortune, Sun would retreat to Shanghai and begin reorganizing the Guomindang (or Chinese Nationalist Party). This would reveal that early efforts were futile for a strong nationalist party in China. Sun would later then ally with the Soviets and model his government model after theirs.
Cao Xueqin’s Story of the Stone is a classic in Chinese literature, showcasing the life and exploits of the wealthy Jia clan during the feudal era. Through Cao’s depiction, the reader is afforded a glimpse into the customs and lifestyle of the time. Chinese mode of thought is depicted as it occurs in daily life, with the coexisting beliefs of Confucianism and Taoism. While the positive aspects of both ideologies are presented, Cao ultimately depicts Taoism as the paramount, essential system of belief that guides the character Bao-yu to his eventual enlightenment. As was the case in China, Cao depicts the two forms of belief existing alongside one another, and not necessarily practiced exclusively to one another.
In many of the works we have read this year, there have been many critiques to the Chinese Communist ideals. These works solely critique the ideals of communism, and promote change in the way that it is implemented in life. The movie “Blue Kite,” tries to show what life was like under the communist government in China. By showing the people the true agony and suffering during the regime, they hoped to change the ideas of many people about communism. While the majority of scholars and students believe that “Blue Kite” is solely a critique of communistic ideals in China, I believe that it is a promotion of more progressive and democratic ideas shown through the Chinese government emphasis on little to no family life, and the visual and metaphorical
Ba Jin does not judge Cultural Revolution directly; however, the cruelty can be found from all those unfair miseries Xiao Shan suffers. The more simplicity and innocent Xiao Shan is shown, the crueler Cultural Revolution is. Personal grief is associated with the familiar historical event is more affective to readers.
Interregnum, painted by the Chinese artist Hung Liu, is a massive oil painting created circa 2002. With the intentional application of several principles and elements of art in her work, Liu effectively depicts her late Asian culture’s traditional aspects while also exposing the harsh reality of China’s Communist society. Hung Liu incorporates a variety of styles into Interregnum while also utilizing color and line to visually communicate the subject matter to the viewer. In a formal interpretation of this work, the overarching theme of Interregnum will be explored and described, focusing on the particular values sought out by the artist Hung Liu.
The Red Guard strove to remove and destroy the Four Olds, foreign influence, enemies of the Party and the current societal structure by persecuting those who supposedly perpetuated them. All vestiges of outdated customs, habits, culture and ideas were to be destroyed, since the movement represented “a triumph of youth over age, of ‘the new’ over ‘the old.’” To do so, the Red Guard wrecked thousands of art collections and the contents of libraries, and changed “reactionary” street signs. They persecuted members of the public who attempted to stop them or refused to give up the Four Olds. Those who had foreign ties, like businessmen, missionaries, or who had western education were also persecuted to prevent backwards or rightist ideologies from spreading into the new Chinese society. Chinese intellectuals were also hounded for the same reason: to prevent free thought. The messages of the movement were “negative—against the established authority, against the Party, against the military” and the outdated structures of the older generation. To destroy the established order, the Red Guards attacked educational and political institutions that were enemies of Mao and the party, and created general havoc within China. The Red Guard targeted teachers, education policies, and universities to change the core of education and the qualities that it had extolled. Members of the general public and even party officials themselves were attacked, to remove the “capitalist roaders” with bourgeois tendencies from society. Mao hoped that in this chaos a new communist China would emerge.
It was the events between 1946 and 1964 that strengthened communism in China. At the end of World War II, the Nationalist Party (GMD) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) raced for power in China. The chairman of the Communist Party was Mao Zedong and their army was known as the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). The Nationalist’s were led by Chiang Kai-shek and their army was the Kuomintang.
Chinese people might find naming their religion challenging as it is a mixture of “traditional religion, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism” (Corduan, 2012, p.388). The Chinese Popular Religion continues to evolve and change as the world around it changes and outside influences enter the Chinese culture (Corduan, 2012). Investigation of the Chinese Popular Religion includes its key features, practices, and influences, along with tis role in contemporary China, and how Christians can enhance their interactions.
Chinese art went through many different stages starting from the year 1842. But the massacre of Tiananmen Square in the year 1989 was a turning point in the political life of China and in the country's art. Until the year 1992 art in China was underground, but it kept expanding. As a result of that, some Chinese artists started to do art works that rebel against their government and express their feelings towards China. One of these artists is the famous Chinese artist Ai Weiwei who expressed in each piece of art he did, his feelings that China should let its people break away from the rotten traditional, in order to express their thoughts freely.
Considering communist China's recent increased aggression, and deteriorating relations between them and the United States, the dangers of this novel must be weighed carefully. It is often taught in schools, despite the fact that it promotes un-American and anti-capitalist views. With today's political tension, do we really want our youth exposed to literature that encourages them to mistrust the government and supports a communist revolution?
The 1911 Revolution kicked out the Qing Dynasty and broke the barriers to different developments in China. However, the 1911 Revolution has only provided a framework of a republic and made changes in some particular aspects related to immediate problems and difficulties in society. Hence, the relationship between the revolution and the subsequent development of China was very weak. On one hand, I do not agree with the latter part of the statement that the 1911 Revolution brought new problems to China. The conflicts and problems that China suffered in the early/ mid 1910s were mainly due to the weakness of the military force, conflicting political organizations and disorder in society. On the other hand, I agree with the first part of the statement that the 1911 Revolution did not bring peace to China afterwards. In the following paragraphs, I am going to focus on explaining the reasons of emerging new problems in China and also illustrate my points on the factors of the 1911 Revolution which could not bring in peace to China related to the conditions of the country.