Cultural Change 2 Flashcards
What happened to performances of foreign works?
Banned
Directors, writers and directors were…
Fired or blacklisted
Some attacked by Red Guards
Others committed suicide to escape the violence
All new plays and operas..
Glorified Communism
What was the new slogan to do with culture?
What did this mean?
“Make it revolutionary or ban it”
Woke that featured traditional customs/ habits/ ideas replaced by plays and operas that advocated Communist ideology
What were the new “revolutionary shows”?
What characters did they feature?
Eight new “model dramas” created
Featured communist characters:
•’Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy’— an undercover communist soldier infiltrating and defeating bandits
• ‘The Legend of the Red Lantern’— Communist agents resisting a Japanese invasion
In the new revolutionary shows, how were old traditions and beliefs derided?
Superstitious:
Eg • in ‘Romance on the Milky Way’— a groom, referring to the belief that prospects for a good marriage would be helped by scheduling the wedding for a ‘lucky’ day declares:
“We must pick an auspicious day”
Future sister in law (good Communist) scolds him: “superstitious”
Some of the ballets were
Turned into movies
What happened in “Red Detachment of Women”?
The heroine (poor peasant) escapes an evil landlord who had imprisoned her for failing to pay her exorbitant rent
Becomes the leader of a women’s Red Army detachment (helped by a dashing party cadre)
What happened in The East is Red?
Sweeping dance epic
Took Mao’s cult of personality to bizarre levels
Traced the rise of the Communist Party from obscurity to Civil War victory
The title song:
• announced Mao to be “The People’s Saviour”
• claimed: “Without the Communist Party, there would be no China”
Where did propaganda teams travel?
To villages with new morals of portable projectors to show the films
What does evidence suggest about culture in Guangdong province?
1966– villagers watched four films
1974– watched ten per year
How many people had watched the film version of “Taking Tiger Mountain”?
7.3 billion people— seven times by each Chinese person!
How may operas and plays were allowed?
Only eight new operas and plays
How was China during the Cultural Revolution described?
“cultural desert”
One biographer of Jiang Qing: “turned the mind of the audience to ‘mashes potatoes’”
What happened to interest in culture?
After the initial interest, the lack of diversity became boring:
“eight hundred million people watching eight shows”— one joke
Even communist leaders grumbled: Deng Xiaoping— “people want to go to the theatre to relax” but instead “you find yourself in a battlefield”
Why were there such high audience figures in China?
Aside from Maoist propaganda films there was nothing else to watch!
Why did the new culture not reach all Chinese people?
The government feared to much disruption would reduce agricultural production —
Many peasants were not greatly involved
IT HAS BEEN NOTED that when the PLA went to the countryside to help the peasants, many had never even heard of the Cultural Revolution.
Why did Mao’s rule prove to be disastrous for Chinese culture?
(His belief in its purpose)
Believed culture was a TOOL by which societies could be CONTROLLED or REMADE
Sooooo
All culture had to proclaim the GREATNESS of the Communist PARTY, enforce ideological commitment to its policies.
Maos attitude to the traditions of Chinese life?
He had no respect for them:
brutally swept them aside, replaced with Communist culture that extolled:
The successes of Communist rule,
The heroism of the PLA
The role of ordinary people within National life
What happened to books, music under Mao?
Pre-revolutionary books banned
Music and popular songs praised both Mao and the CCP
What happened to the culture of traditional village life?
Targeted:
• old customs and beliefs (Confucius, respecting family elders) damned as superstitious
• this control was heightened during the push for collectivisation: traditional ways of life radically altered
Did Jiang Qing succeed during the Cultural Revolution?
✅ created a new communist culture
❌ old traditions proved hard to suppress
❌ years since Mao’s death: many of these old customs have been revived, often with renewed vigour.
