scholarly journals Nature as Refuge in Chinese Film and Literature

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 163
Author(s):  
Chunyan Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
Chinese Film ◽  
Social Turmoil ◽  
Zhou Zuoren ◽  
Film And Literature

In the period of 1920s and 1930s, traditional Chinese ideas and aesthetics, although embattled and in the process of being superseded by modern and Western aesthetics, did not totally disappear or die out in Chinese film and literature. For example, the image of nature continued to be constructed for its ability to relieve the misery of humanity. This is demonstrated in the films A Poet at the Edge of the Sea (1927) and Sand Washed by Waves (1936). However, because of social turmoil and turbulence of this period, the peaceful inner spirit as conveyed in the traditional culture seemed unattainable. There were more hints of social struggles in the “utopia”, as shown in the films Little Toy (1933) and Return to Nature (1936). The traditional ideas and aesthetics were also continued by some writers, such as Zhou Zuoren, Feng Wenbing, Yu Pingbo and Wang Tongzhao, who still had close spiritual connections with traditional culture. Sometimes the spirit of the “return to nature” was embedded with another mark of this period: the influence of Western culture, as shown by several of Guo Moruo’s poems.

Taxi Dancers

2020 ◽  
pp. 162-186
Author(s):  
Christina Elizabeth Firpo
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
Colonial Period ◽  
Economic Disparity ◽  
Urban Rural ◽  
Urban And Rural Areas

This chapter explores the clandestine sex work that occurred in dance halls which were also referred to as “the child of Europeanization.” Whereas sex work in ả Đào singing houses was marketed to men who sought comfort in traditional culture, the sex work that occurred in dance halls appealed to men excited — even titillated — by modernization and Western culture. As their success derived from both an image of urban sophistication and a mostly peasant workforce, dance halls exemplified the urban–rural divide in colonial Tonkin. The growing economic disparity and cultural differences between urban and rural areas in the late colonial period gave rise to the all the elements necessary for selling unregistered sex work in dance halls.

scholarly journals Gao Xingjian’s Dialogue with Literary and Visual Traditions

Porównania ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 331-343
Author(s):  
Izabella Łabędzka
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
Broad Context ◽  
Experimental Art ◽  
Gao Xingjian ◽  
Innovative Solutions ◽  
Taoist Philosophy ◽  
Contemporary Chinese

The paper is devoted to the contemporary Chinese prose and drama writer, painter,stage director and author of experimental art films, Gao Xingjian. My aim is topresent his innovative solutions in the field of different arts and media. I try toanalyze his works in a broad context of Eastern and Western culture and to showthe flexibility with which he crosses the narrow borders of arts, makes use of therich heritage of his native traditional culture, Chinese Taoist philosophy with itsprocessual understanding of reality. I also point at his interest in the aesthetics ofemptiness and artistic minimalism.

scholarly journals Religious Factor in Forming a National Modernization Model

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 86-95
Author(s):  
E.K. Chernyaev ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
The State ◽  
State And Society ◽  
National Model ◽  
Religious Factor ◽  
Developing Societies

The problem of the religious factor influence on the process of forming a national modernization model in developing societies, where institutions and elements of Western culture are borrowed, is actualized. The decline in the influence of Westernization, which contributes to the revival of traditional culture and religion in modernizing countries, is studied. Specifics of the religious factor and institutions influence on further changes in the state and society in line with the formation of a national model of modernization are analyzed.

scholarly journals Cultural Identity in Eugenia Kim’s The Calligrapher’s Daughter

2015 ◽  
Vol 62 ◽  
pp. 131-139
Author(s):  
Wen Lee Ng ◽  
Manimangai Mani ◽  
Wan Roselezam Wan Yahya
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Korean Women ◽  
Western Education ◽  
Foreign Culture ◽  
Cultural Identity Formation

Eugenia Kim’s The Calligrapher’s Daughter (2009) is a well-received East Asian novel about a Korean Christian, Najin’s encounter with western culture. As an aristocratic woman, she is expected to uphold Korean tradition. However, as Najin realises that she is culturally marginalised by her father and the Korean traditional society mainly due to her gender, she picks up a foreign culture introduced to her, western culture. This move is extremely significant because after Najin driven by cultural marginalisation to embrace western culture, her cultural practices are no longer the same with traditional Korean women. This important turn of the novel has not been explored by scholars extensively. Thus, this study aims to depart from the cultural marginalisation faced by Najin. Furthermore, due to the fact that cultural identity formation is highly influenced by culture, there is a need to look into the changes of Najin’s cultural identity as she incorporates western culture into her Korean traditional culture. By investigating the changes of Najin’s cultural identity throughout the novel, this study finds that Najin has transformed from a nameless girl without an identity into an independent woman with the help of western education.

Mission/Church Tensions in Africa as a Function of Goal Discrepancy

1971 ◽  
Vol os-18 (6) ◽  
pp. 269-278
Author(s):  
Gerald E. Bates
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Traditional Culture ◽  
Third Culture ◽  
Positive View ◽  
Christian Mission ◽  
True Shape ◽  
Indigenous Church ◽  
Mission Church ◽  
The Relationship

Many problems arising in the relationship between Christian mission and indigenous church stem from differences in the conceptualization of goals, the mission emphasizing evangelization and the churches emphasizing education. These differences arise from differing assessments of the priority of needs in the situation. An approach to such problems is outlined in terms of Malinowski's concept of a “third culture” arising from the interaction of an aggressive Western culture and a tenacious traditional culture. Missionaries should take a more positive view of the transformation of the institutions they found as they find their true shape in this third culture. Suggestions for the management and dissipation of tensions in this area are presented.

Exorcizing the Hungry Ghosts: Following the Middle Path in a 21st-Century Western Culture

PsycCRITIQUES ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul E. Priester ◽  
Joseph R. Priester
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Western Culture

Toxicity in Themes of Control: An Analysis of the Anglo-Western Cancer Rhetoric in A Monster Calls

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 117-129
Author(s):  
Natali Cavanagh
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The World

While infection has always haunted civilizations around the world, there are very few diseases that have had as much of an impact on Western culture as cancer has. The abundance of bereavement literature about characters with cancer begs the question; why cancer? This paper discusses ways in which cancer narratives reinforce Western obsession with control, through the lens of rhetoric and narrative structure. The author will specifically discuss how Patrick Ness’ 2011 novel, A Monster Calls, combats modern illness and cancer narratives and challenges themes of control threaded into Western culture

‘I saw a knock-out’: Fatness, (In)visibility, and Desire in Shallow Hal

Somatechnics ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jackie Wykes
Keyword(s):  
Female Body ◽  
Fat Body ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Knock Out ◽  
Dominant Meaning ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Female Bodies ◽  
Fat Bodies ◽  
Sexual Body

When the Farrelly brothers' movie Shallow Hal (2001) was released, one reviewer suggested that the film ‘might have been more honest if [it] had simply made Hal have a thing about fat women’ ( Kerr 2002 : 44). In this paper, I argue that Kerr hits the mark but misses the point. While the film's treatment of fat is undoubtedly problematic, I propose a ‘queer’ reading of the film, borrowing the idea of ‘double coding’ to show a text about desire for fat (female) bodies. I am not, however, seeking to position Shallow Hal as a fat-positive text; rather, I use it as a starting point to explore the legibility of the fat female body as a sexual body. In contemporary mainstream Western culture, fat is regarded as the antithesis of desire. This meaning is so deeply ingrained that representations of fat women as sexual are typically framed as a joke because desire for fat bodies is unimaginable; this is the logic by which Shallow Hal operates. The dominant meaning of fatness precludes recognition of the fat body as a sexual body. What is at issue is therefore not simply the lack of certain images, but a question of intelligibility: if the meaning of fat is antithetical to desire, how can the desire for – and of – fat bodies be intelligible as desire? This question goes beyond the realm of representation and into the embodied experience of fat sexuality.

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