Webb Keane
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691167732
- eISBN:
- 9781400873593
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691167732.003.0008
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
This chapter examines the case of moral revolutions that are bound up with political ones that are self-consciously atheist. One of the hallmarks of the twentieth-century socialist and communist ...
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This chapter examines the case of moral revolutions that are bound up with political ones that are self-consciously atheist. One of the hallmarks of the twentieth-century socialist and communist revolutions was the effort to remake societies that were more or less dominated by religious faith on nonreligious or even militantly antireligious grounds. The chapter then focuses on some of the ethical sources and goals of Vietnam's anticolonial and communist revolution. By looking at how, in everyday practices, revolutions attempted to propagate an expanded moral sensibility, inculcate people with egalitarian values, and reconfigure their intuitions about agency and responsibility, one can see some of the links among psychology, face-to-face interaction, and social history.Less
This chapter examines the case of moral revolutions that are bound up with political ones that are self-consciously atheist. One of the hallmarks of the twentieth-century socialist and communist revolutions was the effort to remake societies that were more or less dominated by religious faith on nonreligious or even militantly antireligious grounds. The chapter then focuses on some of the ethical sources and goals of Vietnam's anticolonial and communist revolution. By looking at how, in everyday practices, revolutions attempted to propagate an expanded moral sensibility, inculcate people with egalitarian values, and reconfigure their intuitions about agency and responsibility, one can see some of the links among psychology, face-to-face interaction, and social history.
Johanna Malt
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199253425
- eISBN:
- 9780191698132
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199253425.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
The point of departure in this chapter is the fundamental question of the possibility of a revolutionary art. What can writers and artists contribute to the cause of a Communist proletarian ...
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The point of departure in this chapter is the fundamental question of the possibility of a revolutionary art. What can writers and artists contribute to the cause of a Communist proletarian revolution? Though this may seem a very general, pragmatic, and perhaps ambitious place to start, it serves to establish the parameters of the debate in terms of Marxist cultural theory. The chapter sets out a brief account of André Breton's theory of the surrealist revolution, and sketches its possible positions in relation to the Communist revolution itself. The chapter's intention in doing this is not to rehearse a set of well-established surrealist tenets, and certainly not to retrace the movement's involvement with the Communist Party, but rather to establish the limitations of an approach based on individual or collective political engagement.Less
The point of departure in this chapter is the fundamental question of the possibility of a revolutionary art. What can writers and artists contribute to the cause of a Communist proletarian revolution? Though this may seem a very general, pragmatic, and perhaps ambitious place to start, it serves to establish the parameters of the debate in terms of Marxist cultural theory. The chapter sets out a brief account of André Breton's theory of the surrealist revolution, and sketches its possible positions in relation to the Communist revolution itself. The chapter's intention in doing this is not to rehearse a set of well-established surrealist tenets, and certainly not to retrace the movement's involvement with the Communist Party, but rather to establish the limitations of an approach based on individual or collective political engagement.
Yinghong Cheng
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824830748
- eISBN:
- 9780824870164
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824830748.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter details China's communist experiment with human nature. The idea of a new man, a morally perfect person, served as a model for Chinese society and became embedded in the Chinese culture. ...
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This chapter details China's communist experiment with human nature. The idea of a new man, a morally perfect person, served as a model for Chinese society and became embedded in the Chinese culture. The concepts of human malleability and the role of social environment in shaping human nature were not alien to Chinese history either. However, they became part of the discourse of nationalist ideology in the early twentieth century; indeed, in the second half of the century, they became a prime target of the Chinese communist revolution, as Mao Zedong aspired to surpass the Soviet Union in both economic and ideological terms. The idea of new men—or “Mao's good soldiers”—was created to perpetuate the revolution and generate an economic miracle, born from the absolute selflessness and dedication of such new men.Less
This chapter details China's communist experiment with human nature. The idea of a new man, a morally perfect person, served as a model for Chinese society and became embedded in the Chinese culture. The concepts of human malleability and the role of social environment in shaping human nature were not alien to Chinese history either. However, they became part of the discourse of nationalist ideology in the early twentieth century; indeed, in the second half of the century, they became a prime target of the Chinese communist revolution, as Mao Zedong aspired to surpass the Soviet Union in both economic and ideological terms. The idea of new men—or “Mao's good soldiers”—was created to perpetuate the revolution and generate an economic miracle, born from the absolute selflessness and dedication of such new men.
Huaiyin Li
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824836085
- eISBN:
- 9780824871338
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824836085.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter investigates the origins of the revolution narrative in the context of political and intellectual struggles between the Nationalists and the Communists and among the Communists. The ...
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This chapter investigates the origins of the revolution narrative in the context of political and intellectual struggles between the Nationalists and the Communists and among the Communists. The revolutionary narrative emerged in the 1930s and 1940s primarily as resistance by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its supporters to the modernization narrative then prevailing in mainstream historiography under the Nationalist regime. Among the Marxist historians and CCP theorists who contributed to its rise, Fan Wenlan (1891–1969) stood out for his writing, which had a profound impact on Chinese historiography during and after the communist revolution, and for his particular role as a trusted historian and personal friend of Mao Zedong.Less
This chapter investigates the origins of the revolution narrative in the context of political and intellectual struggles between the Nationalists and the Communists and among the Communists. The revolutionary narrative emerged in the 1930s and 1940s primarily as resistance by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its supporters to the modernization narrative then prevailing in mainstream historiography under the Nationalist regime. Among the Marxist historians and CCP theorists who contributed to its rise, Fan Wenlan (1891–1969) stood out for his writing, which had a profound impact on Chinese historiography during and after the communist revolution, and for his particular role as a trusted historian and personal friend of Mao Zedong.
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520217201
- eISBN:
- 9780520922389
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520217201.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the issues of politics, sex and family in the context of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) in China during the period from 1966 to 1968. It proposes new ...
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This chapter examines the issues of politics, sex and family in the context of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) in China during the period from 1966 to 1968. It proposes new hypotheses concerning some of the sources and forms of political critique during the GPCR. It argues that aside from the well-documented elite and socioeconomic cleavages between the winners and losers under socialism, other important dimensions of conflict were brought about by the different conceptualizations of proper marital and sexual and behavior and changes in family relations after the Communist revolution.Less
This chapter examines the issues of politics, sex and family in the context of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR) in China during the period from 1966 to 1968. It proposes new hypotheses concerning some of the sources and forms of political critique during the GPCR. It argues that aside from the well-documented elite and socioeconomic cleavages between the winners and losers under socialism, other important dimensions of conflict were brought about by the different conceptualizations of proper marital and sexual and behavior and changes in family relations after the Communist revolution.
Ho-fung Hung
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780231164184
- eISBN:
- 9780231540223
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231164184.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Asian Politics
Mao era development actualized the aspirations of generations of Chinese state builders who sought state-directed industralization since the late nineteenth century. The chapter also explores how ...
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Mao era development actualized the aspirations of generations of Chinese state builders who sought state-directed industralization since the late nineteenth century. The chapter also explores how legacies of the Mao era laid the foundation for the China boom .Less
Mao era development actualized the aspirations of generations of Chinese state builders who sought state-directed industralization since the late nineteenth century. The chapter also explores how legacies of the Mao era laid the foundation for the China boom .
Lisa Rofel
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520210783
- eISBN:
- 9780520919860
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520210783.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This analysis of three generations of women in a Chinese silk factory interweaves the intimate details of observations with a broad-ranging critique of the meaning of modernity in a postmodern age. ...
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This analysis of three generations of women in a Chinese silk factory interweaves the intimate details of observations with a broad-ranging critique of the meaning of modernity in a postmodern age. It is based at a silk factory in the city of Hangzhou in eastern China. The book compares the lives of three generations of women workers: those who entered the factory right around the Communist revolution in 1949, those who were youths during the Cultural Revolution of the 1970s, and those who have come of age in the Deng era. Exploring attitudes toward work, marriage, society, and culture, it connects the changing meanings of the modern in official discourse to the stories women tell about themselves and what they make of their lives.Less
This analysis of three generations of women in a Chinese silk factory interweaves the intimate details of observations with a broad-ranging critique of the meaning of modernity in a postmodern age. It is based at a silk factory in the city of Hangzhou in eastern China. The book compares the lives of three generations of women workers: those who entered the factory right around the Communist revolution in 1949, those who were youths during the Cultural Revolution of the 1970s, and those who have come of age in the Deng era. Exploring attitudes toward work, marriage, society, and culture, it connects the changing meanings of the modern in official discourse to the stories women tell about themselves and what they make of their lives.
Yinghong Cheng
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824830748
- eISBN:
- 9780824870164
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824830748.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
The idea of eliminating undesirable traits from human temperament to create a “new man” has been part of moral and political thinking worldwide for millennia. During the Enlightenment, European ...
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The idea of eliminating undesirable traits from human temperament to create a “new man” has been part of moral and political thinking worldwide for millennia. During the Enlightenment, European philosophers sought to construct an ideological framework for reshaping human nature. But it was only among the communist regimes of the twentieth century that such ideas were actually put into practice on a nationwide scale. This book examines three culturally diverse sociopolitical experiments—the Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin, China under Mao, and Cuba under Castro—in an attempt to better understand the origins and development of the “new man.” The book's fundamental concerns are how these communist revolutions strove to create a new, morally and psychologically superior, human being and how this task paralleled efforts to create a superior society. It begins by exploring the origins of the idea of human perfectibility during the Enlightenment. The discussion moves to other European intellectual movements, and then to the creation of the Soviet Man, the first communist new man in world history. Subsequent chapters examine China's experiment with human nature, starting with the nationalistic debate about a new national character at the turn of the twentieth century; and Cuban perceptions of the new man and his role in propelling the revolution from a nationalist, to a socialist, and finally a communist movement. The last chapter considers the global influence of the Soviet, Chinese, and Cuban experiments.Less
The idea of eliminating undesirable traits from human temperament to create a “new man” has been part of moral and political thinking worldwide for millennia. During the Enlightenment, European philosophers sought to construct an ideological framework for reshaping human nature. But it was only among the communist regimes of the twentieth century that such ideas were actually put into practice on a nationwide scale. This book examines three culturally diverse sociopolitical experiments—the Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin, China under Mao, and Cuba under Castro—in an attempt to better understand the origins and development of the “new man.” The book's fundamental concerns are how these communist revolutions strove to create a new, morally and psychologically superior, human being and how this task paralleled efforts to create a superior society. It begins by exploring the origins of the idea of human perfectibility during the Enlightenment. The discussion moves to other European intellectual movements, and then to the creation of the Soviet Man, the first communist new man in world history. Subsequent chapters examine China's experiment with human nature, starting with the nationalistic debate about a new national character at the turn of the twentieth century; and Cuban perceptions of the new man and his role in propelling the revolution from a nationalist, to a socialist, and finally a communist movement. The last chapter considers the global influence of the Soviet, Chinese, and Cuban experiments.
Jan Kiely
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- September 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780300185942
- eISBN:
- 9780300186376
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300185942.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Beginning with an account of the accelerated expansion of the penal reformation and thought reform systems under Kuomintang and Communist authorities amid the late 1940s civil war, this chapter ...
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Beginning with an account of the accelerated expansion of the penal reformation and thought reform systems under Kuomintang and Communist authorities amid the late 1940s civil war, this chapter argues that the Communist version that became a core instrument in their process of revolutionary advance, conquest and transformation of society was an ultimate extension of the wartime mode of the system. It also presents a dynamic sense of the culminating moment when the thought reform regime proliferated across China as an integral mechanism critical to the disciplining of a rapidly expanding party and military apparatus, a mushrooming prison labor camp system, and campaigns of revolutionary social-political transformation in the early 1950s. Much of the Communist system of thought reform resembled its predecessors and revealed its debts to the foundations laid in the previous decades. Yet it also featured certain distinctive modes and methods unlike those of its predecessors not just in its vast scale, but also in the experience of its disciplinary process. The Communist thought reform regime regularly inverted a disciplinary mode long designed and still often pursued in highly moralistic terms into forms requiring an amoral commitment to absolute loyalty.Less
Beginning with an account of the accelerated expansion of the penal reformation and thought reform systems under Kuomintang and Communist authorities amid the late 1940s civil war, this chapter argues that the Communist version that became a core instrument in their process of revolutionary advance, conquest and transformation of society was an ultimate extension of the wartime mode of the system. It also presents a dynamic sense of the culminating moment when the thought reform regime proliferated across China as an integral mechanism critical to the disciplining of a rapidly expanding party and military apparatus, a mushrooming prison labor camp system, and campaigns of revolutionary social-political transformation in the early 1950s. Much of the Communist system of thought reform resembled its predecessors and revealed its debts to the foundations laid in the previous decades. Yet it also featured certain distinctive modes and methods unlike those of its predecessors not just in its vast scale, but also in the experience of its disciplinary process. The Communist thought reform regime regularly inverted a disciplinary mode long designed and still often pursued in highly moralistic terms into forms requiring an amoral commitment to absolute loyalty.
Kathleen López
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- July 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781469607122
- eISBN:
- 9781469607986
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469607122.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
This chapter focuses on how politics, warfare, and revolutions disrupt migration flows, dislocate people, and sever homeland ties, sometimes forever. Revolutions in China, 1949, and Cuba, 1959, ...
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This chapter focuses on how politics, warfare, and revolutions disrupt migration flows, dislocate people, and sever homeland ties, sometimes forever. Revolutions in China, 1949, and Cuba, 1959, transformed both societies and altered the fabric of transnational Chinese merchant communities. Ironically, exiles fleeing Communism in China were confronted with a similar political upheaval in Cuba just ten years later. Both longtime residents and newer Chinese migrants joined the Cuban exodus in the wake of the revolution. The Chinese Communist Revolution contributed to the Cuban government's increasingly hardline stance toward its political opponents. In 1950, the government shut down the Communist newspaper Hoy. When a group of Chinese protested, their own publication Kwong Wah Po in Santiago de Cuba became a target of government censorship and repression.Less
This chapter focuses on how politics, warfare, and revolutions disrupt migration flows, dislocate people, and sever homeland ties, sometimes forever. Revolutions in China, 1949, and Cuba, 1959, transformed both societies and altered the fabric of transnational Chinese merchant communities. Ironically, exiles fleeing Communism in China were confronted with a similar political upheaval in Cuba just ten years later. Both longtime residents and newer Chinese migrants joined the Cuban exodus in the wake of the revolution. The Chinese Communist Revolution contributed to the Cuban government's increasingly hardline stance toward its political opponents. In 1950, the government shut down the Communist newspaper Hoy. When a group of Chinese protested, their own publication Kwong Wah Po in Santiago de Cuba became a target of government censorship and repression.
Yan Xu
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780813176741
- eISBN:
- 9780813176772
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813176741.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
The introduction first provides a historical background for the book during the period from the 1924 establishment of the Whampoa Military Academy to the 1945 end of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu ...
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The introduction first provides a historical background for the book during the period from the 1924 establishment of the Whampoa Military Academy to the 1945 end of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu goes on to introduce the major themes that the book aims to engage with, namely state-building and state-society relations in modern China, war and soldiers in Chinese military history and literature, as well as social emotion and mass mobilization in the Chinese Communist Revolution. Xu argues in the introduction that her book focuses on both social and cultural impacts of war in order to treat war as a cultural event for the people it influences rather than simply an analysis of politics and strategy. Xu ends this section by introducing the chapter structure and primary sources of the book.Less
The introduction first provides a historical background for the book during the period from the 1924 establishment of the Whampoa Military Academy to the 1945 end of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu goes on to introduce the major themes that the book aims to engage with, namely state-building and state-society relations in modern China, war and soldiers in Chinese military history and literature, as well as social emotion and mass mobilization in the Chinese Communist Revolution. Xu argues in the introduction that her book focuses on both social and cultural impacts of war in order to treat war as a cultural event for the people it influences rather than simply an analysis of politics and strategy. Xu ends this section by introducing the chapter structure and primary sources of the book.
Kam Louie (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789888028412
- eISBN:
- 9789882206960
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888028412.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter provides an overview of the decade since the 1997 retrocession by framing it within the wider scope of Hong Kong's history and within comparative colonial history. After briefly ...
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This chapter provides an overview of the decade since the 1997 retrocession by framing it within the wider scope of Hong Kong's history and within comparative colonial history. After briefly reviewing some of the changes and continuities in the period between 1997 and 2007, it considers three main issues: the problems of periodization and definitions inherent in Hong Kong's unique decolonization process, the difficulties involved in commemorating Hong Kong's first postcolonial decade, and some of the region's colonial legacies and current political realities. The overwhelming majority of tourists are no longer Westerners but mainland Chinese. Whereas Westerners used to travel to Hong Kong to catch a glimpse of “Red China” across the border, they also came to see traditional China, preserved in the New Territories and seemingly unchanged by the Communist revolution. Now, newspapers and magazines overseas frequently carry articles about Hong Kong's heritage and the dynamic, hybrid flair reflected in its cinema, cuisine, and architecture.Less
This chapter provides an overview of the decade since the 1997 retrocession by framing it within the wider scope of Hong Kong's history and within comparative colonial history. After briefly reviewing some of the changes and continuities in the period between 1997 and 2007, it considers three main issues: the problems of periodization and definitions inherent in Hong Kong's unique decolonization process, the difficulties involved in commemorating Hong Kong's first postcolonial decade, and some of the region's colonial legacies and current political realities. The overwhelming majority of tourists are no longer Westerners but mainland Chinese. Whereas Westerners used to travel to Hong Kong to catch a glimpse of “Red China” across the border, they also came to see traditional China, preserved in the New Territories and seemingly unchanged by the Communist revolution. Now, newspapers and magazines overseas frequently carry articles about Hong Kong's heritage and the dynamic, hybrid flair reflected in its cinema, cuisine, and architecture.
Qian Gong
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9789888390892
- eISBN:
- 9789888455003
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888390892.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Ode to Yimeng (Yingmeng Song), a major ballet production created in May 1974, was based on the short story “Red Sister-in-Law” (Hongsao). It is one of the “red classics” that deals with a ...
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Ode to Yimeng (Yingmeng Song), a major ballet production created in May 1974, was based on the short story “Red Sister-in-Law” (Hongsao). It is one of the “red classics” that deals with a revolutionary “base area,” and in essence, is about how the Communist Party won the support of the subaltern, the backbone of Chinese society at a tipping point in modern Chinese history, when CCP triumphed over the Nationalist army. The story of heroine, Sister-in-Law Ying, who saved a seriously wounded Communist soldier with her breast milk and nurtured him back to life, was once metaphoric and metonymic of the symbiotic relationships between army and the people. This chapter argues that the post-Mao remake in the format of a television drama has significantly re-defined the essence of the “fish-and-water” relationship in the spirit of traditional Chinese values and, in particular, Confucian values.Less
Ode to Yimeng (Yingmeng Song), a major ballet production created in May 1974, was based on the short story “Red Sister-in-Law” (Hongsao). It is one of the “red classics” that deals with a revolutionary “base area,” and in essence, is about how the Communist Party won the support of the subaltern, the backbone of Chinese society at a tipping point in modern Chinese history, when CCP triumphed over the Nationalist army. The story of heroine, Sister-in-Law Ying, who saved a seriously wounded Communist soldier with her breast milk and nurtured him back to life, was once metaphoric and metonymic of the symbiotic relationships between army and the people. This chapter argues that the post-Mao remake in the format of a television drama has significantly re-defined the essence of the “fish-and-water” relationship in the spirit of traditional Chinese values and, in particular, Confucian values.
Eugene Ford
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780300218565
- eISBN:
- 9780300231281
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300218565.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 20th Century
How did the U.S. government make use of a “Buddhist policy” in Southeast Asia during the Cold War despite the American principle that the state should not meddle with religion? To answer this ...
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How did the U.S. government make use of a “Buddhist policy” in Southeast Asia during the Cold War despite the American principle that the state should not meddle with religion? To answer this question, this book's author delved deep into an unprecedented range of U.S. and Thai sources and conducted numerous oral history interviews with key informants. The author uncovers a riveting story filled with U.S. national security officials, diplomats, and scholars seeking to understand and build relationships within the Buddhist monasteries of Southeast Asia. This fascinating narrative provides a new look at how the Buddhist leaderships of Thailand and its neighbors became enmeshed in Cold War politics and in the U.S. government's clandestine efforts to use a predominant religion of Southeast Asia as an instrument of national stability to counter communist revolution.Less
How did the U.S. government make use of a “Buddhist policy” in Southeast Asia during the Cold War despite the American principle that the state should not meddle with religion? To answer this question, this book's author delved deep into an unprecedented range of U.S. and Thai sources and conducted numerous oral history interviews with key informants. The author uncovers a riveting story filled with U.S. national security officials, diplomats, and scholars seeking to understand and build relationships within the Buddhist monasteries of Southeast Asia. This fascinating narrative provides a new look at how the Buddhist leaderships of Thailand and its neighbors became enmeshed in Cold War politics and in the U.S. government's clandestine efforts to use a predominant religion of Southeast Asia as an instrument of national stability to counter communist revolution.
Melissa J. De Graaf
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252036781
- eISBN:
- 9780252093890
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252036781.003.0010
- Subject:
- Music, Opera
This chapter examines the question of authenticity surrounding Paul Bowles's Denmark Vesey. Featuring music by Bowles set to a libretto by Charles Henri Ford, Denmark Vesey incorporates racial ...
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This chapter examines the question of authenticity surrounding Paul Bowles's Denmark Vesey. Featuring music by Bowles set to a libretto by Charles Henri Ford, Denmark Vesey incorporates racial politics and Marxist allusions. Its language and music emphasize Africanisms and African American folklore, much of it thoroughly researched and, in Bowles and Ford's minds, authentic. This chapter first considers “authentic” representations of blackness in Denmark Vesey before discussing some of the opera's prominent themes, including Love versus Hate and the use of animal masks. It also explores Denmark Vesey's evocation of Communist-style revolution, paying particular attention to the conflicts and the gradual alliance between blacks and the Left as elements that set up the context of the opera. Finally, it analyzes the demise of Denmark Vesey due to the loss of the score and explains how Bowles and Ford achieved a distinctive result in their integration of race and politics as well as their bridging of race and labor unrest of the 1820s and 1930s.Less
This chapter examines the question of authenticity surrounding Paul Bowles's Denmark Vesey. Featuring music by Bowles set to a libretto by Charles Henri Ford, Denmark Vesey incorporates racial politics and Marxist allusions. Its language and music emphasize Africanisms and African American folklore, much of it thoroughly researched and, in Bowles and Ford's minds, authentic. This chapter first considers “authentic” representations of blackness in Denmark Vesey before discussing some of the opera's prominent themes, including Love versus Hate and the use of animal masks. It also explores Denmark Vesey's evocation of Communist-style revolution, paying particular attention to the conflicts and the gradual alliance between blacks and the Left as elements that set up the context of the opera. Finally, it analyzes the demise of Denmark Vesey due to the loss of the score and explains how Bowles and Ford achieved a distinctive result in their integration of race and politics as well as their bridging of race and labor unrest of the 1820s and 1930s.
Yan Xu
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780813176741
- eISBN:
- 9780813176772
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813176741.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
The sixth chapter outlines another political force that influenced modern China: the Chinese Communists during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu claims that the CCP constructed the soldier figure here ...
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The sixth chapter outlines another political force that influenced modern China: the Chinese Communists during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu claims that the CCP constructed the soldier figure here within the parameters of an emotional bond between the army and the people, believing it to be essential for the state-building agenda that was contingent on winning support from peasants in the area and social integration in the revolutionary base. Xu, furthermore, splits the chapter up by examining first the CCP’s policies in Yan’an for integration and winning support from peasants, then later the army-peasant bond during the yangge movement.Less
The sixth chapter outlines another political force that influenced modern China: the Chinese Communists during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Xu claims that the CCP constructed the soldier figure here within the parameters of an emotional bond between the army and the people, believing it to be essential for the state-building agenda that was contingent on winning support from peasants in the area and social integration in the revolutionary base. Xu, furthermore, splits the chapter up by examining first the CCP’s policies in Yan’an for integration and winning support from peasants, then later the army-peasant bond during the yangge movement.
