POSTMODERNITY IN NEW MILLENNIUM CHINA?

Abstract

It is not unusual these days to hear from cultural critics that the very soul of metaphysical life in China—in which events and existences are imbued with meaning—has been irretrievably damaged in the current era of accelerated capitalist restoration. There are fears that such life cannot be rekindled amidst what has been described as the “crazy quilt” of consumerism that is rampant in contemporary China. The popularity of traditional Chinese culture and the appreciation of the work of elite artists has plummeted, while there has been an astonishing growth of mass-market popular culture. China scholars in a variety of fields have suggested that what they see happening is symptomatic of an entirely new epoch, and this paper considers the extent to which we might usefully refer to contemporary China as a postmodern society. There is a tendency for some scholars offering postmodern critiques to focus only on the negative aspects of postmodernity, especially the fragmentations, discontinuities, and disjunctures associated with a rapidly changing society. There is, however, a more positive side to the postmodern critique, one that offers some exciting new challenges for human geographers working in contemporary China. It is increasingly evident that many individuals and groups are now beginning to carve out new identities for themselves in the face of the dramatic and unparalleled changes they are encountering. What is implied here is that the very nature of the geographical unevenness and difference generated during the process of modernization can perhaps be shaped into the components of a new cultural and identity politics.