https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1330-6135
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Abstract
This paper investigates ‘newspaper reading groups’ (dubaozu) in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) from 1951–1955, and how these groups reflected the daily practice, possibilities, and limits of a particular news culture in China under high socialism. As local newspaper reading group leaders translated national and provincial news into locally intelligible form, they were encouraged to combat boredom among audiences by choosing sensational news stories and transmitting this news in an entertaining fashion, adding music, song, and storytelling methods to embellish the ‘dead’ text of the newspaper at hand. By researching the particular methods of the newspaper reading group, this paper revisits the role of emotion in creating political meaning among audiences in what has been deemed one of the most propaganda-oriented societies of the twentieth century, encouraging a reassessment of how propaganda systems function not only in Chinese contexts but also among low-literacy communities the world over.
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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 24.
2 Rosenwein, Emotional Communities in the Early Middle Ages.
3 Stranahan, Moulding the Medium. Hung, ‘Inside a Chinese Communist Municipal Newspaper.’ Man, The People’s Daily and the Red Flag Magazine.
4 The definition of ‘emotion’ has been debated over, with inconclusive results, since even before William James first asked ‘What is an emotion?’ in 1884. See Sundararajan, Understanding Emotion in Chinese Culture, 191–3.
5 Stock, The Implications of Literacy.
6 Rosenwein, Emotional Communities in the Early Middle Ages.
7 Reddy, The Navigation of Feeling, 315.
8 Lean, Public Passions. Wang, Merry Laughter and Angry Curses. Tsai, Reading Shenbao.
9 Ho, Curating Revolution, 249.
10 For Drama troupes, see Demare, Mao's Cultural Army. For pingtan storytelling, see He, Gilded Voices. For emotion in ‘speaking bitterness’ campaigns, see Hershatter, Gender of Memory, 99–100.
11 Yang, ‘Xin zhongguo chengli chuqi Shanghai de dubaozu jiqi zhengzhi gongxiao,’ 243.
12 Ching-Chang and Mei-Rong, ‘U.S. Media Coverage of the Cultural Revolution,’ 318.
13 Peterson, The Power of Words, 56–7.
14 Yang, ‘Xin zhongguo chengli chuqi Shanghai de dubaozu jiqi zhengzhi,’ 242.
15 Zhan, ‘Jiti dubao,’ 94.
16 While the likes of professional film troupes and pingtan storytelling propaganda performers were gainfully employed by the PRC state propaganda bureau, newspaper reading group leaders were not, ensuring the economic advantage of newspaper reading groups. See He, Gilded Voices. See also Johnson, ‘Beneath the Propaganda State.’ See also Liu, Communications and Integration in Communist China, 140.
17 Chen and Chang, Zenyang Gao Dubaozu, 3.
18 Zhan, ‘Jiti dubao,’ 94.
19 Ibid.
20 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 6.
21 Yang, ‘Xin zhongguo chengli chuqi Shanghai de dubaozu jiqi zhengzhi gongxiao,’ 244, Zhan, ‘Jiti dubao,’ 95.
22 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 8.
23 Chuse de xuanchuan yuan, 43.
24 Yang, ‘Xin zhongguo chengli chuqi Shanghai de dubaozu jiqi zhengzhi gongxiao,’ 244. Yang Liping cites this from a 1950 article in the Wenhui Bao, see Xin, ‘Zenyang gaohao dubao xiaozu,’ 3.
25 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 24.
26 Yang, ‘Xin zhongguo chengli chuqi shanghai de dubaozu ji qi zhengzhi gongxiao,’ 249.
27 Bianjibu Bian, Zenyang zuo xuanchuanyuan, 45.
28 Shanghai yiyuan gongzuozhe gonghui, 16.
29 Chen and Chang, Zenyang Gao Dubaozu, 15.
30 Ibid.
31 Ibid.
32 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 24.
33 Shanghai yiyuan gongzuozhe gonghui, Dubaozu ziliao, 17.
34 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 24.
35 Wang, Gaohao dubaoxiaozu, 42.
36 Wang, Gaohao dubaoxiaozu, 25.
37 Shanghai yiyuan gongzuozhe gonghui, Dubaozu ziliao, 19–20.
38 Ibid., 20.
39 ‘Dubaozu yewu xuexi cailiao: dangdai ribao duzhe laixin zubian,’ 5.
40 Shanghai yiyuan gongzuozhe gonghui, Dubaozu ziliao, 20.
41 Ibid.
42 Ibid.
43 Wang, Gaohao dubaoxiaozu, 26.
44 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 16.
45 Ibid.
46 Qu, Kaizhan dubaozu gongzuo, 15. See also Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 24.
47 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 16–7.
48 Chen and Chang, Zenyang Gao Dubaozu, 18.
49 Ma, Zenyang gaohao dubaozu, 18.
50 Shanghai yiyuan gongzuozhe gonghui, Dubaozu ziliao, 17.
51 Ibid.
52 Chen and Chang, Zenyang Gao Dubaozu, 18.
53 Zhan, ‘Jiti dubao,’ 102–3.
54 Ibid., 101–2.
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Donald Santacaterina
Donald Santacaterina, Department of History, University of North Carolina, 102 Emerson Dr., Chapel Hill, NC, 27599, United States of America. Email: [email protected]