Today, China is experiencing the largest urbanization in human history. The iterative upgrading of urban hardware is changing with each passing day, but urban culture, which is the core issue of soft power, is still a weakness. In recent years, the names of a series of Chinese cities such as Beijing, Tianjin, Chongqing, Wuhan, Guangzhou, Suzhou, Xi'an (Chang'an), and Wenzhou have become the beginning of the name "XX Xue", which is a response to this situation. Among these many attempts, the discussion of Shanghai-style culture has the largest volume, the most results, and the highest achievements. This article focuses on the generation path of Shanghai-style culture and sorts it out in three periods, helping us to understand the historical process of the origin, evolution and prosperity of Shanghai-style culture at a deeper level.
Xu Jinjiang, Zheng Chongxuan, et al., New Theory of Shanghai Culture, Shanghai Far East Publishing House, 2001.
Mid-80s of the 20th century to early 21st century: qualitative research, high starting point, neutral attitude
After the reform and opening up, the regional characteristics of all parts of the country have become more and more obvious, and various regional cultures have competed in style, and Shanghai's regional culture has also attracted more and more attention. Before modern times, Shanghai did not have a specific regional cultural name, so people thought of the "Shanghai School" in the Jinghai Controversy, which was a sensation in the 34s of the 20th century.
"Shanghai style", which first appeared in the public eye in 1917, soon became a widely popular term. However, it was not until the mid-80s of the 20th century that the term "Shanghai style" was rediscovered and given meaning by the Shanghai cultural circles, resulting in the term "Shanghai culture". This is the beginning of many groundbreaking academic discussions and research results. In 1984, Huang Shang published an article entitled "Yuxia Miscellaneous Sayings: On the "Shanghai School"" in the magazine "Lookout", arguing that "the Shanghai School has its own characteristics of the Shanghai School, which should be studied and summarized". In the following year, he continued to publish the article "Dare to Raise the Banner of "Shanghai School" and Revitalize Shanghai Culture - My Congratulations", which once again emphasized the enthusiasm of "Shanghai School". In 1985, He Yulin published "On the "Shanghai School", which first put forward the theory of "Shanghai Culture". In this paper, the term "Shanghai-style culture" and "Shanghai-style" are used together, which is regarded as a "peak" and "shining point" in the development trajectory of China's modern history and culture.
In 1985, the Propaganda Department of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China organized a research team of more than 400 experts and scholars from universities, social science research institutions, and government departments in Shanghai, as well as workers in the propaganda and cultural system, to form more than 100 research papers and investigation reports with about 1.2 million words after extensive investigation and research. In November of that year, the Ideological Research Office of the Propaganda Department of the Shanghai Municipal Party Committee, Jiefang Daily, Wen Wei Po and Social Science Magazines jointly initiated a seminar on Shanghai-style culture, which was attended by more than 70 scholars, writers, artists, and cultural workers in Shanghai, and conducted heated discussions on the origins and characteristics of Shanghai-style culture, as well as how to evaluate them. Some people in Shanghai's cultural circles took this opportunity to propose "revitalizing the majesty of the Shanghai School" and "holding high the banner of the Shanghai School", which triggered the discussion of the "Shanghai School Culture" in the late 80s and early 90s of the 20th century for several years. During this period, the academic research of Shanghai School culture had a very high starting point, and the discussion of many issues such as the origin, rheology, connotation, definition, and evaluation of Shanghai School, as well as its relationship with modern Shanghai society, has been quite detailed and in-depth, and its academic influence has continued to this day.
In this stage of research, a prominent feature is that the academic community has a relatively neutral attitude towards "Shanghai School" and "Shanghai School Culture", that is, while affirming its enthusiasm, it is also soberly aware that "Shanghai School" is a thing of the past. In the 1985 academic symposium, an evaluation of the "Shanghai faction" was formed, holding that "it is wrong to denigrate either side of the 'Shanghai faction' and the 'Beijing faction'." Both cultures have their strengths and weaknesses, and they should learn from each other's strengths. In the process of national cultural development, cultural methods with different characteristics should be allowed to exist. As for the future of Shanghai-style culture, the conclusion of this stage is also relatively objective, that is, it pays more attention to revitalizing the prestige of Shanghai culture, and believes that it is necessary to "inherit and carry forward the fine traditions of 'Shanghai-style' culture, absorb the strengths of 'Beijing School' and other schools, and overcome their own shortcomings...... to create a new socialist culture with the characteristics of the 'Shanghai School'".
Regarding the term "Shanghai School", Chen Xulu believes that "the name of Shanghai School can be discarded, but it is indispensable to open up new and flexible and diverse styles". In 1998, the "Shanghai Culture, Urban Culture, Shanghai Culture Academic Seminar" was held, bringing together more than 30 people from academia and media, which was the second large-scale discussion after 1985. Therefore, the Shanghai culture formed under the new historical conditions should not continue to rely on the 'Shanghai culture', and it is better to use the name of Shanghai culture."
From the beginning of the 21st century to 2014: Exploring the spirit of the city and studying specific cultural patterns
Since the beginning of the 21st century, the discussion on "Shanghai-style culture" has mainly revolved around the "urban spirit" at the policy level. In 2000, Shanghai Municipality launched a great discussion on "The Spirit of Shanghai People Facing the New Century." In 2003, Shanghai put forward the city spirit of "embracing all rivers" and "pursuing excellence". In May 2007, the spirit of Shanghai city had a new expression, and it was proposed to "cultivate the spirit of the city with the times, vigorously shape a new image of inclusiveness, pursuit of excellence, open-mindedness, wisdom, and modesty, so that the people of the city can always maintain a spirit of hard work and high spirit". Since then, the spirit of Shanghai has been expressed as: "Embrace all rivers, pursue excellence, be open-minded and wise, and be modest".
At the academic level, the continuous research on "Shanghai culture" is roughly approached from two different paths:
The first is the academic research of the historiography path. After the reform and opening up, the study of Shanghai's urban history has long surpassed Shanghai, and even gone abroad, becoming the academic object of common concern of many scholars around the world, forming a large number of achievements. According to the Bibliography of Overseas Shanghai Studies (1845-2005) published by Shanghai Lexicographical Publishing House, by the end of 2005, there were only 4,092 documents related to Shanghai in English, French, German, Japanese and other foreign languages, as well as some foreign language documents published by overseas institutions in China. The term "Shanghai Studies" has become popular in academic circles. In the process of changing the research paradigm, the historiography has a tendency to pay more attention to the history of social life and the history of new culture, and many phenomena of Shanghai-style culture have been included in the research vision. His representative achievements include "General History of Shanghai", "Map of Shanghai Foreign Culture" and "History of Shanghai Urban Social Life Series".
The newly revised 30 volumes of the General History of Shanghai integrate the red culture, Shanghai-style culture and Jiangnan culture, and embodies the urban character and spirit of Shanghai in the profound development accumulation and historical heritage.
The second is the academic research of literature and art. In 1989, Shanghai Bookstore Publishing House published the "Shanghai School Novels" album of "Reference Materials for the History of Modern Chinese Literature", which included 10 novelists and their representative works. The concept of "Shanghai-style literature" has long been formed in literary studies. Although the meaning of "Shanghai-style literature" is relatively vague, there are still many modern and contemporary writers who depict the theme of Shanghai's urban customs will be named or self-proclaimed as "Shanghai-style literature" writers, and related literary discussions will be classified as "Shanghai-style literature". Not only limited to literary works, but also in other cultural fields such as painting, music, film, opera, opera, linguistics, clothing, food, architectural art, etc., the scope of research on Shanghainese culture has become more and more extensive. However, at the same time, some scholars have pointed out that Shanghai-style culture has become all-encompassing and over-generalized, which is worthy of vigilance.
With the 41st World Expo held in Shanghai in 2010, Shanghai's cultural voice has increased again, and Shanghai-style cultural research has entered a new stage. In 2001, the Shanghai Economics Research Center of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics was established, and in 2003, the center founded the quarterly journal "Shanghai School Economics", which has been published for 20 consecutive years. In 2002, Shanghai University established the Shanghai Culture Research Center, with Li Lun as the new director, and the center was affiliated to the College of Liberal Arts, and began to hold regular academic seminars on Shanghai culture, which has been held for 20 sessions until 2023, and published the "Proceedings of the Shanghai Culture Academic Seminar" after the conference. At the same time, the center organizes the publication of dozens of volumes of the "Shanghai Culture Series", and is currently the most active research institution of Shanghai culture. In the same year, the newspaper "Shanghai Culture" founded by Shi Jianwei and others was published, with about 4,000 copies per issue, and the newspaper was affiliated with the Institute of Overseas Chinese Literature of Tongji University<海派文化>Selected Newspapers. In 2003, Shanghai Jiao Tong University established the Shanghai Culture Research Institute with the main purpose of integrating various disciplines and resources, bringing forth the new, and working together to prosper Shanghai-style culture, with Xiong Yuezhi as the director. In 2013, Donghua University established the Shanghai Collaborative Innovation Center for Fashion Design and Value Creation. In 2014, the Shanghai University Museum was opened, dedicated to the collection, display, research and education of Shanghai culture and Shanghai dialect culture.
At this stage, the research focuses more on promoting the in-depth discussion of various specific forms of Shanghai-style culture and enriching the content of Shanghai-style culture. The "Shanghai Culture Series" is a representative of this period, which tries to outline the whole picture of Shanghai culture through dozens of different themes, so that people can fully see the richness of Shanghai culture. In addition, "Ten Classic Changes of Shanghai Culture" and "Overview of Shanghai Culture" are also representative works at this stage, both of which portray the specific content of Shanghai culture. However, compared with the previous stage, there was less comprehensive and qualitative research in this period, and it was replaced by research on specific cultural patterns, and the quality of research results was significantly lower than that of the previous stage in terms of criticality, speculation and depth of thought.
2015-present: In line with the policy, the scale and influence of research have been improved
Since the end of 2015, "Shanghai culture" has been officially seen in official documents, and in the "13th Five-Year Plan" proposal, Shanghai proposed to "inherit the essence of Chinese culture, absorb the essence of world culture, carry forward the character of Shanghai culture, and strive to enhance the appeal of core values, the persuasiveness of theoretical achievements, the influence of public opinion, and the competitiveness of the cultural industry, and basically build an international cultural metropolis". In December 2017, the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China held a study and discussion meeting, proposing to "make every effort to launch the four major brands of Shanghai service, Shanghai manufacturing, Shanghai shopping and Shanghai culture", and pointed out that "rich red culture, Shanghai culture and Jiangnan culture are valuable resources of Shanghai, which should be used well", and put Shanghai culture as one of the connotations of the "Shanghai culture" brand, and placed it in a position alongside red culture and Jiangnan culture. In January 2021, in the "14th Five-Year Plan", it was clearly proposed to "vigorously spread and promote red culture, Shanghai culture and Jiangnan culture". In July of the same year, in the "Three-Year Action Plan for Deepening the Construction of a Socialist International Cultural Metropolis with All Efforts to Promote the "Shanghai Culture" Brand and Deepen the Construction of a Socialist International Cultural Metropolis (2021-2023), it was proposed to "highlight the role of the 'Shanghai Culture' brand building in the dissemination and promotion of Shanghai-style culture", and planned a series of special actions that would help spread Shanghai-style culture.
The Shanghai-style cultural window of Shanghai Hongqiao Station. Photo by Xu Tao.
Under the call of this series of policies, the scale and social influence of Shanghai-style cultural research have increased again. In addition to the above-mentioned institutions and personnel, in 2017, the Shanghai Cultural Center was established in the North Sichuan Road Park in Hongkou District, Shanghai, which is a public cultural platform with the mission of promoting the innovation and inheritance of Shanghai culture, and holds free exhibitions and activities open to the public. In the same year, the cultural project "Wave Flower Forum" featuring the dissemination of Shanghai-style culture was established, and the 2022 "Ocean Wave Flower Forum" landed in Changning District Library. In 2023, the "Shanghai Culture Research Center for the New Era" jointly established by Shanghai Normal University and Xuhui District will be officially established.
The results of this period continue to be characterized by the previous period, with fewer rational studies, more discourses on specific cultural contents, and less likely to form a dialogue between studies, and more emphasis on interpreting and arguing the spirit of policy documents. The representative achievement of this stage is the publication of the 17-volume "Shanghai Cultural Map" series, which was compiled by the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and the CPPCC districts, with the Shanghai-style cultural characteristic resources and representative figures of the 16 districts of Shanghai as the core content, and its value lies in the display of specific cultural forms. Among the many discourses, there is also a comprehensive study of Shanghai-style culture in the last century. Representative works, such as "A New Theory of Shanghai-style Culture", jointly written by scholars from the Institute of Literature and the Institute of History of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, discuss the historical changes and construction of Shanghai-style culture, as well as the core issues such as Jiangnan culture and Shanghai-style culture, and closely echo the policy; From the perspective of transformation, various aspects of Shanghai-style culture in modern times are discussed, and the study of Shanghai-style culture continues to be promoted.
The above images are provided by the author.
According to the author's incomplete statistics, from the mid-80s of the last century to the end of 2022, there are 640 kinds of books and 1,537 theoretical articles directly related to "Shanghai culture". From the perspective of time trend, the scale of research has been increasing step by step, especially after 2000, the number of research results of Shanghai culture has increased explosively. But even so, the definition of "Shanghai-style culture" is still different from each other, and there is no unified view. In the book "New Theory of Shanghai Culture", it is believed that the Shanghai culture is completely different from the traditional Confucian culture and the Western Enlightenment in terms of generation mode, and it is not a cultural form that can be popularized by a certain class or group first put forward the slogan of "Shanghai School", on the contrary, it is naturally born in a state of unconscious and leaderless, and the citizen class accepted and participated in the creation of Shanghai culture earlier than the cultural elite, and then aroused the interest of scholars.
(Xu Tao, researcher, Institute of History, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences; Liu Yayuan, assistant researcher, Institute of History, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences)