Cultural change in postwar Taiwan

Author(s)

Bibliographic Information

Cultural change in postwar Taiwan

edited by Stevan Harrell and Huang Chün-chieh

Westview Press, 1994

Available at  / 26 libraries

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Note

Papers presented at conference held April 10-14, 1990, in Seattle

Bibliography: p. 302-326

Includes index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

This interdisciplinary study brings together perspectives from literature, anthropology, sociology, political science, economics, history, philosophy, and art to explore the culture of a fully industrialized society with a traditional Chinese background. Discussing the rich and profound cultural changes that have occurred in tandem with postwar Taiwans economic explosion, the contributors explore the countrys arts and literature, religion and rituals, and the everyday lives of its people. With its increasing wealth, a growing and better-educated urban population, and one of the worlds largest trade surpluses, Taiwan has shed its identity as an impoverished, war-torn nation and joined the ranks of developed countries. Yet, despite the attention focused on the countrys profound transformation, surprisingly little information exists on the concomitant changes that have occurred within the cultural matrix of arts and literature, religion and ritual, and the everyday life of Taiwans people.This interdisciplinary study brings together perspectives from literature, anthropology, sociology, political science, economics, history, philosophy, and art to explore the culture of a fully industrialized society with a traditional Chinese background. In addition, the contributors explore the importance of key cultural influences on Taiwan such as traditional Chinese agrarian society, the legacy of Japanese colonialism, the cosmopolitan West, and the unique aspects of the indigenous way of life.

Table of Contents

  • Introduction - change and contention in Taiwan's cultural scene, Stevan Harrell and Huang Chun-chieh. Part 1 Culture in "crisis" - views of the past and outlooks for the future: cultural policy in postwar Taiwan, Edwin A. Winckler
  • civil society and Taiwan's quest for identity, Thomas B. Gold
  • Taiwan and the Confucian aspiration - toward the twenty-first century, Huang C.C. and Wu Kuang-ming. Part 2 Culture at the individual level - education and attitudes: investment in education and manpower development in postwar Taiwan, Sun Chen
  • transformation of farmers' social consciousness in post-war Taiwan, Huang C.C.
  • Part 3 Culture with a small c - everyday life: playing in the valley - a metonym of modernization, S. Harrell
  • changes in postwar Taiwan and their impact on the popular practice of religion, David K. Jordan
  • tourism, formulation of cultural tradition and ethnicity - a study of the Daiyan identity of the Wulai Atayal, Hsieh Shih-chung. Part 4 Culture with a big c - literature and the arts: sociocultural change as reflected in short fiction, 1979-1989, Chu Yen
  • modern poetry in Taiwan - continuities and innovations, Michelle Yeh
  • after the empire - painters of the postwar generation, Jason C. Kuo
  • feminist consciousness in the contemporary fiction of Taiwan, Sung Mei-hwa.

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