Taiwanese culture
From Wikinfo
The cultures of Taiwan are a hybrid blend of various sources, incorporating elements of traditional Chinese culture, Japanese culture, and increasingly globalized values. (Harrell/Huang 1994:1-5).
The common socio-political experience in Taiwan gradually developed into a sense of Taiwanese cultural identity and a feeling of Taiwanese cultural awareness, which has been widely debated domestically (Yip 2004:230-248; Makeham 2005:2-8; Chang 2005:224). Reflecting the continuing controversy surrounding the political status of Taiwan, politics continues to play a role in the conception and development of a Taiwanese cultural identity, especially in the prior dominant frame of a Taiwanese and Chinese dualism. In recent years, the concept of Taiwanese multiculturalism has been proposed as a relatively apolitical alternative view, which has allowed for the inclusion of mainlanders and other minority groups into the continuing re-definition of Taiwanese culture as collectively held systems of meaning and customary patterns of thought and behavior shared by the people of Taiwan (Hsiau 2005:125-129); (Winckler 1994:23-41).
After the escape to Taiwan, the Kuomintang imposed an official interpretation of traditional Chinese culture over Taiwanese cultures. The government launched a program promoting Chinese calligraphy, traditional Chinese painting, folk art, and Chinese opera.
Since the Taiwan localization movement of the 1990s, Taiwan's cultural identity has enjoyed greater expression. Identity politics, along with the over one hundred years of political separation from mainland China has led to distinct traditions in many areas, including cuisine and music.
The status of Taiwanese culture is debated. It is disputed whether Taiwanese culture is a regional form of Chinese culture or a distinct culture. Speaking Taiwanese as a symbol of the localization movement has become an emblem of Taiwanese identity.
Contents |
KMT Era Cultural Policy
During the early postwar period the Chinese Nationalist Party “Kuomintang” (KMT) suppressed Taiwanese cultural expression and barred Taiwanese from cosmopolitan life except in the spheres of science and technology (1994 Winckler:29). The authoritarian KMT dominated public cultural space and Chinese nationalist networks became a part of cultural institutions, leaving little resource for cultural autonomy to grow (Phillips 2003:10-15).
Under the early KMT, Taiwan was realigned from a Japanese imperial center to a Chinese nationalist center, under the influence of KMT and American geo-political interests (Gold 1994:47). Although American cultural activities were modest, they played a significant role in Taiwan’s developing cultural scene. The KMT claimed a loss of morale led to “losing China” and thus the state issued a series of ideological reforms aimed to “retake" China, which became the major state cultural program or the time, The immediate preoccupation with losing China diverted long term investment in the humanities and social sciences. On another level, the state’s main objective was to “sinicize” the Taiwanese by teaching them Mandarin Chinese and Nationalist ideology through compulsory primary education (Wachman 1994:82-88).
By the late 1940s the KMT had eliminated dissent for its cultural policies. When Taiwanese had resumed the cultural activities, which were outlawed by the Japanese in 1937, the Nationalist attitude was that Taiwanese had been Japanese “slaves” and would therefore have to complete a period of moral and ideological tutelage before they could enjoy their full rights as citizens of the Republic of China (Kerr 1965:72;266). The February 28 Incident destroyed Taiwan’s urban elite and the arrival of the mainlander elite ensured Nationalist domination of urban cultural centers (Gates 1981:266-269).
In 1953, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek issued his first major opinion on culture to complete Sun Yat-sen’s Three Principles of the People, which included prescribing Nationalist curriculum for education, building facilities for intellectual and physical recreation and the major state cultural program of promoting anti-communist propaganda (Winckler 1994:30). In regard to Taiwanese cultural life, the major thrust was for “universalization” of education in Mandarin, which was enforced by law. Despite the hard-line Chinese control over culture, the Soviet advances in technology led to a new Nationalist focus on building closer cooperation with American universities and developing engineering programs (Wilson 1970). The American presence in Taiwan also encouraged Taiwanese to resume some politically, ethnically neutral cultural activities, which was expressed in a flourishing Taiwanese language media market (Winckler 1994:32).
Between the 1960s and the 1980s Taiwan's culture was commonly described in contrasts between Taiwan (Free China) and China (Communist China), often drawing from the official tropes of Taiwan as a bastion of traditional Chinese culture, which had preserved “true” Chinese values and culture against the “false” Chinese culture of post Communist China. At the same time, Taiwanese cultural expressions were brutally suppressed by Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese Nationalist Party. In response to the Cultural Revolution of China, the government of Taiwan began promoting the "Chinese Cultural Renaissance Movement" (中華文化復興運動), with a myriad of programs designed to promote traditional Chinese culture to counter the communist movement on the mainland which aimed at uprooting the "Four Olds". These programs involved subsidized publication of Chinese Classics, the symbolic functions of the National Palace Museum, promoting famous prewar scholars to prominent positions in government and academic institutions, textbook and curriculum design with a focus on the official view of “traditional” Chinese culture and involvement in social and community events and the exemplification of Confucian ideology intertwined with Sun Yat-sen thought
Taiwanization
Bentuhua or Taiwanization/Taiwanese localization has become, arguably, the most important symbol of cultural change over the past twenty years. Bentuhua describes the social and cultural movement by the people of Taiwan to identify with Taiwan’s unique historical and cultural legacy. Bentuhua has often been associated with Taiwan Name Rectification Campaign, Taiwan Independence, and Taiwanese nationalism.
Taiwanization of the culture of Taiwan has been a trend since democratisation in the 1980s and 1990s. In 2000, after half a century of Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) party rule, the first ever democratic change of ruling parties in Taiwan occurred with the election of Chen Shui-bian and his Taiwan-centric Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), marking an important step towards Taiwanization. While both major political parties, the KMT and the DPP, are generally supportive of Taiwanization, the DPP made Taiwanization a key plank in its political platform. The Chen administration's policies included measures designed to focus on Taiwan while de-emphasizing cultural and historical ties to China. These policies included changes such as revising textbooks and changing school curricula to focus more on Taiwan's own history to the exclusion of China, and changing the names of institutios that contain "China" to "Taiwan". These policies sometimes led to incongruities such as Sun Yat-sen being treated as both a "foreign" (Chinese) historical figure and as the "Father of the Country" (Republic of China). These policies are called Taiwanization but have been attacked by detractors as "desinicization". These policies are applauded by most ethnic Taiwanese and opposed by the Chinese Nationalist Party.
One phenomenon that has resulted from the Taiwanization movement is the advent of Taike subculture, in which people consciously adopt the wardrobe, language and cuisine to emphasize the uniqueness of popular, groundroots Taiwanese culture, which in previous times had often been seen as provincial and brutally suppressed by Chiang Kai-shek.
The Kuomintang took power in 2008 with the election of Ma Ying-jeou to the presidency. The new KMT administration has controversially sought to reverse some of the desinicizing policies of the Chen administration, to various degrees of public support. The restoration of the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall to its former state has been generally supported. By contrast, a directive by the administration to foreign missions to henceforth refer to visits by foreign dignitaries as "visiting (cultural) China" has been rescinded after criticism from DPP legislators.
Language
Most people in Taiwan speak both Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese. Mandarin is taught in schools, however most spoken media is split between Mandarin and Taiwanese. Speaking Taiwanese under the Taiwanization movement has become a way for the pro-independence Taiwanese to distinguish themselves from the mainlanders. The Hakka, who make about 10 percent of the population, have a distinct Hakka dialect. English is taught universally, starting with middle school. Some Japanese words have remained in common use.
Popular culture
Since 1949, Taiwan had managed to develop itself into the center of Chinese pop culture (also known as "C-pop" or 中文流行文化). Today, the Commercial Chinese music industry in the world (esp. Mandopop and Hokkien pop) is still largely dominated by Taiwanese pop artists. Successful Chinese pop artists from other countries (for e.g. Stefanie Sun, JJ Lin from Singapore) are also trained, groomed and marketed in Taiwan. Chinese pop artists from other countries who wish to become successful usually have to go to Taiwan to develop their music career. Mandarin Pop and Taiwanese (minnan/hokkien) genre music continue to flourish in Taiwan today.
Popular pop artists in Taiwan include Lee-Hom Wang, Jay Chou, Show Luo, Jolin Tsai and David Tao.
References
- Chang, Maukuei (2005). "The Movement to Indigenize to Social Sciences in Taiwan:Origin and Predicaments" in in (Eds.) John Makeham and A-Chin Hsiau's "Bentuhua" Cultural, Ethnic, and Political Nationalism in Contemporary Taiwan. NY: Palgrave Macmillan
- Harrell& Huang, Steven and Chun-chieh (Eds.) (1994). "Introduction" in Cultural Change in Postwar Taiwan. Boulder, Co: Westview Press
- Hsiau, A-Chin (2005). in (Eds.) John Makeham and A-Chin Hsiau's "Bentuhua" Cultural, Ethnic, and Political Nationalism in Contemporary Taiwan. NY: Palgrave Macmillan
- Makeham, John (2005). "Indigenization Discourse in Taiwanese Confucian Revivalism" in in (Eds.) John Makeham and A-Chin Hsiau's "Bentuhua" Cultural, Ethnic, and Political Nationalism in Contemporary Taiwan. NY: Palgrave Macmillan
- Winckler, Edwin (1994). "Cultural Policy in Postwar Taiwan" in in (Eds.) Stevan Harrell and Huang Chun-chieh Cultural Change in Postwar Taiwan. Boulder, CO:
- Yip, June (2004). Envisioning Taiwan:Fiction, Cinema and the Nation in the Contemporary Imaginary. Durham and London: Duke University Press
