JEN-SHU WU
巫仁恕(Wu, Renshu)
1990年代是個關鍵的年代,大規模群眾運動興起,作為小市民的我身歷其境,躬逢 其盛,對於我撰寫博士論文有很大的刺激,於是構想撰寫有關明清城市民變的研究。我嘗試擺脫過去馬克思史觀,而用社會心理學的角度來分析。我也因此被歸為 「右派」!那就改研究別的方向吧!我選擇與日常生活最接近的課題,那就是消費與物質文化。雖然又常被視為不正經的研究,但是在研究過程中,卻可以疏解不少 壓力。最近總覺得自己不像晚明的文人士大夫那樣重視品味,反而比較像清代的士大夫喜歡吊書袋。
1990s was a crucial year, with the stirring of large-scale mass movements, and as I was a citizen I was right in the thick of it. Those events were a huge stimulus for my doctoral dissertation and I came up with the idea of writing about the collective protests the urban people went through in the Ming and Qing dynasties. I attempted to throw off the recent Marxist views of history, and analyze the events from the aspect of social psychology. For this reason I was branded as a “rightist”! So I changed the direction of my research! I chose a topic closest to everyday life, namely consumption and material culture. Although my research continued to be regarded as not serious, nevertheless, in the process of research this actually took a lot of the pressure off me. Recently I have felt that I resemble not so much the serious a late Ming literati who attaches importance to taste, but rather a Qing scholar-official who likes to flaunt his knowledge of the classics.
1990年代是個關鍵的年代,大規模群眾運動興起,作為小市民的我身歷其境,躬逢 其盛,對於我撰寫博士論文有很大的刺激,於是構想撰寫有關明清城市民變的研究。我嘗試擺脫過去馬克思史觀,而用社會心理學的角度來分析。我也因此被歸為 「右派」!那就改研究別的方向吧!我選擇與日常生活最接近的課題,那就是消費與物質文化。雖然又常被視為不正經的研究,但是在研究過程中,卻可以疏解不少 壓力。最近總覺得自己不像晚明的文人士大夫那樣重視品味,反而比較像清代的士大夫喜歡吊書袋。
1990s was a crucial year, with the stirring of large-scale mass movements, and as I was a citizen I was right in the thick of it. Those events were a huge stimulus for my doctoral dissertation and I came up with the idea of writing about the collective protests the urban people went through in the Ming and Qing dynasties. I attempted to throw off the recent Marxist views of history, and analyze the events from the aspect of social psychology. For this reason I was branded as a “rightist”! So I changed the direction of my research! I chose a topic closest to everyday life, namely consumption and material culture. Although my research continued to be regarded as not serious, nevertheless, in the process of research this actually took a lot of the pressure off me. Recently I have felt that I resemble not so much the serious a late Ming literati who attaches importance to taste, but rather a Qing scholar-official who likes to flaunt his knowledge of the classics.
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Wu Jen-shu, “Heaven” after the Catastrophe: Urban Life in Suzhou under Japanese Occupation. Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2017.
Using local newspapers, travel guide books, dairies, travel logs, oral history and archival documents, this study depicts the leisure life of Suzhou after the city was occupied by the Japanese during the Sino-Japanese War in 1937–1945, and reveals a complicated picture of the urban life in occupied Suzhou, with a focus on four leisure industries, tea houses, restaurants, hotels, and opium dens. As demonstrated by these four industries, the leisure life in Suzhou was far from being sluggish under the Wang Jingwei regime, but had been blossoming once the social order was recovered. This work shows that the change of the social structure and wartime social mentality were the main factors for “Suzhou splendor”. After Suzhou was made the capital of Jiangsu province under the puppet regime, the influx of war refugees and civil servants serving the new regime contributed greatly to the leisure industry. Furthermore, the carpe diem spirit that prevailed during the wartime was another major reason for the blooming of the consumer culture. While mainly focusing on the abnormally bustling leisure industry, this book depicts a more complicated picture of Suzhou’s urban life: the subsistence living the vast majority facing, high suicide rate, prevailing social violence, frequent conflicts between the employers and employees, objectified women, and the widening gap between the rich and the poor. This book also examines the relations between state and society in Suzhou under the Wang Jingwei puppet regime. From a bottom up approach, this study finds that the penetration of the puppet regime was deeper than that of the previous governments. Many aspects demonstrate the tighter grip of the puppet state on the society, such as the neighbourhood administrative system (pao-chia) and travel bans, strict control on urban hygiene and public leisure space, market price regulation and consumption ration system. Under the dominance of the state, owners of the leisure industry had been adopting several measures to resist the controls imposed by the state. Such measures include passive cooperation, black market trade, and Teahouse Trade Association, to serve as what James Scott called the “weapons of the weak.”
This monograph makes good contribution to the history of consumption as well as studies of China during the occupation period. Currently research on occupied China has been focusing mainly on Shanghai, whereas the author channels our attention to Suzhou. While the collective memory of the cities under Japanese occupation has been dominated by the massive war atrocities such as “the rape of Nanjing,” this study uses Suzhou as a case study to echo the new scholarship on the multi-layered effects the War had on Chinese cities.
本書分成三篇,各篇有兩章,分別從六個面向來探析。上篇從休閑與購物兩方面來探討明清城市的消費性格與消費的動力。中篇兩章則是以城市休閑消費所反映的社會空間為主題,分別以蘇州的園林與旅遊為例。下篇的兩章主要是關於兩性購物消費的議題。透過上述各章的分析與討論,作者在結論裡分析明清城市消費空間變遷所具有的三層意義。作者總結指出「消費」就是城市性格的重要特徵,同時也以休閑消費的吸引力來解釋明清鄉紳逐漸城居化的原因,並說明十八世紀江南官紳對休閑消費的觀念有去道德化與去政治化的可能性。
My previous monograph, Luxurious Taste: Consumer Society and Literati during the Late Ming (2007) discussed the formation of a so-called consumer society during the Ming Dynasty, a society that had its foundations in urban environments. My new work, Urban Pleasures: Leisure Consumption and Spatial Transformation in Jiangnan Cities during the Ming-Qing Period, focuses on the diversity of leisure and shopping activities and spaces that marked lifestyles and life experiences in cities from the mid-Ming to the mid-Qing period. I consider the concept of “space” in the field of consumption research, argue for the effects of consumption on changing spatial configurations, and explore the social relations and political negotiations behind the changes in the major cities of the Ming and the Qing.
Urban Pleasures is divided into three sections, each consisting of two chapters, which collectively explore the subject from six aspects. Part One focuses on the characteristics and incentives of consumption in Ming and Qing cities through aspects of leisure and shopping. The two chapters in Part Two explore mainly the social space reflected in urban leisure consumption. These two chapters use Suzhou as a case study to show how urban gardens were converted from private leisure spaces to public spaces and explore the evolution of tourism space from the Ming to Qing periods. The two chapters in the last part of the book center on the issue of gender and consumption. Based on the analysis and discussion throughout these chapters, the conclusion explores the significance of variations in urban consumer space in the Ming and Qing on three levels, namely: the spatial practice of consumption, the social production of consumer space, and the political negotiation of urban spaces. “Consumerism” was an integral part of the characteristics of “urbanity” during the Ming and Qing dynasties. The appeal of leisure consumption helps explain why the gentry often moved their residences from the country to the city from the mid-Ming period on. As well, the literati conception of leisure consumption was potentially de-moralized and de-politicized during the eighteenth century.
在中國近現代歷史的演變歷程中,城市無疑地扮演了重要的角色。尤其是現代性的特徵在城市裡表現特別明顯,而城市化又是現代性的一部分。本書透過城市來探討現代性的問題,最重要的目的,就是嘗試突破現代化或西化的框架,擴大視野與議題到其它的面向,並且將近現代城市史研究的縱深,延伸到明清時期。本書的14篇論文大致分為兩類,第一類是關於城市生活與文化的面向,第二類則是涉及到城市內群己關係的重新調整。本文為該書之〈導論〉部分。
Cities have played a crucial role throughout the course of modern Chinese history. Numerous aspects of Chinese modernity manifested themselves most clearly in urban settings, with urbanization constituting an essential component of modernity. This book explores the relationship between Chinese cities and modernity, its main goals being to challenge Western models of modernization, broaden scholarly perspectives on these issues by considering a wide range of phenomena, and extend the temporal scope of research on Chinese modernity to the Ming-Qing era. The 14 articles presented in this book can be divided into two types: the first treats facets of urban culture and daily life, while the second examines new forms of interaction between individuals and communities in urban settings.
Since travel culture is an important aspect of the literati’s culture of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, specific attention is given to how the literati moulded the culture of travelling. Part two of this book deals with the tourist activities of the literati. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties there were periods when the zest for traveling diminished, yet travel remained an important activity of the literati all the time. The literati's diaries during the Ming and Qing Dynasties show the real day-to-day practices of travel and prove that the mainstream preference at that time was for short distance journeys. The diaries also indicate that the literati thought highly of comfort and leisure while they were touring and that one of the functions of traveling was also social intercourse.
Part three of this book discusses how the literati built their travel culture. Besides introducing the relevant texts that the they wrote, this part focuses on the evolution of narrative and writing styles that took place especially from the late Ming to the mid Qing periods. Mainly through the analysis of the travel notes, we probe into the literati’s self-consciousness of their social status, and their tendency to change their writing styles in order to raise their social profile. We also present another point of view which refers to the impressions and attitudes of Chinese travelers − such as special envoys, intellectuals, overseas students and migrants, etc. − who traveled to the West or came in contact with Westerners in the late Qing period.
Finally, we discuss the representation of the tourist landscapes through three cultural forms. First, the literati’s typical landscape impressions and how the Jiangnan mountains and rivers influenced their traveling choices. Secondly, we show that building tourist landscapes also related to politics, as it was the case with the emperors who produced new sceneries during the Qing Dynasty. Finally, we will take Suzhou as an example of how the tourist landscapes developed in the Ming and Qing periods to become historic sites in the 20th century as well as the scenic spots of modern tourism.
摘要:
本書透過具體而細緻的實證研究,探討晚明的消費社會與士大夫的消費文化。作者希冀呈現晚明消費史的多元面向,豐富這段歷史。全書的兩大主軸,其一是嘗試把近代早期中國的消費史,放在世界史的脈絡下,突顯晚明時期的重要性。作者指出晚明已形成「消費社會」的現象,以修正英國史學家關於「消費革命」的歷史解釋。本書另一個主軸是士大夫的消費文化。從消費文化的角度,一方面可以看到晚明社會結構的變動,特別是士、商關係的變化;另一方面士大夫也透過消費文化,塑造消費品味與流行時尚,來重新建構他們的身分地位。
Elegant Taste: Consumer Society and the Literati in the Late Ming
Wu Jen-shu
This book explores the formation and elaboration of consumer society in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century China. With concrete and detailed empirical research, this book not only vividly illustrates Chinese literati’s material life in the late Ming, but also challenges previous works on the “consumer revolution.” Scholars have argued for the emergence of the consumer revolution in eighteenth-century Britain and its contribution to the subsequent industrial revolution. This book shows that a similar change in consumer culture occurred in China even earlier than in Britain while it did not necessarily lead to the same outcome. In addition, this book demonstrates social mobility between literati and merchants. Facing competition from the “vulgar” merchants, the late Ming literati reclaimed its class identity and dignity by forging a “taste of elegance.”
婦女超越生理基本需求的消費,代表明清時期婦女收入和經濟力的提升,而晚明的情欲觀,正好提供人們追求感官欲望的合理化基礎與動力。情欲觀帶動情色產業的興盛,妓女成為流行時尚的代言人。婦女的奢侈消費也衝擊了兩性關係,明清的士大夫對此提出許多批評,其中夾雜著性別偏見,甚至以法令嚴格規範婦女奢侈的消費。本書從消費的角度,重新觀察明清婦女的生活、地位及其對當時產業的影響,期望能予讀者明清婦女另一面貌。
Women of luxury – Women’s Consumer Culture of the Jiangnan region (area south of the Yangtse) in the Ming-Qing period
Wu, Jen-shu
The influence of the May Fourth movement has given us a rigid impression that traditional Chinese women were oppressed by Confucian culture. Yet it is also true that women in the Ming and Qing also could live lives of luxury, not only pursuing popular styles of personal adornment, but also in traveling and enjoying natural landscapes. This was not confined to the rich; the middle classes also followed suit. Going beyond the basic physiological needs of consumption, this represented an increase in the income and economic power of women. Moreover, the concept of sexual passion that appeared in the late Ming provided people with the rational grounds and the motivation to satisfy their lust. The sex industry was flourishing, and the prostitute became the representative of fashion. Consumption of luxury goods by women had an impact on gender relations, and many scholars treated this with a mix of criticism and misogyny, even going so far as to promulgate laws restricting the consumption of luxury goods by women. This book reexamines the lives and status of women in the Ming and Qing periods, and their influence on production, from a consumer perspective. It is hoped that this book can acquaint readers with another aspect of women during the Ming and Qing.
Papers
The present paper attempts to combine the research methods of history and criminology to investigate crime during the reign of the Tongzhi Emperor by using cases of theft in the archives of Ba county, Sichuan, from 1862 to 1875 as historical data for analysis. First of all, it has been found that three important historical events of the period, namely instances of harassment by remnants of the Taiping army in 1862, the “Zhenyuan 真原 Catholic Church Incident” which occurred in 1863, and the sharp rise in rice prices beginning in 1864, all directly affected the occurrence of theft cases. However, individual agency was not entirely affected by historical events. The second section of this paper analyzes the motivations of individual criminals. The majority of arrested criminals confessed that their motive was poverty and most of them came from the lower or working class. In addition, after rational consideration, they often organized into groups and systematically committed their crimes. Not everyone faced with poverty, of course, became a criminal as, perhaps most importantly, the presence of suitable unguarded targets provided opportunities, showing the importance of opportunity for thievery. Moreover, not all thieves were impoverished and tempting situational opportunities encountered within their daily lives likewise led to theft. The third section of this essay explores the complex processes of crime. Instances of “cat burglars” were far and few between as the main method involved damaging walls or doors and windows to gain entry. Other examples highlight that certain special occasions, such as temple festivals and weddings, also tended to attract thieves. Concerning the stolen items, clothing was in the majority, whereas gold and jewelry were rarely
pilfered. Several channels existed for the disposal of stolen goods: in addition to pawn shops and local markets, there were fences, or movers, who specialized in the handling of the items. Finally, a “hidden hand” or mastermind led from behind the scenes, who not only helped to harbor criminals and sell stolen goods but was also likely to be the head of the criminal syndicate.
Based on an analysis of the theft cases in Ba County from 1862 to1875, this essay discusses the relationship between criminal behavior and urbanization in China in the mid-19th century from a variety of perspectives. During this period, Chongqing’s urbanization rate reached 19-20%, and the proportion of burglary cases in the city rose from 19% in the mid-18th century to 33% in the mid-19th century. Burglaries in Chongqing were concentrated in five of the city's commercial and administrative centers. The main method of burglary in the city was to break through doors or windows, while theft in the countryside mainly was by damaging walls, which reflected the difference between the urban and rural environments. Moreover, the different types of houses in the city had different weaknesses in burglary prevention. Few houses were not vulnerable to theft. The stolen goods taken in the city, the items were more expensive and diverse than those taken in the countryside, reflecting the gap in the level of material consumption between people in the cities and rural areas. The city was full of shops and inns bustling with people, illustrating the higher visibility and accessibility of objects to be targeted by thieves than in the countryside. There were mechanisms in place in the city to prevent theft, i.e. fences and constables. However, such preventive mechanisms were not 100% effective. Many victims of theft actually suspected the police of colluding with the burglars, but the present study of Chongqing disclosed few known cases of police cover up for or collusion with the burglars. The above results illustrate how the development of urbanization affected the occurrence of crime in China.
Despite the growing wealth of studies related to gender in Chinese history, scholars have tended to neglect the fates of women in occupied China under the Japanese. As well, what little research has been done focused almost exclusively on the elite classes. This article seeks to reconstruct the plight of ordinary women through an analysis of contemporary newspaper articles, showing how many lost their homes and livelihoods as a result of the occupation. At the same time, however, war also served as an accelerator of social change. As the example of Suzhou shows, marriage mores came under enormous pressure amid the upheaval of the times, leading to both greater uncertainty and greater autonomy for women. Similarly, socio-economic pressures also led to an upsurge in new service jobs for women, who increasingly relied upon themselves to make ends meet. These changes were often criticized or satirized by male writers, who dominate the main sources used here. Nonetheless, their descriptions reflect a sense of anxiety amid the general volatility of life under the occupation, as well as the accumulating social changes that were taking place. In the final part of this article, a brief excursion into the leisure activities of contemporary women is undertaken, which reveals a growing rift between the rich and the poor in urban Suzhou.
This paper analyzes the history of Dongpo pork through a variety of approaches. The dish is named after Su Shi (1036-1101), a famous scholar-poet who lived in the Song Dynasty, who was also known as Su Dongpo. Although it is possible that Su Shi might have invented a method of cooking pork, it was not called “Dongpo Pork” at the time, and the term did not appear until the Ming Dynasty. The method of cooking Dongpo pork also evolved over time. The method is described as paying attention first to the heat, and then to the variety of spices and the mixing of the sauce. In Ming and Qing times, it was not a dish for common people, but a favorite cuisine item among the literati and gentry. Dongpo pork became an important dish during elite banquets, and was also a common gift among friends. The popularity of Dongpo pork was linked to the veneration of Su Shi and the dish thus became a symbol of literati culture and identity. Dongpo pork became a main feature in Hangzhou cuisine only during the Republican Period. As Hangzhou restaurants gradually expanded their business to other parts of China, they vigorously promoted Dongpo pork as their signature dish, and even invented fictional accounts about Su Shi when he was an official in Hangzhou. Dongpo pork eventually spread overseas, most conspicuously to Japan, where it became widely regarded as a representative dish of Chinese literati culture.
關鍵詞:乾隆、巴縣、竊盜、消費、時尚
Recent research on the history of consumption during the early modern period has begun to question Eurocentric approaches, pointing out that China’s consumption trends may have been similar to those of Britain or Western Europe at same period. However, the relevant Chinese documents focus overwhelmingly on the material culture of the upper classes, and historical resources regarding the common people’s ability to consume luxury objects are rare. Through an analysis of the inventories of stolen goods from 1757 to 1795, this essay investigates the consumers of Ba County in Chongqing Prefecture, a relatively uncommercialized part of the empire, showing that the victims of theft increasingly came to consist of people engaged in commerce and industry. This was a new group of consumers, belonging to the middle segments of society and able to consume such luxury objects as high quality clothes, tin, silver and bronze objects, and the like, that emerged in the eighteenth century. The stolen goods reflected the rapid commodification of the local economy and the changes in people’s consumption patterns. In addition, fashion styles from the Jiangnan area and even imported “foreign goods” could be found among the stolen goods, reflecting the range of outside influences on consumption. Although this essay is a microhistory, it reminds us that China’s consumption in the eighteenth century should not to be underestimated.
Keywords: Qianlong, Baxian (Ba County), theft, consumption, fashion
Wu Jen-shu, “Heaven” after the Catastrophe: Urban Life in Suzhou under Japanese Occupation. Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2017.
Using local newspapers, travel guide books, dairies, travel logs, oral history and archival documents, this study depicts the leisure life of Suzhou after the city was occupied by the Japanese during the Sino-Japanese War in 1937–1945, and reveals a complicated picture of the urban life in occupied Suzhou, with a focus on four leisure industries, tea houses, restaurants, hotels, and opium dens. As demonstrated by these four industries, the leisure life in Suzhou was far from being sluggish under the Wang Jingwei regime, but had been blossoming once the social order was recovered. This work shows that the change of the social structure and wartime social mentality were the main factors for “Suzhou splendor”. After Suzhou was made the capital of Jiangsu province under the puppet regime, the influx of war refugees and civil servants serving the new regime contributed greatly to the leisure industry. Furthermore, the carpe diem spirit that prevailed during the wartime was another major reason for the blooming of the consumer culture. While mainly focusing on the abnormally bustling leisure industry, this book depicts a more complicated picture of Suzhou’s urban life: the subsistence living the vast majority facing, high suicide rate, prevailing social violence, frequent conflicts between the employers and employees, objectified women, and the widening gap between the rich and the poor. This book also examines the relations between state and society in Suzhou under the Wang Jingwei puppet regime. From a bottom up approach, this study finds that the penetration of the puppet regime was deeper than that of the previous governments. Many aspects demonstrate the tighter grip of the puppet state on the society, such as the neighbourhood administrative system (pao-chia) and travel bans, strict control on urban hygiene and public leisure space, market price regulation and consumption ration system. Under the dominance of the state, owners of the leisure industry had been adopting several measures to resist the controls imposed by the state. Such measures include passive cooperation, black market trade, and Teahouse Trade Association, to serve as what James Scott called the “weapons of the weak.”
This monograph makes good contribution to the history of consumption as well as studies of China during the occupation period. Currently research on occupied China has been focusing mainly on Shanghai, whereas the author channels our attention to Suzhou. While the collective memory of the cities under Japanese occupation has been dominated by the massive war atrocities such as “the rape of Nanjing,” this study uses Suzhou as a case study to echo the new scholarship on the multi-layered effects the War had on Chinese cities.
本書分成三篇,各篇有兩章,分別從六個面向來探析。上篇從休閑與購物兩方面來探討明清城市的消費性格與消費的動力。中篇兩章則是以城市休閑消費所反映的社會空間為主題,分別以蘇州的園林與旅遊為例。下篇的兩章主要是關於兩性購物消費的議題。透過上述各章的分析與討論,作者在結論裡分析明清城市消費空間變遷所具有的三層意義。作者總結指出「消費」就是城市性格的重要特徵,同時也以休閑消費的吸引力來解釋明清鄉紳逐漸城居化的原因,並說明十八世紀江南官紳對休閑消費的觀念有去道德化與去政治化的可能性。
My previous monograph, Luxurious Taste: Consumer Society and Literati during the Late Ming (2007) discussed the formation of a so-called consumer society during the Ming Dynasty, a society that had its foundations in urban environments. My new work, Urban Pleasures: Leisure Consumption and Spatial Transformation in Jiangnan Cities during the Ming-Qing Period, focuses on the diversity of leisure and shopping activities and spaces that marked lifestyles and life experiences in cities from the mid-Ming to the mid-Qing period. I consider the concept of “space” in the field of consumption research, argue for the effects of consumption on changing spatial configurations, and explore the social relations and political negotiations behind the changes in the major cities of the Ming and the Qing.
Urban Pleasures is divided into three sections, each consisting of two chapters, which collectively explore the subject from six aspects. Part One focuses on the characteristics and incentives of consumption in Ming and Qing cities through aspects of leisure and shopping. The two chapters in Part Two explore mainly the social space reflected in urban leisure consumption. These two chapters use Suzhou as a case study to show how urban gardens were converted from private leisure spaces to public spaces and explore the evolution of tourism space from the Ming to Qing periods. The two chapters in the last part of the book center on the issue of gender and consumption. Based on the analysis and discussion throughout these chapters, the conclusion explores the significance of variations in urban consumer space in the Ming and Qing on three levels, namely: the spatial practice of consumption, the social production of consumer space, and the political negotiation of urban spaces. “Consumerism” was an integral part of the characteristics of “urbanity” during the Ming and Qing dynasties. The appeal of leisure consumption helps explain why the gentry often moved their residences from the country to the city from the mid-Ming period on. As well, the literati conception of leisure consumption was potentially de-moralized and de-politicized during the eighteenth century.
在中國近現代歷史的演變歷程中,城市無疑地扮演了重要的角色。尤其是現代性的特徵在城市裡表現特別明顯,而城市化又是現代性的一部分。本書透過城市來探討現代性的問題,最重要的目的,就是嘗試突破現代化或西化的框架,擴大視野與議題到其它的面向,並且將近現代城市史研究的縱深,延伸到明清時期。本書的14篇論文大致分為兩類,第一類是關於城市生活與文化的面向,第二類則是涉及到城市內群己關係的重新調整。本文為該書之〈導論〉部分。
Cities have played a crucial role throughout the course of modern Chinese history. Numerous aspects of Chinese modernity manifested themselves most clearly in urban settings, with urbanization constituting an essential component of modernity. This book explores the relationship between Chinese cities and modernity, its main goals being to challenge Western models of modernization, broaden scholarly perspectives on these issues by considering a wide range of phenomena, and extend the temporal scope of research on Chinese modernity to the Ming-Qing era. The 14 articles presented in this book can be divided into two types: the first treats facets of urban culture and daily life, while the second examines new forms of interaction between individuals and communities in urban settings.
Since travel culture is an important aspect of the literati’s culture of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, specific attention is given to how the literati moulded the culture of travelling. Part two of this book deals with the tourist activities of the literati. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties there were periods when the zest for traveling diminished, yet travel remained an important activity of the literati all the time. The literati's diaries during the Ming and Qing Dynasties show the real day-to-day practices of travel and prove that the mainstream preference at that time was for short distance journeys. The diaries also indicate that the literati thought highly of comfort and leisure while they were touring and that one of the functions of traveling was also social intercourse.
Part three of this book discusses how the literati built their travel culture. Besides introducing the relevant texts that the they wrote, this part focuses on the evolution of narrative and writing styles that took place especially from the late Ming to the mid Qing periods. Mainly through the analysis of the travel notes, we probe into the literati’s self-consciousness of their social status, and their tendency to change their writing styles in order to raise their social profile. We also present another point of view which refers to the impressions and attitudes of Chinese travelers − such as special envoys, intellectuals, overseas students and migrants, etc. − who traveled to the West or came in contact with Westerners in the late Qing period.
Finally, we discuss the representation of the tourist landscapes through three cultural forms. First, the literati’s typical landscape impressions and how the Jiangnan mountains and rivers influenced their traveling choices. Secondly, we show that building tourist landscapes also related to politics, as it was the case with the emperors who produced new sceneries during the Qing Dynasty. Finally, we will take Suzhou as an example of how the tourist landscapes developed in the Ming and Qing periods to become historic sites in the 20th century as well as the scenic spots of modern tourism.
摘要:
本書透過具體而細緻的實證研究,探討晚明的消費社會與士大夫的消費文化。作者希冀呈現晚明消費史的多元面向,豐富這段歷史。全書的兩大主軸,其一是嘗試把近代早期中國的消費史,放在世界史的脈絡下,突顯晚明時期的重要性。作者指出晚明已形成「消費社會」的現象,以修正英國史學家關於「消費革命」的歷史解釋。本書另一個主軸是士大夫的消費文化。從消費文化的角度,一方面可以看到晚明社會結構的變動,特別是士、商關係的變化;另一方面士大夫也透過消費文化,塑造消費品味與流行時尚,來重新建構他們的身分地位。
Elegant Taste: Consumer Society and the Literati in the Late Ming
Wu Jen-shu
This book explores the formation and elaboration of consumer society in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century China. With concrete and detailed empirical research, this book not only vividly illustrates Chinese literati’s material life in the late Ming, but also challenges previous works on the “consumer revolution.” Scholars have argued for the emergence of the consumer revolution in eighteenth-century Britain and its contribution to the subsequent industrial revolution. This book shows that a similar change in consumer culture occurred in China even earlier than in Britain while it did not necessarily lead to the same outcome. In addition, this book demonstrates social mobility between literati and merchants. Facing competition from the “vulgar” merchants, the late Ming literati reclaimed its class identity and dignity by forging a “taste of elegance.”
婦女超越生理基本需求的消費,代表明清時期婦女收入和經濟力的提升,而晚明的情欲觀,正好提供人們追求感官欲望的合理化基礎與動力。情欲觀帶動情色產業的興盛,妓女成為流行時尚的代言人。婦女的奢侈消費也衝擊了兩性關係,明清的士大夫對此提出許多批評,其中夾雜著性別偏見,甚至以法令嚴格規範婦女奢侈的消費。本書從消費的角度,重新觀察明清婦女的生活、地位及其對當時產業的影響,期望能予讀者明清婦女另一面貌。
Women of luxury – Women’s Consumer Culture of the Jiangnan region (area south of the Yangtse) in the Ming-Qing period
Wu, Jen-shu
The influence of the May Fourth movement has given us a rigid impression that traditional Chinese women were oppressed by Confucian culture. Yet it is also true that women in the Ming and Qing also could live lives of luxury, not only pursuing popular styles of personal adornment, but also in traveling and enjoying natural landscapes. This was not confined to the rich; the middle classes also followed suit. Going beyond the basic physiological needs of consumption, this represented an increase in the income and economic power of women. Moreover, the concept of sexual passion that appeared in the late Ming provided people with the rational grounds and the motivation to satisfy their lust. The sex industry was flourishing, and the prostitute became the representative of fashion. Consumption of luxury goods by women had an impact on gender relations, and many scholars treated this with a mix of criticism and misogyny, even going so far as to promulgate laws restricting the consumption of luxury goods by women. This book reexamines the lives and status of women in the Ming and Qing periods, and their influence on production, from a consumer perspective. It is hoped that this book can acquaint readers with another aspect of women during the Ming and Qing.
The present paper attempts to combine the research methods of history and criminology to investigate crime during the reign of the Tongzhi Emperor by using cases of theft in the archives of Ba county, Sichuan, from 1862 to 1875 as historical data for analysis. First of all, it has been found that three important historical events of the period, namely instances of harassment by remnants of the Taiping army in 1862, the “Zhenyuan 真原 Catholic Church Incident” which occurred in 1863, and the sharp rise in rice prices beginning in 1864, all directly affected the occurrence of theft cases. However, individual agency was not entirely affected by historical events. The second section of this paper analyzes the motivations of individual criminals. The majority of arrested criminals confessed that their motive was poverty and most of them came from the lower or working class. In addition, after rational consideration, they often organized into groups and systematically committed their crimes. Not everyone faced with poverty, of course, became a criminal as, perhaps most importantly, the presence of suitable unguarded targets provided opportunities, showing the importance of opportunity for thievery. Moreover, not all thieves were impoverished and tempting situational opportunities encountered within their daily lives likewise led to theft. The third section of this essay explores the complex processes of crime. Instances of “cat burglars” were far and few between as the main method involved damaging walls or doors and windows to gain entry. Other examples highlight that certain special occasions, such as temple festivals and weddings, also tended to attract thieves. Concerning the stolen items, clothing was in the majority, whereas gold and jewelry were rarely
pilfered. Several channels existed for the disposal of stolen goods: in addition to pawn shops and local markets, there were fences, or movers, who specialized in the handling of the items. Finally, a “hidden hand” or mastermind led from behind the scenes, who not only helped to harbor criminals and sell stolen goods but was also likely to be the head of the criminal syndicate.
Based on an analysis of the theft cases in Ba County from 1862 to1875, this essay discusses the relationship between criminal behavior and urbanization in China in the mid-19th century from a variety of perspectives. During this period, Chongqing’s urbanization rate reached 19-20%, and the proportion of burglary cases in the city rose from 19% in the mid-18th century to 33% in the mid-19th century. Burglaries in Chongqing were concentrated in five of the city's commercial and administrative centers. The main method of burglary in the city was to break through doors or windows, while theft in the countryside mainly was by damaging walls, which reflected the difference between the urban and rural environments. Moreover, the different types of houses in the city had different weaknesses in burglary prevention. Few houses were not vulnerable to theft. The stolen goods taken in the city, the items were more expensive and diverse than those taken in the countryside, reflecting the gap in the level of material consumption between people in the cities and rural areas. The city was full of shops and inns bustling with people, illustrating the higher visibility and accessibility of objects to be targeted by thieves than in the countryside. There were mechanisms in place in the city to prevent theft, i.e. fences and constables. However, such preventive mechanisms were not 100% effective. Many victims of theft actually suspected the police of colluding with the burglars, but the present study of Chongqing disclosed few known cases of police cover up for or collusion with the burglars. The above results illustrate how the development of urbanization affected the occurrence of crime in China.
Despite the growing wealth of studies related to gender in Chinese history, scholars have tended to neglect the fates of women in occupied China under the Japanese. As well, what little research has been done focused almost exclusively on the elite classes. This article seeks to reconstruct the plight of ordinary women through an analysis of contemporary newspaper articles, showing how many lost their homes and livelihoods as a result of the occupation. At the same time, however, war also served as an accelerator of social change. As the example of Suzhou shows, marriage mores came under enormous pressure amid the upheaval of the times, leading to both greater uncertainty and greater autonomy for women. Similarly, socio-economic pressures also led to an upsurge in new service jobs for women, who increasingly relied upon themselves to make ends meet. These changes were often criticized or satirized by male writers, who dominate the main sources used here. Nonetheless, their descriptions reflect a sense of anxiety amid the general volatility of life under the occupation, as well as the accumulating social changes that were taking place. In the final part of this article, a brief excursion into the leisure activities of contemporary women is undertaken, which reveals a growing rift between the rich and the poor in urban Suzhou.
This paper analyzes the history of Dongpo pork through a variety of approaches. The dish is named after Su Shi (1036-1101), a famous scholar-poet who lived in the Song Dynasty, who was also known as Su Dongpo. Although it is possible that Su Shi might have invented a method of cooking pork, it was not called “Dongpo Pork” at the time, and the term did not appear until the Ming Dynasty. The method of cooking Dongpo pork also evolved over time. The method is described as paying attention first to the heat, and then to the variety of spices and the mixing of the sauce. In Ming and Qing times, it was not a dish for common people, but a favorite cuisine item among the literati and gentry. Dongpo pork became an important dish during elite banquets, and was also a common gift among friends. The popularity of Dongpo pork was linked to the veneration of Su Shi and the dish thus became a symbol of literati culture and identity. Dongpo pork became a main feature in Hangzhou cuisine only during the Republican Period. As Hangzhou restaurants gradually expanded their business to other parts of China, they vigorously promoted Dongpo pork as their signature dish, and even invented fictional accounts about Su Shi when he was an official in Hangzhou. Dongpo pork eventually spread overseas, most conspicuously to Japan, where it became widely regarded as a representative dish of Chinese literati culture.
關鍵詞:乾隆、巴縣、竊盜、消費、時尚
Recent research on the history of consumption during the early modern period has begun to question Eurocentric approaches, pointing out that China’s consumption trends may have been similar to those of Britain or Western Europe at same period. However, the relevant Chinese documents focus overwhelmingly on the material culture of the upper classes, and historical resources regarding the common people’s ability to consume luxury objects are rare. Through an analysis of the inventories of stolen goods from 1757 to 1795, this essay investigates the consumers of Ba County in Chongqing Prefecture, a relatively uncommercialized part of the empire, showing that the victims of theft increasingly came to consist of people engaged in commerce and industry. This was a new group of consumers, belonging to the middle segments of society and able to consume such luxury objects as high quality clothes, tin, silver and bronze objects, and the like, that emerged in the eighteenth century. The stolen goods reflected the rapid commodification of the local economy and the changes in people’s consumption patterns. In addition, fashion styles from the Jiangnan area and even imported “foreign goods” could be found among the stolen goods, reflecting the range of outside influences on consumption. Although this essay is a microhistory, it reminds us that China’s consumption in the eighteenth century should not to be underestimated.
Keywords: Qianlong, Baxian (Ba County), theft, consumption, fashion
City life in the Japanese-occupied territories during anti-Japanese war period has been neglected by historians. Restaurants were an indispensable of daily life activities of urban folk. This article uses Suzhou as an example of the transformation of the restaurant business during the anti-Japanese war period, highlighting that the restaurant business developed more prosperously than during the prewar time. The phenomenon contrasts with the common view of urban life in the occupied territories. There are at least two reasons for explaining the transformation of the restaurant business, including the stable social order and economy under the Wang Jingwei government, and the new consumers resulting from population movements from Shanghai and Zhejiang province. Furthermore, the restaurant industry itself also changed at that time. Additionally, this article assesses GIS from the perspective of space to explore the distribution of restaurants in the urban setting. I point out that the war, transportation, and the structure of the consumer base all affected the distribution of restaurants.
角度來探析逃難時所呈現的社會矛盾、逃難婦女的遭遇與形象、倖存者對抗清領導人的觀感、如何解釋逃難時的不同命運,以及避城或避鄉的爭論等議題。筆者希望藉由他們的逃難紀錄,擺脫明清之際的歷史大敘事,呈現當時戰亂下「逃難社會」的特色。
According to a traditional idiom, “In times of minor disorder, flee to the cities; in times of major disaster, flee to the countryside.” This phenomenon appeared in the Ming-Qing transition, reflecting not only the ravages of war but the awareness of the differences between urban and rural areas. Past research on the history of this period has concentrated on major political events, but the experiences of refugees have been neglected. This article uses the notes and diaries of literati from Jiangnan cities to reconstruct the historical process of flight. While may gentry had moved their residence from the country to the city from the mid-Ming period on, this trend was reversed at the end of the Ming. The status associated with urban residence disappeared, and many literati experienced the distress of flight. The second part of this article investigates such issues concerning flight as its social contradictions, women’s encounters, survivors’ perceptions of the loyalist leadership, and the different fates of refugees through the lenses of social history, mentality studies, and
cultural history. This article challenges the narrative of the macro-history of Ming-Qing transition and describes various characteristics of a society in flight."
本章則嘗試從更長的歷史發展來探討辛亥革命發生在城市的原因,尤其要強調的兩個面向:一是城市的環境,另一是動員群眾的模式。所謂的城市環境係指都市化的發展,促使城市在歷史上逐漸形成與鄉村有別的特殊環境,並且滋生了新的市民階層、新的物質文化與城市文化,這也使得城市的歷史地位逐漸由傳統的邊陲走向核心。至於動員群眾的模式,係參考歷史社會學者Charles Tilly的分析模式。他研究近代西歐的集體行動事件後建構了「動員模型」(mobilization model)理論,強調集體行動的形成是許多要素一步一步地組合而形成的。 本章分為三個部分,分別從明清的城市民變,到晚清的民變,最後是辛亥革命,從這三段不同時期的分析與論述,想要強調的是辛亥革命的形成與城市的關係是有歷史的延續性,但也有斷裂的現代性。