Repairing a rural-urban continuum: cinema as a witness, 2012

I

PueLtcATtons Srntrs

Aspects of Urbanization in China

General Editor

Shanghai, Hong Kong, Cua ngzhou

Paul van der Velde

Publications

fficer

Martina van den Haak Editorial Board

prasenjit Duara (Asia Research Institute, National University of singapore) / carol

/ christophe |affrelot (centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales-sciences-po) / victor T. King (University of Leeds) / yuri sadoi (Meijo University) / A.B. Shamsul (Institute of occidental Studies / Gluck (columbia University)

Gregory Bracken

Henk Schulte Nordholt (Royal Netherlands caribbean Studies) / wim Boot (Leiden University)

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia) Institute of Southeast Asian and

Edited by

/

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Table of Contents

SERTES

6 of lbbles and Illustrations

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TU Delft ffikm;'

UCTION

The publication of this book is co-financed by the Delft School of Design (DSD) and the Delft University of Technology [U Delft).

Aepects of Urbanization Guangzhou Grryory Bracken

in China: Shanghai, Hong Kong, 13

AMBITIONS Tbwards an Understanding of Architectural Iconicity

Cover photo: Gregory Bracken

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Shanghai and the 2010 Expo: Staging the City

Guangzhou's Special Path to Global City Status Xiongnin Guo ond Chonglao Liu

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6

n.p"iring the Rural-Urban Continuum: Cinema as Witness

79

Ana M. Moyo Pellitero Revisiting Hong Kong: Fruit Chan's 'Little Cheung'

101

Tbung-yi M ichcllc Hwang

/

Sensual, but No Clue of Politics: Shanghai's Longlang Houses Lanu Sahaen

tt7

5

Repairing the Rural-Urban Continuum Cinema as Witness

Ana M. Moya Pellitero Abstract

Until t9tt, with the end of the Qing dynasty, China was a single hybrid continuum that was neither urban nor rural. lts civilization was based on a complex web of relationships and hierarchies' The individuals were urban in their political and religious apParatus and rural in their bonds to the land, nature, and place of origin. Chinese society was also based on a social structure of mobility. A large proportion of the population of most cities was non-native and rural. The rural population that temporarily lived in urban centers were mostly rural sojourners. Despite this mobility, native bonds were a principle of social organization. The territory was not organized as a concentric structure of urban centers, wit'h one centrai city surrounded by secondary subordinated urban nuclei. Urban centers of small size and low centrality were positioned everywhere between larger centers of greater centrality (Skinner t977:258).

ln contemporary China, the traditional urban-rural continuum does not exist anymore. lnstead, an extreme social, economical, and environmental contrast exists between the modern global Chinese mega-cities and the undeveloped hinterland, with its poor and derelict rural environment. There is also a duality and disjunction between the bright, optimistic Progress of central mega-cities

land but not to leave the rural areas). Towns have become attractors of economic activity. One of the main characteristics of the

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'l'hc countryside and ltn rurul lili.stylc wcrc a symbol of'Chinese identity in thc face of'fbrcign irrllucrrr:cs, l.rom the r95os onwards, the Chinese Communist Party prortotcd an anti-urban policy that eradicated the culture of'urban modernity that cities like Shanghai represented. Cities wcre meant to be centers of production and not consumption. Cities und villages were inhabited by a working class, both industrial and rur-

ul. The Chinese Communist Paty also wanted to narrow the

gap

bctween urban intellectuals and laboring peasants, erasing the distinction between mental and manual labor. Intellectuals were asked to give up their urban identity and were forced to migrate, at various times, to

in order to restrict mobility restrictions based on a housemigration, imposed uncontrolled the hukou, which was enforced by a strict miregistration system, hold gration law introduced in 1958. This created a number of physical barriers as well as social injustices (Gar-on Ye & XueQiang ry9o: 461. Since 1978, with the shift from a planned to a free-market economy, the aim was once again to reduce the economic gap between rural and trrban areas, privatizing business and allowing the construction of compctitive industries in rural areas. The rural land that belonged to the (:ommune was divided into individual plots and leased to farmers who could start investing money in their own productive business (Wilson r