Modern China’s Idols: Heroes, Role Models, Stars and Celebrities

Elaine M Jeffreys

doi:10.5130/portal.v9i1.2187

PDF

Published: Jun 5, 2012

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5130/portal.v9i1.2187

Keywords:

China – 60th anniversary, celebrity, fame, heroes, role models, youth.

Elaine M Jeffreys

University of Technology, Sydney

Abstract

This paper examines the diversity of China’s popular culture idols with reference to a commemorative website called ‘The Search for Modern China’, which was launched in late September 2009 to celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party on 1 October 1949. The website’s framing narrative suggests that the history of idol production and celebrity in the PRC can be viewed crudely as marked by disjuncture: the decline of heavy-handed Party-state involvement in the propagandistic manufacturing of socialist idols of production, followed by the grafted-on rise of western-style media-manufactured celebrities as idols of capitalist consumption. However, an analysis of the website’s pantheon of idols reveals that while some idols from the Maoist and early reform period have been relegated to the realm of fiction, revolutionary kitsch or are now simply passé, others remain very much alive in the popular imagination. A state-led project of promoting patriotic education has ensured the coexistence in commercial popular culture of revolutionary idols and contemporary celebrities, via memory sites associated with broadcast television, DVDs and the Internet, and the historical locations, museums and monuments of ‘red tourism.’

Issue

Vol. 9 No. 1 (2012): Indian Ocean Traffic

Section

General Articles (Peer Reviewed)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Copyright Notice

For submissions from 31st March 2014 onwards, authors who submit articles to this journal for publication agree to the following terms:

a) Retaining Copyright and Granting Rights:
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication. The work is simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License, allowing others to share and adapt the work. Acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal is required.

b) Non-Exclusive Distribution:
Authors may enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., posting to an institutional repository or publishing in a book). Acknowledgment of its initial publication in this journal is required.

c) Online Posting and Citation Advantage:
Authors are encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process. This may lead to productive exchanges and earlier and greater citation of the published work (See The Open Access Citation Advantage Service). If authors include the work in an institutional repository or on their website, they must acknowledge the UTS ePRESS publication with relevant details.

d) Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) License Awareness:
Authors should note that the CC-BY License permits readers to share (copy and redistribute) and adapt (remix, transform, build upon) the work for any purpose, including commercial use. Proper credit, a link to the license, and indication of any changes made must be provided. The manner of doing so must not suggest endorsement by you or your publisher.

Authors submitting a paper to UTSePress publications agree to assign a limited license to UTSePress if and when the manuscript is accepted for publication. This license allows UTSePress to publish the manuscript in a specific issue.

Articles published by UTSePress are protected by copyright, with rights retained by the authors, who assert their moral rights. Authors control translation and reproduction rights to their works published by UTSePress. All rights are reserved worldwide by UTSePress, and downloads of specific portions are permitted for personal use only, not commercial use or resale.

For reprint or usage permissions, please direct inquiries to UTSePress via the journal's main editor, Dr. Nicholas Manganas at [portal.scholarly.journal@gmail.com]. Reprint permission requires acknowledgment of both UTSePress and PORTAL in the format advised by the journal editor.

Author Biography

Elaine M Jeffreys, University of Technology, Sydney

Elaine Jeffreys is an Australian Research Council Future Fellow at the China Research Centre, University of Technology Sydney, and Associate Professor in China Studies at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, UTS. She is co-editor with Louise Edwards of Celebrity in China (2010) Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press; editor of China’s Governmentalities: Governing Change, Changing Government (2009) London: Routledge and Sex and Sexuality in China (2009 [2006]) London: Routledge; and author of China, Sex and Prostitution (2004) London: Routledge.

Article Sidebar

Main Article Content

Abstract

Article Details

Elaine M Jeffreys, University of Technology, Sydney