The CCTV Spring Festival Gala of China: National Self-Identity Construction in the Context of Chinesenization

Abstract

This study is a basic research type, which conducts an interdisciplinary qualitative research method to study the phenomenon of the 'CCTV Spring Festival Gala in China' on the issue of National Self-Identity Construction in the Context of Chinesenization. The research found that Gala's media discourse was made into a space combined with the creation of Chinese people both domestically and internationally through media culture mechanisms. The Gala, therefore, has changed its focus. "Reform and opening up" (1983-1992) continued together. It includes "Socialist Market Economy and Consumerism" (1993-2002), "Scientific Perspectives on the Development and Building of a Harmonious Socialist Society" (2003-2011), "Realization of China's Dream of the Great Reconstruction of the Chinese Nation (2012-2022)." However, what we found to be unchanged is that the media practice of the Gala over the past 40 years was a process of Chineseization with political and cultural significance. In this process, the Gala serves to rebuild the Chinese national community and reconstruct the national self-identity by reproducing Chinese "nation" and "state" images and discourse. This research proposed that the Gala was not only a comprehensive Gala that Chinese people watched on Lunar New Year's Eve but also the creative invention and modern transformation of the traditional folk rituals of the Spring Festival in modern society. In the context of globalization and Chinesenization, through the Gala, the Chinese government has created large social networks across regional boundaries and rebuilt the self-identity of the Chinese nation by integrating the reproduction of national ideology with the latest television technology. This is the significance of the Gala as a "new folk tradition."

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