Politics of Art

Zhiguang Yin received his Ph.D. from University of Cambridge in 2011. He is Lecturer of Chinese Studies at the University of Exeter and a former Assistant Professor at Zayed University in the UAE. He has published many articles in the field of international history, Sino-Middle Eastern Relations, and modern Chinese intellectual history.

• TablesAcknowledgementIntroductionRevolution and Its RevisitThe Main QuestionsFurther ReflectionsChapter 1Intellectual Social Circles and the Gestation of the Creation SocietySocial Backgrounds of the Creation Society MembersChinese students’ Life in JapanThe KMT Exiles in the Chinese Community in JapanThe Circle of Young China Association and the Establishment of the Creation SocietyChapter 2The Socio-political Context of Intellectuals’ Self-RecognitionSocial Thinking in Taishō JapanCompetition for Social and Cultural Capital in the Early PeriodThe Tension between Intellectuals and Capital MarketAssuming a Proletarian IdentityProletarian or Not?Chapter 3“Mission of Literature” and the Political Involvement of the Creation Society“National Literature” and Its ProblemsBecoming Revolutionary Writers: Political Influence from the KMT Guangzhou GovernmentDisillusioned Intellectuals after 1926Revolutionary Literature: the Social History of a Concept“Revolutionary Literature” Under the Scope of Party PoliticsChapter 4Struggles between Two Souls: Intellectuals’ Theoretical Construction of Class TransformationThe Proletarian Class Consciousness“Proletarian Revolutionary Literature”: A Reflexive ConceptTemporality and HistoriographySubjectivityThe Misinterpretation and Reinterpretation of “Aufheben”The formation of “battle field of ideology” and the Practise of “Aufheben”Chapter 5Theoretical Struggle: The Politics of Literature and ArtsThe Dialectics of Theory and PractiseThe Cultural Policy of the KMT from 1925-1931Political Propaganda of the CCP, 1925-1930ConclusionBibliography

"Politics of Art is an innovative study of the political significance of the Creation Society (创造社), a celebrated literary society of 1920s China. Among its many insights, for example, it introduces readers to intriguing connections, such as that between the Frankfurt School and the Creation Society, via the Japanese Marxist Fukumoto Kazuo [...] all in all, Politics of Art makes an important contribution to our understanding of the history and historiography of some of the centrally important questions in twentieth-century Chinese intellectual history, such as the relationship between the intellectual and the people and the dialectics of theory and practice." - Liang Luo, University of Kentucky, MCLC Resource Center Publication, Dec. 2015“Yin tries to restore the historicity of the politics of theoretical struggle, inherent in the Creation Society’s practice, which has been effaced by depoliticizing discourses, and to illuminate its relevance to contemporary politics. […] This book is a valuable addition to the existing corpus of scholarship on the Creation Society. The author has conducted substantial historical research utilizing numerous first-hand materials and archives.” - Xiangjing Chen, Cornell University, in: Frontiers of Literary Studies, 10.3 September 2016