Journal of East China Normal University (Philosoph ›› 2013, Vol. 45 ›› Issue (5): 77-84.

• 中国近代史研究 • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Moulding the Image of the Party-nation: The Movie Education Movement in Zhejiang Province in 1930s

FENG Xiao-cai   

  • Online:2013-09-15 Published:2013-11-06
  • Contact: FENG Xiao-cai
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Abstract: Since their introduction into China, movies have been closely related to political propaganda. When the Nanjing National Government was founded in 1927, movies were taken as a shortcut technological method to mould the image of the party-nation effectively and provide discipline education for the common people. Since the early 1930s, the authorities of the Nanjing Government had promoted the Movie Education Movement with great efforts. Hangzhou was an important center. Hangzhou Affiliate of China’s Association of Movie Education and Zhejiang Education Department jointly organized mobile movie projection teams, who went deep into towns and countries in the whole province to show movies. Movies became an important medium that made the common people know about “the image of the party-nation”. People could also come close to movies as modern invention. Obviously, both the choice of movies and the promotion of projection were closely connected with Nanjing Government’s purpose of “moulding the image of the party-nation”. However, this propaganda of the party-nation was paradoxical, and the mass education that skimmed over the surface had no practical effect in fact.