The Study Of Cultural Identity In The Perspective Of Historical Materialism

Cultural identity has a special significance both for the attribution of the individual and the stability of the group.In the research paradigm of historical materialism,cultural identity is not an elusive “mysterious thing” and does not carry any “mysterious and speculative colors”.The main body of cultural identity is the“realistically active person”.The reality basis is practice,and the way to achieve it is social interaction.The direct cause of formation and evolution is interest pursuit.Cultural identity is the rational confirmation,emotional conversion and practice maintenance of the spiritual civilization outcomes that the subject reflects on the needs of its own production and life practices.The culture mentioned in this paper refers to the culture of the concept form,which is formed on the basis of human production practice and life practice,and has a counteractive effect on the spiritual civilization.The identities mentioned in this paper refer to the way of existence of the“social existence” rooted in people,the actual needs of the promotion of the subject,and the subject concept and identity consciousness formed by the subject reflecting its objective world.Cultural identity is the result of the combined effects of host and guest factors.Cultural identities originate from a common economic foundation,a common social identity,and a common notion system.The main ways of formation are cultural heritage,cultural exchanges,and political forces.Rational confirmation,emotional conversion,and practice maintenance constitute the generation mechanism of cultural identity.Regardless of whether it is an individual or a group,cultural identity is not given once in advance and is not eternal.Social development and progress promote the development of cultural identity.Political forces,elites,and other multiple forces exert direct influence on cultural identity through political,economic,social,cultural,educational,and other institutional settings and policy formulation.The crisis of cultural identity is an extreme manifestation of the problem of cultural identity.It is both a crisis of cultural identity and a cultural crisis.The crisis of cultural identity is normal in the history of mankind.It is both an inevitable result of the historical process of social history and a manifestation of the evolution of cultural identity.In modern society,the problem of cultural identity is more prominent.Themain forms are the expression of traditional cultural identity over modern cultural identity,foreign cultural identity beyond local cultural identity,and subcultural identity over national-nation cultural identity.The crisis of cultural identity is rooted in social reality.It lies in the change in the relationship between the subject and the objective world;it lies in the imbalance between the material world and the spiritual world.It manifests itself as the inadaptability of traditional culture and the development of social production practices,the traditional cultural identity and changes in the way of interaction,the concept systems and lifestyle changes.The crisis of modern social and cultural identity is accompanied by globalization,modernization,and informationization;it has a direct relation with the strengthening of the cultural subject consciousness caused by modernization,the mixture of cultural subject identities caused by globalization,and the reconstruction of the cultural identity connotation caused by informationization.Measuring the status of cultural identity should adhere to the Marxist practice standards,and it should put the criteria for defining the crisis of cultural identity that whether it is adapted to the unity of the nation,contribute to the progress of social development and the free development of the individual.The crisis of cultural identity is not necessarily negative.The change in cultural identity based on social progress is in line with the law of the development of human society;active guidance and support should be given.The truly worrying cultural identity crisis is the cultural security problem caused by cultural retroism,foreign cultural invasion,and rising subcultural identity.Identity and construction are inseparable.In order to deal with the crisis of cultural identity,constructing a cultural identity requires systematic measures in economics,politics,society,culture,and other aspects.First,we need to achieve the greatest number of common interests.Second,we need to enrich the connotation of common identity.Third,we need to reinforce the common cultural foundation.With productivity as the coordinates,the crisis of cultural identity can be divided into two categories: First,the identity crisis of the culture that adapts to the old social form,essentially in which the culture does not meet the requirements of the development of the productive forces;second,the cultural identity crisis that fits with the new social form,in which the reason for this cultural identity crisis is that the new culture was born late,and people do not recognize or accept it enough.To cope withthe former crisis of cultural identity,the fundamental approach is to adapt to the requirements of the development of productive forces,change the old social system,guide and promote cultural transformation,and construct new cultural identity.To deal with the latter crisis of cultural identity,it is necessary to vigorously develop the productive forces,raise the level of material security,and strengthen the persuasiveness of the new cultural forms;second,we must strengthen the education of new culture,publicize and disseminate,and increase their awareness;third,it is necessary to increase cultural investment,achieve prosperity and development of new culture,enhance the appeal and attractiveness.In the context of modern nation-states,the core task of responding to the crisis of cultural identity is to resolve the identity crisis of the nation-state culture,or to harmonize various cultural identifications of subcultures and supranational countries with complex cultural identity system based on national culture.As far as culture itself is concerned,the main reason for the crisis of cultural identity is the insufficient construction of a culture that is compatible with the new social system,or the lack of integration of multiple cultures or the invasion of foreign culture.To deal with the crisis of cultural identity,the construction of a common culture should be taken as the core task.First,we must properly handle the relationship between “tradition” and “modern” and realize the modernization transformation of traditional culture.Second,we must properly handle the relationship between “local” and “foreign”,actively participating in cultural exchanges and realizing “making foreign things serve China”.Third,we must properly handle the relationship between ethnic and national cultures and ethnic subcultures,and integrate national cultures.Fourth,we must develop common culture system construction from cultural symbols,historical memories,and values.The confidence of Chinese culture refers to the full affirmation and firm belief of Chinese excellent traditional culture,revolutionary culture and socialist culture.Strengthening the confidence of Chinese culture still faces many challenges.From the culture itself,the challenge facing Chinese culture is in essence the problem that the mature cultural identity has not been formed: the blind adherence to the traditional culture,the coexistence of all discarded and innovative development views,the coexistence of the support of the socialist culture and a certain degree of disapproval,and the copying,resistance and reference to western culture.Traditional culture ischallenged,criticized and negated;the dominant position of mainstream culture has been impacted.In order to strengthen the Chinese cultural identity and confidence,we should strengthen the traditional cultural innovation,consolidate the socialist culture as the dominant cultural pattern,and strengthen the "multiple integration" pattern of Chinese culture by providing a richer and higher quality article on the basis of consolidating the material basis and strengthening the system guarantee,in order to better satisfy the spiritual and cultural needs of all ethnic groups and enhance the attraction,cohesiveness and charisma of Chinese culture.This article includes the introduction and five chapters,in which the full text of the materialist concept of history as the framework of interpretation and theoretical basis,focusing on "the essence of cultural identity and generation evolution",by revealing the essence of cultural identity,examining the mechanism of the formation and evolution of cultural identity,exploring ways to respond to cultural identity crisis and providing suggestions for enhancing Chinese cultural identity and self-confidence.The overall logical structure is: the essence of cultural identity-the generation and mechanism of cultural identity-the cause of the crisis of cultural identity-the principles and methods of cultural identity construction-overcoming the crisis of cultural identity and enhancing the confidence of Chinese culture.