A Study Of Generationally-Based Perceptions Of The Spring Festival And Christmas

Recent years have brought a decline in the traditional flavor of long standing Chinese festivals, including the influential Spring Festival. Conversely, the Western celebration of Christmas seems to be more welcomed than the Spring Festival. Despite many discussions about the two festivals in China, few scholars made a comparison of the perceptions of the young people and middle-aged and older people reflected from the two festivals. Through interviewing twenty natives of Shanghai--ten students and ten middle-aged and older people who work and have retired, about their conceptions of the Spring Festival and Christmas, the author tries to seek the generational similarities and differences in how the Spring Festival and Christmas are experienced in Shanghai, China, and the reasons for the similarities and differences.The thesis first traces the history of western modernization, and then summarizes the history of Shanghai's modernization and westernization in the background of China's modernization and westernization. Following, the psychological responses of the Chinese people to modernization are discussed and the two festivals are compared in history and cherished old and new customs. After that, a qualitative method in a grounded theory basis, the interview guide, the background of the informants and method of analyzing the data are explained.The research reveals that the two groups have similar perceptions of home, alienation from relatives, decreasing positions of eating, celebration of Christmas as personal choice and the Spring Festival's importance beyond Christmas in Shanghai. Family ties, identity, and recognition of tradition and modernity account for the similarities between the two groups. They have different perceptions in five aspects: family reunion, involvement of interpersonal relationships, over-all feelings about the festival, spending Christmas as a celebration or not and the status of familial economic condition. The reasons for the differences are social development, generation gap, and the role of different age groups. Finally, the limitations of this thesis and suggestions on further exploration of this topic are raised.