Qing Dynasty Shanghai At The Age Of The Festival Activities On Space Research (1750-1900)

After Shanghai's opening up to foreigners as a treaty port in 1843, the social activities in this city underwent significant changes in form, content and spatial distribution. Researches on the evolution of activity spaces in modern urban community in Shanghai will help us understand the profound influences on people's daily life by changes in urban lifestyle and continuous expansion of built area during the course of Shanghai's development into the largest modern metropolis in China.To this end, this thesis chooses as its subject matter lunar festival activities, which are important recreational activities in traditional Chinese society. By analysing relevant records in several Shanghai gazetters compiled in the mid- and late Qing Dynasty (1750-1900), the author studies the activity space before and shortly after 1843 by combining methods of functional division and time geography, trying to re-present the time and spatial distribution of urban festival activities and its evolution in this period, and revealing the fundamental framework and dynamics of public activity space in modern Shanghai.