Tea Houses And Market-towns

As an attempt,this essay diverts the research perspective form the significant and official objects to the microscopic and daily “market spaces”: the Teahouses.Through the study of the anonymous type space of the nameless people,the essay try to reveal the behavior and activities of people beyond the architectural form and the shaping of space.On the other hand,the study explores the characteristics of the “market-town” by describing the relationship between these specific building types(teahouses)and the settlements surround them,and how these special forms are formed and represented,therefore how they in turn reshaped our daily lives.The three core chapters of this article discusses the relationship between teahouses and towns from three perspectives.The second chapter explains the rationality of the large-scale coexistence of teahouses from the perspective of market economy,and the function to stimulates the economic benefits while supplementing the towns.The third chapter analyzes the control of elites on the teahouses and the struggle of the marketplace for the teahouses from the perspective of cultural concepts.The teahouse,as the center of the convergence of the two forces,reflects the "profit-driven" performance and the needs of "collective cultural identity" of Jiangnan market-town under the background of Western culture.The fourth chapter goes further into the analysis of the operating mechanism and power relations behind the teahouses,discussing the dual roles of the national power and the rural politics demonstrated by the towns.The three perspectives are interrelated and inseparable.This article may not be an academical history about teahouses or towns,but focuses on the relationship between the two.Through the analysis of related aspects of behaviors,phenomena,space,systems,and so on,we can understand and grasp specific types of buildings from a broader perspective,and from a microscopic point of view to perspective settlement spaces,which helping us to form part of the understanding of the cognitive or challenge interpretation.