Countryside Fantasy in the Context of Urban-Rural Divided post-Mao China

Abstract

This paper focuses on an urban-rural experimental reality television show, The Exchange Programme. Within the context of the contradictions and struggles between capitalism and socialism currently faced by the Chinese government, I argue the programme’s representation of the urban youth allegorically reveals the changing "hybridity" of Chinese cities, with the city becoming a battle field, a "third space" of culture and discourse, while the countryside acts as the nation’s "original culture." In addition, applying Zizek’s theory on ideology, I argue that the programme actually suggests the existence of a socialist "ideological fantasy," which structures the social reality and proves that the socialist ideology is an ideology in-and-for-itself. It is the force regulating the ruthless market at an unconscious level in an era of economic globalization.

Keywords

• countryside
• ideological fantasy
• ideology in-and-for itself
• original culture
• the exchange programme