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Title
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The ‘Essence–Function’ of China’s Earliest Modern Urban Imaginary: The Nationalist Planning of Greater Shanghai, 1927–49
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Type
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Refereeing
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Keywords
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ssence–function; ti–yong; nationalist planning; planning diffusion; city making; nation building; Shanghai
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Abstract
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This article investigates China’s earliest modern urban imaginary through analysing two signature plans for Greater Shanghai during 1927–49. It employs the traditional Chinese philosophy of ‘essence–function’ (ti–yong) to unravel several relationalities that hinge on ‘nationalist planning’—China and West; nation building and city making; modernity and modern planning. Despite explicit ‘function’ of ‘Westernness’ expressed in these plans, the ‘essence’ of them was embodied in ‘Chineseness’. The findings refresh an understanding of the genesis of modern planning in China, and offer an alternative reading of modern planning diffusion that was also a process involving local fusion and nationalism.
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Researchers
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Akbar Mohammadi (Referee)
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