The Continuation Of The May Fourth Movement——Thought Of1980s Enlightenment From The"Fifth Generation"

This paper, through comparing the5th generation of directors and intellectuals during the May4th Movement as well as with the help of analyzing the development and works of the5th generation of directors, is to make a detailed investigation on the enlightenment movement in the1980s. In terms of the details, though existing certain discrepancies between the May4th Movement and the enlightenment movement in the1980s, whenever we refer to the enlightenments in the20th century, inevitably both of them would meanwhile come into and dwell on our mind. In the period of the May4th Movement when China was encountered with inner conflicts and outer invasions, the intellectuals then, leaded by Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao, passionately propagated the spirits of democracy and science which were called Mr. De and Mr. Sai. Against to the Confucianism, the choices were not made to refute its theories concretely, but, after witnessing so many failures which were aimed to make a stronger and more powerful China, to destroy its ideological flag inasmuch as the intellectuals had discovered that the Confucianism had so intimately a relationship with the feudal system that it existed as a safeguard of the latter.With the coming of the1980s, the5th generation of directors which were mostly represented by Zhang Yimou, Chen Kaige, Tian Zhuangzhuang, Huang Jianxin and so on, had become the main force of the'renaissance'in the domain of film, the development of which had caught more and more attention from the whole world. This paper is about to start with the works of such directors who represent themselves as a group of intellectuals, analyzing their enlightening consciousness and means as well as the defects from the perspectives of the present era. In addition, the inner problems of the enlightenment movement in1980s that had a deep influence upon the5th generation of directors will be also elaborated as in the direction of the intellectual history analyzing, such as the word enlightenment/revolution and its ideological context and social facts behind it. In the process of doing the analysis, what needs to be specifically paid attention is that there is a wide-span time gap between the western enlightenment and the Chinese one, so that the enlightenment and the modernity in our discourse context are not contradictory, instead are inter-mixed in some works, which is the actual facts faced by the intellectuals in the enlightenment movement in the1980s.Having seen clearly the fact that China lags far behind the western and experienced the ideological suppression and barrenness, the Chinese intellectuals have desperately struggled out to make their voices heard for the purpose to prosper the national culture, which was well manifested in the May4th Movement in which they fought against the feudal ideology and imperialism; Also in the enlightenment movement in1980s when they objected the cultural tyranny, both of which demonstrate their unparallel courage. However, we are supposed to detect the truth that the intellectuals in two movements all have their own limits. The former ones had done far more radical than they should have, while the latter, when inheriting the critical mission, was bound up in the depicting of the inner family life, which results in the separation of the integral Chinese image. The ways in which such measures undertook tried to avoid the realistic contradictions, with no help to change people's values on the history, from the perspectives of which the depth of this enlightenment had not reach the expected level. Early in the1990s, due to the alterations of the inner and international background, the enlightenment movement in the1980s gradually ended. However, the spirits of the May4th Movement and the enlightenment movement in the1980s have already developed a grand space for the improvement of the civilization, with which the expectation of high probability would be able to be obtained that the Chinese civilization could have a brighter future.