Introduction To Cultural Modernity

Living in the modern society is the fundamental judgment of our living situation. In the past hundreds of years, human beings have been undergoing the grandest experience since the beginning of the history. According to Karl Marx, "all that is solid melts to air." This kind of experience makes us entered an absurd existing situation: on the one hand, it brings us a hopeful new world; on the other hand, it is followed by a kind of repression beyond depression. "Modernity" is the theoretical abstraction of the fundamental principles of this world full of absurdity.Since the beginning of modern times, China has fallen into an inferior position on late-developing modernity. However, in more than 100 years on the way being forced to modernity, people are not conscious on culture in conforming, evading and remaking modernity. How to cope with cultural unconsciousness and to foster clear-headed consciousness of modernity to make the modernization of socialist with Chinese characteristics advancing ahead is still a practical theoretic issue of the day China has to face forward. The discourse about cultural modernity is just a deeply responding to the issue.Whether on the historical background or on the theoretic resources, the developing and changing of western modernity has provided beneficial reference for the late-developing modernity of China. Form the view of "culture", combing historically and logically the western modernity with the method of embryology, by comparing and synthesizing, looking for the cultural symbol of modernity, distinguishing and analyzing all kinds of affection it brings out, is the basic mission of the study of cultural modernity. Obviously, this theoretical plan doesn't include many detailed concrete and practicable methods.Specifically, the study should be spread out in the following six aspects:The basic conception of cultural modernity. "Culture" and "modernity" are both the most complicated conceptions, but by philosophical abstraction we can consider culture as a category involving spirit which indicates the symbol layer such as meanings, values and concepts of human society. Modernity, the fundamental principle modern being modern, is a highly summarization of the characters of all kinds of modern phenomena, modern accidents, modern processes, and even the whole modern society. Cultural modernity is the cultural layer of modernity, and it is not only the pivot to grasp modernity, and also the premise to build modernity. The theories about cultural modernity both in domestic and foreign academic circles have different characters according to different understanding on culture and modernity, but they have much difference from the inclination of this article.The philosophical intention of cultural modernity. The concept of subjectivity is the most basic concept of the history of human civilization since modern times, and it represents the strength and direction of modern human as subject. This kind of strength and direction embodies on the ruling of modern reason and value by modern human. Modern human liberate the individual, and promote the strength of remaking the nature and the society with instrumental and legislative rationality, and meanwhile they put forward the ideal of value whose main part is wealth, democracy, justice, freedom, etc. But the strength and direction of the subject haven't had harmonious development, so with the development of the modernity, the concept the subjectivity of the modernity suffered stern criticism, and all kinds of facts it brings involving meaning losing and freedom depriving indicate that it's time human made law for themselves again.The time-space dimension of cultural modernity. Cultural time and space is the existing form of modernity, and also the time-space dimension of cultural modernity. The sense of time walks back and forth between freedom and reason in cultural modernity. The experience of time by modern human indicates that modern culture has both break and succession on time. As to cultural space, modernity and globalization made each other, and formed a global look for cultural modernity, and the digital existing of the day is its typical scene. The divergence between the people on culture pluralism and would ethic reflects the sufferance of cultural modernity.The realistic field of cultural modernity. For the division of the reason, modernity gained corresponding independence and autonomy in all field of social practice. Specifically, it involves the main fields such as economy, politics, ethics, culture, art, science, technology, etc. The embody of cultural modernity in all fields has a same point—going from the heaven of gods to the world of human, while it emphasizes the subjectivity, reason and value of modern people. But it is never the same completely, its character in the field of culture comes out from the difference of the way people grasping the world and the value people pursuing for: from the homo economics hypothesis on economy and by means of commodity system and industrialism, modern people take wealth as the main goal of value; by establishing connection between cultural modernity and nature law, modern people establish the conception of the theory of natural rights and social contract on politics; through natural disenchantment, modern people found the methodological base of mathematical logic and empirical reason, and implement humanistic transplantation of natural scientific method to entire society on science and technology; while on ethics, the pursuing of moral lost its scenery, with the grounds of "the happiness of average", utilitarianism becomes the basic normal form of ethic; on the taste of appreciation, classicism was replaced by romanticism, and intensive criticism to modernity was showed. All field not only link each other up and permeate into each other, but also present a deeply ambivalent logic.The Chinese context of cultural modernity. In China being in the stage of late-developing modernity, the different traditional culture and background of society's transformation form the special background of cultural modernity. Marxist classical writers' criticism and surmounting upon modernity has showed its truthful quality increasingly. Today, Marxism has successfully gained Chinese identity, therefore became the fundamental guiding principle of the construction of Chinese cultural modernity. In this backgrounds of modernity, in order to cope with cultural crisis and cultural confliction, cultural self-consciousness must be advocated, and the relations between cultural sophistication and cultural modernity must be well dealt with, while socialist culture with Chinese characteristics must be constructed on this foundation.The evolution and future of cultural modernity. Cultural modernity is a history of evolution. The cultural crisis and confliction of modernity repeal us to construct a harmonious modernity. While in the historic process of pursuing harmonious modernity, cultural modernity gained indispensable self-inspective quality.