Investigating The Intercultural Marital Adaptation Of The "Phoenix Man"with "Silk-Stocking Ladies" In Shanghai

With the development of globalization, more attention has been given to the study ofintercultural communication, especially in the intercultural adaptation. A great amount ofresearch has been done in this area between people from different countries. But,intercultural adaptations taking place in similar cultures have not aroused as muchattentions as they deserve.In recent years, with the rapid development of urbanization in China, more and more non-locals flowed into big cities to look for better study and job opportunities. Shanghai, theeconomic center of mainland China, undoubtedly becomes one of the cities that attractmost non-local young men. And it also increased the ratio of the intercultural marriagesbetween local women and non-local men. Though they are both Chinese, due to thedifferent areas and different dialects, cultural differences between these two exist beyonddoubt. However, the intercultural marital adaptation of the "phoenix man" and "silk-stocking ladies" in Shanghai has never been systematically studied yet.Drawing on the works in intercultural adaptation, this thesis, through in-depth interviewswith16non-local men in Shanghai and4local women, attempts to answer these fiveresearch questions:(1) What is the general situation of their intercultural adaptation inShanghai, both socioculturally and psychologically? What are their adaptation strategies(assimilation, integration, separation or marginalization)?(2) What are the factors thataffect their intercultural adaptation processes?(3) What is their intercultural marriagesituation? Does any difficulty exist in their intercultural marital adaptation?(4) Does theirnon-local identity impact their intercultural marital adaptation with local ladies inShanghai?(5) Do they expect to better adapt to their intercultural marriage? And whatefforts do they make?By looking into the various aspects of the intercultural marital adaptation of phoenix menin Shanghai, their sociocultural and psychological adaptations were analyzed. Multipledifficulties in their intercultural marital adaptation have been identified. There are several limitations of the present pilot study and implications for future research listed at the endof the thesis. This study, as an exploratory effort on this issue, tries to arouse morepeople’s attention and care to the living status of the target group and hopefully elicitmore researches in this area.