The Conflicts Between Farmers Identity And Modernity

In the history of the modern and contemporary Chinese literature,"farmers coming into the city" is a repeated literary theme, such as lu xun’s A Q and Laoshe’s Camel Xiangzi, Xiao Yemu’s Zhang Tongzhi, Shen Ximeng’s platoon leader, Chen Xi, Gao Xiaosheng’s Chen Huansheng, Lu yao’s Gao Jialin, jia ping-wa’s Liu Gaoxing and so on. This theme, per se, shows the lasting pursuit of modernity in the Chinese society. In this sense, the coming into the city of the farmers, who represent the traditional civilization, can better reflect the collision between traditional and modern civilizations. So, farmers coming into the city, on the one hand, means that their identities need to be re-constructed, but on the other hand, it forecasts that their expectations of modernity may lead them to anxieties and traps of modernity..Since the1990s, with China’s process of modernization accelerating, the theme of "farmers coming into the city", as one part of the literature of bottom layer in society, has gradually become a heated topic in the literary field. But in general, the research lacks a systematic survey of it. Besides, from the perspective of the conflict between the peasants’identity anxiety and modernity, there are not enough articles on the topic. Therefore, after considering the current researches on farmers coming into the city, we, taking the dimension of the farmers’ identity (modern) anxiety in the city, survey the typical contemporary literature works about the topic.The paper is divided into three parts. The first chapter is "the peasants’ identity reconstruction and modern expectation". It will analyze the construction of the identity of farmers as well as their modern expectations from two aspects:social development and the personal pursuit. At first, the identification of peasant, is a kind of occupational concept; and secondly, it is a hierarchic social status; and thirdly, is a kind of cultural psychology and thinking mode. For farmers, the pursuit of modernity (coming into the city) does not only mean getting a better way of life, but also improving their social status, and overcoming the shortcomings of traditional civilization.The second chapter is "identity transformation and anxiety of modernity", discussing from four aspects the anxiety of identity in the transforming process before and after the farmers coming into the city. Firstly, in the literatures of "Seventeen Years" and the "Cultural Revolution" Period, farmers coming into city is usually a sign of political progress, but at the same time could be considered to be snobbery. Secondly, in the new period, because social limitation began to loosen, some farmers like Chen Huansheng, Heiwa, and Xiangxue, Gao Jialin, Jingou and the like began to admire the city life and did their best to enter the city, but their peasant identity was always their obstacle. Thirdly, since the1990s, with China’s modernization speeding up, more farmers have come into the city and become migrant workers, but it is also at this point that the identity anxiety of farmers coming into the city grew more intensive. Finally, even for those who got a better life in the city and have higher social status, the conflict between their peasant identity and modernity still continues. Their Farmers’ cultural identity deeply rooted in them all the time tormented them such as Zhuang Zhidies and Yang Kes, who are living in the city.The third chapter is "the price of pursuit of identity in modernity trap". It focuses on the price which the farmers pay for coming into the city. Commonly, they used four means to obtain the city identity:the power, the labor, the violence, and the body. In the real life, the low status of the peasants is mainly due to social and political reasons, therefore relying on the social and political power is undoubtedly the fastest way to improve social status. Besides, relying on labor to coming into the town almost is the only choice for most farmers to pursuit modernity. If both are regarded as "good", the other two ways of coming into the city, i.e. violence and selling their bodies (including body organs), both of which adopt market principle, should be "evil". But, of course, the "evil" means are never accepted by mainstream society, and hence, it will lead the peasants taking the means of violence and selling their bodies to degenerating in the modern trap step by step.