Cultural Interaction and Confrontation Among the Haunting Ghosts of Russians, Japanese, and Chinese in Harbin

THE POLITICS OF MEMORY: CULTURAL INTERACTION AND CONFRONTATION AMONG THE HAUNTING GHOSTS OF RUSSIANS, JAPANESE, AND CHINESE IN HARBIN JING XU A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY GRADUATE PROGRAM IN HUMANITIES YORK UNIVERSITY TORONTO, ONTARIO MAY 2019 © Jing Xu, 2019 Abstract This dissertation focuses on a spatial analysis of the cultural memories of Harbin, a city in Northeast China, a former (semi)colony of Russia and Japan, and a habitat of more than forty nationalities from across the world in the first half of the twentieth century. Harbin’s history, determined in great part by a large foreign presence, is still a matter of contention in China and elsewhere. By adopting Pierre Nora’s concept of “lieux de mémoire (places of memory),” Henri Lefebvre’s notion of “the social production of space,” and concepts and theories of many others, this dissertation investigates the contested memories of Harbin through the lens of architecture, literature, film, and television drama. It conducts interdisciplinary and inter-medial examinations of Harbin as an encompassing lieu de mémoire, where various practices demonstrate, individually and collectively, differently yet consistently, the social signification of the city’s pasts in the present, enriching the city with ambivalent and contradictory meanings, and contributing to the social production of the memorial space and spatial memory of the city. This dissertation examines Harbin as a contact zone amongst Russia, Japan, and China, and as a periphery of the cultural heartland of China. It attaches importance to memories as an arena for the contemporary Harbiners to negotiate the divergent ideologies, power contests, and economic and cultural concerns. The city itself is a palimpsest, a text which has experienced, and is experiencing, a process of being effaced and “rewritten,” translated, and resignified. The city’s contested past overlaps with its present, persistently haunting and shaping ii the city, while experiencing metamorphosis and resurrection. Overshadowed by the real-and-imagined ghosts of the past, Harbin continues to function as a contested contact zone and frontier that de-territorializes China’s homogeneous cultural identity from the periphery. In this way, Harbin describes a local particularism by evoking a future-oriented reinvigoration of its cosmopolitan past in the current context of globalization. In this process, contemporary Harbiners demonstrate ambivalence and paradox in promoting the city’s exoticism as much as complying with the state’s construction of nationalism. iii Acknowledgments The completion of this dissertation would have been impossible without the tremendous help and support of many wonderful people. I am deeply indebted to Professor Pietro Giordan, who patiently guided me through every single process of dissertation construction. Pietro instructed me to turn a blurry blueprint to the final work. His intelligence and advices inspired me in each conversation. From the establishment of dissertation outline and proposal, to the detailed correction of my drafts, including punctuations, and to the support for my research funding applications, I highly appreciate Pietro’s ample guidance, inspiration, and help. My deep gratitude goes to Professor Markus Reisenleitner, who always offered me encouragement and support, even when I had no confidence in myself. His precious feedback helped me to establish and improve the structure of each chapter, and better the overall picture of the dissertation. His courses of Research Practices and Methodologies, and Communication Culture and the City were indispensable for building up my knowledge and laying foundation for this dissertation. As the Graduate Program Director, Markus is golden-heart and considerate for the benefits of students. With his great help, my life at York is much easier and warmer. My heartfelt thanks and gratitude to Professor Thomas Lahusen are beyond words. Without his guidance and support, I would have not been a graduate student in Canada. From the step-by-step instruction in applying for graduate school, to the inspiration for doing research about Harbin and Northeast China, and being one of my referees in many iv cases, Thomas helped me to grow a lot on the way of academia. I was deeply moved and motivated by his enthusiastic commitment to Harbin studies over the decades. And I benefited a lot from his erudite knowledge of Harbin. Without the insightful feedback and prominent references Thomas provided, this dissertation would have been much plain. I thank many eminent professors at York University, whose instructions enriched my knowledge and prepared me for this dissertation. I thank Professor Joan Judge and Professor Joshua A. Fogel for guiding and helping me in my early stage of research. I thank Professor Ted Goossen, whose suggestion about the Japanese in Harbin was crucial for me to revise the structure of my dissertation. I appreciate Professor Susan Ingram’s encouragement for students to be involved with the Comparative Literature and World Literature Diploma at York. I thank Professor Gail Vanstone, whose detailed and insightful correction made my Master Research Proposal a big difference. I thank Sorkleng Jax, Carolin M. Potter, and Alicia Filipowich for their great help in Humanities Department and York Center for Asian Research. I was lucky to be around many helpful friends in Humanities Department, including Sarwar Ahmed Abdullah, Tracey Thomas, Christopher Satoor, Angie Wong, Josh Trichilo, Jun Lu, and many others. It was with their friendship that I felt not isolated. I thank the great support of Scott Library and Writing Center at York University. Amongst the instructors who helped me to improve my dissertation writing are Margot La Rocque, Courtney Fairweather, and Brenda McComb. I thank my editor Professor Peter Heron for his conscientious and skillful editing of my dissertation. v This dissertation and my professional development were benefited from the financial support of Faculty of Graduate Studies at York University, York Center for Asian Research, and Canadian Union of Public Employee 3903. The tremendous help from many kind-hearted people in Harbin is essential for the completion of this dissertation. I thank Professor Liu Songfu, Professor Wu Songtao, Xing Siwen, Wang Dongke, Chen Qihui, Gao Yubao, Zhang Haining, Li Shuxiao, Lü Jing, Bi Congliang, and many other interviewees, for their precious knowledge and feedback, which constitute an important part of my studies of Harbin. I thank my two sets of families for their ample support and love. Special thanks are to my husband, Tian, whose encouragement helped me to go through many difficult times, and thank Tian for enduring the long-distance relationship with me over the years. Finally, I am very grateful to Humanities Department at York University which offered me chances to do research in Canada during the seven years of master and PhD learning. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ii Acknowledgements----------------------------------------------------------------------------iv Table of Contents------------------------------------------------------------------------------vii List of Figures-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------x Introduction Thesis-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 Theoretical Framework: Memory and Space-------------------------------------------5 Methodological Framework: Translation, Intertextuality, and Articulation-------19 A Historical Introduction of Harbin-----------------------------------------------------23 The Contribution and Scope of This Dissertation-------------------------------------35 Chapter One. St. Nicholas Cathedral: A Site of Ideological Contestation---------44 The Social Context of Russian Architecture Revitalization in Harbin-------------44 The Spatial Politics of the Afterlife of St. Nicholas Cathedral----------------------50 Nostalgia for St. Nicholas Cathedral----------------------------------------------------56 Nationalism versus Exoticism-----------------------------------------------------------62 The Competition between the Russian and Chinese Traditional Harbin-----------66 Conclusion---------------------------------------------------------------------------------70 Chapter Two. Harbin Station: A Site of Colonization and Decolonization--------72 Introduction--------------------------------------------------------------------------------72 Harbin Station 1904 versus 2018: Revival of Classicism---------------------------77 Going Back to the Russian Root: Decolonizing the Decolonized---------80 Away from Classic Nationalism to Modernist Exoticism and Public Perceptions of the Change------------------------------------------------------82 Façade, a Lens to See the Changed Official Ideologies in Regard to Harbin’s Russian Culture-------------------------------------------------------84 Harbin Station 2018 versus Kowloon-Canton Railway Clock Tower----87 Harbin Station: A Site of Power Contention-------------------------------------------88 A Place of Oblivion: the Soviet Red Army Monument----------------------89 A Place of Memory: Ahn Jung-geun Martyr Memorial Museum-----------92 Conclusion---------------------------------------------------------------------------------94 Chapter

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