Collapse China: The Inevitable Fate of Oral Culture

Author: Li Bo
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: Although Li Bo's attitude is unusually severe, like a scholar, and his writing style is quite sharp, as a free writer, his text is more often between essays, sketches, novels, and academic works. Numerous historical stories, keen observations on society, and personal insights are interwoven, making it very easy to read. Therefore, overall, Chewing Up China is not an academic work in the strict sense, but rather a popular cultural read with a nature of questioning, self-examination, and confession. Such a book is rare and holds significant cultural and realistic meaning. Together with The Fate of Oral Culture: Chewing Up China and The Deep Structure of Chinese Culture, these two books will have a significant impact on traditional Chinese studies. Many of Li Bo's innovative ideas are worth pondering and deep reflection.
Firstly, his understanding and description of the position of "oral culture" in Chinese culture. He says: "‘Eat’ is the most complex character in Chinese, far beyond the scope of food culture, encompassing all the secrets of Chinese culture. In China, the saying ‘The people depend on food for survival’ is widely known and considered an unbreakable rule. It elevates ‘eating’ from the core of food culture to the level of a national religion; it acts like an invisible iron hand, controlling the trajectory of China's politics, economy, and cultural development, shaping the unique individual personality and absurd national character of the Chinese people." His entire book revolves around proving this central argument. Li Bo takes the well-known saying “The people depend on food for survival” as his starting point. He says: "I am increasingly skeptical of the unbreakable rule ‘The people depend on food for survival.’ I believe this sentence has inverted the subject and object. This insidious and subtle misplacement has led to the misalignment between Chinese culture and modern civilization, making all the unreasonable things in China seem justified. I think that China's profound and self-satisfied food culture is just another charming ‘Emperor's New Clothes’! Beneath its dazzling and attractive facade, under its carnival and paralyzing sensory stimulation, lies a bloodthirsty mouth—devouring people! In China, almost every problem is related to ‘eating.’ Eating is more dangerous than a tiger!" He uses elements of food culture such as food, appetite, hunger, taste, organs, chewing, cooking, etiquette, alcohol, and gourmets as a "coordinate system," "microscope," and "scalpel" to observe and deconstruct Chinese history, culture, personality, national character, reality, and everything else. Through these food culture elements, the author systematically and rigorously examines and reflects on the mother culture, thus drawing a cautionary conclusion: "The one-sided emphasis of Chinese oral culture on taste ultimately leads to the famine mentality, famine personality, and physicalized existence of the Chinese people, profoundly shaping their personality and culture. As a result, the Chinese have fallen into a cyclical fate of being ‘chewed up’ by oral culture—Chewing Up China."
In the end, the author also makes efforts to propose a solution. He believes that if "The people depend on food for survival" can be returned to "Food depends on the people for survival," then the Chinese may have a chance to break free from the fate of oral culture—Chewing Up China.