The development of Chinese cultural citizenship

Abstract

The increasing demand and consumerism of culture sees the significance of the understanding of cultural citizenship. Initially, cultural citizenship was only applied in the research on the cultural rights of minorities, especially immigrants. Later, the scope was broadened to include diverse social groups such as the elderly, adolescents, ethnic minorities, the disabled, and women, with breakthroughs in the hierarchy. In response to the development of globalization and capitalism, cultural obligations have become increasingly intertwined with citizenship. When the concept was introduced into China, because of the diversity and complexity of the concept of ‘culture’, Chinese scholars realized that citizenship and cultural citizenship as two standalone Western concepts cannot be applied to China directly. A few studies are exploring Chinese cultural citizenship from the perspective of the Chinese context. Future researchers will pay increasing attention to the local (Confucian) discourses. Some new topics such as tourism, media, heritage tourism, the cross-disciplinary research of these fields with cultural citizenship as a central theme, will continue to thrive.