Loading...
Consuming Modernity in Summer: The Localization of American Cold Refreshments in Republican Shanghai (1912-1949)
Ni, Haoran
Ni, Haoran
Citations
Altmetric:
Abstract
Coca-Cola and Hazelwood Ice Cream—signature products of the U.S. Coca-Cola Company and the Henningsen Produce Company—were the two most popular Western cold refreshments available in Republican Shanghai (1912–1949). Their Americanness and association with American cultural values contributed significantly to their appeal to modern Shanghainese urbanites of the time. My dissertation examines the localization and popularity of Coca-Cola and Hazelwood Ice Cream in Republican Shanghai. My research argues that the acceptance, popularity, and even rejection of Coca-Cola and Hazelwood Ice Cream in Shanghai reveal the initiative and agency of Chinese urbanites in localizing American capitalist consumerism and creating a hybridized modernity in twentieth-century Shanghai. Through this hybridity, Chinese people incorporated American values into their scientific thinking, gender relationships, and sense of identity. This interdisciplinary historical research exemplifies how food studies intersects with the topics of women and gender, global capitalism, medicine and technology, and identity and nationalism in the Chinese context. Business archives, newspaper articles, and visual sources from both Chinese and U.S.-based archives and libraries constitute the primary materials for this dissertation. The five chapters explore American food companies’ varied business models and marketing strategies in Shanghai, the public representation of Coca-Cola and Hazelwood Ice Cream in Chinese print media, Chinese urbanites’ perceptions of these American refreshments during and after WWII, and Republican-Era Chinese women’s consumption of these refreshments in their everyday lives.
This dissertation on transpacific food history offers a perspective from people’s everyday lives to reinterpret Chinese metropolitan modernity in a global context. Through the lens of food, this dissertation reveals the initiative of Shanghainese people in social transformation, and helps to dispel the conflation of Chinese modernity and Westernization. It further deepens our understanding of China’s integration into American capitalism and the changes in Sino-U.S. cultural and economic relations. Throughout the twentieth century, as Chinese views of the U.S. shifted, so, too, did Chinese perceptions of these American foods. Accordingly, Shanghainese urbanites’ use and perceptions of these American refreshments not only reflect their lifestyle and values but also reveal their shifting knowledge of and attitudes toward America and the Western world.
Description
Date
2025-01-01
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Kansas
Collections
Archive Status
This item contains archived web content.
Files
Ni_ku_0099D_20354.pdf
Adobe PDF, 3.15 MB
- Embargoed until 2176-05-31
Research Projects
Organizational Units
Journal Issue
Keywords
American Consumer Capitalism, Business History, Coca-Cola and Hazelwood Ice Cream, Cosmopolitan Modernity, Gender and Everyday Life, Transpacific Food Exchange