This book explores intellectual discourse in reform era China by analysing the so-called debate on the spirit of the Humanities, which occurred in the years 1993-95, and which is recognised by scholars as one of the most interesting, influential and important debates of the 1990s. This debate, in which Chinese intellectuals reflected on reform-era mass culture and on their role in society, was the first debate in China after the crackdown of 1989 and the launch of new economic reforms after Deng Xiaoping s 1992 southern tour . The book, drawing on a large corpus of texts and a wide range of...