The local politics of festivals: Hangzhou, 1850-1950

Abstract

International audience ; The article examines the large public festivals in late imperial Hangzhou, notably the processions of major gods such as Marshal Wen and the Emperor of the Eastern Peak, and their place in local religious culture. It argues that, while the Buddhist pilgrimage attracted large numbers of people from outside the city, the Hangzhou local religious landscape was more deeply framed by Daoist rituals. It then explores the successive policies towards the festivals by the late Qing and Republican regimes, and looks at how they transformed the festivals, aimed some specific types of religious practices rather than others, and thus reshaped the local religious landscape over the course of one century.