Analysis of the Driving Force of the New Culture Movement on the Transformation of Modern Chinese Literary Thought

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_19How to use a DOI?

Keywords

New Culture Movement; Modern Literature; Literary Revolution; Vernacular Language Movement; Enlightenment

Abstract

The New Culture Movement (1915-1923), born in the historical context of deep national crisis, the rigidity of traditional thought and the gradual advancement of Western learning, was a key turning point in the history of modern Chinese thought and literature. This paper takes the driving force of the movement on the ideological change of modern Chinese literature as the core research object, and analyses in depth how the movement radically reshaped the spiritual core and expression of Chinese literature through radical criticism, theoretical introduction, linguistic revolution and creative practice. The study reveals that the spirit of “science” and “democracy” advocated by the movement gave birth to the awakening of modern rationality and individual consciousness in literature; the vernacular language movement established the linguistic foundation of modern nation-state literature; and the large-scale translations of Western literary and artistic trends broadened the boundaries of expression and aesthetic paradigms of literature. These practices together contributed to the transformation of the function of literature from “carrying the Word” to “enlightenment”, the modernization of the language medium, the unprecedented rise in the consciousness of the creative subject, and the formation of modern literary trends such as realism. This change not only laid a solid foundation for modern Chinese literature, but also profoundly influenced the development of Chinese literature with its spiritual legacy of the pursuit of modernity, which is still of great relevance today.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Yang Lei
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/02/26
TI  - Analysis of the Driving Force of the New Culture Movement on the Transformation of Modern Chinese Literary Thought
BT  - Proceedings of the 2025 5th International Conference on Culture, Design and Social Development (CDSD 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 153
EP  - 164
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_19
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_19
ID  - Lei2026
ER  -