Mandopop under siege: culturally bound criticisms of Taiwan’s pop music

Abstract

This article examines the cultural biases embedded in critiques of Mandopop (Mandarin Chinese pop music). Contemporary commercialised Mandopop is generally recognised as beginning around 1980, drawing on musical traditions from the early twentieth century. In the 1980s and early 1990s, Taiwan’s popular music swept across China and many in the PRC government reacted to the values embedded in Taiwan’s lyrics with mistrust and disdain, expressing a fear that Taiwan and Hong Kong’s cultural incursion would result in the PRC’s loss of national identity. On the other side of the strait, people in Taiwan complained of Mandopop’s fast pace and changing nature and linked this to similar trends in Taiwan’s society. More recently, several of Taiwan’s scholars have critiqued Mandopop for promoting patriarchal gender roles, and English language publications complain of a lack of individualism in that songs are produced in teams of composers, lyricists and performers. I examine the cultural contexts of these critiques in order to come to a better understanding of the most popular Chinese language music in the world.