Contemporary Yangge: The Moving History of a Chinese Folk Dance Form

Since the beginning of its rule, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has consistently claimed that the performing arts "should assist in the process of educating the masses" (Mackerras 1981: 9). The development of yangge dance is particularly linked to the CCP's policies during both the party's establishment and the Cultural Revolution. In this paper, I use personal experience and embodied research to complicate the existing conventional historical narrative that asserts the political exploitation of yangge in modern Chinese history.