“卡拉OK式礼乐”——卡拉OK实践与现代性问题

Karaoke-Style Rituals and Music:On the Practice of Karaoke and the Problem of Modernity

卡拉OK,是晚近二十年中国大陆都市生活与大众文化的核心内容之一。然而,尚只有贝淡宁等少数学者曾将它纳入学术分析的对象之列。不同于那些将分析只聚焦在卡拉OK活动所衍生的某种社会现象的研究(如贝淡宁所分析的"卡拉OK式卖淫"),本文旨在直接对卡拉OK这个活动本身做一个结构性分析,并将它置于古典儒家关于"乐"的思想传统的并置之中。最后,本文认为,"卡拉OK结构"构成了现代性的一个特征性结构,并由此导致其"真诚性危机"。

As one of the key parts of metropolitan life and popular culture in contemporary China, Karaoke has so far eluded the scope of scholarly study. This paper aims not just at analyzing the phenomena spurred by Karaoke activity but essentially at developing a structural analysis of this activity itself. By juxtaposing Karaoke against the Confucian thought on music, this paper argues that the structure of Karaoke constitutes a key feature of modernity and manifests what I call the ＂crisis of sincerity. ＂