At the sixth “Shanghai May 5 Shopping Festival,” visitor explore specialty markets and savor a variety of food and beverages. Photo: IC PHOTO

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In most countries around the world, folklore studies has consistently centered on rural areas and traditional culture. However, with the ongoing development of urban society, a key challenge for contemporary folklore studies is to move beyond established research paradigms and identify meaningful topics within the everyday lives of urban residents.

Early urban folklore studies largely overlooked new folklore phenomena and issues emerging from urbanization and modernization processes, failing to highlight the field’s contemporary relevance. As China’s urbanization accelerates and lifestyles change dramatically, folklore studies must address real-world concerns. This entails not only examining the continuation and evolution of traditional festivals and customs in cities but also exploring new lifestyles and strategies urban dwellers have formed in response to their environments—especially how urban culture is created at the intersection of tradition and modernity. In cities, where cultural phenomena are exceptionally rich and complex, the key to advancing folklore studies lies in identifying appropriate focus areas.

First, a profound understanding of the features of contemporary urban life can be gained through comparison with traditional folk culture. How do urban residents meet their daily needs—food, clothing, housing, and transportation—in a commodified urban society characterized by complex divisions of labor? How do they navigate social interactions in a city where most people are strangers? Contemporary urban society is characterized by a consumer culture where consumption is nearly ubiquitous, shaping both lifestyles and individual identities. As a central feature of daily life—reflected in people’s behaviors, conversations, and concerns—consumption presents a compelling direction for future folklore research.

While contemporary urban life offers greater individual freedom, interpersonal relationships tend to be distant. Traditional social ties such as kinship and neighborly relations are declining among the urban population marked by diverse origins and backgrounds, varied interests, and high mobility. Against this backdrop, interest-based groups are flourishing. Members of these groups engage through shared hobbies or pursuits, building emotional connections and accumulating social and cultural capital. These interactions fulfill both psychological needs for connection and cultural needs for identity—a phenomenon that deserves close attention from folklore scholars.

Another important area of inquiry is the transformation of rural traditions and the transmission of intangible cultural heritage in urban contexts. Today, many forms of intangible cultural heritage, having expanded beyond their original settings, now appear in cities as nostalgic landscapes, experiential activities, or museum exhibits. Urban openness, diversity, and inclusivity allow these repackaged folk arts and traditions—modified for popular appeal—to evolve into new forms of tradition. Folklorists must remain attuned to such shifts with academic sensitivity.

Equally significant is the widespread acceptance of new traditions in urban life. Shopping festivals, film festivals, and art festivals enjoy strong appeal among urban Chinese. Western holidays like Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and Halloween have been reinvented by Chinese youth in ways that reflect local creativity. In response to such developments, folklore studies should move beyond rigid concerns about authenticity and instead focus on the innovations that arise from cultural fusion.

Urban folklore studies should also strive to demonstrate its practical value. Cities, as densely populated spaces, demand a high degree of public order. In addition to contributing to the preservation of urban traditions, the field can play a role in informing contemporary urban governance. Take, for instance, the ongoing debate over banning fireworks in cities—a debate that highlights the tension between traditional customs and modern regulatory systems and requires scholarly engagement. Research in urban folklore can also provide an empirical foundation for shaping cultural industries and guiding cultural policymaking.

Finally, the field can expand its research scope by drawing upon theories and methodologies from multiple disciplines. Currently, it is primarily concerned with aesthetically rich and culturally appealing research objects such as food, tourism, music, architecture, and language. To fully explore these phenomena, it must integrate insights from related disciplines like history, cultural studies, and communication studies while identifying the inherent connections between urban folklore, urban spaces, and the urban economy by adopting an interdisciplinary approach. Meanwhile, new developments in digital life and online spaces also merit sustained scholarly attention.

In summary, while urban folklore studies extends beyond the rural focus of traditional folklore research, its goal is not simply to relocate its subject matter. Instead, it must seek out new directions rooted in the present, tracing the everyday creative practices and lived wisdom of urban residents. In doing so, it can offer robust support for cultural continuity and innovation in the city, and help folklore studies evolve in step with the times.

Xu Ganli is a professor from the Institute of Folklore at East China Normal University.

Edited by WANG YOURAN