ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the historiographical trajectory in which the animated visual representation has engaged in a sophisticated way within the sociocultural transformation of Chinese society, as well as the struggle for the creativity and diversity of cinematic language. It reviews the Chinese animation filmmaking and related studies, which are entangled with the modern historical discourses of China and address the marriage of nationalism and animation aesthetics. By most visual arts criteria, Chinese animation has become an established, national film genre since 1949, represented as a cinematic linkage between Chinese modern visual history and the socialist literary canon. The chapter discusses the rise and conceptualization of China's national/ethnic style, termed in Chinese as the minzu style of film studies. It raises questions concerning the problematic of cultural metaphor and catachresis of "meishu film" to its engagements with nationalism, minzu style, and the cultural agenda of pursuing Chineseness in animation filmmaking.
