ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts discussed in the preceding chapter of this book. The book examines cultural hybridity has been intrinsic to the author's exploration of the Chinese shopping mall. The foregoing critique is an attempt to unravel and better understand the mechanics of what makes the shopping mall tick. The problem of the shopping mall is the profound sway that it holds over the consumer psyche and the economic arguments with which it steamrollers the non-believers. In China, the shopping mall has become a more cohesive part of its urban tissue. The emancipatory visual language of China's hyper-modern architectural monuments is one whose origin lies in the shopping mall, and thus fuses with the public spaces employed to liberate' its urban populace. Peter Coleman of the Building Design Partnership hypothesizes that the lightweight glazed roofs that are now customary in many shopping malls are a marked departure from the various vaulted roofs which normally enclose public spaces.
