ABSTRACT
Shanghai is an example of a city with a layered landscape biography along the lines of Marvin Samuels, but with an equally rich representation in popular culture, which has developed simultaneously with the city. Through expressions in, for instance, cinematography, comics or advertisement, millions of people around the world have encountered Shanghai, and these images determine the ‘image’ of the city to a great extent. The translation to this popular culture has led to a kind of reductionism, through which – following Wohl and Strauss – the city can be accessed. These images can even be seen as a type of immaterial heritage. Of course, both biographies are closely related to each other, but several elements show discrepancies. An example of this is the fictional element (the free interpretations in popular culture), the adaptation of western or eastern perspectives on the city and the western desire for the exotic. Still, both biographies appear to play an important role in the profiling and positioning of the city in the present time. Formerly, controversial elements of the landscape biography were used for ‘scripting’ the urban space, and the characteristics that were previously abhorred are resurfacing after the decades of attempted communist ‘correction’. The use of both physical heritage and the ‘character’ of the city is the key to a successful ‘reintegration’ of Shanghai in the global community.
