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Comment by _iyig | Hacker News Reader

To what extent did the Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, and destruction of the "Four Olds" (Old Customs, Old Culture, Old Habits, and Old Ideas) damage this extensive cultural and historical tradition? Was the damage mostly material e.g. temples razed and books burnt, or did China's early Communist period have significant cultural/behavioral impacts as well?

I've heard some commentators say that Taiwan preserves much of this "lost" Chinese culture and history, but outside of temples and dragon dancing, I don't really know what this means. Could anyone shine a light?

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My great grandfather was missionary in China and founded a university there. Some relatives visited the university a while ago and it was apparently a local technical college (still with the same name and even plaque honoring my great grand father). The photos made it look a lot like a typical American community colleges.

Which is to say that I suspect that, despite all the tumult of the cultural revolution, just modernization has likely been the largest force upending the previous culture order.

You see the thing about virtually all pre-industrial societies is that only a quite small minority of the population were at all educated in the intricacies of the culture - with most people having to work as farmers to simply support the society, few people could be educated, few people could read, etc. So most people educated today have been educated in the process of industrialization and so they have whatever knowledge was being handed out, and they got it in the way that modern people are educated.

> I've heard some commentators say that Taiwan preserves much of this "lost" Chinese culture and history, but outside of temples and dragon dancing, I don't really know what this means. Could anyone shine a light?

Also the writing script and literary tradition, as well as a general appreciation of erudition. Pre-revolutionary family and social values.

> damage this extensive cultural and historical tradition

Damaging tradition is one of the traditions. Think of the first emperor literally damaged the culture of the six kingdoms to unite China in 213 B.C.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burning_of_books_and_burying_o...

I certainly remember Emperor Qin Shi Huang from his appearance in both "The Three-Body Problem" and the somewhat lesser-known "Day of the Dragon King," an entry in Magic Tree House children's fantasy series :)

Ironically given the book-burning context, our youthful protagonists in the latter are equipped with magic library cards.

When they fled to Taiwan the KMT crated as many treasures from the capital, in particular the Forbidden City, as they could, given the chaotic conditions, and took them to Taiwan. This probably saved a lot of them from being destroyed in the Cultural Revolution. Many of them are now on display at the National Palace Museum in Taipei, which is an amazing place to visit.

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