From "Safe Fruit" to Christmas Window: The Symbolization of Christmas in China and the Construction of Consumption Ceremony

Abstract

The reconstruction of Chinese culture caused by the cross-cultural communication of Western festivals has been widely discussed, but academia still lacks a systematic explanation of the core mechanism of Christmas localization and the interactive logic of commodity symbols and consumption rituals. Based on the symbolic consumption theory and structural theory, this paper integrates the literature and empirical data at home and abroad in the past 15 years, focusing on the localization and transformation of Christmas in China and the integration of consumer culture. The research shows that Christmas has transformed from a traditional religious festival to a secular cultural phenomenon with both consumption attributes and social functions. The core consumer groups are 18-35-year-old youth and college students. Commodity symbolization realizes the value transition through the three-level path of "meaning binding - media diffusion - consumer identity". There is a dynamic correlation between the two. Based on this, this paper proposes that cross-cultural Festival communication should pay attention to the localization of symbols and the adaptation of consumption ritual scenes, taking into account the differences in group needs and cultural inclusiveness, so as to provide practical reference for the sustainable development of festival consumption culture.