Wei Wang, Wenyao Li

Wei Wang

November 05,  2024

Traditional IP animation, History and memory, Semiotics.

This paper focuses on the analysis of the character Nezha in the IP animations “Nezha Conquers the Dragon King”, “The Legend of Nezha” and “Nezha: Birth of the Demon Child”. Utilizing Peirce's semiotic framework, the study delves into the historical significance and the collective memory evoked by the visual representamens of these characters, and examines the underlying cultural psychology that influenced their creation. The results demonstrate that in contemporary Chinese popular culture, traditional IPs are presented with new avenues for development. It is concluded that for traditional IP content to succeed, it must strike a balance between embodying traditional cultural values and meeting contemporary popular culture demands. On the representamen level, it is imperative to recreate symbols that resonate with collective historical memory. On the object level, it is essential to capture the cultural characteristics of the time. At the interpretant level, the character images must resonate with the public by aligning with the prevailing cultural psychology.

© 2024, the Authors. Published by ISCCAC

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license