Rescaling the contributed sphere: sociocultural processes in temple reconstruction in Taiwan

This paper explores temple reconstruction as a symbolic action within traditional Han Chinese society, emphasizing the evolution of this expression in the architectural history of temples. Simultaneously, it underscores the sociocultural process of converting economic capital into symbolic capital. We utilize the “rescaling the contribution sphere” approach to clarify these processes, emphasizing people’s contribution culture in reconstruction. It proposes examining how the spatial accessibility of this culture influences the materialization of symbolic capital. Based on the archives from the reconstruction of “Tongshan Guan”, a temple in Magung City, between 1932 and 1951, we analyze how its architectural action transitioned from communitarianism, emphasizing the process of rescaling the ideal scale of the contributed sphere within the “architecture-history-politics” nexus. We found that the Han Chinese relieve social conflicts and tensions through temple architectural actions, hence, the value of temple architectural changes lies not only in technical history and aesthetics but also in their role as both the material outcomes and specific symbols of social change.