The changing cityscape of Jiangbeicheng provides a concrete means of understanding the role of religious competition in the historical process of building urban China. In this study, I will explore how different religions flourished in Jiangbeicheng and how Christian churches and state intervention altered its religious landscape. I will examine the development of temples, churches, and other ritual places across historical periods, with particular focus on the high Qing to 1891 when Chongqing became a treaty port, the heyday of urbanization in the 1920s and 1930s, the early period of socialist construction from 1949 to the 1970s, and the recent new-century urban reform. Focusing on religion in an urban setting, this study will offer a micro-historical perspective of how local experience is shaped by and fits into changing political discourses on religion, society and urban development in modern China. 

​

江北城城市景觀的歷史變遷，為我們提供了一個長時段中具體而微的研究對象，去理解不同宗教在現代中國城市發展過程中所經歷的競爭與妥協。在本課題中，我會去探索不同的中國傳統宗教為何能在江北城內得以發展，而十九世紀晚進的天主教與基督教，及二十世紀以來，不同政治力量主導的城市化進程又是如何改變了江北城內的宗教面貌。我會具體研究江北城內寺廟、教堂和其他宗教場所的歷史變遷，尤其關注1891年重慶開埠，20世紀20年代到30年代，1949年到70年代這幾個歷史時期宗教和國家力量的角逐。通過江北城的個案研究，我希望能提供一個微觀歷史的視角，去探討現代中國城市發展的過程中，宗教、社會、和國家所扮演的不同角色，及其對現代中國發展的影響。