This thesis explores some of the possibilities of the relationship between love and modernity by mainly doing close textual analysis of two movies, Before Sunrise, Before Sunset. It also introduces a Japanese movie, Adrift in Tokyo, to be a comparation and discuss love between family members. Love, as an emotion, has its own initiative. It is in the confrontation against modernity that emotion will emerge. But the relationship between love and modernity is complicated, love arising between the characters in the movies is not only anti-modernity, but also seems to carry the inherent advancement of modernity.

Zhang Jinjin. Love and Modernity: before Sunrise and before Sunset in Cultural Studies Criticism. Frontiers in Art Research (2023) Vol. 5, Issue 4: 1-5. https://doi.org/10.25236/FAR.2023.050401.

[1] Barker C. (2008). Cultural Studies Theory and Practice (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications.

[2] Virlio P. (2018). Esthetique De La Disparition (K. L. Yang, Trans). Yangzhi Culture. 

[3] Dostoyevsky F. (2006). Notes from Underground (J. Coulson, Trans). Penguin. 

[4] Clark D. (Ed.). (2004). The Cinematic City (X. R. Lin., B. R. Jian & Y. C. Liao, Trans.). Guiguan Books LTD.

[5] Bauman Z. (2002). Liquid modernity (J. G. Ouyang, Trans). Shanghai SDX Joint Publishing Company. 

[6] Benjamin, W. (2008). The work of art in the age of its technological reproducibility, and other writings on media. Harvard University Press. 

[7] Storey J. (2007). An Introduction to Cultural Theory and Popular Culture (5th ed.) (J. Chang, Trans). Peking University Press.

[8] Calvino I. (1997). Invisible Cities. (W. Weaver, Trans). Vintage. 

[9] Chang Y. X. (2006). A Brief History of English Literature. Nankai University Press.

[10] Culler J. (2008). The Literary in Theory. (P. Li, Trans). Yilin Press.

[11] Derrida J. (2001). Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences. Writing and Difference (pp. 278-294). (A. Bass, Trans). Routledge.