Frivolous Friday: In Praise Of Jianbing 煎饼,
2011
National Committee on U.S.-China Relations
Frivolous Friday: In Praise Of Jianbing 煎饼, Maura Elizabeth Cunningham
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Wednesday morning began like any other. I poured some cereal, made a pot of coffee, and flipped open my laptop to catch up on what had filled my Google Reader and Twitter feed overnight. One of the links I clicked on took me to Evan Osnos’s Condé Nast Traveler article about the ongoing “creative destruction” of Beijing, where my morning routine ended as soon as I read this paragraph:
A Quick Q & A With Tom Scocca–Author Ofbeijing
Welcomes You,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
A Quick Q & A With Tom Scocca–Author Ofbeijing Welcomes You, Jeffrey Wasserstrom
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Tom Scocca’s engaging new book, Beijing Welcomes You: Unveiling the Capital City of the Future, which explores his experiences in China during its pre-Olympic and Olympic moments, has been getting enthusiastic reviews, includingone by Jonathan Yardley of the Washington Post and one that yours truly did forTime. Seeing references online to the author giving talks about his book at various East Coast venues, I decided to send a few questions his way on topics ranging from the reaction he’s getting from audiences to how he keeps up with Chinese events now that he’s based back in the US. He readily …
Dalian’S Past, Dalian’S Present, Part 2,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Dalian’S Past, Dalian’S Present, Part 2, Miriam Kingsberg
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
The tens of thousands of Dalian residents who gathered this weekend to demand the relocation of a chemical plant were responding to a contemporary situation. Their protest, though, reflected a complicated relationship among the people, the state, and the environment that was inscribed in the city from the very moment of its founding.
Screening Tiananmen,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Screening Tiananmen, Chris Berry
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Recently, I’ve been spending a lot more time in Shanghai than in Beijing. This is because of a research project comparing moving image screens—mostly Lighting-Emitting Diode (LED) screens—as part of everyday culture in public places in Cairo, Shanghai and London. (If you’re interested, you can read more about that here.) But in the meantime, I had heard about the Jumbotron screen installed in the middle of Tiananmen Square. So, when I made it back to Beijing for the first time since just before the 2008 Olympics to do a bit of teaching at the Chinese Film summer school organized by …
Reading Round-Up, 1/11/11,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Reading Round-Up, 1/11/11
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
• When a football game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Minnesota Vikings was canceled in late December due to heavy snow in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell was not pleased. Calling the United States “a nation of wusses,” Rendell went on to say
The Man In The Picture,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
The Man In The Picture
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Earlier this week, we published Alice Miller’s post on what wasn’t new about Hu Jintao’s recent comments on human rights; at about the same time, Time.com posted a commentary by China Beat consulting editor Jeffrey Wasserstrom that listed other things that weren’t novel about the recent summit.
China Events In Southern California, February 8-22,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
China Events In Southern California, February 8-22
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
China Beat readers living in and around the Southern California region might want to check out one or more of these events in the upcoming weeks:
Reading Round-Up: Richard Mcgregor’S The Party,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Reading Round-Up: Richard Mcgregor’S The Party
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Financial Times journalist Richard McGregor is this year’s recipient of the Asia Society’s Bernard Schwartz Book Award for his 2010 investigation into Chinese leadership, The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Rulers. If you haven’t caught up with McGregor’s book yet, here are a few links about it to whet your appetite:
Harbin’S Past, Modern Style,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Harbin’S Past, Modern Style, James Carter
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Historical preservation in China’s ever-growing cities is a challenge. Transformations to Beijing and Shanghai are best documented (for example, as evocatively narrated by Michael Meyer in his Last Days of Old Beijing), but dozens of cities, up and down the coast especially, are witnessing historically rapid change, and a rapid change to their histories.
Factories Without Smoke: Wang Jia Yi And Gao Tian Ci,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Factories Without Smoke: Wang Jia Yi And Gao Tian Ci, Chris Cherry
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Wang Jia Yi and Gao Tian Ci, Dalian to San Li Village, Anhui Province
“How Can We Hope To Make A Living If Our Roots Are
Cut?”: Track-Laying, Modernization, And People’S
Livelihood In Republican Beijing,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
“How Can We Hope To Make A Living If Our Roots Are Cut?”: Track-Laying, Modernization, And People’S Livelihood In Republican Beijing, Jared Hall
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
In a post yesterday at this site, I discussed recent cleavages between the rapidly expanding Beijing Subway and segments of the public the system is meant to serve. In that post, I pointed to residents who voiced concerns about property seizures, safety lapses, and excessive noise from nearby tracks. When the subway corporation attempted to shut out community objections related to each of these issues, residents then utilized a common repertoire of protest that included petitions, visits to government offices, and public demonstrations.
Chinese Tour Groups In Europe, Chinese Tour Groups In
Yunnan: Narrating A Nation In The World,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Chinese Tour Groups In Europe, Chinese Tour Groups In Yunnan: Narrating A Nation In The World, Tami Blumenfield
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
The first winter I stayed with a Moso (sometimes spelled Mosuo) family in southwest China, my weeks of Naru language tutoring did not help me get very far in understanding their conversations. I had trouble sorting out the names and relationships of the ten to eighteen family members who ate meals together and lived in that household. The apu (grandfather) joked to me that I, an American citizen who had been living in China, was now in the foreign country’s foreign country; no wonder I was disoriented. Their corner of Yunnan was culturally and linguistically distinct from other parts of …
China’S Water Challenges: A Quick Q & A With
Environmental Historian Kenneth Pomeranz,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
China’S Water Challenges: A Quick Q & A With Environmental Historian Kenneth Pomeranz, Jeffrey Wasserstrom
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Ken Pomeranz, Kate Merkel-Hess and I had various reasons for launching this blog at the start of 2008. One thing that led us to start the venture, at a time when Kate was the only one of us with any blogging experience, was simply a sense that some of the things that we were saying to one another over lunch and in the hallways at UC Irvine might be of interest to people in other places who were working on, living in, or just curious about China. As much as the venture has developed since then (adding new contributors continually, …
Excerpt: Why Taiwan Matters: Small Island, Global
Powerhouse,
2011
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Excerpt: Why Taiwan Matters: Small Island, Global Powerhouse, Shelley Rigger
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Taipei 101, the blue-green glass tower that reigned for six years as the world’s tallest building, is everywhere in Taiwan. Its image appears on advertisements, magazine covers, brochures, guidebooks, and billboards; the soaring structure itself is visible from nearly everywhere in Taipei City. As ubiquitous as Shanghai’s Oriental Pearl TV tower—and considerably more graceful—Taipei 101 has become the iconic image of contemporary Taiwan.
Soft Power With Chinese Characteristics: Promoting Creative Industries While Maintaining Political Control,
2011
Hong Kong
Soft Power With Chinese Characteristics: Promoting Creative Industries While Maintaining Political Control, Thomas Glucksmann-Smith
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
On October 15-18th 2011 during the latest Plenary Session of the 17th CPC Central Committee, China’s leaders discussed ways to make China a ‘culturally strong nation’ (文化强国) and defined strategies to enhance China’s international soft power. This meeting coincided with tax evasion charges laid against China’s world renowned artist Ai Weiwei—charges he now plans to challenge.
Ai Weiwei, recently described by Art Review as the ‘world’s most powerful artist’ would, in any other nation, be regarded as a perfect diplomat for his country’s cultural industries. But, for China’s CCP leaders Mr Ai’s political activism and provocative behaviour has gone too …
Symposium: A Futuristic Look Through Ancient Lenses - Egypt,
2011
Eastern Illinois University
Symposium: A Futuristic Look Through Ancient Lenses - Egypt, Booth Library
Symposium on Ancient Egypt: Exhibit Booklet
Symposium Dates
This exhibit was displayed at Booth Library October 6 - November 2, 2011
About the Symposium
A Futuristic Look Through Ancient Lenses - Egypt brought together the Eastern community and citizens of the region to explore the future by learning about this great ancient civilization. It was the first in a series of symposia that explore various ancient civilizations of the world, learning what made them great and what led to their decline. It has been said that history repeats itself because people were not paying attention the first time. The panorama of topics covered by this symposium …
Transmitting The Ideal Of Enlightenment: Chinese Universities Since The Late Nineteenth Century (Book Review),
2011
Sacred Heart University
Transmitting The Ideal Of Enlightenment: Chinese Universities Since The Late Nineteenth Century (Book Review), Thomas D. Curran
History Faculty Publications
Book review by Thomas D. Curran.
Mak, Ricarado K. S., ed. Transmitting the Ideal of Enlightenment: Chinese Universities Since the Late Nineteenth Century. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2009.
ISBN 9780761847267
Perpetrators, Bystanders, And Rescuers: Popular Attitudes Towards Ottoman Christians During The Armenian Genocide,
2011
Chapman University
Perpetrators, Bystanders, And Rescuers: Popular Attitudes Towards Ottoman Christians During The Armenian Genocide, Stefan Cristian Ionescu
History Faculty Articles and Research
This article explores the popular attitudes of Ottoman Muslims (mainly Turks and Kurds) and foreign residents (German, US, British, so on) towards their Christian (mainly Armenian and Syriac) friends, neighbours, and countrymen during the tragic events that occurred in WWI Ottoman Empire, known in Western scholarship as the Armenian genocide. Overall, the attitudes of Ottoman Muslims and foreign residents towards local Christians fit into the perpetrators/ bystanders/rescuers paradigm and varied from active persecution to indifference, opportunism, and sometimes help and rescue.
Reader Responses: Celebrating Jianbing,
2011
National Committee on U.S.-China Relations
Reader Responses: Celebrating Jianbing, Maura Elizabeth Cunningham
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
[Editor’s note: It seems that quite a few of our readers are as fond of jianbing as we are here at China Beat HQ. This morning’s post on the tasty breakfast dish garnered a number of responses on Twitter (revealing that not everyone is a fan, though all have strong feelings on the jianbing issue), which I’ve collected below, followed by one story sent in by a reader via email. And fellow UC Irvine graduate student Aubrey Adams directed my attention to this basic recipe for jianbing, in case I (or anyone else) wants to attempt making them at home.]
Soft Power Struggle: Ai Weiwei And The Limits Of Sino-German Cultural Cooperation,
2011
Pacific Lutheran University
Soft Power Struggle: Ai Weiwei And The Limits Of Sino-German Cultural Cooperation, Adam Cathcart
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
As an attempt to drain the seemingly endless reserves of paranoia fed by China’s rise, the extension of Chinese “soft power” [ruan shi li 软实力] into Western Europe is one of the more interesting stories of our day. How the Chinese Communist Party uses culture and cultural exchange to shape its image in Europe varies, like any good guerrilla strategy, depending on conditions. In the performing arts, PRC-sponsored groups tour European stages, acting out a meta-drama that pits twirling autonomous-region Uighurs against the ubiquitous Falun Gong-affiliated Shen Yun ballerinas (and their army of granny pamphleteers). Embassy-sponsored photographic exhibits celebrating modernization …
