Asian Studies Commons^™

The Hunger Strike Begins, Philip J. Cunningham

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The idea that the campus was under student control struck me as a dangerous illusion. Bright and others said campus life had changed for the better, and in the aftermath of May 4, I could see evidence of the soaring change in spirit. But what if the whiff of freedom turned into a mockery of the same, a transient window of openness that served to make people implicate themselves? It had happened before in the 1950s, when Mao urged “a hundred schools of thought to contend,” only to punish those who expressed themselves too freely.

To date, the campus strike …

One Year Ago

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

A year ago, we were glued to our televisions and computers, like so many others in China and around the world, watching a tragedy unfold in Sichuan. The news we saw from the earthquake zone was bleak and heartbreaking.

Several news sites have run memorials, one-year on, and we’ve selected a few of those in the reader below. We also point you to some of the coverage we ran atChina Beat in the days that followed.

1.One of the things Kathryn Edgerton-Tarpley stressed in a piece for China Beat last May was that Chinese volunteerism was not a brand-new phenomenon, …

May 10, 1989: Demonstration Of Ten Thousand Bicycles, Philip J. Cunningham

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

For a few days there it seemed that the successful student march of May 4 would be the last of the big demos and soon everyone would be back on campus attending classes again. Railing against this rather pleasant and natural inclination, strident wall posters at Shida and Beida called for continuing the student strike. One of the more florid campus wall posters that I managed to snap a photo of was a florid eulogy to the Great Hall of the People as a symbol of representative rule. The dark message, written on May 5, 1989 was at odds with …

Creating Memory: J.G. Ballard And Shanghai, Robert Bickers

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

When news of Shanghai-born J.G. Ballard’s death reached China Beat, we asked friend-of-the-blog Robert Bickers, author of Britain in China and Empire Made Me: An Englishman Adrift in Shanghai, to share his thoughts about the writer with us. He was kind enough to oblige, passing on these thoughts on Ballard’s most famous novel, Empire of the Sun (subject, of course, of a Spielberg film), and also another work of fiction that uses Shanghai as a backdrop.

They own him and disown him. “My brother was in his class at school,” one might tell you. “Why did he tell those lies …

Academic Journal Report: Inter-Asia Cultural Studies By Nicole Barnes

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I have in my hot little hand the December 2008 issue (Volume 9, Number 4) of a hot little journal from Routledge Press, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies. Supported by the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation and Taiwan’s National Chiao Tung and Tsing Hua Universities, this journal has a truly international editorial collective hailing from Singapore, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Taiwan, the PRC (including Hong Kong), Japan, Australia, Malaysia, Thailand, Korea, India, and the U.S. To further demonstrate its comprehensive Pacific Rim approach, the journal accepts publications in Asian languages as well as in English.

Although this is an academic journal, it …

1989: A Lively Dinner In A Quiet Week

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

May 7, 1989

The Yang’s spare living room was transformed into a vibrant cultural salon, with Gladys and Xianyi taking their habitual places in twin armchairs, bringing to mind a kindly old king and queen holding court. The rest of us, lined up on a long couch against the opposite wall behaved like loyal subjects, beaming with respect and admiration.

The Yangs had been through unimaginably hard times, including solitary confinement during the Cultural Revolution, but remained true to one another through thick and thin, emerging with a rare degree of contentment, humility and self-knowledge. They did their best to …

Some Interviews (And Answering A Question I Wasn’T Asked)

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I’ve recently been lucky enough to be asked to do a couple of radio interviews to promote Global Shanghai, 1850-2010: A History in Fragments, and also to get an opportunity to explain what I was trying to do in the book to various journalists working for Chinese and English language publications. This is a very nice development because I wrote the book with general readers as well as academics in mind, and because I hoped that my ideas about Shanghai would start to make their way into Chinese as well as English language discussions of the city’s past, present, and …

More Web-Based Resources For Learning And Reading Chinese

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In two earlier posts (from last May and August 2008), we offered some of our top picks among language and literature websites for students of Chinese. Here are five more recommendations for anyone who is learning the language or who struggles occasionally (!) with reading Chinese texts. All these resources are free unless otherwise noted.

1. Based on a popular tool for reading Japanese websites, Chinese Perapera-kun is an easy-to-use pop-up translator that can be installed as an add-on to the Firefox web browser. Once the tool is enabled, positioning the mouse cursor over any Chinese character on a website …

The Big March Of April 27, 1989

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Wang Chaohua is an independent scholar who received her doctorate from UCLA last year, has written political commentaries for periodicals such as the New Left Review, and is the editor of One China, Many Paths. A leader of the Tiananmen protests of 1989, she wrote the following essay reflecting on the events of twenty years ago for Hong Kong’s Ming Pao newspaper, which will run the original Chinese language version soon. Dr. Wang has been good enough to provide us with an English language translation to publish here.

We all know that the large scale, student-led pro-democracy movement that took …

Readings On 1999’S "May 8th Tragedy"

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The events that began with the May 4th protests and the struggle that took place seventy years later during the lead-up to the June 4th Massacre loom largest in the history of Chinese youth activism in years ending with the numeral 9. But there were also protests involving university students in other years ending with that number, including 1999. These took place soon after the 80th anniversary of the may 4th Movement was marked, and they were triggered by NATO missiles hitting the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, killing three PRC nationals. The Embassy was hit on May 7 European time, …

Rambling Notes: Tracing “Old Shanghai” At The Futuristic Heart Of “New China”, Niv Horesh

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Shanghai is in many ways the face of the new People’s Republic. Even as the city has been remade in recent decades, efforts are underway to selectively salvage what remains of its pre-war architectural heritage (1842-1937) and many of its archival records are becoming accessible to foreign researchers. Touted as Asia’s biggest and most cosmopolitan urban centre in the pre-war era, Shanghai has (re)emerged over the last two decades as “a harbinger of China’s future and a testing ground for the world at large.”

It is therefore worth reprising Shanghai’s distant treaty-port past not just as tourist-trivia pursuit: the past …

Yasufumi Nakamori Interview About Ysuhiro Ishimoto, Katherine Cloutier

Asian American Art Oral History Project

2009 interview with Yasufumi Nakamori, friend of photographer Yasuhiro Ishimoto

Follow-Up Interview With Lijia Zhang, Author Of Socialism Is Great!

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Last June, Nicole Barnes of the China Beat interviewed Lijia Zhang, author of the acclaimed book Socialism is Great!, whose paperback edition has just been released by RandomHouse. Here is a follow-up interview with Ms. Zhang about her recent (and ongoing) book tour, her upcoming book, and women’s issues in Asia:

Nicole Barnes: You recently completed your book tour for Socialism is Great!Where did you speak about your book?

Lijia Zhang: I have not completed my book tour yet. My French publisher has promised to invite me for a promotional tour this autumn when the French version comes out. I’ll …

They Chose China Now At Youtube

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Last year, China Beat ran a review of Shuibo Wang’s fascinating documentary,They Chose China. The documentary traces the stories of American POWs who chose to stay in China after the 1953 Korean War armistice.

At the time that we ran that review, we noted that the video was hard to come by. Now, however, the entire documentary has been posted on YouTube, in five parts. We’ve posted all five parts below (and here are direct links to YouTube for Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, and Part V). Those interested in learning more might also be interested in …

The (Model) Un Comes To Beida, Alec Ash

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In our ongoing effort to draw attention from time to time to blogs about China we come across and like (as we did in this recent post), we want to let our readers know about an intriguing one we’ve just started following. Six, maintained by Alec Ash, was recently singled out by CNReviews (another new addition to our RSS feed list, which we’ll doubtless start linking to regularly now that we’ve discovered it) as one of the “ten eclectic China blogs” worth following.

Rather than explain Six’s features to you, we asked Ash to let us repost a piece from …

The New May Fourth Spirit, Philip J. Cunningham

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

China Beat has been running excerpts from Philip J Cunningham’s forthcoming memoir, Tiananmen Moon; Inside the Chinese Student Uprising in 1989, which will be published in May by Rowman & Littlefield. This excerpt addresses the events of May 4, 1989. Readers can also read the first, second, and third in this series at China Beat or read more at Cunningham’s website.

The sun is rising. At Beijing Normal University, red flags flutter and unfurl in the early morning breeze above the sports ground. Thousands of students mill about, excitedly falling into groups and lining up to take to the streets …

China Beat Comments

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

We wanted to let our readers know that we will be discontinuing comments at the site for the foreseeable future. China Beat is committed to ensuring that the discussions that take place here are productive and respectful, but we unfortunately do not currently have the time to edit and post content as well as manage the comments that come in.

In the interim, we will be considering how we might reconfigure the site more generally, which in part involves exploring ways to procure a little funding to support what we do.

You can always email us if you need to …

China’S Bottom Line, David Moser

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

This text message is being passed around virally this May 1st holiday. For the first time in my memory, China is feeling safe and comfortable at home. From their vantage point, it’s the rest of the world going to hell!

五一何所见?

北美猪疫黯.

美汽车破产.

法总统服软.

韩审卢武铉.

朝嚷放火箭.

巴伊阿泰惨.

街头扔炸弹.

他乱由他乱.

咱享咱平安.

It’s May First: What’s the bottom line?

North America hit by flu from swine.

U.S. car companies in sharp decline.

The French president has lost his spine.

Roh Moo-hyun’s on the firing line.

The North Korean missile fell into the brine.

Israel, Afghanistan, Thailand, Palestine —

Everywhere you step, a …

Intellectuals And The Nation In China And India: A Roundtable Report

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Last Friday, China Beat and the UCI International Center for Writing and Translation (ICWT<) hosted a public roundtable with UC Riverside professor Perry Link and Tiananmen activist Wang Chaohua weighing in on the China side, and writer Pankaj Mishra (a frequent friend of the China Beat) and UCI professorVinayak Chaturvedi speaking about India. China Beat and UCI’s Jeff Wasserstrommoderated the roundtable discussion, and asked the panelists to consider “dates ending in 9” of specific relevance for China (1919, 1949, 1959, 1979, and 1989) and India (where 9-2 seems to be a more pertinent number, as in 1857 and 1947).

Vinayak Chaturvedi began with a discussion of 1909 as the year of publication of 2 foundational texts in Indian nationalism: Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj (or Indian Home Rule) and Vinayak Damodar Savarkar’s Indian War of Independence: 1857, a history of the 1857 “mutiny” (if you were British) and “war of independence” (if you were Indian). [Readers who are intrigued by the reflections of one Vinayak, a UCI professor, on another Vinayak, a Hindu nationalist, can read Dr. Chaturvedi’s article on the same subject in Social History vol. …

Wielding The Double-Eded Sword: Creating The Perception Of A Chinese Enterprise To Obtain And Enforce Patent Protection In China, David A. Fazzolare

Brigham Young University International Law & Management Review

No abstract provided.

China And The United States: A Balance Of Power, William Jeffery Stephens

Dissertations

Throughout world history states have banded together to form coalitions, alliances, and economic agreements with each other to protect and secure their borders, develop their economic prosperity, and grow their political relationships. Alliances, economic agreements, and political relationships have come and gone, decreased or increased, and continue to be at times as fluid as water. During the Cold War the international system had a bipolar structure, with the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies balancing against the United States and its North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies. What makes countries align themselves with other countries economically, politically and militarily? There …

Todd Barkman, Julia Valentine

International Faculty Researchers

Dr. Todd Barkman grew up in Pinckney, Mich. and admits growing up in a rural area is what first inspired his interest in plants. While studying at Michigan State University, he had the opportunity to grow orchids for the botany department. "I fell in love with orchids," Barkman said. "I decided I wanted to work with and study orchids for the rest of my life."

Todd Barkman's website

Promoting Nonprofit Organisations' It Enablement In Singapore, Projjal Ghatak, Guillaume Sachet, Jared Tham

Lien Centre for Social Innovation: Research

The non profit landscape in Singapore is large and diverse, consisting of more than 1,800 registered charities and more than 500 approved Institutions of a Public Character (IPCs). These organisations vary in size from less than $100,000 in annual receipts to those with over $10 million in receipts. They also operate in over 10 sectors ranging from religion to education to sports. NPOs could consider the following four common models for enabling and deploying IT: In-sourcing; Outsourcing; Shared Services; Software as a Service (SaaS). Overcoming the challenges and capturing the opportunities can allow Singapore to increase the automation of the …

Schisms In Humanitarianism: The Khmer Rouge Tribunal's First Hearing, Mahdev Mohan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Mass atrocity invokes humanitarian impulses in all of us. But when a genocidaire casts himself as a victim, the right response is less straightforward. This article analyzes a recent hearing of one of Cambodia's most feared Khmer Rouge cadres who stands trial before a newly established hybrid tribunal and suggests the consequences of responding to war crime trials with polemics rather than principle.

How Emerging Giants Are Rewriting The Rules Of M&A, Nirmalya Kumar

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

While Western companies struggle with mergers and acquisitions, emerging giants like Indian aluminum producer Hindalco are using M&A as their main globalization strategy. That's partly because developing economies grew at near double-digit rates in the past 15 years, enabling many enterprises to make acquisitions. It's also because, according to the author's research, those corporations create more value from takeovers. To compete, Western multinationals should change their mind-set and shift the locus of their M&A efforts to regional headquarters in developing countries.U.S. and European companies, inhibited by slow-growing home markets, acquire rivals primarily to become bigger and thus create economies of …

The Role Of Abortion In Explaining Ethnic Fertility Differentials In Vietnam, Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan, Sajeda Amin

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Until recently, Vietnam had the highest abortion rate in Asia. Abortion–mostly provided by the government—is believed to have contributed significantly to the country’s remarkable fertility decline over the last three decades. Despite the overall fertility decline, fertility rates vary across Vietnam’s 54 ethnic groups. The majority Vietnamese and ethnic Chinese, who together account for 85% of Vietnam’s total population, have total fertility rates below the replacement level. Meanwhile, other ethnic minority groups such as Dao and Hmong, who are disproportionately poor and live in remote, isolated areas, have the total fertility of 3.6 and 7.1 respectively. Analyzing the 1999 Census …

May Fourth Movement: Top Five Readings, Rana Mitter

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The May Fourth Movement – so famous in China it doesn’t need a year, although 1919 – the year it happened – has become legendary too. On that date, some three thousand students marched through Beijing demonstrating against Japanese imperialism and started a political movement that would become identified with Chinese demands for “science” and “democracy” through the next century. From the Cultural Revolution to Tian’anmen Square, May Fourth echoes through China’s modern history. The Chinese Communist Party still claims the movement as its point of origin. On May 4, 2009, the movement will be ninety years old. In some …

A Monster Mash(Up) With Chinese Characteristics: Breaking News From The Prc For Those Intrigued By The "Pride And Prejudice And Zombies" Phenomenon

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

By the end of this post, readers will have been able to click on a word to be introduced to the sounds of “Redgrass Music” (a genre that uses Chinese instruments in a novel manner), seen the special look of a curious vehicle recently displayed in Shanghai that one journalist has said should be called a “Lexiac” ( like a Pontiac from the front, like a Lexus from behind), and discovered something important that Zhang Yimou and Jane Austen have in common (hint: surprise appearances by the undead are involved in each case). First, though, some background about “mash-ups” (aka …

Digital Traces Of 1989

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

China Beat sent out a note to a few scholars and journalists who have carefully watched and written about the events of 1989, asking them to send in short commentaries detailing what they wish more people knew, associated with, or remembered about that spring. We ran the first piece in this limited series, by John Gittings, on April 23, the second, by Jonathan Unger, on April 26. This is the third piece.

Yang Guobin is an Associate Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures at Barnard College. He has written essays on many subjects, including the students protests of 1989, …

Reprint: Conflicts And Clashes Are The Social Norm, Sun Liping

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

China Beat checks in regularly with Xujun Eberlein at her blog Inside-Out China, and we’ve run pieces by Xujun in the past. In early April, she ran another in her series of translations of Chinese materials. We thought this continuation of her translation of Professor Sun Liping‘s works on social protest was interesting enough to reproduce in full (with Xujun’s permission).

Note: About a month ago I translated an essay from Prof. Sun titled “The Biggest Threat Is not Social Unrest but Societal Breakdown.” His rational and perceptive view attracted wide interest from readers, and that post was linked by …