Confessions Of A Lifelong China Watcher,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Confessions Of A Lifelong China Watcher, Angilee Shah
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Looking back on China’s dramatic recent history, from the devastation of the Great Leap Forward to today’s exuberant “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” is a fascinating exercise. China Watcher offers the rare opportunity to learn this history as author Richard Baum did — from the front row.
Notes On A Conversation: Ian Johnson And Angilee Shah,
2010
UC Irvine
Notes On A Conversation: Ian Johnson And Angilee Shah, Miri Kim
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Earlier this week, we held the final event of this year’s “China Lecture Series” at UC Irvine, featuring a dialogue between Ian Johnson and Angilee Shah. Johnson, formerly of the Wall Street Journal, is author of Wild Grass: Three Stories of Change in Modern China and A Mosque in Munich: Nazis, the CIA, and the Rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West. Shah is a freelance writer and blogger; her work has appeared at the Far Eastern Economic Review, Global Voices Online, Zócalo Public Square, and The China Beat. Below, a summary of the conversation between Johnson and Shah.
Looking At China From Across The Pacific And Across The Himalayas,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Looking At China From Across The Pacific And Across The Himalayas, Jeffrey Wasserstrom
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
“Wouldn’t it make more sense to focus on Japan?”
Reflections On Qing History,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Reflections On Qing History, Maura Dykstra
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
A review of Pamela Kyle Crossley’s The Wobbling Pivot: China Since 1800, An Interpretive History (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) and William T. Rowe’s China’s Last Empire: The Great Qing (Belknap Press, 2009)
Around The Web: Podcasts And Videos,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Around The Web: Podcasts And Videos
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Though we spend a lot of time reading over here at China Beat headquarters, we also like to keep up with the many China-related podcasts and videos that are proliferating on the web these days. A sampling of what’s caught our attention recently:
Blogging Aas 2010 (5),
2010
University of California, Irvine
Blogging Aas 2010 (5), Miri Kim, Charles Wheeler
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
In this panel, organized by Siyen Fei (University of Pennsylvania), Mark Edward Lewis (Stanford University), Hilde De Weerdt (University of Oxford), and Fei presented papers that creatively engaged the work of G. William Skinner on how to conceptualize empire in time and space. Lewis proposed that the northern capital historically functioned as a peripheral center that connected the agricultural and economic centers found further south with the steppe, and this positioning, a prime concern of the dynasties founded by nomads, helped maintain China as a coherent empire. De Weerdt used social network analysis to mine Song dynastybiji for data that …
Blogging Aas (3),
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Blogging Aas (3), Miri Kim
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
This intellectually and visually stimulating roundtable was chaired by Carma Hinton (George Mason University) and focused on the legacy of China’s socialist past in China’s not-quite-so socialist present. I’d like to think I took good notes, but this was a session very rich in materials and ideas (and excellently managed time-wise, which means things moved along at a brisk pace), so apologies in advance for any errors or omissions.
If You Can Read Chinese, Read This E-Journal,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
If You Can Read Chinese, Read This E-Journal, Xujun Eberlein
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
The new issue of Remembrance (<记忆>) continues to review Mao’s Last Revolution (by Roderick MacFarquhar and Michael Schoenhals; Chinese translation can be found here). The four articles in issues 55 and 56 discuss the book from different angles, with thoughtful comments and legitimate questions. All are well worth reading.
Anhui’S Barefoot Aids Doctors,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Anhui’S Barefoot Aids Doctors, Annie Ye Ren
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
For the past four years, I have periodically worked with a Chinese grassroots HIV/AIDS non-governmental organization (NGO) that serves children in Fuyang Prefecture, Anhui Province. The Fuyang AIDS Orphan Salvation Association (AOS)gives aid directly to local communities, addressing local needs that are often overlooked or underfunded by large-scale government projects.
A Chinese Immigrant Reads Yiyun Li,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
A Chinese Immigrant Reads Yiyun Li, Xujun Eberlein
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Among the twenty-three people who received MacArthur Fellowships last month was Yiyun Li, a fiction writer based at the University of California, Davis. Born and raised in Beijing before coming to the United States for graduate work (first in immunology, later in creative writing), Li is one member of a growing community of Chinese authors now writing in English. We asked Xujun Eberlein, also part of that group, to reflect on Li’s writing.
Symbols: Liu Xiaobo’S Nobel Peace Prize,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Symbols: Liu Xiaobo’S Nobel Peace Prize, Paulina Hartono
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Liu Xiaobo is, and now is probably much more so after Friday’s announcement, one of China’s most well-known dissidents—or activists, depending on the term you prefer. Most people who have heard of him know about his hand in penning part of Charter 08, a manifesto based on Charter 77, which advocates broad democratic political reform and human rights protections in China. Those who are more familiar with Liu’s name know of him for his hunger strike in Tian’anmen, or his prolific number of essays published in print and on the Internet.
China By The Numbers: The Chinese Professor And The Red Emperor,
2010
Northwestern University
China By The Numbers: The Chinese Professor And The Red Emperor, Charles W. Hayford
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Remember those jailbirds who know all of each others’ jokes? They don’t tell the whole joke, just shout out the number from the jokebook. Our public discourse on China has something of the same quality. Instead of shouting out a number, however, somebody “shouts out” a word or an image which evokes a whole China story. These stories can be persuasive, poetic, or insightful, but when we only “shout out” the number, then we don’t have the chance to examine the whole story. Painful facts or challenges to venerable beliefs can be papered over when the story is a misleading …
On Michael Jackson In Mongolia, Hanging Out At Shanghai’S World’S Fair, And Other Topics: A Quick Q & A With Marketplace’S Rob Schmitz,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
On Michael Jackson In Mongolia, Hanging Out At Shanghai’S World’S Fair, And Other Topics: A Quick Q & A With Marketplace’S Rob Schmitz, Jeffrey Wasserstrom
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Over the summer, there was a changing of the guard in the Shanghai office ofMarketplace, an American radio program that has consistently carried smart reports about China. Scott Tong moved from the PRC back to the US (where he continues to work for the show) and former Peace Corps volunteer Rob Schmitztook his place. I had the pleasure of meeting them both in Shanghai in July andran a post with the former in early August, in which he reflected on his time covering the China beat. Now, as a sequel to that post, comes a quick q and a with …
What I Read On My Summer Vacation (Iv),
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
What I Read On My Summer Vacation (Iv), Ron Javers
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
I was booked to give a China talk in August, high season in the Hamptons, as part of the summer series at the Rogers Memorial Library in Southampton.
Analysis Of The Recent Made-In-China Campaign,
2010
University of Pennsylvaina
Analysis Of The Recent Made-In-China Campaign, Hongmei Li
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
China has recently launched its first global advertising campaign about products made in China. A 30-second television commercial, sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce of China and four Chinese trade associations, has been running on CNN, the Headline News and International Asia TV channels in the United States since November 23, 2009. Costing tens of millions of Yuan, the commercial was scheduled to run for six weeks. The commercial also started to run in some parts of Asia starting in December 2009.
More On Google + China,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
More On Google + China
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Now that we’ve all had a few days to think deeply about the Google + China story, lots of commentaries and opinion pieces are coming across the wire. Here’s a sampling of those that caught our attention over the weekend:
Travelogue, Delhi-Beijing,
2010
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Travelogue, Delhi-Beijing, Pallavi Aiyar
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
The plane burps to a halt and almost immediately everyone is on their feet, jostling to open the over-head lockers, reaching high for their strolleys. My head feels stuffed with lead and I marvel at the nimble alacrity of my fellow travellers, at 3:00 in the morning. Slowly we shuffle off the Air China flight and make it into the inadequately-air conditioned environs of Indira Gandhi International Airport.
Blogging Aas 2010 (2),
2010
University of Manchester
Blogging Aas 2010 (2), William Callahan
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
One of the pleasures of going to a conference is seeing what free goodies you can scam from various institutions. Lots of free pens were proffered by various publishers. A Chinese press was giving out some trinkets — but for some reason not to me. The International Institute for Asian Studies (Leiden) was once again giving out sheer canvas bags loaded with their newsletter and other readable items. UBC Press offered 50-year-old issues of Pacific Affairs for the antiquarians among us, as well as more recent issues.
Dangerous Obscurity: A Study Of The Female Suicide Combatants Of Sri Lanka,
2010
Bemidji State University
Dangerous Obscurity: A Study Of The Female Suicide Combatants Of Sri Lanka, Jessica Santala
Political Science Theses and Capstones
Since 1991 the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam have used female suicide operatives in their civil war with the Sri Lankan government. Gaps in research about these phenomena suggest that it’s not seen as a gender specific problem and that female suicide bombers can be compared toe to toe with their male counterparts. I contend that the situation surrounding female suicide terrorism is unique and that certain discernable socioeconomic indicators can explain the reasons behind why some women of Sri Lanka become more active in suicide terrorism. I have compiled a suicide terrorism dataset out of terrorist acts perpetrated by …
Ann Hui’S Films And The Poetics Of Mundane Redemption,
2010
Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica
Ann Hui’S Films And The Poetics Of Mundane Redemption, Peter Zarrow
China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012
Seen from above, people are ants. As ants are specks in nature, so people—at least Hong Kongers—are specks in the massive infrastructure of forty- and fifty-storey highrises, the limitless concrete of train and highway networks, and the forbiddingly busy shops. Seen up close, however, face-to-face, they become souls. The camera in the masterpiece directed by Ann Hui, “The Way We Are,” switches between these two perspectives. “The Way We Are” (lit. “Day and Night in Tin Shui Wai” 天水圍的日與夜, 2008) simply shows the quotidian, extremely ordinary events in the lives of a few characters, gradually revealing how they came to …
