Review of Barme and Goldkorn, eds., Civilising China: China Story Yearbook 2013 (The China Journal 2015) (original) (raw)

Modernization of Chinese Culture (edited by Jana S. Rošker and Nataša Vampelj Suhadolnik)

2011 was the 100th anniversary of the Xinhai Revolution. The centennial is relevant not only in terms of state ideology, but also plays a significant role within academic research into Chinese society and culture. This historic turning point likewise represents the symbolic and concrete linkages and tensions between tradition and modernity, progress and conservatism, traditional values and the demands for adjustment to contemporary societies. The book shows that Chinese transition from tradition to modernity cannot be understood in a framework of a unified general model of society, but rather through a more complex insight into the interrelations among elements of physical environment, social structure, philosophy, history, and culture. The present book carefully maps the Chinese modernisation discourse, highlighting its relationship to other, similar discourses, and situating it within historical and theoretical contexts. In contrast to the majority of recent discussions of a “Chinese development model” that tend to focus more on institutional then cultural factors, and are more narrowly concerned with economic matters than overall social development, the book offers several important focal points for many presently overlooked issues and dilemmas. The multifaceted perspectives contained in this anthology are not limited to economic, social, and ecological issues, but also include political and social functions of ideologies and cultural conditioned values, representing the axial epistemological grounds of modern Chinese society.

Civic Colonization? An anthropological view of the Processes of Civilization in China.docx

7th International Symposium for Young Researchers in Translation, Interpreting, Intercultural Studies and East Asian Studies, 2016

This research proposes to approach the «public/private» dichotomy through the ethnographic analysis of another socially constructed distinction: the «civilized/uncivilized». The primary hypothesis of this inquiry is that Chinese public space is being produced on the moral basis of the wenming 文明 discourse. Thus, wenming appear as the linguistic manifestation of a tension between the state’s ideal of a civil subject and the multiplicity of habitus produced by and producers of the city as a complex social space. As Sara Friedman (2004) pinpoints, wenming works as a symbolic apparatus that generates a fundamental inequality between the «civilizing center» –now based on the rise of a Chinese middle class– and the peripheral people on which it acts. Civilization is a process that materializes through two main spaces: the city and the bodies that dwell it. The goal is to observe how the micro-sociological processes of daily life become the fundamental link between structure and subjectivity, state-mediated discourse and social practice. Therefore, the study of civility as the moral ground in which «the public» is constructed, results on the logical previous step to comprehend public goods in urbanizing China.

INTRODUCTION to China from Where we Stand.pdf

China from Where we Stand

What is Comparative Sinology? China from where we stand brings together powerful, diverse voices to define the boundaries and possibilities of this new field. In today’s global academic landscape, there are National Studies in China, and then China Studies (Sinology) abroad. Here, we are bridging this gap. We are bringing perspectives together: insider, outsider and in-between, with China as our center. This approach exemplifies a new China: progressive, outward-looking, yet reflective. In the last forty years, great strides have been made by movements that were first marginal, but then gained ground at the center of academic thought and research, such as women’s rights, civil rights, and postcolonialism. All of these advocated for acknowledging the subject position. They argued that the neutrality or universality claimed by dominant scholars is an illusion. Focusing on how people study China differently depending on their own background, and the way Sinology differs from country to country, sheds light not only on China, but also on other countries, on individual and national subjectivities, and on interactions between China and the world.

China and the Chinese in the modern world. An interdisciplinary study

2020

This monograph is a collection of chapters devoted to modern China on various approaches. There is no future without a past and a modern China is a country that skillfully combines the new with the old and the authors have attempted to present this phenomenon in this book. It brings to light issues such as a honorificativity in Chinese administrative and legal documents, a comparison of Chinese and Western legal traditions in the past and now, modern Polish and Chinese civil law perspectives on the principle of good faith and finally, the Chinese government’s efforts to end gender discrimination in the workplace, discovering the roots of the Hanfu movement development, a brief overview of constructing Sino-Polish bridges and last but not least the perspective of Chinese and European about mianzi and guanxi concepts in the 21st century. The interdisciplinary research field thus marked out enabled authors to present contemporary China and its inhabitants in a differentiated way. The thematic scope of each chapter is an inspiring reflection on the unique variety of China.

Changing patterns of Chinese civil society

Routledge eBooks, 2017

Whilst the Chinese Communist Party is one of the most powerful political institutions in the world, it is also one of the least understood, due to the party's secrecy and tight control over the archives, the press and the Internet. Having governed the People's Republic of China for nearly 70 years though, much interest remains in how this quintessentially Leninist party governs onefifth of the world and runs the world's second-largest economy. The Routledge Handbook of the Chinese Communist Party gives a comprehensive and multifaceted picture of the party's traditions and values-as well as its efforts to stay relevant in the twenty-first century. It uses a wealth of contemporary data and qualitative analysis to explore the intriguing relationship between the party on the one hand, and the government, the legal and judicial establishment and the armed forces, on the other. Tracing the influence of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, as well as Mao Zedong, on contemporary leaders ranging from Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin to Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping, the sections cover: The Routledge Handbook of the Chinese Communist Party will be of interest to students and scholars of Chinese Politics, Asian Politics, Political Parties and International Relations.

Culture, Politics, and Society in Late Imperial China (Autumn 2016)

This advanced undergraduate seminar explores key questions and problems in late imperial Chinese history from the end of the Ming dynasty until the fall of the Qing dynasty in 1911. We will examine a wide array of themes, from the historiography of modern China to the history of mercantilism, global trade, and the rise of European imperialism, as well as debates about the East/West divide and the problem of metageography, Qing governmentality and foreign relations, and Qing expansion along the frontiers of the empire. We will then turn to examine the colonial encounter, internal unrest and rebellion, regional conflict and military modernisation, and how the Qing state endeavoured to confront these pressing challenges to its sovereignty. We will also explore themes such as the late imperial city, the social construction of gender, literary culture, the rise of nationalism, civil society and the public sphere, as well as late Qing reforms and the role of intellectuals within society. The aim of the course will be to help students develop a critical perspective on late imperial and modern Chinese history, and to understand the diverse approaches scholars have historically taken towards the field. We will therefore be reading a variety of academic books and articles that provide contrarian and contradictory viewpoints, and students will be encouraged to discuss and debate the relative merits of their positions.