Chinese Characters

1. Auflage 2012
ISBN: 978-0-520-27027-5
Verlag: University Of California Press

Buch, Englisch, 244 Seiten, Trade Paperback, Format (B × H): 149 mm x 228 mm, Gewicht: 346 g

An artist paints landscapes of faraway places that she cannot identify in order to find her place in the global economy. A migrant worker sorts recyclables and thinks deeply about the soul of his country, while a Taoist mystic struggles to keep his traditions alive. An entrepreneur capitalizes on a growing car culture by trying to convince people not to buy cars. And a 90-year-old woman remembers how the oldest neighborhoods of her city used to be.

These are the exciting and saddening, humorous and confusing stories of utterly ordinary people who are living through China's extraordinary transformations. The immense variety in the lives of these Chinese characters dispels any lingering sense that China has a monolithic population or is just a place where dissidents fight Communist Party loyalists and laborers create goods for millionaires.

Chinese Characters is a collection, as Pankaj Mishra writes in his foreword, "to herald a new golden age of journalism about a ceaselessly fascinating country." Contributors include a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, a Macarthur Fellow, the China correspondent to a major Indian newspaper, and scholars whose depth of understanding is matched only by the humanity with which they treat their subjects. Their stories together create a multi-faceted portrait of a country in motion and an introduction to some of the best writing on China today.

With contributions from: Alec Ash, James Carter, Leslie T. Chang, Xujun Eberlein, Harriet Evans, Anna Greenspan, Peter Hessler, Ian Johnson, Ananth Krishnan, Christina Larson, Michelle Dammon Loyalka, James Millward, Evan Osnos, Jeffrey Prescott, Megan Shank

Autoren/Hrsg.

Shah, Angilee

Wasserstrom, Jeffrey N.

Weitere Mitwirkende

Mishra, Pankaj

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie | Volkskunde Ethnologie Kultur- und Sozialethnologie: Allgemeines
• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Spezielle Soziologie Globalisierung, Transformationsprozesse

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Foreword
Pankaj Mishra

Acknowledgments

Introduction: “Who Are You This Time?”
Jeffrey Wasserstrom

PART ONE. DOUBTERS AND BELIEVERS

1. The North Peak
Ian Johnson

2. The New Generation’s Neocon Nationalists
Evan Osnos

3. Out of Tibet
Alec Ash

PART TWO. PAST AND PRESENT

4. Belonging to Old Beijing
Harriet Evans

5. Another Swimmer
Xujun Eberlein

6. Looking for Lok To
James Carter

PART THREE. HUSTLERS AND ENTREPRENEURS

7. The Ever-Floating Floater
Michelle Dammon Loyalka

8. King of the Road
Megan Shank

9: Painting the Outside World
Peter Hessler

PART FOUR. REBELS AND REFORMERS

10. The Road to a Better Life
Ananth Krishnan

11. Yong Yang’s Odyssey
Christina Larson

12. The Court Jester
Jeffrey Prescott

PART FIVE. TEACHERS AND PUPILS

13. The Great Wall of Education
Anna Greenspan

14. Gilded Age, Gilded Cage
Leslie T. Chang

15. Shredding for the Motherland
James Millward

Afterword
Angilee Shah

Notes and Reading

List of Contributors

Credits

Über Autor(innen)

Jeffrey Wasserstrom is Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of books such as China in the 21st Century, Global Shanghai, and China’s Brave New World, and the editor of the Journal of Asian Studies.
Angilee Shah is a freelance journalist. Her work has appeared in the Far Eastern Economic Review, Mother Jones, TimeOut Singapore, Global Voices, and AsiaMedia, among other publications.