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Genaro Flores.
clay dubeWhile conditions for most women in China are much better than they were in 1949 or 1979, it's clear that there has been a roll back in real determination to remedy gender discrimination. With China's economic rise, some women have become fantastically rich and powerful. These are often the daughters of powerful officials, but there are exceptions. One of the richest women is Zhang Yin. She became one of the giants in the recycling business. Here's a NY Times article about her:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/15/business/worldbusiness/15iht-trash.4211783.html
Other women are (as those in our seminars know) going into a wide variety of businesses, especially in the service industries (restaurants, beauty salons, and so on).
But in the corporate sector, discrimination remains common. Job advertisements specify that height, weight, and looks are important qualifications. Rich men are taking on girlfriends, and in some cases, men from Taiwan or Hong Kong have dual families, one in their native place and one on the mainland.
Newsweek's Duncan Hewitt uses recent news stories about official support for underage prostitution and other abuses to launch a good discussion of women's position in China today. It errs a bit in being too negative, but his points are well made. What do you think?
clay dubeUS-China Today has published several interactive graphics that you may find useful and might wish to refer your students to.
1) Map of Africa
This map shows Chinese investments in Africa, recent visits there by Chinese leaders, and Confucius Institutes established there.
http://www.uschina.usc.edu/ShowFeature.aspx?articleID=3436
(scroll down to see the map)
2. Map of Latin America
This map shows two way trade between China and various Latin American countries. It also shows the recent visits to the region by Chinese leaders.
http://www.uschina.usc.edu/ShowFeature.aspx?articleID=3814
(scroll down to see the map)
3. Map of China
This map shows the population of Chinese provinces and regions. Through color coding it indicates population density.
http://www.uschina.usc.edu/ShowFeature.aspx?articleID=3136
4. Chart -- Chinese Ownership of U.S. Federal Government Debt
This chart shows how China's share of American treasury notes has risen over the years.
http://www.uschina.usc.edu/ShowFeature.aspx?articleID=4105
clay dubeWe've been encouraging teachers and others to utilize Peter Hessler's Oracle Bones with students to learn about the realities of life in China today. These include migration, gender issues, job insecurity, and more. Here is a link to Fora.tv's version of Hessler's 2006 CSPAN-recorded presentation. It opens with a commercial, then you can navigate to various topics. Fora.tv is technically quite impressive and the video quality is usually better than it is on this segment.
Anonymous"Once again, I am surprised at the swift, non-debatable action of the government and at the resigned and trusting attitude of China's citizens. It is certainly a different country from the U.S.! "
Really, as if Americans question every action their government takes. I don't disagree with the premise that China is a totalitarian state but rather with the assumption that we somehow live in an enlightened state where everything is democratic and there is an informed populace. The United States is in many ways more repressive simply because it has fooled its population into believing that the government has their best interests at heart. The world laughs at how naive Americans are and how we fail to challenge our government. At least the Chinese people have stood up and challenged the establishment many times and shed blood in the process on all sides. We think we protest here when we march and chant slogans in front of cameras. The Chinese have done way more with no one in world paying attention.
AnonymousI was reading the current talking points about the 60th anniversary of the 1949 founding of the People’s Republic and I am reminded of how China's current government is so young. Listening to Clay speak last week about old and young nations was interesting. I was one of the ones who voted that America was a young nation. However, compared with only 60 years, we are quite old. It's a reminder that not everything lasts forever, so who knows what holds for our future. I think this would be an interesting comparison in the classroom and a good bridge into China's culture.
On the art front, the massive Monument to the People’s Hero’s in the center of the Tiananmen square, which, features relief sculptures of key moments in China’s official revolutionary history sounds fascinating and would be a good piece for me to bring up when talking to my students about sculptures.
AnonymousI've just seen some commercials that deal with products with the statement "made in China." In the commercial it emphasizes the tag "made in china..with engineering from Germany" and another "made in china, with product from South America" or something. It's an interesting point to bring to light especially with all the focus on poor quality control articles coming from China these days.
clay dubeBack in 1978, historian Michael Godley wrote about China's first world's fair. It was in Nanjing in 1910. The article "China's World's Fair of 1910: Lessons from a Forgotten Event" begins:
****
FROM before the turn of the century, the great powers held large commercial, industrial and technological exhibitions to show off the fruits of progress and to give their citizens a glimpse of where civilization was headed. World fairs thus provided one window into the future. But it must be remembered that such events also constructed monuments to their own era-an age when jingoism and a paradoxical recognition of the shrinking nature of the globe coexisted before the road to war.
In the final analysis, the grand exposition, with its curiosity about other peoples and nations and its faith nonetheless that mechanical invention would soon make everyone much the same, was a place where imperialists met in thinly disguised competition. How strange it must seem, then, to learn that the last Chinese dynasty, having just discovered the power of nationalism, attempted an international exposition of its own in the summer of I9IO at the same time that the 'Festival of
Empire Exhibition' was booked into London's famed Crystal Palace.
Of course, the 'Nanking South Seas Exhibition' never attained the scale or fame of the grandiose foreign efforts of the epoch. Although the Chinese managed to attract fourteen other nations and to construct a good number of buildings in an impressive
array of architectural designs, the fair was not a complete success. Fortunately, historical significance is a far more relative judgement. In perspective, the Chinese undertaking was as important as the Columbian exposition or the affairs behind British glass because it, too, served as a landmark.
Modern Asian Studies, 197812:3, pp. 503-522.
****
What have you read about the 2010 Shanghai Expo? What is the point of such fairs? Do you know of any important developments tied to such fairs? Does the upcoming expo offer teachers any useful "hooks" or themes to take up with students?
AnonymousMr. Nelson Liu, a licensed acupuncturist and the father of one of my students, Jason Liu, told me over a week ago about a television series that has been pulled from broadcasting in the PRC because of its controversial presentation of the housing crisis in cities like Shanghai and the complicity of corrupt city officials in profiteering from this shortage. The series, which is approximately thirty hours in its entirety, is entitled Wo Ju (Snail House). Mr. Liu said his wife was able to buy a DVD of the entire series at a video store in Monterey Park. On Monday, 12/21/09, he called to alert me to an article on the subject in that morning's LA Times. The article by John M. Glionna, "China plucks popular 'Snail House' TV show off the air," details the controversy and reactions from Chinese viewers.
One of the most controversial aspects of the series is its focus on the fangnu or "mortgage slaves": young women who become mistresses of government officials in order to secure a place to live. (Apparently young Chinese college graduates and professionals cannot even afford to rent in cities such as Beijing and Shanghai.) The "mortgage slave" image may sound like something from a Pearl Buck novel but here's what a Beijing blogger named Beifing says: "The show is famous because it shows a lot of things from real life like being a mortgage slave or mistress. These problems are the problems that people voice. So the government will definitely be sensitive to a show that touches on them." The government response, according to the Times, is that Snail House creates a "vulgar and negative social impact by hyping porn jokes, corrupt officials and sex to woo viewers."
But another internet poster writes, "[The series] is being criticized . . . because all those officials who always talk about morality and righteousness are scared! The more they denounce it, the more corrupted they are!" Another writes, "My situation is exactly the same as [the series]. From the time I wake up, every breath I take, I have to make at least [$70] per day. That's the cost for me to live in this city. All those numbers make me suffocate!"
A young teacher named Selena Liu (no relation to my student or his father) says, "It's a reflection of our real life. In the show, the people work so hard but still can't buy a house. The government doesn't like the show because young people watch it and become even more depressed." A young homemaker, Zhang Han, apparently became a fan of the show and now that it has been canceled she is reading the book on which it was based. "Compared to what I'm reading, the TV was clean," she told Glionna. "The book is very dirty." (Anyone who has read Yu Hua's epic novel Huo zhe [To Live] and then watched Zhang Yimou's politically bowdlerized film version knows that contemporary writers in the PRC enjoy considerably more license than filmmakers do in the area of political commentary and satire.)
Mr. Liu has offered to lend me his copy of Snail House when he and his family are finished watching it. Unfortunately, his version does not have English subtitles. A question for Clay (or anyone else who might know): is there a subtitled version available? And if there is, how can we find it?
Leigh Clark
Monroe High School[Edit by="lclark on Dec 25, 10:01:17 PM"][/Edit]
[Edit by="lclark on Dec 25, 10:05:51 PM"][/Edit]
AnonymousIn the "World" section of the Los Angeles Times for Tuesday, December 29, the article by Beijing correspondent John M. Glionna, "China Executes British Smuggler," focuses on the fate of Akmal Shaik, the first European to be executed in China in half a century (according to British activists). Shaik, a British citizen, was arrested in 2007 on a flight from Tajikistan to Urumqi, a city in China's northwestern province of Xinjiang, and charged with transporting almost nine pounds of heroin in a suitcase. He was executed in Urumqi on December 29. Although the PRC is adopting lethal injection as the preferred method of execution, the article speculates that Shaik, in provincial Urumqi, was probably dispatched the traditional way: shot in the head. The article says the PRC executes an estimated 5,000 people a year, more than all other countries combined. (No source is cited, or even alluded to.) Capital crimes include pornography, corruption and drug smuggling. British supporters claim Shaik suffered from bipolar disorder and was trying to write a song about world peace. Shaik himself claimed he was duped into drug trafficking by men who promised him a recording contract. Various people tried to intervene before the execution, including British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who spoke with the PRC Prime Minister about the case.
The US was quick to weigh in with opinions. "The case certainly sends a message that China is not interested in international opinion when it comes to criminal cases," opines Joshua Rosenzweig with the US-based prisoners'-rights group Dui Hua Foundation. But Christopher Stone with the Program in Criminal Justice Policy and Management at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard counters, "Westerners have a long and disreputable history of seeking exemption from Chinese law for their nationals engaged in drug dealing, going back to the Opium Wars of the 19th Century." According to Teng Biao, a professor of political science and law at China University, most Chinese citizens accept the government's argument that capital punishment acts as a disincentive to lower crime rates. Professor Biao quotes a pithy proverb to illustrate his point: "Kill a chicken, scare off the monkey."
There is abundant historical evidence, of course, especially from 18th-century France and Britain, that no matter how many chickens are killed, and no matter how brutally, capital punishment does not deter impoverished monkeys from committing crimes and may, in fact, make them more ruthless in the commission of those crimes. Britain, a nation that has abolished capital punishment, certainly has a right to criticize the PRC's practice. The US, which continues to practice capital punishment at its own discretion, does not. In fact, as the former world economic leader, the US may very well have set a poor but influential example of how to use all that economic muscle it once had. As teachers know very well, people pay more attention to what you do than what you say or profess.
Leigh Clark
Monroe HS[Edit by="lclark on Jan 18, 10:22:26 PM"][/Edit]
AnonymousThe Person of the Year is actually Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke (!). In the issue that announces his selection (December 25-January 04), the reason given is that Bernanke is "the most important player guiding the world's most important economy." Well, okay. But then we turn to the Short List. #2 is Afghan Warlord Stanley McChrystal. But #3 is--surprise of surprises--the Chinese Worker! Given the usual anti-Chinese rhetoric of US media (standard bearers for "the world's most important economy"), it is amazing that the Chinese Worker came in at #3 on the Short List. Even more amazing is what Chinese workers actually did: protect the eight. The Chinese for "protect the eight," according to Time, is baoba. The "eight" is the 8% annual growth rate PRC officials regard as critical for the country's development. The fact that China was able to accomplish this in 2009, of all years, is nothing short of phenomenal. Even Time is moved to describe China as "the world's fastest-growing major economy" (not to be confused with "the world's most important economy").
The article provides short biographies of five factory workers in Shenzhen, an industrial city of 12 million on the edge of China's southeast border, not far from Hong Kong. The five are all young and from smaller provincial cities: Deng Tao (21, Chengde, Hunan), Li Chunying (34, Shaoyang, Hunan), Qiu Xiaoyuan (26, Meizhou, Guangdong), Cao Bin (20, Chengdu, Sichuan) and Peng Chunxia (21, Shaoyan, Hunan). Their stories are also rather similar. They came to Shenzhen seeking excitement or better wages and found both. Some would like to go home if they could afford it, like Li Chunying, who has been doing factory work since she was 16. Some, like Qiu Xiaoyuan, dream of opening a small shop one day. "You can't do [factory work] for your entire life," she admits. However, most are content with a six-day workweek. One day of leisure a week is not much. But, as Peng Chunxia says, "There is work to do."
These are the people who drive China's awe-inspiring economy, the ones who actually make it happen, not the draconian Communist overlords of the American popular, Fox News-driven imagination. So kudos to Time for revealing something of the truth of the Chinese economy for average American readers.
Leigh Clark
Monroe High School
AnonymousI heard that in Taiwan, elderly people believe that dogs should be hanged and cats should be thrown in rivers. This way they will take away the bad luck. Death is not good and they want to be away from them. If they are taken in the river bad spirits or death will not return. Younger Taiwanese believe that this is harmful to the environment and criticize this act.
clay dubeOne of the most astute observers of revolutionary China was a diplomat who used the pen name Simon Leys. I highly recommend his book Chinese Shadows. In 1989 he published an essay, "The Chinese attitude toward the past." It was reprinted in 2008 by the web journal China Heritage Quarterly. The journal itself is a great resource. This is a wonderful essay. Let me share two paragraphs from it:
"Yet, at the same time, the paradox is that the very past which seems to penetrate everything, and to manifest itself with such surprising vigour, is also strangely evading our physical grasp. This same China which is loaded with so much history and so many memories is also oddly deprived of ancient monuments. In the Chinese landscape, there is a material absence of the past that can be most disconcerting for cultivated Western travellers.... In China, on the contrary, if we except a very small number of famous ensembles (the antiquity of which is quite relative), what strikes the educated visitor is the monumental absence of the past. Most Chinese cities - including, and especially those which were ancient capital cities or prestigious cultural centres - present today an aspect that may not look exactly new or modern (for, if modernisation is a target which China has now set for itself, there is still a long way to go before it can be reached), but appears strangely devoid of all traditional character. On the whole, they seem to be a product of late 19th century industrialisation. Thus, the past which continues to animate Chinese life in so many striking, unexpected or subtle ways, seems to inhabit the people rather than the bricks and stones. The Chinese past is both spiritually active and physically invisible."
I love the notion that the past is within people and not evident in the landscape. You can read the essay at: http://www.chinaheritagequarterly.org/articles.php?searchterm=014_chineseAttitude.inc&issue=014
AnonymousShen Xue and Zhao Hongbo win China's first-ever Olympic figure skating gold medal in Vancouver...........Pretty impressive !
AnonymousExpert says it is Unwise for Obama to meet Dalai Lama
It is "unwise" for President Barak Obama to meet with the Dalai Lama because the session would negatively affect American ties with China, says an expert on U.S.-China relations. I wonder what he thinks? What does the Dalai Lama think? Who makes these decisions for the world leaders????
clay dubeHi Folks,
It was my privilege to visit the BYD plant in Xi'an with a group of Palos Verdes teachers a few years ago. The factory was a bit sleepy, far from the humming place we'd expected or that I saw with another group of teachers in 2008 at Toyota City near Nagoya, Japan. BYD, though, made a big splash at the Detroit auto show last year and has received a large investment ($232 million) from über-investor Warren Buffet. Here's an article about some of what's going on at BYD:
http://english.caing.com/2010/byd/
Wang Chuanfu, BYD's chairman, is now China's richest man.