reading - in manchuria, ch. 10-12

[Anonymous]

From a teachable standpoint what I decided to focus on in this section is the "start" of WWII and the actions of the League of Nations. From a US History viewpoint we teach WWII primarily from Pearl Harbor on. Little attention is paid to the events leading up to the US entrance into the war. Starting on page 171, the discussion surrounds when WWII began in China. Further, it discusses the lack of action on behalf of the League of Nations when sent to investigate the control of Manchukuo. This provided me with more background knowledge of the complex history of the region and will help me to integrate a more global approach to teaching about the start of WWII.

[Anonymous]

As I was reading chapter 11, I was interested in the idea of farming in China. For starters, China had a printed farmers' guide as early as 1149. This would have been hundreds of years before Europeans began their scientific revolution. Even with these guides, China was still in need of increased food yields per hectare. As more and more of China's land is being used for development, the strains put on the common farmer continues to increase. In the 1930's, 80% of Chinese were farmers, I'm not sure on the number it is today, but the growing population and decreased farmable land has required China to increase their food imports. China is now the leading trade partner with Brazil. They have massive agreements with Argentina and Ukraine. All this had driven the price of soy and wheat up. In addition, many other cash crops like nuts have increased in value. As one Georgian farmer put it, the price of walnuts has doubled thanks to the Chinese.
This global connection can be quite useful to our students. They can see the connection between deforestation in Brazil and the increased cost of food. The change in political ties between China and western countries as a result of trade deals.

[clay dube]

Excellent points about how advanced Chinese agriculture was and is, but how much more dependent on imports than it once was. Most of what Meyer writes about agriculture comes from a former teacher of mine, Francesca Bray. Bray is British and taught in California for a number of years. She probably knows more than any non-farmer can know about rice cultivation in particular and agriculture in general.

Her The Rice Economies (https://books.google.com/books?id=9nxkQQCxjlgC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false ) discusses the farming manual Meyer refers to and includes several specific discussions of agriculture in 20th century NE China. Bray gave a lecture at a University of Oregon museum in 2013 on rice in China:

[Anonymous]

As I read chapter 11, I was reminded of the sign and advertisements that are found everywhere reminding us of the importance of conserving water. Being a California native, I was also interested on the topic of farming in China. Farming is a big part of California’s history and current economy. According to the Washington Post, “California… produces two-thirds of our fruits and nuts. California makes more money off agriculture than any other state in the nation. In 2013, farmers sold almost $50 billion of food.” Our current drought is affecting cultivation/production rate and economy. People are getting fined for overusing and farmers are losing money because of new laws and restrictions.

As San Jiu spoke to Meyer, he explained rice cultivation and emphasized the importance of water. He stated, “ That’s the most important thing you know…It’s more important than the seed or the soil, even. River water is the best, everyone knows that… River water has silt and clay” (p.149). The Chinese were extremely advanced in their agricultural techniques. Rice cultivation brought lots of money to their economy. The topic of water and/or agriculture would fit into a conservation/recycling unit, water usage, or agriculture unit. Students would be able to relate and conduct group discussions.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/govbeat/wp/2015/04/03/agriculture-is-80-percent-of-water-use-in-california-why-arent-farmers-being-forced-to-cut-back/

Meyer, Michael. In Manchuria: A Village Called Wasteland and the Transformation of Rural China. Bloomsbury Press, NY (2015).
edited by malvarenga on 6/12/2015

[Anonymous]

I agree that the United States is also migrating to better lives. My paternal grandparents grew up with nothing and worked on a farm throughout their childhood and into adulthood, and they refused to have that same life for my father. Both of my parents went to college and I had grown up with the unspoken expectation that I, too, would go to college. I think migrating to better lives isn't a bad thing, because each generation wants to see better and better, but I think pushing kids into college isn't necessarily "better." I think back to our Sunday seminar and hearing from our guest speaker on the education system in China and how there are schools labelled "Good" and "okay," or similar terms. I hate that our modern culture is looking at trades as an unprofessional/undesired path in life, yet we need electricians and carpenters. I think families should be thinking about what is best for their children; this chapter seemed to show that being in Wasteland wasn't good for educational purposes and their jobs were being taken by the Eastern Fortune Rice, so moving to cities with more opportunities made sense.

I was mostly astonished with Auntie Yi's explanation of the Nationalists and the Communists fighting in her backyard in 1948 (pg 159). It's hard to explain to students why the Communists won and why people would support them, but her explanation of how the Communists came and didn't rape them like the Russians and didn't steal their goods (initially) like the Nationalists, but were kind to them and gave them food- that's how the Communists won support of the people. I will be referencing this in my class.

[Anonymous]

Thanks Clay for the heads up on Francesca Bray. What an interesting scholar! I am looking forward to reading her books. Auntie Yi is clearly a very important character for Meyer, second only to Frances in his circle of Chinese women. Her ballad is one of the most moving sequences in the book. It's a big deal that she opens up to him about the past and shares all those memories and stories and especially the songs, like the final one about September 18. Auntie Yi treats Meyer as a true friend and equal in this chapter, and it sets up her later request that he try to determine the value of Eastern Fortune by making an offer to buy it from the Lius.
Land reform is clearly the deepest public issue in China--questions about how the land will be divided and who will benefit from it are never far from people's minds. As a principled hold out against the Eastern Fortune plan, Auntie Yi represents the desire to retain certain individual rights over property, and to remain grounded through the day to day physical activities of farming. This is a wonderful romantic stance, but most of us are not in a position to take it.

[Anonymous]

"It was easier to define Wasteland by what was absent than what was here." That quote really struck me. In comparison to Harbin in which the city was full of obvious dichotomy, cultural differences and an amalgamation of old and new, Wasteland was described as simple. The addition of the banner announcing Eastern Fortune Rice seemed to me as a way of labeling their property and slowly encouraging people of Wasteland to buy into the mentality that the company is a part of their community and culture. While this may provide job opportunities or job security, I don't feel the people of Wasteland are particularly thrilled by this declaration of presence. The people of Wasteland dont want to move to the new apartments being constructed by Eastern Fortune Rice, they dont like being told what kind of rice to plant as they have been cultivating rice forever.

[Anonymous]

The idea of past and present are present in these chapters. The more I read, however, Meyers seems to foreshadow the looming impact of the future. The future of the villagers’ land of way of life seems at stake. As Meyer meets more villagers, he finds that price increases on almost everything weighs heavily upon the minds and pocketbooks of these people. With inflation and demand pushing costs up, more villagers may take EF up on their business offers. While Meyer met a bus driver who joked that the village should be renamed Eastern Fortune (P. 148), none of his passengers laugh. Holding on to the past in the present may be challenging when a big company like EF is altering the landscape and their lifestyles.

In addition to EF being responsible for changes to Wasteland, families are also having an impact on Wasteland’s future. Meyer explains that many of the families want their children to study and obtain white-collar jobs (P.150). Although these children would make decent wages, they would break their family’s agricultural heritage. Since farming is not taught in universities, rather passed down by families, there will be fewer people to do the agricultural work in villages like Wasteland. In the US there has been a similar problem. Over time, we have seen houses and buildings constructed where orchards and fields used to be. Many of us grew up aspiring to obtain white-collar professions instead of goals to be a rancher or farmer. Agricultural work is not highly desirable or respected even though our cities could not survive with a steady food supply. While works from John Buck helped China to analyze the amount of agricultural production from the fields, Pearl Buck’s work helped to personalize the lives of agricultural families (P.153). Her work was important because it provided a different look into farmers than their portrayal in ‘Dream of the Red Chamber’ (P.150-51). If applied to the classroom, Pearl’s work would help students to develop an understanding and respect for such workers. Additionally, it would be great to pair excerpts from her book with selections from John Steinbeck or Gary Soto and have students analyze and draw connections between the different texts.

[Anonymous]

It is interesting talking about the cost of plots of land, as my Mom just bought one three years ago when my father passed. Comparing the costs, China the one with the best feng shui $10,500 vs here in So Cal. $12,500 it seems pretty similar. My mom has one that also has a view of the Vincent Thomas Bridge, overlooking the harbor, on the hillside. It is very beautiful, however you could get a cheaper spot, or possibly have more costs depending on the type of tombstone or coffin. There is a difference in that it is not just for 25 years, and that we haven’t had to worry about our dead being affected by “zhang” -them being moved/evicted. I am assuming that in different parts of the United States, it could cost significantly less depending on the value of the land. As I usually discuss with my students, land is power. We talk about how in ancient times they fought over land, which gave them more power & wealth if they owned more. Then I explain to my 6th graders that depending upon the area of land that you own- right on the beach about the size of ones garage could cost one quadruple of that of a land owner in Nebraska with 5 acres of land.
Developing land can be good, yet also bad. It all depends on the need- which is also very much an opinion based idea. Many like the development- it gives them more revenue and new “blood”- others despise the idea of having change.
Just this last February, I visited Catalina. I hadn’t been there in about 2 years. I was shocked to see the barrage of golf carts. The cute, quaint little town of Avalon- where you could walk around with the feel of a secluded little town feel- was lost. There were golf carts driving everywhere on the roads. They may have well have allowed regular cars to come over & drive. I can relate to some of people of Wasteland who are annoyed with the change of their town.

[Anonymous]

Chapter 10

I believe that everyone's reality is created from all the memories we collect along with what is experienced each day. I have watched Temecula grow from s sleepy small town into a bustling suburb. When I look at the Mall I can see the pasture filled with ponies long gone. I can picture the waving grass of the empty lot next door that has been replaced by a huge fancy house. Displayed in a vase in my living room are dried plants that no longer grow in the meadow. For me it seems like yesterday. For new comers these things never happened. I know how San Jiu and Auntie Yi feel. My students and their parents live in the now. They may think about the coming weekend or possibly the next weekend. I teach fifth grade and the end of elementary school comes as a shock. Sometimes parents with older children get a glimmer of the passing of time, but the demands of the day soon pulls them back to the now. In the U.S. we have space for new cemeteries so I was shocked to find out that in Germany the dead have been taking turns for centuries. Ossuaries from the Middle Ages are filled with individuals who have made way for newcomers. I visited the grave of my father-in-law the summer before he too had to make way for a new tenant. Pere La Chaise in Paris only allows the very famous to be entombed for perpetuity.
The new fancy arch is a sign of things to come. Wasteland is becoming a company town. Meyer has documented the fact that the village is growing old. Young people move to the city. More and more farmers turn over their land Eastern Fortune Rice. Farm life is physically demanding and it is taking a toll on elderly farmers like San Jiu. Meyer wonders if it wouldn't be a good idea to for farmers to sign a contract with Eastern Fortune in exchange for a comfortable retirement.

Chapter 11

Wasteland parents no longer take their children to the fields. They don’t want the farming life for their children. Now children are to concentrate on school so that they can have white collar jobs. Modern Americans have no memory of the migration from the farms to the city so similar to the migration that China is experiencing. Americans idealize the small farmers that settled the west. I grew up reading Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books about the struggles and triumphs of her farming family on the western frontier and read them each year to my students. Famous Americans including Thomas Jefferson envisioned the United States as a nation of small farmers. The truth of the matter is that farming has never been easy. It is neither a comfortable nor lucrative way to make a living. California, an agricultural giant, depends on the labor of migrant workers to reap its rich harvest. If we are no longer willing to dig in the soil ourselves is it any wonder that the Chinese are leaving the farm to seek out a better easier life in the city?
Meyer like many Americans that long for the way things used to be is saddened by the modernization he sees in China. He greatly admires the farming tradition in Wasteland. This admiration is not shared by the villagers, the media, or Chinese society. Historians love to witness living history, traditions from the past observed in the present. Farming rice by hand in small plots is living history, but is comes at a cost to the farmer. If Meyer really thought about it he would encourage his friends in Wasteland to take up an easier occupation.
Pearl Buck and her husband also idealized the farmer. It is true that once the agricultural land has been paved over it is gone forever, but should millions be condemned to lives of hard labor to preserve it?
Eastern Fortune Rice is an example of the industrialization of agriculture that is taking hold in China. Corporate agriculture with its scientific advances is dramatically increasing yields and efficiency. As land for agriculture in China decreases leasing farmland in other countries becomes a solution. Currently feed for cattle in China is outsourced to the U.S. and Brazil. California farmers using migrant labor and precious water resources (during a historic drought) produce alfalfa to feed Chinese cattle.
Auntie Yi shares her memories of Manchukuo and World war II. Four armies occupy Wasteland; the Japanese, the nationalists, the Russians, and finally the communists. During the Japanese occupation school was conducted in Japanese and Auntie Yi can still sing the Manchukuo national anthem about the colors of the flag “Red, blue, white, black, yellow.” Yellow is for the Qing Dynasty, red for the Japanese, blue for the Han Chinese, white for Mongolians, and black for Koreans. These are the peoples that make up the Northeast.
"On the Songhua River" is the regional anthem of Manchuria. It tells of the sadness felt by all Manchurians that had to flee their beloved land to escape the Japanese takeover. Wandering far and wide they yearn for the day they can return home.

Chapter 12

I watched The last Emperor after reading Chapter 9. It was very interesting to get another perspective on Manchukuo from the Emperor himself. The movie compressed some aspects of the story and barely touched on others so I feel I have a better understanding of the motivations of all parties involved. It seems that it was not just the little people that were caught up in the events. I was fascinated by the Kinneys who whole heartedly promoted Manchukuo and the railway that provided access. Their story would also make a great movie.
The Japanese called Changchun Shinkyo or “New Capital.” Many of the beautiful and impressive public buildings still exist. Unity Plaza, the Central Bank of Manchukuo, the Manchukuo Telephone and Telegraph Company, and the Police headquarters all have been repurposed. The wide pine tree lined boulevards still grace the city. The city was planned and built with great speed and filled with modern wonders such as buildings with steam heat and flush toilets. It was a real showplace to impress the world and physical evidence to convince critics that Manchukuo was making real progress at modernizing the northeast.
Japans invasion of Manchuria did register with the rest of the world. The League of Nations sent a delegation to investigate. Newspapers reported it but sensational crimes such as the kidnapping of the Lindberg baby pushed news of the takeover from the headlines. At home japan was facing great pressure from overpopulation and diminishing resources to fuel modernization. The Northeast and Korea provided the perfect solution. Manchukuo for the Japanese was an extension of Japan. Land for settlement and raw materials connected by the South Manchuria Railway. The South China Railway company was the largest corporation in Japan. It collected detailed information to facilitate settlement and guide future colonial administrators.
edited by karenrieger on 6/27/2015

[Anonymous]

I appreciated how Meyer focused on personal histories in these chapters in order to explain the cause and effects of the end of the Qing dynasty and invasion by Japan. I have always been fascinated with Puyi and when we visited his mansion was left with a feeling of ineptitude, loneliness, and longing. What a tragic life. I also feel that the direction we as history teachers are being encouraged to go in is to teach more personal histories, so Meyer's writing style is something that I plan to use for inspiration in the future.
edited by jilliansheehan on 7/21/2015

[clay dube]

As always, please feel free to respond to any or all of these questions or to none of them. Share what you found interesting in these three chapters. Is there anything teachable here?

Ch. 10 Summer Solstice

In Huangdi, Meyer argues, no news is very good news. Everything is fine. But this also speaks to one of his themes, that the past and present are intertwined in the minds of San Jiu, Auntie Yi and others in Wasteland. Is this unique to NE China? Do we have a well-developed since of time and change? Some of us teach history and are mindful of time its passage, but are our students and their parents?

Meyer documents price increases and pressure on land, even land for burial. What would a plot in a nearby cemetery cost you? What would a crypt for an urn cost? More or less than the cost in Shenzhen?

Eastern Fortune, a private company, has erected a new arch over Red Flag Road. It is tall and celebrates the company. Is Wasteland becoming a company town? Could this be a good thing for residents?

Ch. 11 The Ballad of Auntie Yi

Wasteland's parents don't plan to have their children toil in the fields as they did or do. The US underwent such a migration beyond the memory of most Americans, but even now there a tendency to celebrate the family farm. Are the people of Wasteland and China doing the same thing? Migrating to better lives?

Why does Meyer devote such space to Pearl Buck and her classic novel, The Good Earth? She won the Pulitzer Prize and later the Nobel Prize for it and other writing. He notes that few TV programs, at least popular ones, celebrate farmers and their lives and work. Nor is it the subject of popular novels. What point is Meyer making about Buck's celebration of Wang Lung (Wang Long) and his struggle?

How is China feeding its people? It has more land under cultivation now than in 1949, even though much land has been turned into suburbs, factories, and roads. Who is benefiting from the need to feed 1.3 billion Chinese?

///
The book Who Will Feed China? by Lester Brown of the WorldWatch Institute in 1995 caused considerable consternation for China's leadership, which devoted considerable energy to making sure Chinese knew the government was on the problem. The title was a bit sensationalistic, Brown argued that as China became richer, Chinese would eat more meat and overall consumption would rise. He wrote that he figured China would simply import what it needed and that it could afford to do so. He fretted that other countries, however, would suffer as Chinese bought up grain and other products they could have afforded in the past. Brown argued that all would benefit if people in developed nations ate lower on the food chain. Beef, for example, requires the most grain to produce.
http://www.worldwatch.org/bookstore/publication/who-will-feed-china-wake-call-small-planet
////

Auntie Yi remembers some Japanese from her short time in elementary school during the Japanese occupation. She also remembers the many different armies and how they behaved in Jilin. What was the Manchukuo flag? Why did the schools only teach Japanese? What is the central message of the song "On the Songhua River"?

Ch. 12 Puppets of Manchukuo

Meyer prefers personal dramas to sweeping history and in this chapter illustrates big changes through individual lives. Which of these stories do you find most interesting? Puyi's? Zhang Xueliang's? Kinney and his son, propagandists for the South Manchuria Railway Company?

How did the Japanese justify their expansion of control in NE China? How did the world react? What sort of state did the Japanese erect in Manchukuo?

What did the Japanese call Changchun 新京? Describe Changchun. Much of Changchun remains from the days of Manchukuo. Why might this be?

Why did the South Manchuria Railway company collect so much information?
edited by Clay Dube on 6/4/2015

[Anonymous]

The section where he describes Wasteland as having "No museums, no local newspaper, no graveyards, ..." would be a good section to use and have students extend this section for a free write and find textual evidence as well as what effects would occur because of these descriptions. What changes would occur with the people, society, etc. And bring in discussion of the CA Highspeed railway and have students have a debate. Also at the end of Chapter 10, it discussed that the town was almost referred to by the company and not the town name and that reminded me of the Silicon Valley (nickname for the tech area in SF) having the students discuss this and find different reasons why and what cities in the 7th grade curriculum would have an alternative name and why.

Students are again introduced to the predicament of difficulty of agriculture and farming in the book on page 144 with San Ju and the line "I wondered if contracting his crop to Eastern Fortune and moving to a modern apartment wasn't such a bad idea" and having students discuss again evidence and consequences. Comparing it to feudal relationships. Writing different perspective writing narrations.

Loved the line of "PE Teachers don't have to grade homework" because if you have ever subbed for PE teachers or helped them with one of their dance shows or putting on their events, you know they have amazing classroom management and it isn't as easy as it seems.

The word drain is used and has multiple meanings something used in MAP testing, a part of chapter 11 can be used to create a test word and a visual cue can be used with a picture I took at the Great Wall with the drains. These chapters discuss rice in multiple areas, its possible to discuss what technologies are being developed to modernize agriculture, irrigation, and remedy drought water deficiencies with rice crop harvesting. Utilizing science discussions of Life Science and a short Google slide show in collaboration with a science teacher would make students complete a research project.

[Author]

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