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AnonymousAfter viewing the "Invisible Wall" and visiting a number of schools on our study tour in 2015, the disparity between schools in China is dramatic. In the large cities that we visited the schools were large, clean, had a variety of technology and arts programs. The school in the video lacked these features and it was clear that the parents were desperate to provide their children with the best possible education.
AnonymousOne of the most difficult challenges that the Chinese government is facing now is urbanization. According to the video there are millions of people who are moving to the cities seeking a way to survive. Their farms are not producing enough to provide for their needs and there is not employment in rural areas. This is an interesting video to use in the classroom and have students to pretend that they the Prime Ministers and they could brain storm different ideas to solve this huge problem. I can hardly wait to see how China will overcome this big problem.
AnonymousThe topic of Hukuo was introduced to me in the last session of this seminar. I thought a lot about it and how this system puts the government directly into your business. I enjoyed reading your thoughts about this subject and especially appreciated your further research with the additional article. I cannot even imagine being separated from my husband or the division of my family because of this system. I agree with you that this system is interfering with urbanization stemming from the fear of "losing control", and I definitely agree with you that aborting this system will improve the lives of the Chinese citizens.
AnonymousThis is what I appreciated the most about this seminar. I love the contributions that are given by the other participants in class. Some of you have been to China and experienced first hand what it is really like. That is also why I think this program is so successful because of Professor Dube's connection and having lived there. I would like to see what the schools and classes look like and see the teachers in action. Being a Special Education Teacher, I am also curious as to where they put students with learning differences. Many people view Special Education as kids in wheel chairs or Down Syndrome. There are so many different learning disabilities that only affect the area of math or English. What about the students with Autism and deficits in Executive Functioning and reading social cues? Do they even service these students or are they placed in other programs? These are obviously questions I will be researching but I am glad I was able to hear some of the others' experiences after visiting the Chinese schools.
AnonymousIn China, as well as many Asian countries, they have systems in place to look at households and the people and their families. The system provides names, parent’s names, spouse’s name, and birthday. It is officially called the Hukou, but is also referred to as Huji.In South Korea, North Korea, Vietnam and Japan they have simular systems in place. In China some form of the system has been in place since the XI Dynasty 2100 BCE. The form we see now was established in 1958, around the time the communist party taking control. It was created for 4 reasons. First: It was like a census and registered and kept population totals. Second: resource allocation. Knowing which community needed which supplies. It tended to favor the urban communities. Third it controlled migration. They could only live in their designated areas It was was split between two populations of people. Urban communities and rural communities. They wanted to keep each population in their areas. Finally, This allowed them to target people they were watching and keep an eye on everyone they wanted to know about. If you moved out of your area you lost your ability to get grain rations , employer provided housing, and health care. The command economy at the time aided in this system. Today people are very dissatisfied with this system and the government has considered updating and changing the current Hukou.
AnonymousWatching the short video on the USC website entitled “Invisible Wall” was a huge eye opener. The migrant population also called the “floating population” in China is thought to be over 100 million people with almost 20 % percent of that population that are children. All of these families have Hokous that place them in a certain area. The children can attend the migrant schools, but in order for them to advance past grade school, they have to attend school in the area they are registered in. The dad decided to sell the bathhouse and move back to their area so his daughter could continue on with school. Her mom however was frustrated and didn’t want to leave. She finally felt like this was their chance to be successful. She says at one point though, if we stay here we will ruin our kids lives and take away their chances. I felt bad for all of them. They were lucky. Around 20 million migrant children never get the opportunity to attend school at all.
AnonymousThank you so much for this link, the trailers are heartbreaking but very helpful to deliver a clear idea about the struggle of millions of Chinese migrant workers. I will be using the “Ethics of outsourcing to China” lesson plan (with some modifications)
AnonymousThe is a huge divide that has to be bridged between Chinese culture and black culture. Many may argue that the primary cause for the disconnect may be the media, it is truly the first point in the discussion when addressing current views held by both groups. As with many underrepresented communities in America, as well as many cultures around the world, brown skinned peoples equate lighter skin color with beauty.
In China being black is associated with being poor, which in term stems from the country’s own culture where, for centuries, lighter-skinned people have looked down on darker-skinned people and relegated them to being peasant farmers. This is an important distinction as we have previously held discussions that centered around the role of the peasant, the worker and the military but these discussions did not extend into skin color having a role on who was assigned a certain class in Chinese society. I would love to explore if there are many similarities to the black experience in the U.S. as well as the Jim Crow laws of the south.
Internalized hatred manifests not only in intercultural social biases but with dark skin, be it their own fellow countrymen or foreigners working or studying abroad, many often have to face racism that ranges in level from barely overt to outright violent.
In 2012 Georgetown’s basketball team was playing an exhibition game in China when a racial remark by one of the Chinese players resulted in an all-out brawl. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ClAM3zXx-I
In 1998, a 300-people-strong mob broke into an African students’ dormitory at Nanjing University and destroyed their possessions for no other reason than that they were Africans. All the while, the Chinese were shouting “Down with the black devils!” http://www.nytimes.com/1988/12/27/world/chinese-in-nanjing-hold-racist-rally.html
Currently, there is a very offensive commercial circulating depicting a black man who is ”washed white.”
In the advert a pouch of Qiaobi cleaning liquid is forced into the man’s mouth and he is then bundled into a washing machine by a smiling woman. After a cycle of muffled screams, she opens the lid and a grinning Asian man climbs out. He winks at the viewer before the slogan flashes up on screen: Change begins with Qiaobi. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/28/china-racist-detergent-advert-outrage
Many can point to the media the root to how cultures and peoples are misrepresented which can result in breeding and feeding stereotypes and characterizations of people of color. The irony is, both Asian and black cultures have been very vocal of how displeasing they are with depictions of them internationally – mainly by Hollywood – however, I find it disturbing that these depictions of the “other” are so easily accepted by the very people who themselves have to fight against it.
AnonymousChina’s economy has been slowing. Although trade growth has been collapsing everywhere those under dictatorship seems to facing the steepest decline mixed with a drop in birth rates, working age adults and compounded social issues that promote the abandonment of both the elderly and the young.
Many take note of the impact on Filial Piety in which Chinese youth move to industrialized cities to work and leave their aging parents. But there are also currently 61 million children who have been left to their own devices for survival as well – or with their grandparents – in the rural communities as their parents relocate to the big cities. This huge problem is caused by a Chinese residency program that will not allow parents to take their children to the cities with them. This is because public services like schools and hospitals can only be accessed where you are a registered. Relocation means you have to pay fee assessed to be registered as a resident in a new location and most factory workers do not earn enough to afford the fees. This leaves millions of children suffering from depression, abandonment issues and anxiety. The imploding families of parents who leave their children and never return are creating an entire generation of damaged children.
Governmental policies not only affect economic development but, “The knife also cuts the other way: social issues have economic impacts.” - Bryce Covert
The economic crisis of 2008, Lehman Brothers filed bankruptcy tipping the global economy into recession and demand collapsed globally and China’s growth in the export industry was crushed. With a heavy debt burden that needs to be reduced (in lieu of the collapse of trade growth and decrease in working-age adults) China’s financial crisis will have global repercussions. Fearing social unrest, China’s reaction was to double down on its old industrial model fueling investment in factories.
Three decades of industrialization has resulted in the construction of hundreds of new cities. “Cities and districts built without demand or necessity resulted in what some Chinese scholars have termed, literally,’walls without markets’,” says William Hurst, political science professor at Northwestern University. “Or what we might translate as uncompleted or hollow cities.” https://www.wired.com/2016/02/kai-caemmerer-unborn-cities/
edited by rcharles on 1/21/2017
AnonymousChina’s rise as a modern nation has been nothing short of remarkable lifting 600 million people out of poverty. But with a slowing economy, cracks are starting to appear with poorly managed government spending that some might even consider to be reckless spending. This unchecked spending have resulted in the rise of ghost towns. Using taxpayer dollars to build, construction of these new cities came to a halt when the economy began faltering. The Chinese government can began programs such as these across the country without the consult or consent of the people and after the construction of these metropolises these “investments” have imploded because the government failed to ask anyone if they wanted to live there. The answer is a resounding no, which is why these new cities are nothing more than billion-dollar ghost towns. Compounded with the closing over several factories resulting in workers being laid off, no one could afford to move/live in these cities.
http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/nobodys-home-the-ghost-cities-of-china/
AnonymousI thought this would be an interesting piece to watch, given the contradictions and "alternative facts" that have shown up on television in the last few days. There was one thing that surprised me during this segment:
What I'm curious to know is whether or not those who used Weibo were punished for registering their complaints? Are they allowed to do that or is it considered counterrevolutionary? (I'm not sure what it would be called now, given that the Cultural Revolution is over...
It does not surprise me that at some point, foreign journalists were being roughed up and beaten or carried off... It also does not surprise me that the newspapers and editors were looking for the sensational stories that could sell newspapers, which meant that the important human interest stories of the countryside may not be told. I LOVE Barbara Demick, the journalist who would put on dusty clothes, a big floppy hat, and face mask to blend in and get her story. It is a shame, though, that that kind of thing has to happen, but I appreciate that she was willing to go that far to report what was happening in other parts of that country.
What is sad, though, is the journalist for "This American Life" that fabricated the story and perpetuated a lot of the stereotypes that continue to exist about China, even now. He reported about workers being abused and working long hours, etc., which turned out to be false. My hope is that that individual has continued to pay some sort of retribution for the damaging report that would clearly stain China's already tarnished reputation. There is a powerful lesson here about how our words are powerful and can either perpetuate or dismantle stereotypes that we have about people and other countries.
AnonymousI thought this would be an interesting piece to watch, given the contradictions and "alternative facts" that have shown up on television in the last few days. There was one thing that surprised me during this segment:
What I'm curious to know is whether or not those who used Weibo were punished for registering their complaints? Are they allowed to do that or is it considered counterrevolutionary? (I'm not sure what it would be called now, given that the Cultural Revolution is over...
It does not surprise me that at some point, foreign journalists were being roughed up and beaten or carried off... It also does not surprise me that the newspapers and editors were looking for the sensational stories that could sell newspapers, which meant that the important human interest stories of the countryside may not be told. I LOVE Barbara Demick, the journalist who would put on dusty clothes, a big floppy hat, and face mask to blend in and get her story. It is a shame, though, that that kind of thing has to happen, but I appreciate that she was willing to go that far to report what was happening in other parts of that country.
What is sad, though, is the journalist for "This American Life" that fabricated the story and perpetuated a lot of the stereotypes that continue to exist about China, even now. He reported about workers being abused and working long hours, etc., which turned out to be false. My hope is that that individual has continued to pay some sort of retribution for the damaging report that would clearly stain China's already tarnished reputation. There is a powerful lesson here about how our words are powerful and can either perpetuate or dismantle stereotypes that we have about people and other countries.
AnonymousI can't believe I forgot to write about this in December. I think it was getting late when I finished watching it. What I recall having an impact on me was that the construction of the schools was more poor than the other government buildings, which showed when the earthquake hit, and that was not something that the Chinese government wanted to get out. Also, the story of a man, I believe, stuck beneath the rubble of a building after the earthquake, and unable to be extricated, the Chinese news reporters could only stay there and talk to him while he was dying.
clay dubePlease refer back to the "recent years" videos included in the session 10 list.
Required readings:
1990s-2000s readings
Please watch:
One of the following Assignment:China episodes: Tremors, Contradictions or Follow the Money. http://china.usc.edu/assignment-china-watch-complete-usci-series-american-reporting-china
And one of these short videos:
Invisible Wall (parents have to decide whether or not to move to further daughter's education) http://china.usc.edu/documenting-global-city-project-beijing-2009-invisible-wall-%E6%88%91%E7%9A%84%E5%B0%8F%E5%8D%87%E5%88%9D
Short 2013 Financial Times video on China's push to move another 200 million into cities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SExDPEi8ogM
Jonathan Woetzel, How to Change a Billion People 2016 presentation at USC: http://china.usc.edu/jonathan-woetzel-how-change-billion-people
Optional (some available from streaming services, both have recommended teaching resources):
China in the Red (economic troubles) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/red/
Last Train Home (on migration) http://www.pbs.org/pov/lasttrainhome/film-description/
edited by Clay Dube on 11/29/2016