Proseminar Introduction to the Anthropology of China

Introduction to the Anthropology of China Summer Semester 2015/2016 Alessandro Rippa China’s stunning economic growth is one of the most important developments of our time. Since the beginning of the Reform and Opening policy in 1978 the country has undergone unprecedented changes, completely reshaping, among other things, the anthropological study of China. As the discipline revived, Chinese anthropologists began to engage directly with foreign colleagues, institutes, and international debates, while international scholars were once again allowed into the country. This course provides an overview of anthropological research on these changes, introducing key concepts, issues, and framework for the study of contemporary Chinese culture and society through the work of both Chinese and foreign anthropologists. Although focusing on the post-Mao reform era, the course briefly covers the history of the discipline in China and then introduces various topics of contemporary relevance such as migration, urbanisation, sexuality, kinship and minority issues. As such, the course will provide students with a comprehensive and multidimensional understanding of contemporary China and of many of the issues that the country is facing, as well as an overview of the most recent studies and debates on the subject. The course will be taught in English; term papers should be written in English. Programme 1. 19 April Introduction to the course The pre-reform period 2. 26 April - Fei, Hsiao Tung. 1946. Peasantry and Gentry: An Interpretation of Chinese Social Structure and its Changes. The American Journal of Sociology 52(1): 1-17. - Yan, Yunxiang. 2003. Private Life Under Socialism: Love, Intimacy, and Family Change in a Chinese Village, 1949-1999. Stanford: Stanford University Press (Chapter 1, pp. 17-41). Übung Chinese modernities 3. 3 May - Osburg, J. 2013. Global Capitalism in Asia: Beyond state and market in China. The Journal of Asian Studies 72(4): 813-829. - Ong, Aihwa. 1997. Chinese Modernities: Narratives of Nation and of Capitalism. In Aihwa Ong and Donald Nonini (eds.). Ungrounded Empires: The Cultural Politics of Modern Chinese Transnationalism. London: Routledge, pp.171-202. 4. 10 May - Pun, Ngai. 2003. Subsumption or Consumption? The Phantom of Consumer Revolution in -Globalizing” China. Cultural Anthropology 18(4): 469-492. - Chu, Julie. 2006. To Be -Emplaced”: Fuzhounese Migration and the Politics of Destination. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 13 (395-425). Übung : if you find time, please listen to the following podcast: -Inside the property revolution, with Luigi Tomba- (link: http://popupchinese.com/lessons/sinica/inside-the-property-revolution). The pedagogical state 5. 24 May - Kipnis, Andrew. 2011. Subjectification and education for quality in China. Economy and Society 40(2): 289-306. - Cheek, Timothy. Chinese Propaganda in Historical Perspective: Five terms to Consider (China Policy Institute blog: http://blogs.nottingham.ac.uk/chinapolicyinstitute/2015/05/11/chinese-propaganda-in-historical-perspective-five-terms-to-consider/) What is China and who is Chinese? 6. 31 May - Duara, P. 1993. De-Constructing the Chinese Nation. The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs 30: 1-26. - Dikotter, F. 1994. Racial Identities in China: Context and Meaning. The China Quarterly 138: 404-412. Übung : if you find time, please listen to the following podcast: -Identity, Race and Civilization- (link: http://popupchinese.com/lessons/sinica/identity-race-and-civilization). Morality 7. 7 June - Steinmuller, Hans. 2010. Communities of Complicity: Notes on state formation and local sociality in rural China. American Ethnologist 37(3): 539-549. - Yan, Yunxiang. 2003. Private Life Under Socialism: Love, Intimacy, and Family Change in a Chinese Village, 1949-1999. Stanford: Stanford University Press (Conclusion, pp. 217-236). Business and Sexuality in postsocialist China 8. 14 June - Zheng, Tiantian. 2009. Red Lights: The lives of Sex Workers in Postsocialist China. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press (Introduction, pp. 1-34). - Zheng, Tiantian. 2009. Red Lights: The lives of Sex Workers in Postsocialist China. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press (Chapter 7, pp. 211-242). Übung : if you find time, please read James Palmer, -The Bro Code- (ChinaFile, link: http://www.chinafile.com/reporting-opinion/postcard/bro-code); OR listen to this podcast with James Palmes on the same topic: -Business and Fucking in China- (link: http://www.chinafile.com/library/sinica-podcast/business-and-fcking-china). Religion and Ethnic minorities 9. 21 June - Kipnis, Andrew. 2001. The Flourishing of Religion in Post-Mao China and the Anthropological Category of Religion. The Australian Journal of Anthropology 12(1): 32-46. - Gladney, Dru. 2003. Islam in China: Accommodation or Separatism? The China Quarterly 174: 451-467. 10. 21 June (28 June NO class ) - Fei, Hsiao Tung. 1981. Ethnic Idenfication in China. In: Fei Hsiao Tung: Toward a people's Anthropology. China Studies Series. New World Press: Beijing, 60-77. - Gladney, Dru. 1994. Representing Nationality in China: Refiguring Majority/Minority Identities. The Journal of Asian Studies 53(1): 92-123. China's peripheries: Tibet and Xinjiang 11. 5 July - Emily Yeh. 2007. Tropes of Indolence and the Cultural Politics of Development in Lhasa, Tibet. Annals of the Associaltion of American Geographers 97(3): 593-612. - Saxer, Martin. 2012. The Moral Economy of Cultural Identity: Tibet, Cultural Survival, and the Safeguarding of Cultural Heritage. Civilisations 61(1): 65-82. Übung : if you find time, please read this short article: Leibold, James. 2015. China's Ethnic Policy Under Xi Jinping. China Brief XV (20): 6-10. 12. 12 July - Bovingdon, G. 2002. The not-so-silent majority: Uyghur resistance to Han Rule in Xinjiang. Modern China 28(1): 39-78. - Gladney, Dru.2004. Ethnogenesis or Ethnogenocide? In: Dru Gladney, Dislocating China: Reflections on Muslims, Minorities, and Other Subaltern Subjects. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press (Chapter 10, pp. 205-228) Übung : Feedback and concluding remarks. Fakultät für Kulturwissenschaften 4+2 ECTS (Proseminar+Übung), Hausarbeit, benotet LMU München SoSe 2016 Rippa Alessandro