China

4. Sep 2023

Creativity vs control: tensions in Chinese educational policy

China, Education, InFocus, InFocus, Innovation

For the past decade, the Chinese state has promoted the development of “mass entrepreneurship” by requiring all higher education institutions offer courses in innovation and entrepreneurship. But innovation and entrepreneurship requires creativity, critical thinking, and independence, characteristics seemingly at odds with government efforts to promote loyalty to the party-state.

13. Apr 2023

Globalism or Nationalism? Chinese Public Discourse on COVID-19 Vaccines

China, COVID-19, InFocus, InFocus, nationalism

On 11 March 2020, COVID-19 was officially declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization. Subsequently, the pandemic impacted the lives of millions of people. It is widely accepted that the development of COVID-19 vaccines would be a significant step in controlling the pandemic.
As the COVID-19 vaccines also have triggered heated discussions on social media in the PRC, I conducted an online observation from 9 October 2020 to 9 February 2021 on Sina Weibo to collect data on discussions about COVID-19 vaccines.

28. Feb 2023

Life as “humineral”? What is behind China’s high-tech boom?

business culture, China, InFocus

In early 2023, the term “human mine” or “huminerals” (renkuang 人矿) has sparked a widespread discussion on the Chinese Internet (China Digital Times, 2023). The term first appeared in 1984 in the People’s Daily to describe Chinese workers as a kind of material resource for economic development. Forty years later, young talents in the high-tech industry have used the term to criticise how their lives are used as “consumables” and exploited continuously. What is the underlying logic behind the sudden popularity of the term? How do young talents in urban China experience their work and life?

24. Oct 2022

Workshops outdoors: means of coping amidst COVID-19 online mode in Suzhou, China

China, COVID-19, InFocus

Amidst global pandemic of COVID-19, online learning and teaching, video conferencing and online meetings are oftentimes treated as the new normal. Students, tutors, employees and supervisors are expected to accept it and perform as effectively as under face to face situation. However, online mode sustained over periods of longer time, e.g. several months, often results in decreased motivation, lesser ability to concentrate, and general fatigue. While exercise programs and other coping methods indoors are being suggested, there is still limited information available on best strategies to alleviate online learning challenges. Learning outdoors, when possible and relevant, would offer more comprehensive experience of inquiry and healing effects of nature that offers deep replenishment.

30. Sep 2022

Sensing the Sinophone: Urban Memoryscapes in Contemporary Fiction

China, cultural studies, Hong Kong, InFocus, literature, Shangahi, Taipei, urban development

What happens when the city you live in changes so rapidly that space melts into time and your memories can find no recognisable place to take hold? This kind of morphing urban reality was and is experienced by many in east Asian mega cities, where what cultural critic Dai Jinhua calls the “destructiveness of construction work” (“Imagined Nostalgia.” Boundary 2 24 (3), 1997: 146) is a defining factor. For cities like Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Taipei, the 1990s saw a new level of urban transformation that fundamentally affected quotidian ways of life and urban identities, a tendency that continued well into the 21st century. In her new monograph Sensing the Sinophone: Urban Memoryscapes in Contemporary Fiction, Astrid Møller-Olsen argues that fiction writing has the ability to capture both the sense of ongoing transformation and the complex and often ambiguous identity politics that follow.

1. Apr 2022

The People’s Map of Global China: Denmark profile

China, InFocus, International relations

While Denmark retains its pragmatic approach to China and largely frames the Sino—Danish relationship in terms of economic diplomacy, controversies related to human rights have strained bilateral ties in recent years.

31. Mar 2020

Covid-19, International Trade and Global China: Reflections from Yiwu

China, COVID-19, InFocus

By Magnus Marsden, University of Sussex The Covid-19 epidemic has in all likelihood brought to an end the fieldwork activities of the TRODITIES project. Since 2015, team members have documented and analysed the dynamics of the Chinese international trade city of Yiwu that is a base to over 12,000 foreign traders and a key hub […]

22. Jan 2014

Farming is Ugly: Reform, Friction and Bishan Commune

China, culture, development, InFocus, politics, Rural development, Tourism

From 2014, Anhui Province will pilot a reform of the residential land market in China, thus integrating rural Anhui in the national housing market. On the opposite note, artist and activist Ou Ning has proposed the Bishan time money currency, intending to establish an alternative economic circuit in Bishan Village. Bishan Village, Yi […]

18. Jun 2013

Unearthing the Past: From Independent Filmmaking to Social Change

China, cultural studies, documentaries, film, InFocus, media, migrant workers, social activism, village elections

Wu Wenguang, considered the father of independent Chinese documentary film, has since 2005 slowly but surely been handing over the camera to people on the margins and to younger generations of Chinese documentary filmmaking. In 2010 Wu and Caochangdi Workstation initiated the Folk Memory Documentary Project, where young filmmakers go to the countryside to gather […]

12. Mar 2013

Another China – other inequalities

China, gender, Human rights, InFocus

By Mai Corlin, Ph.D. student, Aarhus University Gender inequality is not simply the unfair treatment of men and women. It is a complex issue tied to a whole range of disparities in society at large, argues Professor Min Dongchao, who has just been awarded a Marie Curie International Incoming Fellowship and will be a guest […]

China

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