Report
Well, I finally started finished my report for ASIANetwork, the organization that gave us the grant for our research. I was planning to kind of do a follow up post for the blog, but you see how well that worked out...I've been busy. And I guess there's a precedent--last time I didn't write a follow up post until sometimes second semester. Anyway, here's my report instead.
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Our research in Shanghai focused on how modernization and the changes that come with it have impacted the lives of Shanghai residents. We selected four streets on which to focus our attention in order to get a fuller picture of Shanghai. In the course of our work we interviewed people we met on these streets or in shops along the streets, and on all but one of the streets we had the opportunity to interview people in their homes (and were constantly amazed at people’s hospitality). We had an interpreter for these interviews, which were arranged through the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. We were also able to travel to Hangzhou, Suzhou, Nanjing, and Hong Kong. While we did not do formal interviews in these cities, the short trips allowed us to compare Shanghai to other places in China.
One of the most obvious educational gains for me was an improvement in my language skills. Being surrounded by both spoken and written Chinese really helped me progress. Also, the interviews for which we had an interpreter were valuable because I was able to listen to the Chinese translation of what was said in English and thereby pick up nuances of wording or sentence structure. As with language, when trying to understand a foreign culture there really is no substitute for in-country experience. I had studied Mandarin in Beijing for a month last summer, but even having had that experience, I was surprised by Shanghai. It seemed much more modern, and is definitely more affluent. Small things, things that would never make it into a textbook, I found fascinating; even something as silly as fashion can reveal a lot about the differences between places.
China has gone through many tumultuous changes during the lives of the people we interviewed. One of the most important realizations for me was the extent to which certain events affected the course of peoples’ day to day lives. Of course I had studied the Cultural Revolution and the reforms of Deng Xiaoping; I was familiar with the macro effects of these events, but I had no conceptualization of the impact they had on a micro scale. There was a disconnect in my mind between those historical events and the people whom we interviewed. It soon became clear during the course of our research that these events framed the lives of our interviewees in a way that maybe only September 11, 2001 did for Americans of my generation, except on a larger scale—the Cultural Revolution resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and disrupted the whole country for years. We talked to several people who had been “sent down” to work in factories or on farms during this time period, and almost everyone we spoke to referenced the event, either in telling us about their own life if they were old enough to have lived through that period, or by contrasting their current circumstances to those of their families during that time. The economic reforms of Deng Xiaoping had a similarly extensive effect on people’s lives. Jobs, education, travel, and even ways of thinking, were affected. For someone trying to understand modern China, talking to people who lived through these events was invaluable.
By conducting interviews, we were really able to get a more complete sense of the complexities implicit in modernization and in societies in general. The experiences of the twenty five year-old migrant worker from Anhui province was certainly very different than that of the retired teacher who had lived in Shanghai her whole life. At the same time, they and our other interviewees were all affected by the same forces reshaping China, albeit in different ways.
Our research in China was an amazing experience for me. It reinforced my desire to become proficient in Mandarin and intensified my determination to learn all I can about China. The experience has given me a much better understanding and a much deeper appreciation of the complexities of modern China, which will certainly benefit my studies as well as my future career. I am truly grateful to the Freeman Student-Faculty Fellows program and ASIANetwork for the wonderful opportunity to enhance my education in Asian Studies.
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Our research in Shanghai focused on how modernization and the changes that come with it have impacted the lives of Shanghai residents. We selected four streets on which to focus our attention in order to get a fuller picture of Shanghai. In the course of our work we interviewed people we met on these streets or in shops along the streets, and on all but one of the streets we had the opportunity to interview people in their homes (and were constantly amazed at people’s hospitality). We had an interpreter for these interviews, which were arranged through the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. We were also able to travel to Hangzhou, Suzhou, Nanjing, and Hong Kong. While we did not do formal interviews in these cities, the short trips allowed us to compare Shanghai to other places in China.
One of the most obvious educational gains for me was an improvement in my language skills. Being surrounded by both spoken and written Chinese really helped me progress. Also, the interviews for which we had an interpreter were valuable because I was able to listen to the Chinese translation of what was said in English and thereby pick up nuances of wording or sentence structure. As with language, when trying to understand a foreign culture there really is no substitute for in-country experience. I had studied Mandarin in Beijing for a month last summer, but even having had that experience, I was surprised by Shanghai. It seemed much more modern, and is definitely more affluent. Small things, things that would never make it into a textbook, I found fascinating; even something as silly as fashion can reveal a lot about the differences between places.
China has gone through many tumultuous changes during the lives of the people we interviewed. One of the most important realizations for me was the extent to which certain events affected the course of peoples’ day to day lives. Of course I had studied the Cultural Revolution and the reforms of Deng Xiaoping; I was familiar with the macro effects of these events, but I had no conceptualization of the impact they had on a micro scale. There was a disconnect in my mind between those historical events and the people whom we interviewed. It soon became clear during the course of our research that these events framed the lives of our interviewees in a way that maybe only September 11, 2001 did for Americans of my generation, except on a larger scale—the Cultural Revolution resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and disrupted the whole country for years. We talked to several people who had been “sent down” to work in factories or on farms during this time period, and almost everyone we spoke to referenced the event, either in telling us about their own life if they were old enough to have lived through that period, or by contrasting their current circumstances to those of their families during that time. The economic reforms of Deng Xiaoping had a similarly extensive effect on people’s lives. Jobs, education, travel, and even ways of thinking, were affected. For someone trying to understand modern China, talking to people who lived through these events was invaluable.
By conducting interviews, we were really able to get a more complete sense of the complexities implicit in modernization and in societies in general. The experiences of the twenty five year-old migrant worker from Anhui province was certainly very different than that of the retired teacher who had lived in Shanghai her whole life. At the same time, they and our other interviewees were all affected by the same forces reshaping China, albeit in different ways.
Our research in China was an amazing experience for me. It reinforced my desire to become proficient in Mandarin and intensified my determination to learn all I can about China. The experience has given me a much better understanding and a much deeper appreciation of the complexities of modern China, which will certainly benefit my studies as well as my future career. I am truly grateful to the Freeman Student-Faculty Fellows program and ASIANetwork for the wonderful opportunity to enhance my education in Asian Studies.
posted by Mike and Jean Anne at 4:47 PM
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