Chapter One. Social Formation Under State Domination in Modern China: An Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-30
Keyword(s):  
Modern China ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
State Domination

Social Formation Under State Domination in Modern China

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shuang Chen
Keyword(s):  
Social Stratification ◽  
The State ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Modern China ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
Social Categories ◽  
Local Agency ◽  
Multiple Structures ◽  
State Registration ◽  
State Domination

This chapter introduces the methodological and historical background that supports the narrative presented in the rest of the book. The Shuangcheng settlement is a case of state-initiated projects of social engineering by which the state used policies to proactively plan or design social orders. Thus, the case offers an opportunity for exploring the mechanisms through which the state-designated social hierarchy played out on the ground. After introducing the Banner system and the settings of Shuangcheng, the chapter integrates theories in state-building and social stratification to provide a conceptual framework surrounding the question: how a state-dominated system of social formation influences life opportunities. Within the framework, state registration and resource allocation created the structural inequality; customary practices made possible local agency; and the interplay of local agency with the multiple structures – economic conditions, state entitlements, and family demography – eventually constructed and sustained the boundaries between social categories.

Aesthetic Dilemmas of Adaptation and the Politics of Subjectivity: Animating the Chinese ClassicJourney to the West

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chengcheng You
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Modern China ◽  
Historical Time ◽  
The West ◽  
The Real ◽  
Quest For Meaning ◽  
National Allegory ◽  
Canonical Text ◽  
The Fantastic ◽  
Monkey King

This article reviews four major Chinese animated adaptations based on the classic Journey to the West. It shows how these adaptations, spanning four historical phases of modern China, encapsulate changes in Chinese national identity. Close readings underpin a developmental narrative about how Chinese animated adaptations of this canonical text strive to negotiate the multimodal expressions of homegrown folklore traditions, technical influences of western animation, and domestic political situations across time. This process has identified aesthetic dilemmas around adaptations that oscillate between national allegory and individual destiny, verisimilitude and the fantastic quest for meaning. In particular, the subjectivisation of Monkey King on the screen, embodying the transition from primitivistic impulse, youthful idealism and mature practicality up to responsible stewardship, presents how an iconic national figure encapsulates the real historical time of China.

Linguistics: A Rhetor's Guide

1994 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dick Leith
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Primary Concern ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
Text Linguistics ◽  
The Social ◽  
Language Study ◽  
Recent Trends ◽  
Linguistic Inquiry ◽  
Dominant Paradigm

Abstract: To non-specialists, academic disciplines invariably seem homogeneous, even monolithic. But even a relatively young discipline such as modem linguistics is more diverse in its procedures and concerns than might appear to those working in other fields. In this paper I attempt to show how certain kinds of linguistic inquiry might be relevant to those whose primary concern is rhetoric. I argue that these practices are often opposed to what I call the dominant paradigm in modern linguistics, with its commitment to abstraction and idealization. I discuss first those strands of linguistics, such as discourse analysis, text-linguistics, and stylistics, which tend to take the social formation for granted; I end by considering recent trends in so-called critical language study. Finally, I offer some thoughts on how linguistics may proceed in order to achieve a more programmatic rapprochement with rhetoric.

Occupy Movement, Religion and Social Formations

2014 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-24
Author(s):  
Matt Sheedy
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Public Space ◽  
Religious Communities ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Opportunity ◽  
Social Formation ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
Opportunity Structures ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
Political Opportunity Structures

The Occupy movement was an unprecedented social formation that spread to approximate 82 countries around the globe in the fall of 2011 via social media through the use of myths, symbols and rituals that were performed in public space and quickly drew widespread mainstream attention. In this paper I argue that the movement offers a unique instance of how discourse functions in the construction of society and I show how the shared discourses of Occupy were taken-up and shaped in relation to the political opportunity structures and interests of those involved based on my own fieldwork at Occupy Winnipeg. I also argue that the Occupy movement provides an example of how we might substantively attempt to classify “religion” by looking at how it embodied certain metaphysical claims while contrasting it with the beliefs and practices of more conventionally defined “religious” communities.

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