From Beijing to Palestine: Zhang Chengzhi’s journeys from Red Guard radicalism to global Islam

This article traces the intellectual evolution of Zhang Chengzhi (b. 1948), a contemporary Chinese poet, novelist, essayist, archaeologist and ethnographer, from Mao-era radicalism to Islamic internationalism. Allegedly the inventor of the term “Red Guard” in the context of the Cultural Revolution, he has remained an unapologetic defender of Mao and of the “Red Guard spirit” since the 1960s. In 1987, meanwhile, Zhang converted to an impoverished and ascetic sect of Chinese Islam, the Jahriyya, and since the 2000s he has become one of China’s most prominent spokesmen for global Islam. The article explores how Zhang has reconciled his zeal for Cultural Revolution Maoism, on the one hand, with Pan-Islamist positions on the other. Although Zhang’s stance suffers from undoubted contradictions and inconsistencies, his career and beliefs illuminate the complexities of the legacy of Mao’s and the Cultural Revolutions, of Chinese intellectual dissidence and of the contemporary trajectories of Chinese internationalism and global Islam

Red Allure and the Crimson Blindfold

This essay takes as its starting point the precipitous fall of Bo Xilai in March 2012 and discusses the context of the abiding significance of China’s red legacies, in particular Maoism, in understanding the People’s Republic of China today. While thinkers labour to salvage Marxism, the red legacy constitutes a body of cultural, intellectual, and linguistic practices that are profoundly ingrained in institutional behaviour in China. This study explores to what extent this version of the red legacy leeches out the power of other modes of left-leaning critique and independent thought, and abets the party-state in its pursuit of a guided, one-party neo-liberal economic agenda

Shared Destiny: China Story Yearbook 2014

Humanity as never before shares a common destiny, whether it be in terms of the resources of the planet, the global environment, economic integration, or the movement of peoples, ideas, cultures. For better or worse humankind is a Community of Shared Destiny 命运共同体. The People’s Republic of China under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and its ‘Chairman of Everything’, Xi Jinping, has declared that it shares in the destiny of the countries of the Asia and Pacific region, as well as of nations that are part of an intertwined national self-interest. The Party, according to Marxist-Leninist-Maoist theory, is the vanguard of progressive social forces; it cleaves to the concept of shared destiny and its historical role in shaping that destiny. Since its early days nearly a century ago it has emphasised the collective over the individual, the end rather than the means. It addresses majority opinion while guiding and moulding the agenda both for today, and for the future

La séduction rouge et le bandeau écarlate

Cet article prend comme point de départ la chute vertigineuse de Bo Xilai en mars 2012 et analyse le contexte de la signification durable des héritages rouges en Chine, en particulier du maoïsme, pour comprendre la République populaire de Chine aujourd’hui. Si certains penseurs travaillent à sauver le marxisme, l’héritage rouge constitue un corpus de pratiques culturelles, intellectuelles et linguistiques qui sont profondément insérées dans le fonctionnement institutionnel de la Chine actuelle. Cette étude explore dans quelle mesure cette version de l’héritage rouge cannibalise d’autres critiques de gauche ou indépendantes et aide l’État-Parti dans sa mise en œuvre d’un agenda économique néolibéral avec parti unique

Citizen Ai: warrior, jester, and middleman

Ai Weiwei is famous for crossing boundaries, especially the boundary between art and politics. To appreciate the often contradictory nature of Ai’s work, this essay employs multiple narratives: “Ai the Heroic Warrior” who criticizes the Chinese government; “Ai the Court Jester” who plays with the Chinese state and Western media; and “Ai the Middleman” who acts as a broker between China and the West, between young and old people, and between civil society and the state in the PRC. The essay concludes that a fourth narrative can bring together these three stories in a multicoded understanding of Ai’s work: “Ai the Citizen Intellectual” who sometimes works with the state, and at other times against it—but always for the good of China. By comparing Ai’s work with that of other public intellectuals and placing it in the context of debates about civil society, the conclusion argues that “citizen intellectual” also tells us about a broader movement of activists and public intellectuals who are creating a new form of political space in postsocialist China

Writing in London. Home and Languaging in the Work of London Poets of Chinese Descent

This essay discusses literary works produced in London by poets of Chinese descent who are foreign-born or London native. Some of these works are written in English, and some in Chinese. The aim is to discuss poetry that has emphatically or reluctantly embraced the identity narrative, talking of home and belonging in substantially different ways from each other, according to each poet’s individual relationship with movement, migration, and stability. Therefore, through the use of the phrase ‘London poets of Chinese descent’, I do not aim at tracing a shared sense of identity, but instead I am interested in using London as a method for an oblique reading that recognises the variety of angles and approaches in these poets’ individual experience, history and circumstances that can range from occasional travel to political exile

Diglossia and identity in Northeast Thailand: Linguistic, social, and political hierarchy

The paper explores diglossic relations between Central Thai and phasa isan, a variety officially known as a dialect of Thai, but linguistically close to Lao. Phasa isan is spoken by almost one-third of Thailand's population but its speakers in the Northeast are often stigmatized as uneducated and backward. We conducted field research mainly among university students in Ubon Ratchathani, a northeastern border province, by drawing upon data from survey questionnaires, reflective essays, interviews, and field observations. The findings suggest a transitional diglossic relationship in which Central Thai is the High and phasa isan the Low variety. These relationships are discussed in terms of nationalism, social hierarchy, and language maintenance and shift

Cultural Contestation in China: Ethnicity, Identity and the State

This chapter explores how the political-administrative design of the Chinese state, characterized as “multi-level governance”, might be the cause of more subtle forms of resistance. By looking at the formulation of heritage policies of Lancang County, Christina Maags illustrates how the administrative fragmentation resulted in both administrative contestation and cultural contestation, with a threatened local identity at its core