Liu He is one of the more active curators at Handshake 302. While we are waiting for the students to prepare their “Shake Hands with the Future”exhibition, he is using the space as a refuge for people who want 8 hours alone, without their phone. The project, “Hidden in the City” is simple. At 9:30, Liu He meets the participant at Handshake 302, makes sure they have water and understand how the toilet works (and often doesn’t) and then takes their phone. At 10:00 a.m., the participant is “on the clock”, on retreat from the city for the next 8 hours, coming off at 6:00, when the cell phone will be returned, a dinner served along with a 302 salon/ discussion about what it all means. Below a translation of Liu He’s curatorial statement for “Hidden in the City”; the Chinese version follows. Continue reading
Monthly Archives: April 2015
Chinese Tourists and Six Uncivil Behaviors – 文明
Uncivil tourists and a call to post “act civilized” announcements in Chinese outside of China. The post has me thinking about 文明 both as a technology of regulating relationships between strangers and as Ann Anagnost’s early work on “civilization” as a means of regulating the bodies of peasants so that they might be mobilized more easily for post-Mao politics (see the prescient National Past-Times: Narrative, Representation, and Power in Modern China, an anthology of essays published during the early and mid 1990s), begging the question: just who benefits from 文明?
These days, Chinese tourists have developed a bad reputation, not only abroad. Chinese people are also tired of Chinese tourists. “东方卫报” (dōngfāng wèibào – “The Eastern Guardian”), a Nanjing based daily newspaper, published the following article on their front page on Tuesday April 7, 2015:
The heading translates to “Take it Easy on Your Outings: Six Kinds of Uncivil Behavior to Take Note Of.” The six uncivil behaviors are listed below:
违规吸烟 (wéi guī xīyān) – smoking illegally
随地吐痰 (suídì tù tán) – spitting phlegm everywhere
争抢座位 (zhēngqiǎng zuòwèi) – to scramble for the seats
乱扔垃圾 (luànrēng lājī) – to litter garbage
大声喧哗 (dàshēng xuānhuá) – to be noisy and to make a racket
推挤插队 (tuī jǐ chāduì) – to push, shove and cut in line
Examples of the behavior:
Failed System
The incidents including Chinese tourists within China and abroad are too numerous to count, but one thing is…
View original post 393 more words
handshake 302 in the classroom
Our current project, “Shake Hands with the Future” started last week, when curator Liu He and I went to Shenzhen Middle School to talk with students about an after school project to investigate and creatively respond to the urban villages in their neighborhood. And, because Shenzhen Middle School is located right next to Dongmen, the school is also next to several of the most iconic urban villages. So very excited about what the students will bring us.
qingming ramblings
It’s grave sweeping day, and the streets were empty. So my friend and I headed out to the Fenghuang Mountain Fenyan Ancient Temple. Neither of us have been and we were curious. However, it turns out that we couldn’t get into the temple because there were too many people burning incense and all traffic was being redirected. In the middle of the only traffic jam we encountered all day (including on Guangdong 107), I jumped out of the car and took a picture of the old pagoda at the Wen Tianxiang memorial; handshakes, many, many, many migrant workers, and a touch of something ancient. My friend mentioned that during the Cultural Revolution, they were only allowed to sweep the graves of revolutionary martyrs; no sweeping family graves. Today, however, although workers had the day off, most could not go home and so they had gone to the temple or to walk the mountain paths. Then, because we couldn’t find a parking spot from which to visit either the completely restored ancient village or the temple, we headed back to guannei. On our way to Shekou, we passed the former site of the Nanyou Building; once upon a time was an important landmark but is now a building site. We reminisced about how narrow and small Nanshan and Shekou used to be, as we approached the recently erected sign for the Shekou and Qianhai Free Trade Zone at the border between Shekou and Nanshan. Reading the sign, I realized that Shekou-Qianhai is not precisely a free trade zone, but rather a pilot free trade zone, which sounds ominously unstable, with the possibility of expanding or retracting at any moment. Ramble. Ramble. Ramble.
shenzhen and xiamen are special administrative regions!?
Word on the WeChat circle and as yet unconfirmed, slipping the information in under the holiday radar: Shenzhen and Xiamen may have been elevated to the status of provincial ranked Special Administrative Regions (特别行政区) and not directly administered cites (直辖市) as many have been speculating. Hong Kong and Macao are SARs; Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing are directly administered cities.
It’s true, because of the establishment of the Shenzhen and Xiamen Free Commerce Zones, where there will be different legal systems, if Shenzhen and Xiamen are SARs then they are higher-ranking cities than Beijing!
As part of its elevation, Dongguan’s Chang’an, Qingxi, and Fenggang Districts, Huizhou’s Huiyang District, and Huizhou’s section Daya Bay will be redistricted to Shenzhen.
The Guangdong Provincial Vice Secretary, Ma Xingrui will be promoted to be the first General Secretary of the Shenzhen SAR.
And just like that: good bye special economic zone, hello special administrative region. Let me know if you see an official announcement. In addition to WeChat notes, I’ve seen blog posts. The fact that the news is circulating is, like wow, NEWS.
Update: not news, apparently. Over the Chinese New Year, the speculation was that Shenzhen and Xiamen would become directly administered cities. In fact, just what’s going to happen is still unknown…
礼貌 and 文明, thoughts
The difference between 礼貌 and 文明 matters because I bumped into a group in the Shekou Sihai park. They were members of 荣格 (RGLove). the charitable fund of the Shenzhen based high-tech company, 荣格科技集团. RGLove had brought in people from all over the country to explore and develop their civilization levels through Confucian studies. The goal, of course, is to intervene in the world by expressing correct relationships, that of course included 礼 which maybe 礼貌, but I’m not for sure. Meanwhile, inquiring minds want to know: just what does all this mean? Continue reading
brutal logic of contemporary capitalism -saskia sassen
worth a look.
plus her paper Public Interventions: http://www.skor.nl/_files/Files/OPEN!%20Key%20Texts_Sassen.pdf
礼貌 and 文明: what’s the difference?
This is an open question to all speakers of Chinese: what’s the difference between 礼貌 and 文明？ My sence is that 礼貌 are practices of appropriate intimacy, while 文明 refers to practices for navigating amongst strangers. In turn, 礼貌 would map onto the moral territory of 脸, while 文明 is about presentation and being seen, hence mapping onto 面子. Am I wildly off, or have I stumbled into a difference that makes a difference? Thoughts?
baishizhou: withering practices
The process of uprooting the northern section of Baishizhou has begun through withering practices–the removal of social nutrients in order to promote razing and evacuations as inevitable, necessary, desired. Continue reading
Shenzhen Noted 