This essay is the work of a social anthropologist but it is not based upon field work. It is concerned with Chinese matters but it is not written by a sinologue. In this essay are the author’s reflections on certain aspects of southeastern Chinese society during the last hundred and fifty years, with attention on the Fukien and Kwangtung region of China has it has specialized not only in large-scale unilineal organization but also in sending people overseas.
This work is the result of more than a decade of research on the Chinese household and lineage in the southeastern province of Fujian during the Ming and Qing period (1368-1911). It offers new interpretations of the Chinese domestic cycle, the relationship between household and larger kinship groups, and the development of lineage society in south China. Using hundreds of previously unknown lineage genealogies, stone inscriptions, and land deeds, Zheng Zhenman provides a candid view of how individuals and families confronted the crucial issues of daily life: how to minimize taxes or military conscription; how to balance the ideological imperatives of ancestor worship with practical concerns; how to deal with the problems of dividing the household estate. His research leads to an exploration of issues such as the relation of state to society and the compatibility of Chinese culture and capitalism. This complete translation allows access to some of the most exciting new research being done in Chinese social history. Zheng's book draws on important materials largely unknown to Western scholars, comes to novel conclusions about society in late imperial China, and illustrates the importance of the non-Western perspective in studying the history of the world outside the West.
Presenting a new approach to the history of Chinese kinship, this book attempts to bridge the gap between anthropological and historical scholarship on the Chinese lineage. It explores the historical development of kinship in the villages of the Fuzhou region of southeastern Fujian province.
This book explores the remarkable phenomenon of Chinese lineages - groups of people connected through patrilineal kinship ties, which have existed for centuries in China and which are currently undergoing significant revival after being suppressed in many parts of China during the cultural revolution period. The book considers how lineages and the associated networks and membership associations have developed, surveys how lineages have been studied by anthropologists and others over time in different ways, and discusses the important social functions of lineages in contemporary Hong Kong and mainland China.
Do Chinese voluntary organizations continue to have a role in modern societies enmeshed in a globalizing world that questions continuation of the nation-state and ethnic identity? This book argues that Chinese voluntary organizations continue to play a significant role in both the established and new Chinese communities in the Diaspora. They are able to do so because of their ability to transform their organizational structure and functions. At the same time, they are able to reinvent their own images to suit their co-ethnic community and the wider polity. The uniqueness of this volume lies in its integration of historical and contemporary approaches to the study of traditional Chinese voluntary organizations in the Diaspora. The chapters explore how the Chinese voluntary organizations continue to fulfil the needs of the Chinese community in different parts of the world, and do this by both localizing and globalizing their functions and roles in the countries where they have established roots. The contributors cover traditional Chinese voluntary organizations from Asia to Australia, North America and Europe examining not only their activities in established Chinese communities such as Singapore and Malaysia, but also in the new emerging Chinese communities in Canada and Eastern Europe. This allows the readers to compare and contrast the voluntary organizations across countries and across time. Readership for this book includes scholars and students of Chinese Studies, Asian Studies, Anthropology, Sociology, Diaspora Studies, History, Social Organizations and the general educated Chinese population.
This admirable book contains fascinating autobiographical accounts, by some of Southeast Asia's most eminent scholars, concerning their struggle to find their own voices in interpreting the region to which they belong. The book should be indispensable to anyone interested in thinking about knowledge production and its politics in a postcolonial world. In the views of these scholarly Southeast Asians, we are made to see, in very personal terms, the link between the global crisis in the social sciences and the need to find remedies for it that are neither Eurocentric nor parochially anti-Western. Professor Alexander Woodside Professor of Chinese and Southeast Asian History University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. This book marks the shift of the centre of Southeast Asian Studies from the West to Southeast Asia. The insights provided by the authors are not simply explanations of colonial and postcolonial experiences of major Southeast Asian scholars. Rather, the book provides a unique set of intellectual genealogies that show that distinctions between humanities and social sciences are less important than the development of distinctive local and regional traditions and practices of scholarship. Goh Beng-Lans introduction frames the collection through her subtle deconstruction of international discourses on Southeast Asia. This introduction then allows the reader to view the different generations of Southeast Asian scholars in their social, political, and academic contexts. The end result is a combined view of the state of the art of Southeast Asian Studies, a view that is greater than the sum of its national parts. Professor Adrian Vickers Chair of Southeast Asian Studies University of Sydney and Director, Australian Centre for Asian Art and Archaeology The collection represents a coming of age of scholars from Southeast Asia. What we hear is not bluster that comes from a wounded pride or doctrinal certainties, but a quiet confidence that acknowledges the multiple currents in which their scholarship has been formed, and a willingness to engage the perspective of the other, both within and without. The reflexivity in this volume sets the stage for scholars from the region to develop perspectives and concepts to address the challenges of the new configuration of the Asia being ushered in by ASEAN. Professor Prasenjit Duara Raffles Professor of Humanities and Director of Research Humanities and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore
