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Introduction
No full textBook synopsis: The accompanying hardback catalogue to the British Museum exhibition, China’s hidden century: 1796–1912.
Cultural creativity in China between 1796 and 1912 demonstrated extraordinary resilience in a time of warfare, land shortages, famines and uprisings. Innovation can be seen in material culture (including print, painting, calligraphy, textiles, fashion, jewellery, ceramics, lacquer, glass, arms and armour, rugs, silver, money, and photography) during a century in which China’s art, literature, crafts and technology faced unprecedented exposure to global influences.
1796 – the official end of the reign of the Qianlong emperor – is viewed as the end of the ‘high Qing’ and the start of a period of protracted crisis. In 1912, the last emperor, Puyi, abdicated after the revolution of 1911, bringing to an end some 2,000 years of dynastic rule and making way for the republic.
Until recently, the 19th century in China has been often defined – and dismissed – as an era of cultural decline. Built on new research from a four-year project supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and with chapter contributions by international scholars from leading institutions, this beautifully illustrated, 336-page book edited by Jessica Harrison-Hall and Julia Lovell sets out a fresh understanding of this important era. It presents a stunning array of objects and artworks to create a detailed visual account of responses to war, technology, urbanisation, political transformations, and external influences
Engendered perceptions - Reconsidering wartime female Tewu (Special Agent) activities and narratives of “Honey Traps” in the early People’s Republic of China, 1949–1959
Get PDFThis article considers how Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials understood, perceived, and experienced enemy female tewu (special agent) activities and “honey traps” during the early People’s Republic of China. Drawing upon internally circulated party reports and newsletters, speeches of officials, newspapers, films, literature, and dramas, it finds that officials saw enemy female tewu as real threats that had tangible impact on both civilians and men affiliated with the party through honey traps and gendered manipulations. It further argues that narratives of female tewu in official instructions, newspaper reports, and popular cultural works played a larger role in the CCP’s broader efforts to combat and resist enemy espionage than previously understood. This article contextualises existing arguments about CCP counterespionage propaganda. It counterbalances perspectives that suggest the utilisation of these narratives was largely based on irrational wartime sentiments, with the primary aim of increasing the party’s societal control
Totally administered heteronomy: Adorno on work, leisure and politics in the age of digital capitalism
Get PDFThis paper aims to demonstrate the contemporary relevance of Adorno’s thought for business ethicists working in the critical tradition by showing how his critique of modern social life anticipated, and offers continuing illumination of, recent technological transformations of capitalism. It develops and extrapolates Adorno’s thought regarding three central spheres of modern society which have seen radical changes in light of recent technological developments: work, in which employee monitoring has become ever more sophisticated and intrusive; leisure consumption, in which the algorithmic developments of the culture industry have paved the way for entertainment products to dominate us; and political discourse, in which social media has exacerbated the anti-democratic tendencies Adorno warned of in the mid-20th century. We conclude by presenting, as a rejoinder to these developments, the contours of an Adornian ethics of resistance to the reification and dehumanisation of such developments
Psychometric properties and development of the Chinese versions of Gaming Disorder Test (GDT) and Gaming Disorder Scale for Adolescents (GADIS-A)
No full textCurrently, six instruments have been developed using the 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) criteria for Gaming Disorder (GD). Two of these are the Gaming Disorder Test (GDT) and Gaming Disorder Scale for Adolescents (GADIS-A). The present study validated both the GDT and GADIS-A among a large sample of Chinese emerging adults. Via an online survey, 3381 participants (56.6% females; mean age = 19.56 years) completed the Chinese versions of the GDT, GADIS-A, Internet Gaming Disorder-Short Form (IGDS9-SF), and Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale (BSMAS). Confirmatory factor analysis was used to examine the factor structure of the Chinese GDT and GADIS-A. Pearson correlations were computed to examine the convergent validity (with IGDS9-SF) and divergent validity (with BSMAS) of the Chinese GDT and Chinese GADIS-A. The GDT had a unidimensional structure, which was invariant across sex and disordered gaming severity subgroups. The GADIS-A had a two-factor structure, which was also invariant across gender and gaming severity subgroups. Both the GDT and GADIS-A had significant associations with both IGDS9-SF and with BSMAS. Both the Chinese GDT and GADIS-A are valid instruments to assess GD among emerging adults in mainland China, enabling healthcare providers to adopt these tools in their efforts to prevent and examine GD severity among Chinese youth
Attitudinal, motivational, and sociobiographical predictors of EFL teachers' well-being
No full textThe present study sets out to identify predictors of well-being (defined as one facet of trait emotional intelligence; Petrides and Furnham 2001) in a dataset collected via an online questionnaire from 513 English as a Foreign Language teachers. Statistical analyses revealed that teachers with low levels of amotivation, high levels of professional intrinsic motivation, and with a positive attitude towards their institution were more likely to score high on well-being. Sociobiographical variables had no effect. The data suggest that institutions play a central role in how their teachers feel. Investing in the well-being of teachers is created by and contributes towards a positive institution and benefits the students and the institution as a whole
The communities of the book of Margery Kempe
No full textAnthony Baleߣs essay takes up recent scholarship on the historicity and production of The Book of Margery Kempe and on international influences on Kempeߣs piety and devotional practices. He argues that while the Book itself presents Kempe as an outsider, repeatedly repudiated by communities, and as disruptive, a ߢqueerߣ influence, collaboration is central to it. The essay recovers three earthly communities with which Kempe and her Book successfully engaged: Franciscan, Bridgettine, and monastic, considering questions of literacy, education, and cultural prestige. Kempeߣs experience in the Holy Land, Bale shows, was indebted to her integration into the Franciscan-led pilgrimage community, where she ultimately gained a high and holy reputation. The essay demonstrates that Bridgettine communities and patronage networks in Rome and at Syon also shaped Kempeߣs spiritual experience, while in Norfolk, a textual community including preachers and confessors formed around her. Following Kempeߣs death, manuscript annotation and printing history suggest a community of engaged readers who responded affectively to her spirituality
A retreat from Universalism: opposing and defining Antisemitism and Islamophobia in Britain, ca. 1990–2018
No full textThis essay highlights changes in the concept of antisemitism in the last decade of the twentieth century and in the early twenty-first century. It considers this history alongside parallel changes in how racism more broadly and Islamophobia in particular have been conceived. In doing so it suggests that these changes in the concept of antisemitism are not only an episode in Jewish history but also in the history of anti-racist movements. The core of the essay examines attempts in the present century to persuade governments and other bodies to adopt and promote particular definitions of antisemitism and Islamophobia. It asks how the concepts of antisemitism and Islamophobia changed in these years and what difference in the world these changes were intended to make
Foreign language learning boredom: conceptualization and measurement
Get PDFThis article reports on an investigation in two steps conducted among Chinese university non-English-major EFL students and English teachers. In Study 1, 22 students and 11 English teachers were interviewed and 659 students responded to an open questionnaire, recalling and describing their experiences or perceptions of boredom in English learning. A qualitative analysis revealed that more than 90% of students reported boredom in FL settings. The data allowed a multidimensional conceptualization of foreign language boredom (FLB), empirically supporting the control-value theory in educational psychology. Study 2 used the new conceptualisation to develop and validate a new scale for FLB. Through surveying 808 students in a pilot study and 2223 in the main study, a 7-factor Foreign Language Boredom Scale with 32 items was identified and validated using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses as well as further validity and reliability analyses. It is argued that FLB is a crucial addition to the emerging field of FL classroom emotion research
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